Catholicism

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[theresearchpersona]

(Debate continued from this thread.)

Look, there are millions of anti-Catholic chat rooms around the globe. Can you'all post there? Frankly this is really offensive to say nothing about mis-

informed.  I don't want to start a huge and completely pointless theological debate which would do nothing but hurt feelings. Let's save this stuff for Ihatecatholics.com.

No "theological debate" is pointless: "Theology" means "word about God", that is, "Theology" is the doctrine of who God really is, what he is...and all other information and understanding about Him. Further, the gospel is itself offensive according to the word.

Might I make a suggestion, then?

If there is going to be debating of doctrinal/theological issues that are not GCx related, can it please go in its own forum (or at the very least, in its own separate thread, CLEARLY LABELED) so that those of us who don't want to read it can avoid it?

Post-gc, our family chose to attend/join a Catholic Church.  If I want to hear all about how Catholicism is evil, I'll go visit my local GCx affiliate.

As a deciple and friend of Jesus I am commanded to "contend for the faith once [ONLY, that's why some put "once for all"] deliverd to the saints".

And I wish you to know...I don't write any of this because of hatred, neither wanting to offend, though it may be offensive; offenses will come, remember? Thing is, I do care.

My grandmothers, great aunts, aunts, uncles...are Catholic. My grandmother and her sisters are from Ireland. My mom, aunts, and uncles grew up confirmed Catholics. This stuff matters...and wanting to avoid the painful stuff would be as bad as if my oncologist had told me "no, you don't have cancer" (I did). It would be like me saying "no, you're not in any danger". Another gospel, another Christ, cannot save you; and Jesus and His Apostles wouldn't be so adamant of warning us about wolves, false teachers, Satan's angels and ministers who can transform themselves into angels/ministers of light, and so on if there wasn't truly concern and danger.

Now, who is bashing or hating who? Christians who want to lovingly warn Catholics who receive a false Christ and doctrines of traditions of men exalted above scripture, the Word which God says He has exalted above all? Or Catholicism which states ALL salvation is subject to..the POPE, that indulgences may save people, that mary is co-redemtrix, and that Christ's sacrifice on the cross was not sufficient, because he must be re-sacrificed over and over and over again in the Eucharist to impart cleansing...and that then those who die must go to purgatory to pay (themselves) for their sins which didn't get cleansed...though they teach we may buy masses to be prayed for the dead to haste their delivery from purgatory.

The Pope even assumes the title "Vicar of Christ". "Vicar" means "in place of", did you know that? That's the equivalent meaning of the Greek term "antichrist". Paul wrote "even now there are many antichrists". Early churchmen wrote that the Holy Spirit was the Vicar of Christ.

The Church is the pillar and bastion of Truth, its parts are commanded to defend it, the Truth. We must for the sake of the Lamb who deserves our affections and singleness of the eye. WHEREVER the perversion of it, or any deception, is found, the Church must take up arms, not of fists, but the Sword of the Spirit, the words of God. You happen to be having this intercourse with a man who has a watch around his wrist, blessed by the Pope, that if "used" on certain catholic Holy Days would supposedly grant a plenary and complete indulgence from all sin, according to the catholic church's official teachings. Salvation apart from Jesus is a deception: an illusion; and any spirit that denies Jesus the Christ explicity OR implicitly is an antichrist.

Vatican II also reaffirm anethema against all Christians not under Rome's authoritarian domination. The organization that slaughtered MILLIONS; at times they ordered the extermination of whole cities, whole demographics, or whole sects; Rome declares these men, who are monsters, who effectively claim to be Christ AND to speak for God and even subject His word to their own by speaking "ex cathedra", "infallible". For this binding Catholic dogma they will not even refute the teachings of Popes who did wipe out entire cities out of their interests, and initiate the persecution of Christians not only throughout Europe, Africa, the Middle East, and so on...but commensed to slaughter Christians who would not join them wherever their missionaries arrives (India, Ireland, and so on).

No, I will not cease to offend you... if it is by the Truth. Search the scriptures. You'd rather escape the authoritarianism of GCM for more spiritual despots who can give you no life? You either need Christ, or you have been thoroughly deceived and haven't learned Rome's doctrines...and you may never, either, as they're not often known to really teach, instead they perpetuate the pagan mass.

Beware and take heed...I have nothing to gain, no bone to pick, only Jesus the Christ the Son of the Living God who is the only name by which we must be saved, who was God incarnate come of a SINFUL (not immaculate) but virgin woman named Mary, the law-giver come under the law, who lived a spotless and righteous life, the only ever amongst men, fully God and fully man, the person of the Godhead the Son, who gave himself obeying the will of His Father after delivering the Words of His Father to be crucified while the fullness of the Deity dwelt within him, and die, be buried, and rise again, according to the scriptures, raised unto life and glory by the Father that all that Believe in him, those whom the Father gave Him before the foundations of the World, may be saved and be crucified and buried with Him, and be raised unto life with Him, being not alive of themselves but having the very light of Life within them, Christ, shining out into this dark and rebellious world to be hated and accused, persecuted...but having joy in their only Hope and trust, Jesus the Messiah, the Lamb Who was a perfect and complete offering, the Son of God.

I won't leave you unaided by any other sources, though. There is the Bible, which I say go to first for all authority and instruction as it is sufficient for every good work, contains the whole of the Lord's counsel, and the very words of Him who is Life itself.

