Debate: The Bodily Assumption Of Mary (White vs Sungenis)

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Welcome, I'll get right to it and introduce our speakers. Dr. Robertson Jennis is the

President of Catholic Apologetics International, an international evangelistic organization dedicated to teaching and defending the

Catholic faith. Since 1993, Dr. Singenis has authored 12 books and hundreds of articles, has appeared on various television and radio programs including

CNN, EWTN, and the BBC. He has advanced degrees in religion and theology and is presently enrolled for a second doctorate at Liverpool Hope University in England.

His master's degree comes from Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia, PA, making him very familiar with the positions of Dr.

White and all Reformation thinkers. And Dr. James White is a director of Alpha and Omega Ministries, a

Christian apologetics organization based in Phoenix, Arizona. Dr. White is a professor, having taught

Greek, systematic theology, and various topics in the field of apologetics. He has authored or contributed to more than 20 books, is an accomplished debater, having engaged in more than 100 moderated public debates.

He's an elder at the Phoenix Reformed Baptist Church, has been married to Kelly for more than 28 years, and has two children,

Joshua and Summer. The topic of our debate tonight will be the bodily assumption of Mary, and the specific resolution which

Dr. St. Janus will defend is the bodily assumption of Mary, as defined by Roman Catholicism, is a divinely revealed dogmatic truth.

Now the format of our debate will be that both speakers will make 20 -minute opening statements, 10 -minute rebuttal, five -minute rebuttals to the rebuttal, and then 15 minutes, then a break, 10 -minute break, strict, 15 -minute cross -examination each, and then a 10 -minute closing statement each.

So the debater's task is to keep the debate civil and on topic. Mine is to keep it on time.

And yours is to reiterate what Paul Skarzafava said, please hold your applause until the very, very end of the debate, no amening, no heckling, no calling out.

If you do so, you will be promptly escorted out. And Pastor Skarzafava, you know some guys.

Gabish? I'm just saying, I hear things, I hear things. Now we will not have questions from the audience, which is why we're giving the speakers half an hour, 15 minutes each to question each other, let them get it on that way.

Please turn off your cell phones, and with that, let's get started. Dr. St.

Genes, 20 -minute opening statement, please. Well, thank you again for coming this evening, glad to see most of you back, and I hope you're in for another rip -roaring debate.

This one is going to be a little different than the last one, of course. This one deals with the doctrines of Mary, precious to the

Catholic Church, not so precious to a lot of other churches. So, I have an uphill climb here, and I think, though, that what

I have to present will be appreciated by you. First, let me define the assumption of Mary.

We would say that the Blessed Virgin Mary was assumed into heaven, body and soul, and presently lives and reigns with Christ, who is in the right hand of the

Father. We would not say that Mary was ascended into heaven, or ascended into heaven, since ascension, which occurred with Jesus in Acts 1, would mean she went to heaven by her own power.

She was taken up to heaven by the power of God. Now, the question that would normally come up at this point is, why is this doctrine so important to Catholics?

It is a dogma of the Church, and if you don't believe it in the Catholic Church, then you're condemned.

Of course, that's true with any dogma in the Catholic Church. If you choose not to believe it, then you are condemned. One reason is that it allows

Christ and Mary to share their mother -son relationship uninterrupted. The great love that Christ had for His mother moved

Him to assume her into heaven. Now, that may not mean much to us, and I understand that, but if it did mean something to Christ, and that was

His motivation, and He did have a great love for her, I can see that as being the prime motivation.

Scripture gives us precedent for the draw of love. In Genesis 5 .24,

it says that Enoch walked with God, and he was not, for God took him. Hebrews 11 .5

is even more explicit about this instance. It says, by faith

Enoch was taken up so that he would not see death, and he was not found on earth because God took him up.

For he obtained the witness that before his being taken up, he was pleasing to God.

So, apparently, God had a great love for Enoch, and thus assumed him into heaven.

Likewise, it would be no stretch of the imagination to say that Christ had a great love for His mother, and thus assumed her into heaven.

Some people believe that Enoch may come back in the future to do a mission for God.

Some people believe the same about Elijah, who 2 Kings 2 .11

tells us, was also taken up to heaven, body and soul, in a whirlwind.

This leads to the more important reason for Mary's assumption into heaven. She was later given a mission from God to communicate

God's message directly to the people on earth. If her body had not been assumed into heaven, she could not come back with a body to earth and deliver

God's message. The most dramatic physical appearance of Mary was at Fatima, Portugal, in October 1917.

At that time, she prophesied that World War I would end shortly, and it did several months later, but that there would be another world war unless men repented of their sins and turned to God.

As we all know, that war did come in 1939. And she prophesied to these

Fatima children that it would come. In 1917, that same Mary at Fatima warned of Russia being used by God as a chastisement upon the world, and it was in the following year, 1918, that the

Russian Bolsheviks, most of them atheistic Jews, murdered the Christian czar, whose ancestors had reigned in the

Romanov dynasty for over 500 years. It was the same Mary who, in 1917, gave the three

Fatima children and the 70 ,000 people gathered with them the miraculous vision of the sun moving about wildly in the sky, reports of which anyone here can look up in the

Portugal newspaper, O Seculo, of October 13, 1917, on the internet, and read the eyewitness accounts of the people who saw it, or look it up on Wikipedia and find the same information.

This was the same Mary who warned in another appearance in 1929 that in order to stop the spread of Russia's atheism across the world, that nation had to be consecrated by the

Pope and his bishops. But since it was never done, or never done properly, the chastisement of the world by the hand of Russia persisted for many years thereafter, wherein nations were devoured and millions lost their lives, and much of the world was immersed in communism.

As Jesus said to the unbelieving Jews of his day, if I am not doing the works of my

Father, then do not believe me. But if I do them, even though you do not believe me, believe the works, that you may know and understand that the

Father is in me and I am in the Father, John 10, 38. So these works of Mary, I assume, who prophesied events in the 20th century that could have only been foreseen by heaven itself, asks us to believe that she has been commissioned by God to warn us of future events and what to do about them to save our lives and our souls.

So we see that the assumption of Mary is not merely some sentimental doctrine held by Catholics, who, as some critics may think, have an over -infatuated view of Christ's mother.

The assumption of Mary, as it may be for Enoch and Elijah, who were also assumed into heaven, is an integral part of the plan of God, especially in these days when many believe we are coming very close to the return of Christ and at which

Mary has been chosen to be one of the messengers of God. The dogmatizing of the assumption of Mary in 1950 by Pope Pius XII in his previous teaching in the

Assumption in the Encyclical Mystice Coporis in 1943 had as one of its purposes the confirmation that what the

Fatima witnesses saw in 1917 or what St. Bernadette saw at Lourdes as another example in 1858 in her visions of Mary, that is, that these appearances of Mary are possible because Mary's body and soul had been assumed into heaven many centuries prior.

Incidentally, you can also consult Wikipedia and see a picture of St. Bernadette's body that was exhumed in 1909 and lies now in a crypt in Nevers, France, after 131 years is as fresh and incorrupt as the day she died.

You can see pictures of it on the Internet. So as Jesus said again in John 10 .38,

even though you do not believe me, believe the works that you may know and understand. How much more evidence than a 130 -year -old incorruptible corpse does it take to convince people that these things really happened and are from God?

Or are we going to be like the Jews, who with every miracle Jesus did either denied it or attributed it to the devil?

But some will say, but where is the testimony of the assumption in sacred Scripture? Where is the testimony of the assumption in the

Fathers? To the first question I answer with Catholic theologian Ludwig Ott, quote, direct and express scriptural proofs are not to be had, unquote.

But we have possible allusions to the assumption in Scripture, allusions, not direct evidence.

In Psalm 131 .8, Psalm 44 .10 -14, Song of Solomon 3 .6,

4 .8, 8 .5, Isaiah 61 .3, but can we do that?

Can we look to allusions in Scripture and use that to support a doctrine as esoteric as the assumption of Mary?

Well, Scripture does give us some precedent for doing so. Let's look at Acts 1, for example. In Acts 1,

Judas had died, and now they need to replace his apostleship with another man.

And so Peter stands up in Acts 1 .20 and says this, For it is written in the book of the

Psalms, let his homestead be made desolate and let no man dwell in it, and his office let another man take.

It is therefore necessary that of the men who have accompanied us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us, beginning with the baptism of John, that we choose one of them.

Well, let's take a look, a close look at what Peter's doing here. He quotes from a

Psalm, and the Psalm is Psalm 69, verse 25. And he quotes from another

Psalm, Psalm 109, verse 8. But if you look at those Psalms, they say nothing about Judas, not a word.

They say nothing about apostleship, not a word. So why is

Peter using them? If you look at those passages, what they are talking about is

David's court. He was the king of Israel, and he had enemies who betrayed him.

And in that Psalm 69, verse 25, he's talking about let their homestead be desolate and let no man dwell in it, about the people in his day.

So why is Peter using this? This is now Peter, for the whole church, using a rather obscure scripture to say that Judas now must be replaced by a twelfth apostle.

And why do they need twelve apostles? Why can't they have eleven, or ten, or maybe thirteen?

Why do they need twelve? Well, he answers that in the next verse that he quotes from Psalm 109, verse 8.

It says, his office let another man take. But if you look back at Psalm 109, it says nothing about apostleship.

It says nothing about Judas. There's no prophecy about Judas in the Old Testament. So what's

Peter doing? Oh, he's taking another passage from the court of David, where David says that once this man is taken out of the way, let another man take his place.

So David had another officer come into his court to replace the one that had been taken away. And yet Peter is using this rather ambiguous, obscure passage, we might say is just alluding to Judas, and using it for the foundation of the church, to have twelve apostles.

I think that's rather interesting. So we can have a passage of Scripture that may be rather weak, in our view, but be used by the church to support its belief.

Now to the second question, where's all the patristic evidence for the assumption of Mary? Well, I would say the same thing that Ludwig Ott says about Scripture.

I would say about patristic evidence, direct and express patristic evidence is not to be had.

But what hangs in the balance here, we do have late patristic witnesses, we do have

John Damascene, we have Germanus of Constantinople, we have a Modestus of Jerusalem, but some people may not be satisfied with that, because they come rather late on the scene.

John Damascene comes in the 7th century. Some people might believe that the father's patristic evidence might go up until, let's say,

Augustine, or to the Council of Orange, 529 A .D. So we have a problem still.

We do have early and late medieval witnesses. We have Anthony of Padua, Albert the Great, Thomas Aquinas, Bonaventure, Bellarmine, Francis de

Sales, Afonsus Liguori, all testified to the assumption of Mary. But some people in the

Catholic Church may not like that, because it's not patristic evidence, and I understand that. But what hangs in the balance for the skeptics to the doctrine of the assumption are two truths, and they both ironically come from Scripture.

We've already seen one in Acts 120. First, Scripture has no verse which says that every doctrine we believe must be explicitly stated in Scripture.

