You once chastised me for posting articles without comment. I have noticed a pattern with you too. You don't ever comment or even attempt to refute some of the points made in these very posts. That is why I stressed that to read some of these things one must be intellectually honest. I know it hurts to read these sometimes for you. YOUR silence speaks volumes to everyone. As far as my Lent, try it sometime. Yeah yeah we know, you do Lent everyday...
1. I don't believe the pope is any more central than any other person that claims Jesus to be their Lord and Savior. I have no problem with the traditions of setting dates for Easter. We've gone over that before. I do have problems with Friday being the day of execution, leaning more toward early Thursday, or possibly even Wednesday, owing to Jonah being three days And nights in the belly of the fish, symbolic of Christ in the grave.
2. You can use all the signs you want to vanquish your demons. Eph 6:12 - I don't see anything anywhere about any sign of the cross in any part of the whole armor of God.
3. We never reject fasting, we never recognize the emblems as being the actual blood and flesh of Christ, and the only sacrifice we need to do during communion/breaking of bread, etc., is the only sacrifice we can actually do at that time, giving our time, minds, and heart to the Lord in the best manner we can at that time to simply remember Him as he simply requested his disciples to carry on forward.
4. The emblems are just symbols, and partaking of them can in no way be necessary for salvation. Once saved, always saved. If one continues in sin, they need to take a good, hard, inward look at their sincerity when they professed knowing the Lord. Acts 19:3-5? Although the disciples of Jesus had mostly been baptized by John the B., this new baptism in the name of Christ was in order as a PUBLIC TESTIMONY of their new faith in Christ.
5. Again, I and my born again Christian brother and sisters are not Gnostics, and side with neither Catholics or them. Just go with the Bible story of the arrival of Christ. 2 John 1:7, John said what he said, meant it at the time, and I have no problem with it.
6. People need to be individually in union with Christ, not any pope or any other designated leader. The Bible calls all believers saints.
Six topics, a lot of words, but only three Biblical references. Does the rest come from men's writings and the sacred Catholic traditions?
We'll continue to agree to philosophically disagree, and I do it without any inferences to name calling.
Enjoy the rest of Lent. I will.