Here are videos of Richard Bennet, a man who was a devoted Roman Catholic and then priest for most of his life. Since he knew the scriptures he began to recognize things that were very bad within the church...and then, eventually, with no papers or help, left and found Christians who took him in and taught him the true gospel, and saw to it that they observed him to discern whether he was reborn or not:

The Eucharist |http://youtube.com/watch?v=cVJ0WEIu5P4
The ABCs of Catholicism (60) |http://youtube.com/watch?v=u2p7sJ5A7TA&feature=related

here is a video by a Mr. David Hunt:

A Woman Rides the Beast - Dave Hunt |http://youtube.com/watch?v=w5Ke7Tn3uOU

And you will find neither of these men hate Catholics. May you lose your life for Christ's sake, and find the Life of Him (Jesus).

[Truth Lover]

Re: Theresearchpersona ~

Yes, he does speak the Truth in love, and ones would do well to listen to him about this important subject!

[namaste]

While I appreciate your efforts in typing all of that out, I'd like to point out that, again, I'm not interested an iota in what you're saying.  My issue is not being unqualified to debate the theological positions of the Catholic Church, my issue is that I've stated quite plainly both here and elsewhere that the Catholic Church is the best possible place for me and my family at this time.

I really can't bring myself to give a flying flip what your opinion about the Catholic Church, "truth," or anything else regarding my personal spiritual opinions is.  The fact of the matter is that it's my choice, and my personal spiritual life is none of your business.

Now, I believe that it was made clear that if you wanted to continue this discussion, it should be continued in a separate location, and clearly labeled.  If you'd like to continue this, please do so elsewhere, and avoid hijacking this thread.

If I may say so, your continuing this, in plain disrespect to me, after acknowledging your comments and requesting to excuse myself from the discussion, is AWFULLY familiar.  It sounds like what a GCx-er (or heck, a freaking Jehovah's Witness!) would do.

Bug off.

[theresearchpersona]

I'm sorry if you're hurt/offended, and my apologies about the topic vs. the thread (though GCM has related tendencies as the RCC and it's also pertinent to the subject, if not wholly consistent with it), so again, sorry about that. However I'm still commanded by Jesus, and we're commanded not to bear anyone with a false gospel or another Christ. God cares about the sparrows, and he doesn't even delight in the death of the wicked (though it's His pleasure to execute judgment and pour-out wrath against sin), so he must care about you and your family too. And while I mean no trespass, anyone who claims Christ could be a brother or sister, and thus they are my business (as I am theirs), for we are told "love one another", "prefer one another", "bear one anothers burdens", "rebuke error publicly", and so on; we need to protect one another, and any claimant to Jesus is worth contending with, and for.

Please don't see "me", but what I wrote is true...and I ask that you examine the Scriptures to determine this, that's wise (See Jesus's prayer for His sheep in John 17), and noble (Acts 17:11). I'm also very sorry about something else. GCM mixes much error with some truth, and some of the truth it preaches isn't really, because it's twisted: they twist it. They don't hold to the form of sound words...and if they're confronted with that, they say "I know his heart"; trouble is that the Word says only God knows our hearts.

If in any way I seem like GCM to you, I hope it is in the aspects that are good...however without the twisting. You wouldn't think, however, that taking anyone into the Jehovah's witnesses, Mormons, Rastafarians, or others could be a "best place", would you? The Catholic Church also twists and squirms...but on a whole other level: by magnitudes. I'm only giving warning...and I repeat I'm ordered by my Lord to bring every thought captive...to speak the Truth (in love) and not permit error: his Church needs be kept pure for himself. I don't ask that you simply assent to my "opinion" but learn of Him in His Word: I come from a Catholic background, remember? There's a LOT that I believed contrary to the Word...and it was quite offensive and even stung at times when the Word undid it, but I trust His hands more than my own thoughts. Please consider and hear...and if you don't know of any other Christians around for fellowship, please pray for it. The Catholics labor under a gospel of works righteousness, some of them very earnestly yet they will not enter heaven that way nor know God; and this robs them of the grace of God, by this they're made twice the child of hell, just like the Pharisees did of those they proselytized; Rome does the same by subjegating and re-defining the Word with its traditions.

The difference between Rome, GCM, and myself, in this regard...and I'm relying on the spirit to testify with me, is that they want control, and subjegation, and even to build the kingdom here on earth (Rome explicity, GCM implicity though some of them may not realize it); I wish no such thing, need not your subjegation, nor following: I only wish you to follow the one True Good Shepherd. And that is Jesus Christ.

You may be interested to know that some of those on this forum specified Romish practice and teaching in GCM as contributing to its many other problems, and why it left (like Apostolic Succession type leadership recognition).

I also empathize for wanting a place for your family...the Christians I know taken with error are my family, and I want a place and especially safety for them too: but you won't find it through a "best place", but rather you need a body where they won't compromise or tolerate error, nor try to perpetuate it.

Here are some food for you:

2 Cor 6:
And working together with him we entreat also that ye receive not the grace of God in vain (for he saith, At an acceptable time I hearkened unto thee, And in a day of salvation did I succor thee: behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation): giving no occasion of stumbling in anything, that our ministration be not blamed; but in everything commending ourselves, as ministers of God, in much patience, in afflictions, in necessities, in distresses, in stripes, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labors, in watchings, in fastings; in pureness, in knowledge, in long suffering, in kindness, in the Holy Spirit, in love unfeigned, in the word of truth, in the power of God; by the armor of righteousness on the right hand and on the left, by glory and dishonor, by evil report and good report; as deceivers, and yet true; as unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and behold, we live; as chastened, and not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing all things. Our mouth is open unto you, O Corinthians, our heart is enlarged. Ye are not straitened in us, but ye are straitened in your own affections. Now for a recompense in like kind (I speak as unto my children), be ye also enlarged. Be not unequally yoked with unbelievers: for what fellowship have righteousness and iniquity? or what communion hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what portion hath a believer with an unbeliever? And what agreement hath a temple of God with idols? for we are a temple of the living God; even as God said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Wherefore Come ye out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, And touch no unclean thing; And I will receive you, And will be to you a Father, And ye shall be to me sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty. (ASV)


Matthew 16:19, which deserves commentary. Here's the KJV:
"And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven."