Dr. White, for example, believes in the Trinity. He has written a whole book on it called

The Forgotten Trinity, and I applaud him for that. I happen to agree with him on the Trinity. But is it explicitly taught in Scripture?

No. Even Dr. White will admit that it is only implicitly taught, and that we must, with the utmost care, extract this doctrine from a number of passages, knowing that all kinds of wrong interpretations could be made.

By the same token, does Scripture explicitly teach that Christ is homoousios, the same substance as God, or homoousios, that he's like God?

Let's bring it closer to home. The Scripture teaches explicitly about contraception, abortion, artificial insemination, test tube fertilization, genetic engineering, surrogate motherhood, sterilization, masturbation, sex education, eugenics, cloning, equal rights for women, usury, cremation, labor strikes, slavery, et cetera, et cetera.

No, we would all agree that if anything, judgments on these issues are either not in Scripture or are only there implicitly and must be drawn out of Scripture by logical reasoning.

Second, Scripture itself shows us that there will be instances in which we have no direct

Scripture upon which to base a doctrine, or instances in which the Scripture witnessed is so slight or ambiguous that, as Dr.

Ott says, direct and expressed evidence of it is not to be had. In the early church,

Scripture itself gives us testimony to such an instance, an instance in which there is no

Scripture and there is even no tradition, yet a major doctrine is made for the whole church.

The only thing available is the authority of the church itself to declare the doctrine. This example occurred at the first council of the church in Jerusalem, recorded in Acts 15.

In verses 1 to 6, the Pharisees, the apostles, the bishops, and Paul and Barnabas are at a huge debate whether the

Gentiles coming into the church should be circumcised. But in verse 7, Peter stands up and gives a short speech, which sets the foundation for the practice of the church for the next 2 ,000 years, namely, the

Gentiles will not be required to be circumcised when coming into the church. What's remarkable here is that Peter cites no

Scripture for precedent. In fact, if anything, the available Scripture they had in 37

AD when this council took place would seem to be in favor of continuing circumcision, not discontinuing it.

Peter also cites no tradition except to say in verse 10 that the tradition bears witness that circumcision was, quote, a yoke which neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear, unquote.

So Peter, the recognized leader of the church at this time, sees Scripture and tradition not as the ultimate authorities to rely upon to decide this issue.

Instead, he relies on the experiences he had which showed him that the Gentiles received the

Holy Spirit just as the apostles had received it, and that from this experience

God was teaching him that there was no longer any distinction to be made between Jews and Gentiles.

Logically, Peter figures, why would we want to sign such a circumcision any longer that was originally assigned for Jews to make a division between them and Gentiles?

All of us are saved by grace of the Lord Jesus, he says, and therefore we need no more ceremonial distinctions.

Peter is using his intelligence, his wisdom, his experience, his knowledge, and the guidance of the

Holy Spirit to make this decision that's not explicit in Scripture or tradition.

And if any of these were in view, it was only in the remotest sense possible.

Peter's logic was sound, indeed. It was sound enough that it prompted James to stand up and support

Peter's declaration by citing a passage of Scripture from Amos who said and prophesied that the

Gentiles were going to be coming into the church to rebuild the temple of David which had fallen down.

Interestingly enough, Amos in the Old Testament doesn't say anything about whether circumcision would be required of these

Gentiles. No, that was a decision made by Peter based on the experiences

Peter had learned from God a few months earlier or a few years earlier. So does

Scripture give us examples of when Scripture and tradition are virtually silent on a particular issue?

But in that vacuum, the recognized leader of the church stands up in the midst of the controversy and decides for everyone in the church worldwide what they will believe from then onward?

Yes, it does. And whoever denies it has denied the testimony of Scripture as well as the history of the church in Acts 15.

So, would this same scenario be possible 100 years after 37 AD, 200 years after, 500 years after, 1500 years?

That is, would it be expected of the recognized leader of the church to stand up in the midst of a controversy about doctrine and declare how the church will answer the controversy and do so without having any direct and explicit testimony of the issue from either

Scripture or patristic tradition? Well, if it happened at the first council of the church, then it could happen at the second council and the third, the fourth, the fifth, and so on.

There is no time limit to the help of the Holy Spirit since Jesus said that He would send the

Holy Spirit to the church and He would be with her forever, John 14, 16. Hence, if Peter can declare for the church a dogma which has no explicit evidence from either

Scripture or patristic tradition, but only implicit or indirect allusions, and do so based on what he had experienced in his travels with the

Gentiles and observing how God was leading them, then the same recognized leader of the church today can declare another dogma for the church, this one concerning the assumption of Mary that serves as the basis for her unique remission from God to proclaim

God's warnings to the world. And he can do so with little or no explicit teaching from either

Scripture or patristic tradition, and rely only on implicit testimony from both, and there is nothing in either

Scripture or tradition that forbids him to do so. And in fact, Scripture and tradition direct him to do so, as Acts 15 teaches.

Thank you. Thank you, Dr. St. Genes. Twenty -minute opening statement,

Dr. White, please. Well, thank you very much for being here this evening.

Whoa, a little voice from heaven there for a second. Thank you very much for being here this evening. We have a lot to cover, and it is extremely important material because it has to do with Rome's claims to being able to define dogmatically the gospel of the

Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Since November of 1950, the bodily assumption of Mary has been a defined dogma of the

Roman Catholic Church, a belief one must hold to be a faithful member of the one true Christian church, the mother of all churches.

We read in the papal document defining it, for the glory of Almighty God who has lavished His special affection upon the

Virgin Mary, for the honor of Her Son, the immortal King of the Ages, and the victor over sin and death, for the increase of the glory of that same august

Mother, and for the joy and exaltation of the entire church, by the authority of our

Lord Jesus Christ, of the blessed apostles Peter and Paul, and by our own authority, we pronounce, declare, and define it to be a divinely revealed dogma that the

Immaculate Mother of God, the ever -Virgin Mary, having completed the course of Her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory.

Hence, if anyone which God forbid should dare willfully to deny or to call into doubt that which we have defined, let him know that he has fallen away completely from the divine and Catholic faith, this being the papal document

Munificentissimus Deus from 1950. Now, Rome claims to be governed as the

Church of Christ by Scripture and tradition. Yet, the three major dogmas defined by Rome in the past century and a half tell a completely different story.

Now, sola Scriptura is the belief that the God -inspired Scriptures are the sole infallible rule of faith of the church.

Only that which is theanustos, God -breathed, can function as the infallible guide for God's people.

Rome denies sola Scriptura and replaces it with her own authority. Rome claims infallibility for her magisterium as a whole and in particular for the

Bishop of Rome when speaking ex cathedra. Sola ecclesia is the functional

Roman position. Rome defines what Scripture is, that is the canon, and what Scripture says, its meaning, what tradition is, and what it means.

How can Rome be under the authority of either one when she defines what is and what is

Scripture and tradition, what tradition means as well? This becomes exceptionally important in that Rome claims her dogmas on Mary, including the immaculate conception and bodily assumption are revelations.

When were these things revealed? That is a question that we need to understand. Now, Dr.

Segenes has stated that he does not need to provide a biblical basis for the bodily assumption since Rome does not require such a foundation being infallible and the final authority.

He just made that presentation himself. But as Karl Keating said in his book Catholicism and Fundamentalism, still fundamentalists ask, where is the proof from Scripture?

Strictly, there is none. It was the Catholic Church that was commissioned by Christ to teach all nations and to teach them infallibly.

The mere fact that the church teaches the doctrine of the assumption as something definitely true is a guarantee that it is true.

That is sola ecclesia. Now Munificentissimus Deus carefully avoids saying any one

Scripture is proof of the bodily assumption. However, it does refer to a number of interpretations offered by holy writers that give evidence of the prevalence of the doctrine in their thinking.

The proposed interpretations speak for themselves. Here is an example from the 29th section of that document.

Among the holy writers who at that time employed statements and various images and analogies of sacred

Scripture to illustrate and to confirm the doctrine of the assumption, which was piously believed, the evangelical

Dr. St. Anthony of Padua holds a special place. On the feast day of the assumption while explaining the prophet's words,

I will glorify the place of my feet, Isaiah 60 verse 13, he stated as certain that the divine

Redeemer had bedecked with supreme glory His most beloved mother from whom He had received human flesh.

He asserts that, quote, you have here a clear statement that the blessed virgin has been assumed in her body where was the place of the

Lord's feet. Hence, it is that the holy psalmist writes, arise, O Lord, into your resting place, you in the ark which you have sanctified.

And he asserts that just as Jesus Christ is risen from the death over which He triumphed and is ascended to the right hand of the

Father, so likewise the ark of the sanctification has risen up since on this day the virgin mother has been taken into her heavenly dwelling.

Now all we have to do is look at the biblical text, there is Isaiah 60 verse 13, the glory of Lebanon shall come to you, the

Cyprus, the plain and the pine to beautify the place of my sanctuary and I will make the place of my feet glorious.

What's being referred to? The temple in Jerusalem. It has nothing to do with Mary. And yet if you're looking for a way of inserting

Mary, I guess that's how you have to find such things. We also read in section 27, moreover the scholastic doctors have recognized the assumption of the virgin mother of God as something signified in that woman clothed with the sun.

Similarly, they have given special attention to these words in the New Testament, hail full of grace the Lord is with you, blessed are you among women.

And yet the earliest interpretations from the first centuries, the Christian era of Revelation 12 and the woman clothed with the sun universally spoke of her not as Mary, the mother of Jesus, but as the church.

And there is nothing in an angelic greeting of Mary as one who has been graciously blessed by God that is not said of all believers, both as to the specific term used, karatao, used of all believers in Ephesians 1 .6,

as well as the form of the participle, likewise used of people in Matthew 25 .34.

So if it's not in Scripture, then where would we might find it? Well, what about tradition? Well, as Juniper Carroll says, and as Ott agreed, as Dr.

Syngenis noted, the first express witness in the West with genuine assumption comes to us in an apocryphal gospel, the transitist

Beati Maria of Pseudo -Milito. This is a fourth to fifth century document, and even then it is

Pseudo -Milito, that is someone is writing as if they were Milito of Sardis who lived at the end of the second century but was not.

These are apocryphal gospels. We read about them from William Webster, quote, in his decree,

Pope Galatius lists the transitist teaching under the following condemnation. These in writing similarly as these which the heresiarchs and their disciples or the schismatics have taught or written, we confess have not only been rejected but also banished from the whole

Roman and apostolic church and with their authors and followers of their authors have been condemned forever under the indissoluble bond of anathema.

Yes, folks, the first source we can find for this concept of bodily assumption is an apocryphal material that the

Pope of Rome condemned as heretical at the end of the fifth century. That's the first place.

Now some people say, oh, but doesn't Epiphanius say something? Well, let's listen to what he had to say. But if some think us mistaken, let them search the scriptures.