Rome says this means Peter received these keys alone and through Apostolic Succession (as if the preacher of the Gospel to the circumcision would actually be in Rome of Gentiles) the Pope's and Rome's ministration control access to heaven; the Bible says it's Jesus alone ("no other name"). But it's luke 11:52 that's important here: "Woe to you, lawyers! [the law's experts/interpreters/etc.] for ye have taken away the key of knowledge: ye entered not in yourselves, and them that were entering in ye hindered." That tells us the key, it's not these men. Further, no translation seems to translate teh verbs in Matt 16:19 correctly for being so awkard, which gives the sense that heaven is responding to Peter. However it's the other way around, and I offer my humble attempt (simply by giving the verb tenses as they are in Greek):

"And I shall be giving thee the keys of the kingdom of the heavens, and whatsoever thou-should-bind upon the earth will-be, having-been-bound in the heavens; an whatsoever thou-should-be-loosing upon the earth will-be, having-been-loosed in the heavens."

Notice it's "having-been (already)". GCM's problem is false teaching...which leads to false practice (the technical term is "heteropraxy"). Please, and I do beg, don't take your family from danger to danger...and I empathize as I know others in bad places which need help...and who want a place themselves, just like you do for your family.

You can also look something up, if you will. Rome now admits in its encycloopedias that it is the "Babylon" of scripture in the NT; thing is, the sense of which "Babylon" depends on contexts, and is not a blanket-label; the reason is they try to claim that therefore Peter must have come to Rome, however it's not sound. The offical teaching also states that "Mystery" is the heart of their teaching, especially in the Eucharist, and they declare (I quote) "(It is Mystogogy"). Revelation after describing this Mystery Babylong, immediately address the Saints; the last time I read this I was in a Catholic mass and opened-up my Bible and it opened right here to this passage: "After these things I saw another angel come down from heaven, having great power; and the earth was lightened with his glory. And he cried mightily with a strong voice, saying, Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird. For all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth are waxed rich to the abundance of her delicacies. And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues." (Revelation 18:1-4)

"But if any of you lacketh wisdom, let him ask of God, who giveth to all liberally and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him. But let him ask in faith, nothing doubting: for he that doubteth is like the surge of the sea driven by the wind and tossed. For let not that man think that he shall receive anything of the Lord; a doubleminded man, unstable in all his ways." (James 1)

2 Cor 11:1-4 (KJV)
"Would to God ye could bear with me a little in my folly: and indeed bear with me. For I am jealous over you with godly jealousy: for I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ. But I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. For if he that cometh preacheth another Jesus, whom we have not preached, or if ye receive another spirit, which ye have not received, or another gospel, which ye have not accepted, ye might well bear with him."

Galatians 1:1-9
"Paul, an apostle (not from men, neither through man, but through Jesus Christ, and God the Father, who raised him from the dead), and all the brethren that are with me, unto the churches of Galatia: Grace to you and peace from God the Father, and our Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins, that he might deliver us out of this present evil world, according to the will of our God and Father: to whom be the glory for ever and ever. Amen. I marvel that ye are so quickly removing from him that called you in the grace of Christ unto a different gospel; which is not another gospel only there are some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ. But though we, or an angel from heaven, should preach unto you any gospel other than that which we preached unto you, let him be anathema.  As we have said before, so say I now again, if any man preacheth unto you any gospel other than that which ye received, let him be anathema."

With Love.

[skewed_grace]

theresearchpersona,

while a lot of what you are saying is kind of logical.. i have to say, to me, you come off as very legalistic. and it was partly the reason why i left the GCM church.

you have to understand that everybody comes from a different background, everybody goes through different life scenarios...and, finally, everybody's perception of certain SPIRITUAL things is different. so when a person like you comes and tries to shove down the throat a pill that he/she adamantly believes will save everybody, it's called a GRINDER. once started, it will keep spinning and churning out zealots like you. for walmart, apparantly, this mass production of  cheap goods has served a gread deal, but for people who are truly seeking it will NOT work. so when you go on a tirade allegedly under the aegis of saving the world, it's when for me YOU become a product of the mass production, a wound-up Japanese toy (produced probably in China) that goes around and continuosly "preach" AT people.

I am just learning about Orthodoxy and Catholicism myself. And let me tell you, there is a depth that you might never fathom...unless you truly try to get out of your shell and HUMBLY try to understand what's been bulit brick by brick for centuries. although i agree, to be a Lone Star Ranger versed in the letter of the law is easier.

[theresearchpersona]

Legalism isn't speaking the truth or the whole counsel of God, including the law; it is binding those who might otherwise be rescued by the grace of God to traditions of men and not those of the Lord;

Traditions aren't in themselves bad, however when they affront God's own itent and commands, they are. I repeat, we are COMMANDED as the pillar and bastion of truth (the Church) to contend for the faith; I don't think it would be improper to translate it "war"; for our war isn't against flesh and blood; our sword isn't armaments, but the Sword of the Spirit, which is God's Word. Jesus said that if we love him, we obey his commands, he says that his sheep abide in his word; those who don't do these things aren't His; what's more, those who do these things in order to obtain for themselves salvation apart from the birth of the Holy Spirit wholly trusting in His work, and not ours, is also deceived.

I understand Catholicism well enough in the light of that Word, and orthodoxy...I have Catholics who are trying to convert me...but they don't realize their dead system of legalism will not turn me from the grace of my Lord and His person so long as His remains first, and I do very much hope I am one of those who he has prayed for, and actually trust that I am not because of my works, or that I've prayed, or that I'm perfect or whatever...but because of what He did, and the death of who I was.