They will not find Mary's death. They will not find whether she died or did not die. They will not find whether she was buried or was not buried.

Scripture is absolutely silent on the end of Mary. For my own part, I do not dare to speak but I keep my own thoughts and I practice silence.

The fact is scripture has outstripped the human mind and left this matter uncertain. Did she die?

We do not know. Either the holy virgin died and was buried or she was killed or she remained alive since nothing is impossible with God and he can do whatever he desires.

For her end, no one knows. At the end of the fourth century, we don't know.

We have nothing from the apostles. We've got nothing at all. This is extremely important because as Juniper Carroll rightly points out, a

Roman Catholic writer I point out, in these conditions we shall not ask patristic thought as some theologians still do today under one form or another to transmit to us with respect to the assumption a truth received as such in the beginning and faithfully communicated subsequent ages.

Such an attitude would not fit the facts. Patristic thought has not in this instance played the role of a sheer instrument of transmission.

Here's Juniper Carroll admitting there is no apostolic tradition on this matter in any way, shape or form.

In fact, speaking of the account of Pseudo -Milito, Juniper Carroll says, the account of Pseudo -Milito like the rest of the transitive literature is admittedly valueless as history.

As an historical report of Mary's death and corporeal assumption, under that aspect the historian is justified in dismissing it with critical distaste.

The earliest known patristic witness to the belief in the assumption in the West appears to be St. Gregory of Tours around 593.

However, now listen to this, due to the detail in which he describes the death of our blessed mother with the apostles in attendance and her assumption at the command of Christ, some scholars believe that he was greatly influenced by what?

The Apocrypha. And what are they referring to there? The transitive literature which was condemned by Pope Galatius and as we have seen is not only apocryphal, it is historically worthless.

However, apart from the Apocrypha, there is no authentic witness to the assumption among the fathers of either the

East or the West prior to the end of the 5th century. Now we have a very interesting statement here.

Listen to this. Listen carefully to what this Roman Catholic writer is saying, in order to establish the continuity of a given doctrine throughout the ages, it is not necessary that we possess an uninterrupted chain of explicit testimonies linking our times with the apostolic period.

The reason for this is quite obvious. Since the custody and infallible interpretation of the deposit of faith has been entrusted by God to a living organism, which is the church, and since the church of today is the same moral person it was in the 1st or 2nd century, it follows logically that whatever the church of today holds and teaches as pertaining to the original deposit of revelation was also held and taught, at least implicitly, by the church of the 1st centuries.

Now you see, why does Carroll have to say this? Listen to this last paragraph. Either we accept this, this idea that, well, the church is the same today as it was then, and therefore, if it's taught today, it must have always been true.

That's sola ecclesia to the max. Either we accept this as an incontrovertible principle, or we'll be confronted with very serious difficulties trying to reconcile the fact that the deposit of revelation was closed at the death of the last apostle with the fact that the church has defined as divinely revealed certain truths which were not always explicitly believed, such as the immaculate conception to cite but one example.

I appreciate the honesty. Carroll recognizes what Rome has defined as dogmatically true was absolutely unknown to the apostles of Jesus Christ, unknown to Scripture, and unknown to the early centuries of the

Christian faith. They somehow lived without this as part of the gospel, but we can't today?

Very, very interesting. What's more than this, Pius XII didn't just sit back and do an unbiased examination of the facts here, folks.

As what Carroll points out, the dogma was part of a program planned by Pius XII as he confided to Monsignor, later

Cardinal Tardini, shortly after he became pope. This was a plan he had before he became pope.

This was something he wanted to do should he become pope. That's not exactly putting you in a position of judging things fairly, is it?

And listen to this. Due largely to Father Yugi's expertise and influence, the question of Mary's death was removed from the scope of the dogma.

The idea of tracing a historical tradition from apostolic times was abandoned.

It was thought better to concentrate on the whole of divine revelations so as to bring to an explicit stage what it contained implicitly.

Again, though the pope said that all the proofs and considerations of the holy fathers and the theologians are based upon the sacred scriptures as their ultimate foundation, he appealed principally to the faith of the church rather than any particular biblical text as the basis of the definition.

Again, this is O 'Carroll who is a Roman Catholic writer. Now I simply have to ask this question.

Is this a solid foundation for a dogma of the Christian faith? We have been told, you don't need to have an explicit statement.

We don't really need to know what the early church said. The church that Christ has commissioned has told us this is true and that's enough.

And if you've been listening carefully, that's exactly what the foundation the pope is functioning on. Well, since the majority of people have said this is true, the bishops agree with me, there's this universal consent, well, then this is what the church teaches, therefore it's true because we're the same church.

Is that what the early Christians believed? Is that what we should believe? Athanasius, the great bishop of Alexandria wrote, the holy and inspired scriptures are sufficient of themselves for the preaching of the truth.

How could you preach the bodily assumption from the scriptures? You can't because it's not there. These canonical books are the fountains of salvation so that he who thirsts may be satisfied with the oracles contained in them.

In these alone the school of piety preaches the gospel, let no man add or take away from them.

When the pope said, this is dogmatic, de fide, dogma, he added this to the gospel.

You believe it or you're cut off. Athanasius didn't believe in the bodily assumption of Mary.

And yet he was the defender, the key defender, even when the bishop of Rome collapsed. It was Athanasius who stood firm for what?

The deity of Christ. How did he do so? On the basis of some nebulous tradition, scripture.

Listen to St. Cyril of Jerusalem. Even to me who tell you these things, do not give ready belief unless you receive from the holy scriptures the proof of the things which

I announce. The salvation in which we believe is not proved from clever reasoning, but from what?

The holy scriptures. This is in his catechetical lectures. He's a bishop in the church in the middle of the fourth century.

And he says, even though I as a bishop tell you these things, don't receive it just because I tell you, you need to find your foundation in what?

The holy scriptures. He didn't believe in the bodily assumption either. Never said a word, never defined it as the gospel.

And yet how many times have I heard Roman Catholic apologists say, this is the faith of the 2 ,000 year old church.

What if you're teaching things as the gospel that nobody at the beginning of the church ever thought of before?

How can you say it's the same church? Gregory of Nyssa, contemporary, middle fourth century, we make the holy scriptures the canon and rule of every dogma.

We have necessarily look upon that and receive alone that which may be made conformable to the intention of those writings.

Gregory of Nyssa didn't know anything about the bodily assumption. Never preached a sermon about it, never said a word about it or the immaculate conception or the infallibility of the

Pope either. All things defined by Rome over the past 160 years on her own authority against scripture and tradition.

What about the great Augustine? What more shall I teach you than what we read in the

Apostle? For holy scripture fixes the rule for our doctrine, lest we dare to be wiser than we ought.

Therefore, I should not teach you anything else except to expound you the words of the teacher, which is why he never said anything about the bodily assumption.

And ironically, someone in the middle ages had to come up with a fake writing they attributed to him about the bodily assumption of Mary that then

Thomas Aquinas used to promote the belief, not realizing it was a fraud. I had a

Roman Catholic apologist two weeks ago tomorrow quote that very fraudulent work against me in a debate, not knowing it was fraudulent.

What do the scriptures say? To the law and to the testimony, if they do not speak according to this word, it is because they have no dawn, they have no light, they have no revelation, they have no direction

The Apostle Paul wrote to Timothy and he said to Timothy, tough times are coming,

Timothy. There are going to be false teachers that are going to rise up amongst the flock, deceivers deceiving and being deceived.

What do you say to Timothy? Stick close to Peter, the vicar of Christ in Rome. What source did he direct him to?

What source did he direct the Ephesian elders to in Acts chapter 20? Same source. He said to Timothy, all scripture is theanoustos,

God -breathed. And what's it profitable for? Teaching, reproof, correction, training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be adequate, what?

Equipped for every good work. May I ask my Roman Catholic friends, is it a good work to teach that Mary was bodily assumed in heaven?

Is that a good work? The scripture doesn't equip you to do it, does it? And yet, the biblical teaching is that the man of God who stands before the people of God is thoroughly equipped for every good work by an appeal to that which is theanoustos, that which is

God -breathed. Jesus rebuked the Jews who claimed they had a tradition that was passed down outside of written scripture from Moses to their current day.

He rebuked them, called them hypocrites in Matthew chapter 15.

The fact of the matter is we have here a dogma that has been bound upon the consciences of men, has no basis in scripture, and no basis in tradition, and demonstrates that the

Roman church does not even believe any longer that Revelation ended with the last apostle. She has acted over the past 150 years against scripture, against tradition, in defining things that were not believed by the primitive

Christians. And hence, I submit to you, has demonstrated that by denying sola scriptura, she has cut herself off from the line of those who follow in the footsteps of the apostles of Jesus Christ, and as such, has no authority to bind anything upon anyone.

Thank you very much. Thank you,

Dr. White. Dr. St. Genes, ten -minute rebuttal, please. All right, let's see what we can do with what

Dr. White has presented. First thing he said is, one of the first things he said,

Rome claims to be governed by scripture and tradition. Yes, that's certainly true, but it doesn't mean in every case.

And I already pointed one out to you, and I backed it up with the teaching of scripture to show you that when scripture and tradition are not available to us, and yet we have a belief that has been circulating in the church for quite a long time, despite some discrepancies along the way, who's going to make that decision?

Well, that's what Acts 15 was brought up to the fore for us to consider.

Peter made the decision without any scripture, without any tradition, because he decided what was good for the church to believe, and apparently circumcision was not good to believe, so he made the decision.

As a matter of fact, in the document that Dr. White read on the doctrine of the assumption, in that very document, the church does say this, for as the

Vatican Council 1 asserts, all those things are to be believed in divine and Catholic faith which are contained in the written word of God or in tradition, and which are proposed by the church, either in solemn judgment or in its ordinary and universal teaching office, as divinely revealed truth which must be believed.

So it is wrong to say that Rome is governed by scripture and tradition without qualifying that statement.

That is not always true if there is no scripture and tradition to give us information on a particular issue.

Now, he pointed to Isaiah chapter 60, verse 13, and read that verse for you and said, well,

I don't see the assumption in here. Well, I never said the assumption was in there. What I said was that there are allusions, there are allusions to the passage of scripture which may or may not give us some kind of information about the assumption.

There's the Ark of the Covenant, for example, in Exodus and Apocalypse chapter 11. Some people believe that that's a reference to Mary because she was the

Ark of Jesus. It's possible, okay, but that's not where we get our proof.

They're just allusions. So I would never use Isaiah 60 .13 as proof of the assumption. Now, he talked about Pseudo -Milito in the fourth century and the transits, but if you'll notice,

I've read the document on the Assumption of Mary, the church never quotes from the transits for obvious reasons.

So that's a non -issue. The church quotes from any other sources that were credible about the

Assumption of Mary. And also, in dealing with the transits, the transits contained many doctrinal errors on all kinds of subjects.

It wasn't just about the Assumption of Mary, and even that's not clear in the transits.

It had many other doctrines that were in error, so the church threw out the whole thing.

But that doesn't mean that they threw out the Assumption of Mary, obviously, if the church, just a century or two later, picks it back up again.

The impression Dr. Wade tried to give you was that because they threw out the transits, they threw out the Assumption of Mary. That's not true.

Then he talked about Epiphanius in the fourth century, and Epiphanius says, well, we don't know what happened to the body of Mary.

And Dr. White seemed to be making the conclusion from that that there was no Assumption, just because he says we don't know.

That's not what Epiphanius said. Epiphanius says he didn't know, which means it was still an open issue.

It means somebody was talking about it in the fourth century. Evidently, it was a topic of discussion.

Hey, we don't know where Mary's grave is. What happened to her? And we can see people beginning to wonder when

Epiphanius is the first one. And just because he says he doesn't know doesn't mean that the

Assumption never occurred or that he was denying the Assumption. But that's the impression

I think that Dr. White wanted to leave you. The fact is the Holy Spirit knows and guides the church.

As I read from John chapter 14, verse 16, Jesus says, I will give you the

Comforter and He will guide you into all truth and He will be with you. When? For the first century?

No. Forever. Forever. Now, I find it interesting that John Calvin, when he was questioned about how he knew the canon of Scripture, that is, how do you know which books belong in the

Bible? Have you ever asked yourself that question? How do you know which books belong in the

Bible? Who told you? Do you know what John Calvin said?

He said the Holy Spirit guided the church to know the canon of Scripture. Well, that's interesting because I'm making the claim that the

Holy Spirit guided the church to make a dogma of the Assumption of Mary, and I'm basing that on what

Jesus said to the apostles in John 14, 16. I'm basing it on what Peter taught us in Acts 15, where he had no

Scripture tradition, guided solely by the Holy Spirit to give us the doctrine that Gentiles will not be circumcised.

Now, Dr. White also talked about Dr. Carroll, and Dr. Carroll said the church must have believed it.

If it believes it now, it must have believed it before. And then he said that Carroll said it was unknown.

So I'm kind of puzzled as to whether he's saying Dr. Carroll believed it was believed in the early centuries of the church or it was not believed, okay?

The fact is that just because you don't have many people talking about it doesn't mean it wasn't believed.

What Dr. White is assuming is because these fathers didn't write about it, well, then it automatically is not a doctrine of the church.

It was not believed by the church. Nobody talked about it. Well, we already saw Epiphanius talking about it. Well, if he was talking about it, other people were talking about it, and that's all we need.

We just need people talking about it. We know the germ is there. Now, who's going to make the decision afterwards is the crucial question.

Who has the authority to make the decision afterwards? Who had the authority to make the canon of Scripture? When was that decided?

Well, it was decided almost four centuries after Jesus ascended into heaven. They were debating back and forth about it.

Everybody was talking about it like they were talking about the Assumption of Mary. They had a pretty good idea of what it was, but nobody had the exact canon, and it was not dogmatized.

And finally, we had it, and then the church dogmatized it and used it thereafter. He said that I said we don't need explicit

Scripture. Well, that's true, because that's what Peter told us in Acts 15. That's why I went through that passage.

You see Peter citing any Scripture to give us the dogma that Gentiles would not be circumcised? Not a one.

And he says the Pope says that if you don't believe, then you're cut off. Well, that's what

Peter did in Acts 15. If you don't accept that Gentiles don't have to be circumcised, you're cut off.

You didn't say those exact words, but that's what the church said later on. If you believe you have to be circumcised, you're cut off.

That's what Paul said to the Galatians. He says, Dr. White says

Athanasius didn't believe in the Assumption. Says who? Where does Athanasius say in his writings, any of his writings,

I don't believe the Assumption is Mary? Not a one. Not a one. And as a matter of fact, almost every doctrine that Dr.

White believes is repudiated by St. Athanasius. St. Athanasius believed in the sacraments, baptismal regeneration.

Does Dr. White believe that? No. He believed in confession to a priest. Does Dr.

White believe that? No. He believed in the Eucharist. Does Dr. White believe that? No. He believed in giving allegiance to the

Pope and the councils. Does Dr. White believe that? No. So he can quote Athanasius all he wants, and he quotes him out of context when he quotes him about Sola Scriptura.

That's another issue altogether. But Athanasius is not his friend. Athanasius is not

Dr. White's friend, and neither is Augustine, because Augustine believed the same things that St. Athanasius believed that the

Catholic Church still believes today, that Dr. White has had many debates, over 100 of them, repudiating those very doctrines that Athanasius believes.

The only thing he hangs his hat on is Sola Scriptura, and he's even got that one wrong. There is no instance in which

Athanasius denies an accepted dogma of today's Catholic Church. I wish I could get to 2

Timothy 3 .16, but I have 15 seconds left, and I'll try to pick that up in the next session. Thank you. Thank you,

Dr. St. Janus. Dr. White, 10 -minute rebuttal, please. While it is fresh in your mind,

I would like to point out that it is an amazing form of argument to say, well, Athanasius never denied the bodily assumption.

If you're the one promoting the dogma, you've got to prove he actually ever said a word about it. You've got to prove somebody in his day was even talking about it.

He never did—Athanasius never denied the Book of Mormon was the Word of God either, but I don't think anyone wants to say he believed it.

That kind of argumentation is absolutely amazing to me. Athanasius believed in the doctrine of the

Trinity. We were just told that he believed in allegiance to popes and councils. For 40 years after the

Council of Nicaea, he alone stands for orthodoxy, even when the Bishop of Rome gives in, and numerous councils have told

Athanasius, you're wrong, submit, and he said, no, I won't, because Scripture says this, and you can say

Athanasius had allegiance to popes and councils? That is the most amazing historical argumentation

I have honestly ever heard in the entirety of my life. Similar to saying the canon was dogmatized in the 4th century, when from Rome's perspective, the first dogmatic definition of the canon is

April of 1546, not the 4th century. Somehow the Council of Nicaea was able, on the basis of Scripture, to define the deity of Christ without a formalized dogmatic canon of Scripture.

How could they do that? So many problems here, but let's go to the most important thing.

About the only argument that has been made is that, well, Peter came up with stuff. Well, first of all,

Peter's an apostle, Pope Pius XII is not. Secondly, the reading of Acts chapter 15 is completely in error.

Peter does not give the decision for that council. Peter's not even in charge of that council,

James is. Can you imagine the bishop of Rome today being second chair to any other bishop in the room at a council of the church talking about the gospel?

And after Peter gets done speaking, Paul gets up and he doesn't just simply verify, he as an apostle talks about what

God has done through him, and then James gets up and says, Ego crino, I judge.

That is an amazingly imbalanced reading of Acts chapter 15. Peter does not get up and say,

I don't need Scripture, I don't need tradition, and I'm just going to make a dogma, and therefore all popes down through history could be able to do the same thing.

The assumptions you have to pack into that, the assumption that Peter has successors, those successors are in Rome, all of the problems that arise with that are absolutely amazing.

And to get that to the point where you can then say, and you have to believe in the bodily assumption of Mary when nobody in the early church believed it, none of the apostles ever taught it, and in fact, it wasn't even defined until 1950, all on the basis of Peter spoke at the council of Jerusalem in Acts 15, it is very difficult to wrap your head around this.

I would like to know if Dr. St. Janus agrees with Gerry Matitix. Gerry Matitix and I debated back in 1996 on Long Island, and Gerry Matitix made the following statement, we have the exact same warrant to believe in the bodily assumption of Mary that we have to believe in the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

The very same authority tells us that the bodily assumption of Mary is true that tells us that the resurrection of Jesus Christ is true.

I would like to know if Dr. St. Janus would agree or disagree with Gerry Matitix on that particular issue.

We had, once again, Dr. St. Janus used the example of the doctrine of the

Trinity, well, I believe in the doctrine of Trinity and it's not explicitly in Scripture, my friends. The doctrine of the

Trinity pulses on every page of Scripture. You cannot even begin to understand its testimony as to who

Jesus is without understanding the doctrine of the Trinity, but people for hundreds of years read all the

New Testament and never dreamed of the bodily assumption of Mary. To even make the parallel is to demonstrate you have no argument at all.

The Scriptures are clear in identifying the fact there's one true God, in teaching the deity of Christ, the deity and personality of the

Holy Spirit, in using the name Yahweh of Jesus and of the Holy Spirit. The Scriptures are clear on these things.

I could spend hours giving us the biblical, clear, explicit evidence of the doctrine of the

Trinity on the pages of Scripture and you go to Isaiah chapter 60 verse 13 where it talks about God's feet and those that were

Jesus' feet that were in Mary's womb when He's actually talking about the temple, and dare to say that there's a parallel between the divine doctrine of the

Trinity and the bodily assumption. That is absolutely offensive to me as a

Christian. It is offensive to me. I love the doctrine of the Trinity. I defend the doctrine of the

Trinity. I've stood in front of rooms full of Muslims in England, in London, in New York, in Queens, and defended the deity of Christ, but I would be embarrassed to stand before those people and argue for the bodily assumption of Mary as a divine revelation.

We were told the translist literature is irrelevant. Folks, from any meaningful historical perspective, from any meaningful

Roman Catholic historical perspective, the translist literature is the earliest testimony we have to this belief in the bodily assumption of Mary.

And as I pointed out, the first Orthodox writer to give testimony to the fact that he believed in the bodily assumption had been influenced by what?

Believing that the translist literature was real. So much of what

Rome teaches today historically was based upon fraudulent documents. The papacy could never have developed were it not for fraudulent documents like the

Donation of Constantine, the Pseudo -Isidorean Decretals. There were entire collections of books that were written in the

Middle Ages that were 98 % bogus citations, citations of early church fathers that were never said by those early church fathers, that were used by men like Thomas Aquinas.

He didn't know. He was ignorant, but he used them. That became the foundation of papal primacy.

We now know today that all those documents are bogus, and yet the papacy is still there. And the same thing is true about the translist literature.

The translist literature had a deep influence upon the arising of this belief in the bodily assumption.

That's why it's completely relevant to anyone who actually wants to know where these beliefs came from.

How could it be that a church that says, we uphold Scripture and tradition, I cannot tell you how many times in debates with Roman Catholics, I've done about 40 debates with Roman Catholics now.

Oh, James, you need to believe what it says. Paul said to the Thessalonians, believe what's in the oral preaching and the written letters, the oral tradition and the written tradition.

Why do any of them ever cite that text when they believe the bodily assumption of Mary? Because the bodily assumption of Mary is in neither.

It's a smokescreen. It's a diversion. The real argument should be, don't worry about what

Scripture says. Because the Pope in Rome has spoken, that's it, believe.

But I can't do that. I can't do that because those same people say, well, we're the continuation of that ancient church.

And the ancient church, I gave you, quote, after quote, after quote, quote. Dr. Jennings did not even try to start.