In Catholicism one must continually re-sacrifice Christ (contrary to the gospel), do works for salvation rather than the works being the natural outflow of a regenerated new man who's faith produces those works intrinsically; must have grace imparted by men through the "sacraments", which they actually teach as being the means by which the Holy Spirit is imparted by the priests to those participating in the mass; the Bible says the Spiritual man is unpredictable, and that the Holy Spirit is not under any man's subjegation, nor bound, but free and doing the Father's will, sent by Jesus.

And I'm sorry, but I notice that you've linked zealousy with a negative conotation: being a "zealot" isn't what is bad, it's zeal without knowledge that God warns against, but to act in zeal according to knowledge, soberly (not in excitement), obeying God for His sake out of loving Him...is our joy. And frankly knowledge does not equal legalism; notice Jesus never condemned even the scribes and pharisees for their knowledge, men who know the OT by heart, but that they missed the point. Catholicism doesn't just miss the point, but does so deliberately and openly declares that all must be brought under its dominion and kingdom. This is their teaching...and you want me to praise how "deep" they go...into hell. It's appropriate that in Dante's works he found the popes in the deepest circles of hell. Please don't be deceived; remember that John was awed by what he saw in Revelation, and the angel's asked "why do you marvel", and God destroyed the city He actually calls a "whore". Spiritual adultery is a serious thing.

Please don't get yourself enamoured with Catholicism or Orthodoxy, which are two groups that claim spiritual dominion over the earth, but rather with Christ and His Word.

And thanks for moving this all to an appropriate thread Mr. (?) Puff.

And guys, here's something important. What MANY sects do, whether genuinely christian or heretically antichrist, is place themselves between the people and God's Word. A preacher's duty is simply to read it, and exposit, and make sure he divides it correctly (as every other Christian is commanded) ad correct error and focus on teaching to exhort and maintain sound doctrine: doctrine isn't legalism, it's about Jesus the Christ; when, however, through praxy (practice) or doctrine (doxy) teachers set themselves between the people and the Word, the people and the Holy Spirit, between the people and the Father, they're false teachers.

GCM does this through twisted descipleship; we ARE to teach everything Christ commanded as he told us, but we're to do so with the realization we're not the desciplers, Jesus is the shepherd and He's the one we're to be desciples to; GCM does this through open heresy too, saying officially "God speaks to leaders first" (Mark Darling). Some of the DT leaders even acknowledge this is heretical and stepping between God and His sheep; Catholicism does it in grace, atonement, the Holy Spirit, the Father and Son, the Word, and all other things; they want more than anything to regain earthly power; even the policies of the inquisition are fully in place in The "Holy" Office.

Sometime you might want to pay attention to how many words in the NT (and OT for that matter) have to do with knowledge and the intellect; EVERYTHING we're told to do is "according to knowledge"; that's not just info about nothing, but about our precious savior, His and His Father's intent.

Whether someone be a teacher/pastor/elder, or simply the learner, when it comes to the Word it ought to be as this, here is His and Our job; the preacher should make this point that as the assembly gathers for teaching he tells them "raise your bibles up in front of your face" (so that they cannot see him): that's the point.

[skewed_grace]

Dear Theresearchpersona:

i read your post. thank you so much! it spoke to my heart. i felt prompted to kneel and pray to god to forgive me for going astray. i also prayed to accept Jesus in my heart. Now He is on the throne of my life.

Now that i am saved and you are accomplished, maybe you need to go and save other people.

P.S. forum fellas, can you please warn me next time. thanks.

[theresearchpersona]

It's Jesus that has accomplished his work; but among ourselves we're also commanded to stand for one another. Why do you think I'm trying to pull something? And for what reason do you lash at me with sarcasm and attitude? Engage what I said and examine it rather than taking shots and trying to humor yourself, will you? As God says in the word, "gird up the loins of your mind"; it's pleasing to Him.

James 1: (ASV)
"1 James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes which are of the Dispersion, greeting.
2 Count it all joy, my brethren, when ye fall into manifold temptations; 3 Knowing that the proving of your faith worketh patience. 4 And let patience have its perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, lacking in nothing.

5 But if any of you lacketh wisdom, let him ask of God, who giveth to all liberally and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him. 6 But let him ask in faith, nothing doubting: for he that doubteth is like the surge of the sea driven by the wind and tossed. 7 For let not that man think that he shall receive anything of the Lord; 8 a doubleminded man, unstable in all his ways.

9 But let the brother of low degree glory in his high estate: 10 and the rich, in that he is made low: because as the flower of the grass he shall pass away. 11 For the sun ariseth with the scorching wind, and withereth the grass: and the flower thereof falleth, and the grace of the fashion of it perisheth: so also shall the rich man fade away in his goings.

12 Blessed is the man that endureth temptation; for when he hath been approved, he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord promised to them that love him. 13 Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God; for God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempteth no man: 14 but each man is tempted, when he is drawn away by his own lust, and enticed. 15 Then the lust, when it hath conceived, beareth sin: and the sin, when it is fullgrown, bringeth forth death. 16 Be not deceived, my beloved brethren. 17 Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom can be no variation, neither shadow that is cast by turning. 18 Of his own will he brought us forth by the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures.

19 Ye know this , my beloved brethren. But let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath: 20 for the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God. 21 Wherefore putting away all filthiness and overflowing of wickedness, receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls. 22 But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deluding your own selves. 23 For if any one is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a mirror: 24 for he beholdeth himself, and goeth away, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was. 25 But he that looketh into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and'so continueth, being not a hearer that forgetteth but a doer that worketh, this man shall be blessed in his doing.