His only response was, well, they believe things James doesn't believe. Well, we could argue about some of the things he said. They didn't believe in transubstantiation.

And go back and listen to our debates on those subjects to find out for yourself. But the point is, they said, Holy Scripture fixes the rule for our doctrine.

We will not teach you anything but what we find in Holy Scripture. But Dr. St. Jenna stands before us and say, well,

I don't have to find it in Holy Scripture because the Pope in Rome has spoken. We can have illusions.

Here is an argument. Just because you don't have a lot of people talking about it, doesn't mean they didn't believe it.

All you need is people talking about it. Epiphanius never said a word about the assumption.

He was talking about the fact that Scripture doesn't tell us that Mary died. Well, Scripture doesn't tell us that 99 .99

% of everybody in Scripture died. So if all you need is people talking about it, my goodness, folks, the early church was talking about all sorts of Gnosticism and all sorts of weird stuff like that.

You could come up with anything if that's all you need. If all you need is, well,

Athanasius didn't deny the bodily assumption rather than, you know what? If I'm going to say Athanasius is relevant here, I need to find some place where he talked about it.

He never said a word. He talked a lot about Mary, didn't he? But he never said a word. Let me ask you a question.

Could any modern Roman Catholic teacher get through a discussion of the Virgin Mary, maybe preaching a bunch of sermons on the

Virgin Mary, and in fact do so without mentioning immaculate conception, bodily assumption, all these things?

Of course not. And so the fact that they did not say these words, they did not ever mention these things demonstrates they did not believe in these things.

This doctrine has no basis in Scripture, no apostle ever taught it, and nobody for the first hundreds of years of the

Christian church ever taught it as something you have to believe. That demonstrates that Roman Catholicism today is not the church of the apostles and early followers of Jesus Christ.

Thank you very much. Thank you, Dr. White. Five -minute rebuttal.

Dr. St. Janice, please. Dr., let me pick up on 2

Timothy 3 .16. One of the questions Dr. White asked was, is it a good work to track…I'm sorry, is it a good work to teach the assumption, because 2

Timothy 3 .16 says that Scripture makes a man equipped to do a good work.

I would say this, Dr. White, is it a good work to deny what Scripture teaches about the authority of the recognized leader of the church in Acts 15,

Dr. White, who had no Scripture, who had no tradition, and yet makes a dogmatic decision for the whole church to follow, and we've been following it ever since for 2 ,000 years.

Is that a good work, Dr. White, to deny that passage? Speaking of 2

Timothy 3 .16, all it says about Scripture there is that it's profitable. It doesn't say it's self -sufficient.

It doesn't say it's the only authority. It doesn't say it's the supreme authority. All these things that Dr. White wants to read into that passage.

Yes, it's theopneustos. Theopneustos, that means God breathed. Here we have another problem.

God breathed. Does God breathe? No. God doesn't have a breath. He's a spirit.

So, what does this word mean? Well, that's an interesting question. The Scripture is

God breathed. It's a figure of speech. Now, what Dr.

White tries to do with that passage is, well, if it's the only time that word is used in Scripture, well, that means that it must be the supreme authority then.

No, not at all. There's many ways that Scripture talks about God's Word.

It says the Word of God, or it says Scripture, or it could say theopneustos, and that's even a weak word because it's a figure of speech because God doesn't breathe.

We have to struggle with that word to figure out what exactly Paul was teaching us there. So, no, all this stuff about Scripture being the supreme authority is not true in Scripture.

It doesn't teach it. Dr. White says that I have to prove that Athanasius did not believe in the

Assumption. Do I? Do I have to have a statement from Athanasius that says, I do not believe in the

Assumption of Mary? That's ridiculous. Dr. White, you know better than that. He also said that the canon of Scripture was not dogmatized until 1546.

Actually, it's 1543, but I'm not a stickler for details here. What I will say is this, the church believed in 382 at the

Council of Rome that the Scripture that was canonized at the

Council of Trent in 1543 was the same council at the Council of Rome. Okay?

All it was was formally dogmatized at the Council of Trent in 1543. It didn't mean that the church had not decided what the

Bible was at the Council of Rome in 382. And then we get to Acts 15, a very important passage, just let me spend some time on this.

He says Peter is an apostle, not a pope. I didn't say, I didn't use the word pope. I said that Peter was the recognized leader of the church.

That's all I said. I didn't talk about any pope. This is the lesson that Scripture gives us.

The recognized leader of the church made a decision without Scripture and tradition of a faith and practice for the church of that day.

Now is that an example for us or not? Do we just look at that and throw it away? I don't think so.

He says, well, Peter does not give the decision. All right, well, let's assume for the sake of argument that Peter doesn't give the decision.

Let's say it's James. I don't agree with that, but let's just say it's James. You got the same problem.

James is making the decision for the church to be followed and does so without a reference to Scripture or tradition.

So whatever way he goes on this, he's trapped. The fact is Acts 15 teaches us that the church makes the decision.

Whoever the recognized leader is, regarding gerrymantics, yes,

I would say the same thing. Why? Because we have the same authority, the Holy Spirit. Dr.

White's going to have to prove that the Holy Spirit doesn't guide the church. It's going to be hard, especially since his mentor,

John Calvin, said that the Holy Spirit guided the church to know the canon of Scripture. It's a difficult position to be in.

I don't envy him at all. My time is up. Thank you. Thank you,

Dr. St. Genes. Dr. White, five -minute rebuttal. Hello, hello.

There we go. Dr. St. Genes is in error. The date for the Council of Trent is April 8th, 1546, the fourth session, as I had said that it was, not 1543.

The Council of Trent hadn't even started yet. If I said that Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch, taught sola fide and sola scriptura, and you said, well,

Dr. White, what's your evidence? Give us some citations. I said, well, where do you deny it? Would you accept that as an argument?

Anyone here accept that as a valid argument? Good, because it's not a valid argument. If I am making a positive statement, then

I have to provide the evidence. Therefore, where did Athanasius ever give positive evidence of a belief in the bodily assumption?

If he did not, then you cannot say, well, you never denied it. That is irrelevant.

That would be as bad as my saying, well, where did Ignatius ever deny sola scriptura and sola fide? This kind of argumentation can be used to prove anything whatsoever.

I am amazed that Acts 15 comes up again. Peter is not standing before the council and saying, we don't have any scripture, we have no tradition.

Paul's epistles argue the Old Testament evidence for justification by faith, do they not?

Why didn't he just go, oh, well, it's what Peter said? Was he not violating the

Roman Catholic understanding of how this works when he later on demonstrates the consistency of his teaching with the

Old Testament and draws it from the Old Testament? He was not just saying, well, I don't have scripture or tradition.

This is scripture that's being written here. This is a period of revelation. To make this parallel, what you're having to tell me is that in 1950, more revelation came, so why hasn't

Rome put that in the Bible? Why hasn't Rome reopened the canon and added it in? Because they're calling it revelation, and that's the only way we can treat it.

Peter simply did not do what Dr. Sogenes says. But again, this is an argument for a dogma that was defined in 1950, 1 ,950 years after the birth of Christ, at least 1 ,900 years after the death of Mary, all of a sudden, now we have clarity, and it's necessary for everyone in the

Christian faith to believe this or you're cut off from the true church. Who cares that for hundreds of years the church functioned without a clue of this?

It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter the apostles never taught it. It doesn't matter they never defined it as a gospel.

We have ultimate authority. You just heard Dr. Sogenes said,

I agree with Gerrymatics. That should be frightening to you, my friend. Remember what

Gerrymatics said. We have the exact same warrant, the exact same basis for believing in the bodily assumption of Mary that we have the resurrection.

My friends, the resurrection of Jesus Christ actually took place in history. His contemporaries bore testimony.

They gave their lives in testimony. They wrote books. We can go back to the first century, the bodily assumption of Mary is first found in heretical books written 500 years later.

And when your doctrine of the church is so far removed from that of the

New Testament that you can say, well, same foundation because the

Holy Spirit has promised. My Mormon friends say the Holy Spirit's told them that Joseph Smith was a prophet.

The Book of Mormon is true. I don't believe them because I test these things. And my

Jehovah's Witness friends have their feelings and they claim the Holy Spirit guides the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society and everybody claims the

Holy Spirit. But my friends, there's one standard of recognizing the Holy Spirit and it's called

Scripture. And Dr. Sogenes just stood up here, well, 2 Timothy 3, 16, all that says the

Scripture is profitable. That's all it says. Why is it profitable? Because it's God breathed.

It is the very breath of God. It is able to make you wise into salvation.

And if you want to reprove, you want to teach, rebuke, exhort in sound doctrine, there's only one source to go to.

And I have given you not only the scriptural testimony to that, I've given you the early church testimony to that.

Isn't it amazing that Rome and that those defending Rome have to sit here this evening and reject the scriptural testimony and reject the patristic testimony on these matters?

That shows you, once again, sola ecclesia, Rome not under the authority of Scripture or tradition, but Rome claiming her own revelations, not following the apostles.

Thank you. Thank you, Dr. White. Okay, we will now begin the cross -examination portion of the debate.

Dr. St. Genes will have 15 minutes in which to question Dr. White.

All right, Alex. Okay, Dr.

White, we have a little bit more flexibility in this cross than we did the last one. I don't know how exactly it's going to work, but I'm sure we both know what the objective is here to have some interaction.

With that, the first question I would ask you is, in Acts 15, James is the bishop of Jerusalem.

Is that correct? That is my understanding. Okay. I mean, that's traditional, but yeah, that's my understanding.

All right. Now, is that why you keep saying, whenever this passage is brought up, that James is making the decision here because James is the bishop of Jerusalem?

No. As I pointed out in verse 19, dia ego crino, it is

James who, after testimony offered by Peter and testimony offered by Paul, is the one who gives, based upon a citation of Scripture, the decision of the council.

And so, Peter's words did not finish the discussion. And so, since he is the only one who says,

I judge, therefore I judge, and the letter that comes from the council is written on the basis of what he says,

I do not see any reason for saying that Peter was somehow functioning in the way that you seem to believe that he was.

Okay. Does Peter stand up in verse 6 and 7 and give the decision about circumcision?

I don't see the word decision. He said, as verse 6 says, in the apostles and the elders came together to look into this matter.

After there had been much debate, Peter stood up and said to them, brethren, you know, then he goes on. But that did not end it because, as you know, in verse 12, all the…

No, wait a minute, wait a minute. I didn't ask you that. Please, if you don't mind me interacting here. No, that's fine. That's fine. I didn't ask you that question yet.

Okay. Let's just take it a step at a time. Did Peter, you don't want to use the word decision, did

Peter make a declaration, a statement about circumcision? Yes.

Okay. Specifically his statement was, but we believe, not I believe, but we believe that we are saved through the grace of the

Lord Jesus Christ the same way as they also. So that's actually… I don't see the term circumcision here.

In fact, no, I don't see the term circumcision. Well, is not the context dealing with circumcision all the way back in verse 1 to 5?

Actually, I would actually disagree that it's about circumcision specifically since Paul had

Timothy circumcised as it is the idea of the necessity of joining the old covenant by circumcision. Well, doesn't verse 5 say it isn't the

Pharisees stood up and said it is necessary to circumcise them and to direct them to observe the law of Moses?

Right. Is that function of circumcision, the idea that circumcision is a part of the New Testament gospel that you have to become a member of the old covenant before you become a member of the new covenant?

Right. Whatever. The circumcision is mentioned. Do you agree to that? You are agreeing that Peter made some kind of declaratory statement about this issue of circumcision.

Do you agree that there was much discussion prior to Peter's decision or Peter's declaration, whatever you want to call it, before he declared it?

There was much discussion about the subject, yes. Okay. All right. So, did

James make a decision about circumcision? Well, yes.

I believe all of this is on the same subject because what you're inserting into the text is that in verse 12, it says, all the people kept silent and they were listening to Paul and Barnabas as they were relating what signs and wonders

God had done through them among the Gentiles. This was the same subject that Peter had been addressing.

And you'll notice that far from making a dogmatic statement, verse 10 says, is a question.

Now therefore, why do you put God to the test by placing upon the neck of the disciples a yoke which neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear?

But we believe that we are saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ in the same way as they also.

Paul and Barnabas affirm that, giving demonstration that the Spirit has been working with them amongst the Gentiles doing the same thing.

After they had stopped speaking, then James, who evidently is in control of the council, then gives the decision of the council.

Well, there's no decision about circumcision from James. Where do you read that? Well, notice, he gives his statement, brethren, listen to me.

I mean, Simeon has related how God first concerned Himself about taking from among the

Gentiles a people for His name, which He then substantiates with Scripture. And on the basis of that says, therefore, it is my judgment that we do not trouble those, etc.,

etc., which again has to do with the whole concept of putting people under the circumcision law and the

Old Testament laws and the Old Covenant and everything else. I don't think that the vast majority of interpreters posit any kind of major distinction between these sections as if they're talking about different subjects.

All right, well, let's say this, Dr. White. What you have here is two apostles working together.

One happens to be the Bishop of Jerusalem. The other is the chief apostle. They've made a decision for the church that circumcision will no longer be practiced.

Both of them do so without any explicit directive from Scripture, tradition, or anywhere else to make their decision.

I'm sorry. That's just not true. We have Old Testament citation in verse 16, 17, and 18 is an

Old Testament citation, so I'm not sure what you mean by that. If you look at those passages, Dr. White, can you tell me where Amos 9, verse 16 discusses circumcision?

I don't think that it has to. I think your argument is with James who saw this as being directly relevant, and he himself is the one, says, with this, the words of the prophets agreed just as it is written.

All right, so what you're telling me then is that James can take a passage from the Old Testament that has nothing to do with circumcision and use that as a support for the decision that the church made, him and Peter, that circumcision would no longer be practiced by the church.

No, as I said at the very beginning, I disagree that this is simply a matter of circumcision. This is a matter of circumcision as being the means by which a person is placed under the

Old Covenant before he can go into the New Covenant, and that is what the prophecy is talking about because it's a prophecy of restoration as all the

New Covenant prophecies were. Dr. White, I beg to differ with you. Show me where anything other than circumcision under the law of Moses is being discussed in Acts chapter 15.

Actually, you cited it yourself when you went to the section, it is necessary to circumcise them and to direct them to observe the law of Moses.

Who? The Gentile converts that were coming in. So as Paul interprets this entire discussion and as Paul interprets the activity of the

Pharisees and the Judaizers, he very clearly recognizes that they saw circumcision as something that needs to be added to faith in Jesus Christ.

You have to become a member of the Old Covenant before you become a member of the New Covenant. All right, so my question still remains, where does

Amos talk about doing away with the law of Moses or circumcision? It has to do with the restoration that is going to come and the fact, as you can see in the text itself, that this has to do with the

New Covenant and how the New Covenant is going to be different from the Old Covenant. Notice it says, it says, so that the rest of mankind may seek the

Lord, that's the Gentiles, and all the Gentiles who are called by my name, says the Lord, who makes these things known from long ago.

So here you have a prophecy that there are going to be Gentiles who are called by his name, not Gentile converts to Judaism who've been circumcised.

So James clearly does understand that there is Old Testament prophecy of this, and Paul demonstrates that in all of his letters over and over again.

We're not talking about Paul, we're talking about James. James could have quoted from Amos and still insisted that circumcision be practiced because there's nothing said in Amos about ceasing circumcision.

That is, the Gentiles, and I'm going to form a question out of this so you can answer it, show us where either

James or Amos is saying that circumcision can't be added when the Gentiles are being added to the

New Covenant. Because a person who is circumcised is no longer a Gentile. Where's that discussion here,

James? Doesn't have to be. It doesn't have to be. Anybody who read this, anybody who read this would understand, and all the

Gentiles who are called by my name would understand that that is a different group of people than the

Jews who are circumcised. I think that if anyone takes the time to go read a wide variety of critical commentaries in Acts chapter 15, they will see that I am giving…

Look, we're not talking about other critical commentaries, we're talking about your interpretation of it, and I want to zero in on that.

If you think, if you are suggesting to us that it's so easy to arrive at this judgment, why are they having such difficult time discussing this?

I mean, they have a huge debate going on between Paul and Barnabas, the elders, the apostles, and Peter stands up and then gives his declaration and says, this is no longer going to be the way we do it.

If it was so easy, why are they having such a struggle with it? The question assumes facts, not evidence.

I never said it was easy. The reality is that this is one of the most important turning points in the history of the early church, and it is the turning point where the danger of a

Gentile Christian church versus a Jewish Christian church was averted. Peter himself had had to receive three times the same vision for him to understand, that he was not to call

Gentiles unclean in Acts chapter 10 before going to Cornelius' house. And so, what made all of this so hard was the traditions of the

Jews and the fact that they saw themselves as a particular people, and they saw those signs that they bore in their body as something that was extremely connected to the favor of God, and that's what made it difficult.

I never said it was easy. Dr. Wright, what we're still stuck on here, however, is that James' quote from Amos says nothing about the

Mosaic Law or circumcision having to be ceased for the

Gentiles coming to the church. Now, the reason this is important for us is because you've made such a big issue about me getting scriptures from the

Old Testament that make allusions to the Assumption of Mary, and I admitted quite reciprocally that they are not direct or explicit references to the

Assumption of Mary, but here we have a passage in Acts 15 where there's no explicit or direct reference to either circumcision or the

Mosaic Law, and yet you're claiming that James is using this scripture to set the precedent for how the

Gentiles are going to make a practice. That is, they will not be practicing circumcision when they enter the church.

So, I am puzzled. Maybe you can help me get out of that puzzle here, but I'm puzzled as to how, on the one hand, you can criticize me for getting indirect passages from the

Old Testament, but here you have one that James is using that's indirect, and yet you give yourself leeway to use it.

Two things. James is inspired, this is inspired scripture, and Pope Pius XII is not. Secondly, this is not merely some illusion.

You may disagree with James' use of this, but anyone who actually reads it for themselves will see, after these things

I will return and I will rebuild the tabernacle of David which has fallen, will rebuild its ruins. That's a promise of gathering the people of Israel back together again, which is a part of the

New Covenant promises. Read Jeremiah chapter 31, and I will restore it so that the rest of mankind may seek the

Lord. That shows the gospel goes outside of the Jewish community to the Gentiles, and all the Gentiles were called by my name.

So you have... Excuse me, that was a long question, I'm not done answering yet. So you have... I thought you were done, sorry.

You have a clear, clear presentation of the gospel going to the

Gentiles in the Old Testament citation in comparison to a mention of the

Lord's feet, which is about the temple in Isaiah 60, being compared to Jesus' feet having been in Mary's womb.

I submit to you that there's no reason to be confused here, there is no parallel between the two.

Dr. White, does Jeremiah 31 say that circumcision would not be practiced? Jeremiah chapter 31 does not mention the word circumcision.

Well, wait a minute. It doesn't. I don't know that it does or does not.

Does any passage in the Old Testament say that circumcision would not be practiced when the New Covenant came?

Actually, Jeremiah chapter 31 does make references to that, specifically in the promise as it is seen in Hebrews chapter 8 that every person in the

New Covenant will know the Lord and that there will no longer be any kind of... Where does that mention circumcision?

I'm sorry? Where does either Hebrews 8 or 10 or Jeremiah 31 mention circumcision?

Again, I allow the New Testament writers to interpret the Old Testament for me, and so when that specific terminology is utilized and they interpret it in that way,

I just simply follow them as it does in the book of Hebrews. They interpret it in what way? Hebrews chapter 8 interprets

Jeremiah chapter 31... I know, but does either passage reference circumcision?

That's the question. The answer is no. Is that correct? I don't recall the word is used specifically. Well, I can tell you right now, it's not there.

So my point still stands, and I used all my 15 minutes for this because it's very important.

There is no passage in the Old Testament that declares circumcision will not be practiced. This is a decision that is made by either

Peter or James. Take your pick. One backed up by the other doesn't make any difference. The fact is it's done without any scriptural precedent, without any tradition.

Is that a statement or a question? I'm making a question. What do you have to say about that? I think you are completely undercutting the argumentation of Peter and James, Paul and all of his epistles, all to try to create an epistemological basis to substantiate a dogma that you have not once mentioned in a 15 -minute cross -examination period in a debate on that subject.

Would I have the right to do that if you can't give me a good answer why James is not stating any passage from the

Old Testament that says circumcision will cease? I think James himself would agree that he gave a very good reference to the fact that the gospel would go to the

Gentiles, which is what the whole circumcision issue was about. Well, someday, hopefully, we can ask James and see what he meant. Okay, my time is up.

Thank you, Dr. St. Genis. Dr. White, 15 minutes. Dr. St.

Genis, is the doctrine of the bodily assumption of Mary a revelation from God? It depends on what you mean by revelation.

Why don't you define that for me? Did God reveal it as a divine truth? Yes. When? He revealed it to the church in 1950.

Was it believed to be a divine truth by Ignatius, anyone in the first century?

Not Ignatius, no. Anyone in the first century that you know? Yes, there would have to be. That was

Carroll's argument. So, there were people in the first century who believed the bodily assumption of Mary, but they left no record of their belief in the bodily assumption of Mary?

Certainly possible. Same with the second century? Certainly possible. Third century? Certainly possible.

Fourth century? Yep. How did the transitive literature come up with this belief?

Did they borrow it from the divine deposit of faith and just pervert it? That's irrelevant. The fact is that the transitive was deemed a heretical work in most of what it said, so it was discarded.

Your assumption that the assumption came from the transitive is unfounded. You have no way to prove that.