26 If any man thinketh himself to be religious, while he bridleth not his tongue but deceiveth his heart, this man's religion is vain. 27 Pure religion and undefiled before our God and Father is this, to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unspotted from the world."

[Jason Stauffacher]

+ I was baptized as a baby as a Catholic, as my parents were Catholic in the 1970's.  My middle name is named after one of the Apostles.

+ I went to uni with a Charismatic girl who spoke in tongues and did the Rosary.

+ I did the Stations of the Cross one Christmas with her out of respect and love, as she knew no one that would-as we were at a Baptist College.

+ I dated a Chinese girl who is Catholic, and she was a great kisser.  

+ My best friend is a former-Catholic community director.

+ I like Catholic funerals; the golden oldies cook GREAT food.

+ Mother Theresa lived in India, and I’ve been to India.  Billy Graham maybe visited there once or twice.  She lived with the sick-of-the-sick FOR YEARS.

+ Goa India has Catholic’s all over the place who respect their Hindu counter-parts in that region.

+ Chic tracks HATE Catholics.  VERY VERY TRUE.

+ Jesus loves those that confess him as Lord-Rosary or no Rosary, Goa Indian or even a good kissing Chinese Catholic girls.

-Jason

[theresearchpersona]

And what has any of that to do with the words of God?

And plenty do good things...but whoso denies Christ (explicity or implicitly) is not His, for he said that his own keep and abide in His Words; "many will say to me, Lord, Lord", remember? Are they not confessing? Yet he will say to them "depart from me, I never knew you, yet that work lawlessness".

Mormons do good works...they teach another God, Christ, and Gospel: and openly admit it; they re-define all the terms; Catholics also re-define all the terms...and I didn't learn this from an apologist, but from Catholic teaching, family, friends, priests: and they say they have the authority to subject scripture to their traditions. Catholicism teaches that through baptism babies are added to the body of Christ, rather than by the act of the Father giving the elect to the son, and grace through faith. I would have been "baptized" Catholic as a baby too...my confirmed mother refused to permit it, however, because it's unscriptural; (and she's left the Catholic church, by the way).

We're even told to examine ourselves. If you love that young woman, truly, beyond liking her kiss: I'd warn her if I were you, and especially to cease practicing acts of paganism. Catholicism doesn't even deny it, they say they incorporate and sanctify what the pagans did/do under their authority: but it's still an affront to God.

Thanks, though, for sharing your experiences with us, though I'm not sure how good a kisser a Catholic woman is helps any.

And it's not about our opinions or personal interpretations, but rather we are to lean on the Lord trustingly and rely upon Him to impart His understanding as Jesus promised the Spirit would teach His sheep all they needed, though it doesn't shirk our responsibility toward God who said, "study thyself approved, a workman unto the Lord, rightly dividing the Word of Truth, so that you will not be ashamed".

[namaste]

From another thread:

You still haven't dealt with the substance of what I've been saying. And notice I haven't been very joking about it either, because those matters aren't funny, aren't unimportant, and require seriousness and care.

Perhaps you missed this in my previous posts, so I'll try to be more clear this time.  I have no intention of hashing out the finer points of Catholic theology with you.  You seem to think you know everything, so surely you also know that there are about ten gazillion websites in defense of Catholicism that debunk the vitriol you're spewing point by point.

But that's neither here nor there.  I really don't care what you think about what church I go to.  Frankly (in case you've missed this), it's none of your business.  Where I worship is between myself and God.

I realize that when you have an uber narrow view of doctrine and theology, and that when you put God in a box, it's easy to have spiritual tunnel vision.  Why we go to a Catholic Church has nothing to do with you.  It's not an attack or insult to you that we choose to do so.  Your attempts to engage me on this point will fail, because, again, IT'S NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS!

"But if any of you lacketh wisdom, let him ask of God, who giveth to all liberally and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him. But let him ask in faith, nothing doubting: for he that doubteth is like the surge of the sea driven by the wind and tossed. For let not that man think that he shall receive anything of the Lord; a doubleminded man, unstable in all his ways." (James 1)

I thought about "seeing your James and raising you Proverbs," but I think it's a lot simpler than that.  If you find inserting yourself into my personal spiritual life to be a reasonable and productive thing to do, your time would be much more wisely spent doing something that doesn't involve me listening to you.  You're talking to a wall here, buddy.

I'm sure your GCx buddies would be highly impressed to hear all about the evils of Catholicism.

[theresearchpersona]

Still obeying...see other posts; and you're still responding. You can't deny the words that are ex cathedra and officially sanctioned teaching...and bless my soul that you should even think to consider teaching me the finer points (seriously); but, thing is, it's the Catholic Church which has complained and demanded that the protestants (and generally anyone else) give up their "specificity" (fine points...those of scripture) to permit their tradition and demands to re-assert themselves. It is the answer to this that "evangelicalism" resembles the end-statements of sunday school a century ago, and that the NAE president that helped write its original documents on their beleifs/purpose/statements said they were giving up protestant "specificity". GCM is just one product of this; and I've never heard them give any real critique of Catholicism, only allusions: I wonder if anyone there has the doctrinal or scriptural ability to demonstrate such a thing. The first I heard of real, open, criticism of Rome in GC was on this board, except for from ex-Catholics there (one of which, at least, may himself be starting to get bugged by many of the things we're discussing here on this board).

I will repeat: God commands "come out from among them" in the NT, concerning those in error, concerning the unclean things, and concerning the spiritual entity described in Revelations, "come out from among her".

Canon 11. If anyone says that men are justified either by the sole imputation of the justice of Christ or by the sole remission of sins, excluding grace and charity which is poured into their hearts by the Holy Spirit and inheres in them, or also that the grace which justifies us is only the favour of God, let him be anathema. (see note 1)

Canon 12. If anyone says that justifying faith is nothing else than confidence in divine mercy, which remits sins for Christ's sake, or that it is this confidence alone that justifies us, let him be anathema.