Okay. Would you agree with the statement of Augustine in his introduction on the

Trinity, Book 1, Chapter 2, Paragraph 4, where he is introducing his discussion of the

Trinity, and before he gets into it, he says this, First, however, we must demonstrate, according to the authority of the

Holy Scriptures, whether the faith be so. Why would Augustine, in the fourth century, end of the fourth century, beginning of the fifth century, why would he say that he had to demonstrate the doctrine of the

Trinity on the authority of the Holy Scriptures? Because, as you said yourself, Dr. White, the Scriptures talk about the

Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, so where else would he go to to get the information about the Trinity? Obviously, he goes to the

Scripture because that has most of the information. It doesn't mean, however, that Augustine's authority, that you're going to now be able to extrapolate that to all the other doctrines

Augustine believed and say that everything Augustine believes has to be explicitly taught in the Scripture. That's not what he said there.

He just said on the doctrine of the Trinity, he was going to go to the Scripture for his authority. I would go to the

Scripture too as my authority because that's where it's talked about. So, since you don't go to the

Scripture for the bodily assumption of Mary, then you're saying it's not talked about there? No, I do go to the

Scripture for the bodily assumption of Mary. I just don't go the way you want me to go. I've gone to Acts 15, and I've shown you that the

Scripture itself gives us precedent that when there is no explicit Scripture or tradition, what do we do then?

Well, what we do then is we get the church to decide about this based on logic, reason, and the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

So, that's what Scripture gives me. So, the decision of Pius XII is a

Holy Spirit -given revelation? Yes. And yet, the revelation had been given in the first century?

Yes. But there just simply isn't a continuous chain of evidence of its existence? Well, we have bits and pieces of it.

But, you know, see what you're expecting us to hold to is that every doctrine that's believed by us has to have this explicit chain of documentation throughout all the ages.

That's not what our church teaches. That's not what the apostles taught. That's not what the fathers taught.

That's not what the church taught. There are some doctrines that are very clear in Scripture.

There are some doctrines we have very ambiguous information in Scripture. That's the nature of life. Isn't this really the vive voce argument, believe it because we said it?

I mean, honestly, isn't this all boiling down to, well, I interpret

Acts 15 a certain way. And by the way, let me just ask, is there an infallible interpretation of Acts 15 you can refer to?

Has Rome infallibly interpreted Acts chapter 15 in the way that you have? No. As a matter of fact, a lot of the passages that Pius XII picks in this document, only assumption, are not infallibly interpreted either.

Okay. So aren't you just basically saying you believe this because we tell you to believe it vive voce?

No. Not at all. I know what you imply by that. You know, it's like my father saying, you know, do this because I told you.

You know. We can all use that argument. You know, authority can use that argument. But authority does not like to use that argument because they don't want to make it appear as if you're just doing this because you're forced to do it.

No. The church in what? How many pages is it? Well, over 20 pages gives us the reasons why we are to believe in this doctrine.

Then she says at the end, okay, we are an authority. And we do command you to believe this.

But the church is not saying, oh, you believe it because we're the church. That's it. Finite. Nothing further to be said.

We just put this in one sentence. Believe it because we said it. That's it. No, that's not the way they do it. But none of those 20 pages of Munificentis Ves Deus actually provides any kind of either scriptural or even patristic argumentation.

Most of the citations are very, very late. They're not in the patristic period whatsoever. And I think you had said that the

Pope never said that Isaiah 60 .13 or Revelation chapter 12 are actually proofs of the bodily assumption.

They're just used as indications or allusions. So, we have indications, allusions, and then at the end, we're told believe.

And if you don't, you're cut off. Why isn't that viva voce? Why isn't that ipsa dixit? We say it.

Well, Dr. White, first of all, you're assuming that scripture and tradition are the only way we get information about faith and morals.

That's not true, number one. Number two is in the document itself, it says that scripture is an authority, tradition is an authority, and doctrines which are proposed by the church either in solemn judgment or in its ordinary universal teaching office.

So, we have three sources we can go to to get doctrine for us to believe.

Scripture, tradition, or the church. You made reference to various miracles and basically likened anyone who would reject these miracles to the

Jews that rejected the miracles of Jesus. And I guess, I think if I recall correctly, correct me if I'm wrong, you made reference to Mary's works.

Do you believe that these apparitions are part of Mary's works that testify to her bodily assumption?

Mary's works, well, Mary's given a mission to come to earth to give information about the future so that men will repent of their sins.

And that's part of the, that's why she, that's somehow related to bodily assumption? Well, if she wasn't bodily assumed into heaven, she wouldn't be able to come back in her body to earth to give a message.

That was my point. I see. When Augustine, in his reply to Faustus, the

Manichaean, book 13, section 5, talked about their claims about miracles, he asks the questions, he says,

If you reject these passages of Scripture in spite of the weighty authority in their favor, what miracles can you show?

And then he says this, This shows that the established authority of Scripture must outweigh every other, for it derives new confirmation from the progress of events which happen as Scripture proves, and fulfillment of the predictions made so long before their occurrence.

So, is it not the case that we are to test any supposed miracle on the basis of Scripture?

Yes. All right. Well, wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute. You said on the basis of Scripture? Yes. I'll agree with you that we are to test a miracle to see if it's true.

Whether Scripture is going to be the final authority, that's another story altogether. We may use Scripture to help us to do that, but Scripture is not the final authority.

So, what basis is the final authority for testing a miracle? The Church, Scripture, and tradition.

But Scripture and tradition are both determined by the Church, are they not? Well, didn't you determine what the canon was?

I'm asking you the questions. Aren't both Scripture and tradition determined, both interpreted and determined by the

Church? I would hope so. Who else is going to do it? So, how do you make them equal when they are subservient to and determined by the

Church? Well, because Scripture is inspired by God, and the Holy Spirit guides the Church. So, we have

God inspiring Scripture, we have God leading the Church, we have God giving oral revelation in the tradition.

So, all the sources are from God. Therefore, they're all equal. What if Rome isn't the Church and your assumption is wrong?

What if you're a Martian and shouldn't be here? I mean, you can ask all kinds of questions all day long about what if.

Let me repeat that so that people can hear that. You are assuming the end of the debate.

That seems to be a circular argument. It sounds like by the answer you just gave, you are demonstrating sola ecclesia.

Well, we are the Church. Just believe us. Well, Dr. White, that's why

I went through Acts chapter 15 for you. That's why I went through Acts chapter 1. I showed you that when the time came for decisions to be made, it wasn't anybody but the

Church making the decisions. If you can point to any other authority in the Scripture who made the decisions, then you have a point.

Okay. The apostles and elders were the ones who met in Jerusalem for Acts chapter 15.

Are you placing Pope Pius XII on the same level as the

Jerusalem apostles? Well, I would hope that if Jesus gave the keys to Peter and gave him the decision, the power to bind and lose, even if he gave it to the apostles,

I would hope that it wouldn't stop with them because if it stopped in the first century after Jesus ascended, we all would be up a creek.

So there is continuing revelation just like the Mormons say that. Excuse me? There is continuing revelation then?

I didn't say that. I'm talking about authority here. Okay. Jesus gave authority to Peter. If it didn't succeed him, then we're all in a bad way here because we have no authority whatsoever.

You don't have any and I don't have any. Don't have any authority whatsoever. So a promise to give

Peter the keys in Matthew 16, which is fulfilled in Matthew 18 with all the apostles, that promise we must believe makes a man in Rome in 1950 capable of defining a dogma that no one for the first 500 years of the

Christian church we have any record of ever binding on anyone else. That's the essence of our debate this evening.

That's why I went through Acts 15 for you, Dr. White. I told you the church can make a decision like that. The Bible is giving us an example of how the church makes a decision without scripture or tradition.

And if you are wrong about Acts 15, then your entire defense of the bodily assumption collapses.

Correct. And yet you do not have anything but your personal interpretation because you've admitted that you do not have an infallible interpretation of Acts 15, correct?

No, because I also have your failure to show us who else is making the decision in Acts 15. Well, we'll let the audience determine who's failed in dealing with Acts 15.

No, no, I didn't say who's failed, Dr. White. I just said you haven't shown me who else is making the decision besides the church in Acts 15.

That's what I said. But the point is that this entire dogma which you have said has the same authority, the same foundation as the resurrection of Jesus Christ is based upon a non -infallibly interpreted text in Acts 15 that's not talking about Mary, has no reference to Mary, has no reference to bodily assumption, and in fact is highly disputed as to who's making the determination and its use of the

Old Testament. That's the foundation upon which we have to stand to believe the bodily assumption of Mary.

Is that the case? No, the church made the decision, Dr. White, in Acts 15. The church made all the decisions that you find came up in the

New Testament. There is no place in the New Testament that you can show me that someone other than the church made the decision.

I'm done. Thank you, Dr. White. Dr. St. Janice, 10 -minute closing, please.

Okay. Well, I believe that Acts 15 is the crux of this issue.

And that's why I spent so much time on it tonight. If I did not believe that the church had the power to make these major decisions for us,

I would not be here tonight. I can tell you that very honestly. But what

I am doing is using the very tool that Dr. White believes is the inspiring word of God to show him that the

Bible itself tells us when there are instances where we don't have scripture and tradition and yet we have a major controversy in the church, what are we going to do?

There was a major controversy, as I mentioned in other remarks, about the nature of Jesus Christ.

We had the Arian heresy develop from that. We had a bunch of other heresies develop from that as well. Who was

Christ was the question. Well, you go to the Bible and you don't get many answers, at least to the very tough questions.

So who's going to answer those questions for us? Did Christ have one will or two wills?

Did he have one nature or two natures? Was he homoousios or homoousios?

Two Greek words that mean something totally opposite. The Arians believed in homoousios.

They carried that heresy for five centuries until it was finally quashed. So who's going to decide those things for us?

We can all believe Jesus is God. I believe it. Dr. White believes it. You believe it. When we get into the intricacies of that man, that God man, that's where we got the problems.

That's why we need a church because if we don't have a church to make a decision for us, whether we like it or not, we're just going to create bigger problems.

So that's why Acts 15 is such an important passage for me. And in that passage,

I have pointed out that whether you talk about Peter or James, whoever you want to talk about, whoever is the leader of the church of that day, they gave us a decision, and we follow that decision.

The Old Testament said nothing about circumcision ceasing, not a word. If anything, the Old Testament gave the impression that circumcision should continue.

It was given to Abraham. It didn't start with Moses. It was given to Abraham. The covenant was given to Abraham 2 ,000 years ago, 4 ,000 years ago, and many centuries before Moses came on the scene.

So it wasn't even the Mosaic Law, per se. It became part of the Mosaic Law, but originally it wasn't.

So that even complicates the question that much more. It originally started with Abraham, who was not under the

Mosaic Law, and that was the only sign of the covenant that he was given. And Abraham is used by Paul in Romans 4.

Later on, as a sign of a man of faith, who's justified by faith, a big argument came about the value of circumcision with Abraham.