Canon 24. If anyone says that the justice (righteousness) received is not preserved and also not increased before God through good works but that those works are merely the fruits and signs of justification obtained, but not the cause of the increase, let him be anathema.

Canon 30. If anyone says that after the reception of the grace of justification the guilt is so remitted and the debt of eternal punishment so blotted out to every repentant sinner, that no debt of temporal punishment remains to be discharged either in this world or in purgatory before the gates of heaven can be opened, let him be anathema.

Canon 32. If anyone says that the good works of the one justified are in such manner the gifts of God that they are not also the good merits of him justified; or that the one justified by the good works that he performs by the grace of God and the merit of Jesus Christ (of whom one is a living member), the justified does not truly merit an increase of grace, and eternal life, provided that one dies in the state of grace, the attainment of this eternal life, as well as an increase in glory, let him be anathema."

The "church" you've joined damns us...openly and officially, except for when criticism is levelled at a "priest" being questioned, at whch point they deny Christ and proclaim universalism (in all cases I've ever witnessed...and remember I'm from this background).

So stop playing games, you just don't seem like you want to hear...yet mabye you do. I'm not trying to make you uncomfortable though I'd imagine all this isn't comforting.

"For, whereas Jesus Christ Himself continually infuses his virtue into the said justified, - as the head into the members, and the vine into the branches, - and this virtue always precedes and accompanies and follows their good works, which without it could not in any wise be pleasing and meritorious before God, - we must believe that nothing further is wanting to the justified, to prevent their being accounted to have, by those very works which have been done in God, fully satisfied the divine law according to the state of this life, and to have truly merited eternal life, to be obtained also in its (due) time, if so be, however, that they depart in grace..."

And thus Rome says it's not Christ's finished work, but a continuous work and re-sacrifice (which is officially explained when learning about the "eucharist"); Paul specifically says that if there were a law by which we could have been justified, it would have been the Law of God (that recieved by Moses), but since all are found guilty none will be by that law, and all under it are condemned, except Jesus who was God and not merely man, and who by His sacrifice has justified all who believe to Him.

Here's the Bible:

“Now to him who works, the wages are not counted as grace but as debt. But to him who does not work but believes on Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is accounted for righteousness, just as David also describes the blessedness of the man to whom God imputes (reckons, credits to one’s account) righteousness apart from works” (Romans 4:4-6).


Rome accuses true teaching as being antinomianism, but true teaching is that we're justified by the FINISHED, the FINAL, work of Jesus Christ, believing on Him; and that those born of the spirit are a new man, the old is dead and passed away, dead with Christ, the new man has Christ's own life. Rome, for instance, tries to twist Jame's letter to contradict Paul, but the Bible is emphatic that salvation is by faith in Jesus Christ: by His merit, not our works. James was writing that unevidenced faith is dead--it was never alive in Christ, it was never born, those are the "believers" 1 John is a warning to, to "examine yourselves whether you be in the faith".

I'm not writing this for fun...but for Christ's sake, and for you to turn to him and not to false teachers. Rome is a murderer and accuser of the brethren, who claims authority over all the earth in every aspect, including physically; proclaiming a false Christ, and a false gospel; and you don't want to hear it, but neither do unbelivers who call us names and accuse us of talking to them when they don't hear: and yet witnesses of Christ continue proclaiming His gospel as they were commanded, for love, even when they're murdered for it.

[jehu]

I'm sorry, I read dogma dogma dogma dogma dogma.  Maybe I have a short attention span.  Is this guy for us or agin us?  If it's Jack Chick, I just wanna say, I love your work.  Maybe you should illustrate your posts.

[theresearchpersona]

I know I've harped on this subject before; but when the leadership of an entire massive worldly empire like the Vatican and its Church is openly in opposition to the faith of th Saints: which Faith, for instance, Paul declared by himself being in agreement with, was what confirmed his message and validated his own claims, vs. the centuries of Rome opposing it...that should tell you something.

[lone gone]

TRP,  what are your opinions about Lutherans, Methodists, Presbyterians, Reformed and Episcopalians?  Do they have the Truth or not?

I am truly curious to find out what sub-set of the body of Christ you think  has, holds to, and teaches the genuine Faith that saves?

[miserere]

The question I ask is:  When did the Lord leave the Church??

[theresearchpersona]

TRP,  what are your opinions about Lutherans, Methodists, Presbyterians, Reformed and Episcopalians?  Do they have the Truth or not?

I am truly curious to find out what sub-set of the body of Christ you think  has, holds to, and teaches the genuine Faith that saves?

It's Christ that warned of apostasy, not increased faith; Paul who warned that wolves would arise from amongst and without at his departure.

The Lutherans, Presbyterians, and the Episcopalians...have a common heritage in returning to scripture and seeking obedience and putting their faith in and wholly in Christ: not their works. Today many of these organizations are massively corrupted and unfaithful--by the mouths of their own leadership (just look at the GAFCON meeting in Jerusalem on how to handle the division of the Entire Anglican communion because of apostasy: which may not yet be official on paper, but as far as faith and communion, half of it is separating from the communion of North America and other provinces: and churches in those places are leaving the diocese here and re-aligning with communions in Africa, etc. {often at the cost of being kicked-out of their buildings and such}).

Methodism was born of John Wesley openly preaching AGAINST the faith of these other groups--publicly professing that his was another gospel, and disseminating anti-Whitefield leaflets as soon as Whitefield had left england to go preach in America; today it's church to church...there's many Methodists ones that are near pelagian, yet some oddly have picked-up the Bible and read-out of the "faith" of Wesley and Co. and may align with the faith that Methodism's founder despised.