So Paul makes an argument. Well, he was circumcised after he had faith. Okay. Well, now we know.

Now we know. Okay? What else did we know? Well, we knew when

Peter and James made their decisions in Acts 15, when they said circumcision wasn't going to be practiced.

That's just as valid as when Paul said that Abraham was circumcised after he had faith because Paul was using

Scripture then. He went back to Genesis 15, showed that Abraham believed before Genesis 17.

Very wise argument. Okay? But we don't find that here in Acts 15.

You know, Dr. White made the argument earlier. He says, well, doesn't Paul use the Old Testament? Well, of course he does. Of course he does.

When it's available, when it addresses the issue, yes. But apparently in Acts 15, the issue about whether the

Gentiles should practice circumcision was not addressed in the Old Testament. You know, in Acts 17, the

Thessalonians had the same problem. You know, they didn't want to believe Paul's preaching about Jesus because they couldn't find

Jesus in the Old Testament. Very important passage, just two chapters later.

It says, now, when they had traveled through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, where there was a synagogue of the

Jews. And according to Paul's custom, he went to them, and for three Sabbaths reasoned with them from the

Scriptures, explaining and giving evidence that the Christ had to suffer and rise again from the dead, saying, this

Jesus whom I am proclaiming to you is the Christ. And some of them were persuaded and joined

Paul and Silas. What was the problem with that for these people? Well, they all had an idea that the

Messiah was coming. Isaiah 53 was pretty clear about the Messiah coming, but it didn't use the word

Jesus. It used the word Christ because that means

Messiah, but it didn't use the word Jesus. So when Paul comes and tells them that this

Jesus whom I'm telling you about is the Christ, well, now, it's a matter of whether they're going to accept what he says.

He can talk about Scripture until he's blue in the face, but it doesn't prove his argument, because Scripture doesn't mention

Jesus. This is now a matter of faith. So where's Paul getting this information? Well, of course, he gets it from his experience.

He knew Jesus. He met Jesus on the Damascus Road. So he can testify about Jesus.

That's what's happening here. So what he's doing is coordinating Scripture with his experience.

So, again, we have the same thing. We have the church making the decision.

When Scripture is not clear, they make the decision for us. When tradition is not clear, they make the decision for us.

Granted, there's a lot of things in Scripture. The Trinity is just dripping from Scripture. I will admit that.

I think it has to be extracted properly because the word Trinity is not in the Scripture. And we have various threads of the

Son and the Holy Spirit and the Father all throughout the Old Testament that really have to be unwrapped and put back together to get a proper understanding of what the

Trinity is. That it's not three gods. That it's not three phases of God.

These are all the doctrines that were taught back in those early centuries. And the church, who was the one who said no to them?

It was the church of that day. It was the councils of that day. The very Trinity that Dr.

White believes in was given to him by those councils who were confirmed by popes.

And those very councils were the very councils that gave Dr. White a head start to have him write his book on the

Trinity so that he didn't have to reinvent the wheel, so that he didn't have to go and say, well, a

Sibelianism was wrong, or a Tritheism was wrong, or a

Patryposenism was wrong. No, that was all done ahead of time for him, and me, and you, by the church.

You can go back and read those councils and those popes who confirmed them in the 2nd, and the 3rd, and the 4th century.

They had the authority to make those decisions, and they did. So why are we going to begrudge that same authority 2 ,000 years hence to decide this rather innocuous doctrine about the

Assumption of Mary? Is it really going to hurt? Is the Assumption of Mary really going to upset your

Christian life? I don't think so. I don't think so.

What Dr. White wants you to believe is that the Assumption of Mary is adding to the Gospel. Is it?

Not really. Not at all. Was Peter adding to the

Gospel in Acts chapter 15 without using Scripture or tradition? Was James?

Can you show me anywhere in the Old Testament where circumcision was prophesied to cease? You can't.

They made a decision. Okay? Same decision they made about the Assumption of Mary in 1950.

If you can prove otherwise, you can go on believing what you're believing. But I don't think that's happened tonight.

My time is up. Thank you very much. Thank you, Dr. St. Janus. Dr.

White, 10 -minute closing, please. Does it really matter if you believe in the bodily

Assumption of Mary? The statement has been made that we have the exact same foundation for believing the bodily

Assumption of Mary that we have in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. My friends, the resurrection of Jesus Christ is the very heart and soul of the

Gospel of Jesus Christ. And Rome, which claims to be the one true church, says you cannot be a member of me if you do not believe these things.

That's not adding to the Gospel. What would be? What would be? Listen to how differently

Augustine argues than Dr. St. Janus does. "'What does homoousios mean?'

I ask, but the Father and I are one. I should not, however, introduce the Council of Nicaea to prejudice the case in my favor, nor should you introduce the

Council of Ariminum that way. I am not bound by the authority of Ariminum, and you are not bound by that of Nicaea.

By the authority of the Scriptures that are not the property of anyone, but the common witness for both of us, let position do battle with position, case with case, and reason with reason.'"

That's how Augustine argued. That's how the early church argued. They did not argue for the Trinity the way

Dr. St. Janus does. Athanasius never argued for the Trinity. He went to the Scriptures. He never said, "'Well, the

Pope said so,' because the Pope hadn't said so. No one dreamed that the Pope was the final authority in that day to begin with.

That was the problem.'" You've heard a lot about Acts chapter 15 tonight.

You know what I just did? I just did a search of all of the entire document,

Munificent Isimus Deus. And by the way, if you can say that three times fast, you're a good person. I just searched the entire document.

Guess what? Acts chapter 15's never cited there. In fact, there's one reference to Acts 20 -28, but Acts chapter 15's never once cited there yet.

All night long, all we hear about is Dr. St. Janus' unique against the vast majority of modern interpreters' understanding of Acts chapter 15 is the reason that you should believe.

Even though Paul demonstrates the Old Covenant did prophesy these things, even though he says in Colossians chapter 2 that regeneration is the fulfillment of circumcision in the

Old Covenant, even though all of that's there, no, you take my interpretation, and that's why you should believe what a man in Rome said in 1950 when nobody in the early church believed a word that man had to say.

My friends, that is utter capitulation. Utter capitulation.

I hope we never hear a Roman Catholic apologist ever again saying, we are bound by Scripture and tradition.

And I hope I never hear a Roman Catholic apologist ever again say, well, as Vincent of Lorraine said, that which has always been believed by everyone everywhere is what binds us because the bodily assumption of Mary shows us that none of those things are even slightly truthful.

They say them all the time. Shame on them. They shouldn't be saying it all in light of what we've heard this evening.

May I remind you of the texts that I gave you that have not even slightly been touched in regards to the fact that the early church testifies that this form of use of Scripture or non -use of Scripture is invalid.

How can Augustine, in debating an Arian, say,

I can't quote Nicaea of you and you can't quote Ariminum of me. See, Ariminum was a council that came after Nicaea.

Are you all aware that for 40 years Nicaea had to fight for acceptance? Nicaea settled nothing

By the way, the Arians believed in heteroousias not homoousias. Nicaea settled nothing.

Athanasius was kicked out of his sea five times for refusing to submit to councils that met that had more bishops in them than met at Nicaea.

And upon what basis did he do that? Scripture says from Dr.

St. Genesis' perspective Athanasius was wrong. He would have to have given in to the majority of the church that spoke.

Council after council condemned him but he wouldn't give in. Why? Because as he said the holy and inspired

Scriptures are sufficient of themselves for the preaching of the truth.

Is the body assumption of Mary true? Then would Athanasius have preached it? Would Athanasius have agreed?

Who would Athanasius have agreed with tonight? He wouldn't have agreed with Dr. St.

Genesis. He said, These canonical books are the fountains of salvation so that he who thirsts may be satisfied with the oracles contained in them.

In these alone the school of piety preaches the gospel. Let no man add to or take away from them.

Which is exactly what Pius XII did in November of 1950. Remember St.

Cyril of Jerusalem? A bishop in the church doing catechesis.

Even to me who tell you these things do not give ready belief unless you receive from the holy

Scriptures the proof of the things which I announce. Given his own statement could

Cyril of Jerusalem have ever believed what Pius XII said? And if not how can

Pius XII claim to be the continuation of the church of Cyril of Jerusalem? Is there not a fundamental discontinuity here?

Let me point something out to all of our Roman Catholic friends here this evening. There is not a single bishop of the

Council of Nicaea that believes what you believe as a Roman Catholic today. Not a one. Not a one.

There is nobody there that believed in papal infallibility. There is nobody there that believed in immaculate conception. There is nobody there that believed in bodily assumption.

There is nobody there that believed in such things as purgatory. Nobody. How can you claim that your church is 2 ,000 years old?

Oh, well, we've got this line. But if the people back here believe something completely different than the people up here what does this line mean?

Now, I would dispute the line. There is all sorts of breaks in that line. Ever heard of the Babylonian captivity of the church?

The pornocracy? But the fact of the matter is may

I suggest something to you? The only meaningful apostolic succession is an apostolic succession of truth.

The only people who follow in the footsteps of the apostles are the people who preach what the apostles taught.

And they never taught the bodily assumption. They never taught the immaculate conception.

They never taught that the Bishop of Rome, there wasn't even a single bishop in Rome until 140

A .D. The church in Rome existed for nearly 100 years and nobody thought, you know, we should only have one bishop.

They had a plurality of elders there. When Ignatius wrote to the church at Rome he didn't even mention a bishop there because he knew they didn't have a single bishop there.

They had a plurality of elders. There is such a massive disconnection between what you always hear from Rome's representatives, it's the 2 ,000 year old faith of the church and the reality of Scripture and history.

That's why Newman had to come up with the development hypothesis. He had to abandon the historical field of battle because the historical field of battle destroys

Roman pretensions. Oh, and I know Roman Catholics, church history is ours.

My friends, it is not. And if it was, Newman would never have had to come up with this theory.

We make the Holy Scriptures the canon and rule of every dogma. That's what

Gregory of Nyssa said. But he speaks with a voice of the mid -4th century. He does not speak with the voice of Rome of 1950.

But there are still people who speak with that voice. There are still people today who say that the salvation which we believe is not proved from clever reasoning but from the

Holy Scriptures. But Rome anathematizes those people. So what does that tell you about Rome?

It is Rome that has separated herself by her claims of infallibility and papal authority from the church of Jesus Christ.

That church Christ has continued to build and He will continue to build. The gates of Hades will not prevail against that church.

But you see, all evening, Dr. Syngenis has assumed church equals Rome, church equals Rome. I say to you, church equals all those redeemed by the grace of Jesus Christ.

And as a result, who follow in His footsteps and who thirst for His truth hear

His voice in His Word and they will not follow another.

There are many false shepherds who have arisen. That's what Pius XII was. False shepherds who have deceived the sheep.

The bodily assumption of Mary is neither biblical nor historical. It is not binding.

It is an addition to the gospel that must be rejected. All of history and all of Scripture testifies to this truth.