The Lutherans are still in rebellion on baptism (a man once took several hundred pages to list all the greek uses of the word bapteizen, in-context, showing a literal translation next to the greek, in both Greek use, and in NT use, demonstrating that it never ever has any sense whatsoever other than to immerse or sumberge!), and they also can tread dangerously close to a sacramental gospel; and then entire regions and portions of their associations (at least in Europe, and in Churches elsewhere affiliated with those bodies) have re-associated with Rome in communion; those don't even remember the protest of  Luther anymore; yet there are also many of them who are faithful, and even as we speak such groups as the Missouri Synod are fighting for their soul: the modernists/marketers who (as always) are abusive and concerned with the world and not worship have taken over, and begun an assault to rid the group of any conservative, careful, bible-obedient influencers--shutting down such things as Issues, Etc., and pushing their agendas through; it's making them become quite more popular with the world, but it's causing a lot of misery for those more concerned with obedience than with being appealing to unregenerates.

Yes, I do have a problem: we have a smörgåsbord not of paganism and cults only, but of a self-serve free-for-all, often indulged by men of feeling rather than dividing the word to examine everything, and compare spiritual things with the spiritual.

You'll find plenty passive, soft-spoken, "nice" men are the ones that seem to always turn on and trample upon anyone who gets in the way; they just copied the demeanor of other respected men, and in fact I even remember a recording where a man traced the influence, the source, of the soft-spoken, gentle-seeming, nice-guy thing going-on right now amongst so many at pulpits, to one of the more influential [neo?] evangelicals of late.

Entire thought-movements, non-biblical, that have not only recrudesced out of the past for never being dealt with, but ones of present that also aren't being pulled-up by the roots, examined, and cut down; worse, when they're exposed to be unbiblical, those who know better often dismiss such things as a matter of opinion, or undangerous "but it's edifying" phenomena: and as the faith of Christ is getting replaced by some subtle, and some not so subtle, varieties which appeal to your target demographic or just general public: it seems few are even willing anymore to speak up, and finding anyone even paying attention, or who cares, is becoming more and more difficult.

The biggest "church" denominations are pentecostal and charismatic: with which I have years of experience, and never heard Christ, that is, the Biblical Christ, preached: so bad was it that you cannot even, when you've learned of Him from the word (not being torn apart buy money-mongering hucksters) you cannot even mistake their "Christ" for that of our scriptures.

There's the death-knell to many of the organizations that now stand almost like empty shells, theological liberalism, which cannot be tolerated...we don't get to adapt the Bible and its message to our times and norms; we don't get to re-interpret what has never been questionable; we shouldn't so eagerly returned to the superstition and chaos of the medievil Church and all its mysticism; we do not impugn tradition merely for being tradition (as do some), however we also ought not let it overtake and force upon scripture a meaning absent therein. Romanism does this; Lutheranism even does this...often appealing to Luther who as a man in his time despised (and trumpted furiously against) that anyone would call themselves, as a Christian, after his name at all. Presbyterianism has a somewhat glorious and faithful past, minus the state intrusions, and yet it has large tracts full of, to quote one pastor, "filing cabinet orthodoxy": not knowing what it believes, as it certainly can't be much in the bible, anymore...though I'm glad this is not all of them, and some are dis- and re-associating to escape the unbelieving parading as Christianity.

The things going on are tragic: I'm not interested only in the tiny speck called GC: I'm interested of the sakes of all being drawn-into what is deceitful, and counterfeit, or who are held by it.

And yes I'm against Crusade: it took a bunch of impressionable youth, got them excited, and created a "not church" without elders, without aged to guide, without accountability to stronger theological and doctrinal entities, and substituted a "church militant" where it re-defined that scriptural term to mean evangelism and a social-gospel to transform the world, rather than what is scriptural, "on guard" against the false, deceiving, and sneaky. Did you know that GC leaders have talked about how they're not looking forward to the day they start asking and sending their members to die in regions of the middle east and Saudi Arabia? (Herschel, I'm not kidding). Did you know it's Crusade, specifically Bill Bright who started directing people in such things while he sat on his duff running his enterprise? Ever wonder if these men have considered the probable inability for those here to even understand even the basic cultural norms in such places, or how to have the tact to survive in such environments? In Saudi Arabia relationships don't protect you: they do in communist countries, yet there the zeal for Mohammedanism spurs men to torture their own wives, and families to turn one another in.  

The visible "Church" is in as about as good a shape as it was pre-reformation; it wasn't necessarily always in much better after that, but at least the teachers and theologians were often (not always) not only believing with that childlike simplicity in Christ and the His truthfulness, and often strong in what they did, and adamant to preach it even when unpopular.

Something interesting, I think, however, is how the Reformation is often cast as the development of something new: go into a University and you'll hear that it was a something similar to a pre-enlightenment rationalization and re-systematization of a once mysterious faith; go, however, into the [imperfect, of course] Reformer's writings and they repudiated the such notions as found in the later "enlightenment", and not only that, they read earlier church works and trace history, seeing it important to establish the fact of the Church's doctrines' extancy through time--a smorgasbourg of ideas (so long as you were under Rome's umbrella and left a few things alone), however, paraded about until enough men began examining things and cried out against them: loudly, unpopularly, and often bringing their death; there truly were competing systems, or faiths, rife and at battle within what is now called "Catholicism", and whatever the "Protestors" evaluated and determined according to the Bible, Catholicism suddenly took the opposite stance, often against its own decrees, defending its own authority, and entrenching itself: which sounds like something I've recently gone through. It is perhaps interesting, however, to consider that a minority of men later called "reformers" were responsible, by the opposition they created, for what Rome recreated itself to be.

It's strange how in contention for the faith that once the battle lines get drawn, and the terms are set down, you can even watch someone hop over the line they were on before...I think the "contend for the faith" is something like the method of separating wheat from chaff, because some will stick to and preach what is true, that is, biblical; and some will repudiate it; and those who do not listen to what is true...are those the epistles says are not, and never were, "of us"; but we also want to be charitable (within the limits of scripture, not promiscuously), knowing our imperfect state. But this is probably a very bad analogy, because chaff looks near-identical (or you just cannot plain discern any difference whatsoever) to wheat: today a lot is very obvious, but pointing it out is condemned.

I think I cannot sit passively and thereby disobey; at the same time I know that drawing those lines, after careful study (not principally to battle, but rather to follow the Lord sincerely...the battles will come) is a necessity to be obedient: in order to stand as a witness to Christ, as well as to be able to rebuke whatever errs, and edify according to others' needs (needs, not only imagined or "felt" needs--though there are many legitimate needs we all feel), and that doing so...will probably bring a lot of pain. It's not popular, it's not socially acceptable; but yet we have a situation where varieties of "christianity", not merely different forms of expression, are competing, (only one being THE faith), for our hearts, minds, and ears; and not only this, but they more and more bear resemblance to the very things the NT writes against so fervently, with such conviction: showing not hesitation to be against them, but readiness to pull them out by the roots.

I would honestly be terrified right now, if I didn't trust the Lord in it. It doesn't bode a wonderful social life, or comfortable ecumenism when so many are more eager to tolerate than oppose false gospels and their bearers. I've been feeling terror in the last several days, and I started praying, and it's being assuaged. It's great.

As far as some of the different denominations go:

The commentators I most enjoy:

Keil and Delitzsch (Lutheran, by the way).
Jamiesson, Fausset, Brown (minus any of their dispensationalistic tendencies).

My favorite hymn? Methodist, actually, after it had suffered a couple revisions, at least: while I often strike-out a line or two that's questionable, or replace it.

Some of my best friends? Evangelical. One odd but enduring acquaintance is Episcopal; in fact I technically have Episcopal communion for having been a member at one of the Churches...I was desperately wanting to hear about God, though, and all I kept hearing was short liturgical readings with not application or consideration, and teachings about the cycle of their church calendar, and the dates of church Holy Days: yeah, some prep for baptism that was.

The "governance" in churches I respect? Congregationalism; the Presbyterianism insofar as it related, though I didn't appreciate one Presbyterian commentator's attempt to re-define a term to support something unscriptural...like I don't appreciate Herschel re-defining slander to thought-block and sheep-bind all dissent and biblical protest; like I don't appreciate dispensationalism's redefinition of "dispensationalism", a word rendering a greek word that has nothing to do with time, at all, that the whole system applies dumbly to divide scripture against itself and claim it's all easy going rather than something requiring thought.

And yet some very valuable teachers today are, (in at least points, or in a modified form), dispensationalist; Garey Giley, Bob DeWaay, John McArthur, and others.

Some favorite theologians? Anglican...J.I. Packer and others, minus any ecumenical efforts they might undertake when in name of unity without true agreement.

I don't despise the Church: nor bring accusations or point-out problems just because I'm opposed to this group or that. I must, however, remain opposed to all that obscures the gospel, or replaces it, or twists scripture, or exalts man.

I think Christ's statement that few, "puny", find the straight road is true, and it's therefore incompatible with the supposed claim of several billion in disobedience who claim Him; half of which claim to re-sacrifice Christ every Sunday to obtain salvation that otherwise they wouldn't get; such a thing would mean Christ is dead in vain...those people need trust in Christ, not Christ through a priest's snake oil; just like a bunch in GC need to get unconfused about who God is, and who pastors are, thinking that they're serving God by obeying the disobedience of their leadership.

And the Lord has not left His Church...Jesus said He never would leave or forsake it, but would send the Holy Spirit, the comforter; rather as Christ said, many who will say to Him "Lord, Lord", He will reply to with "I never knew you, depart from me, ye workers of lawlessness".

I wish more people would read 1 John and examine themselves and pray...and you know what? On that thought, I ask any who read this to pray for people to do just that, to examine themselves, whether they be in the faith, the once delivered saving faith found only in the Person and Work in Christ, and to really mean it when they pray, not snicker.

And I would like to make it clear, because it's not in writing, that none of this is merely defensive or combative.

I also appreciate the questions: makes me think, consider, and put to paper...communication is hard and I need practice. Thanks!

and P.S. when I say "non church" of Crusade I don't mean that they aren't a church when believers gather together...but that in organization, practice, and activities they're not submitted to scripture, neither obedient when they do much of what they do. But I'm increasingly at the people coming out of Crusade: seeming to care more about telling everyone about love without a context rather than love written in blood, because of our sins, to break down the wall of HATRED between God and man, because of man's utter sinfulness and rebellion; I'm genuinely concerned for people therein that I know who are increasingly like this...and that none around them seem to notice, if they're not themselves the same way.

[puff of purple smoke]

..too many words..

[lone gone]

Well I got what I wanted for an answer.... and most of us would have trouble expressing 1/3 of what TRP did.

[puff of purple smoke]

Well I got what I wanted for an answer.... and most of us would have trouble expressing 1/3 of what TRP did.

On one hand, yes he did answer your question. But one has to wonder why words of such length can create such strong emotions in the minds of the listener. Anyone who's ever sat in a literature class has likely had an experience like this one, arising from the fear of all that space on the page around a poem (not knowing how to fill it), the fear of all you don't know about the context of a novel (not knowing how to learn it), the fear of all you need to know--don't know--generally, in order to offer a worthwhile response. My own moment occurred during the first semester of my freshman college writing course.  We were reading a Hemingway short story; the professor criticized the staccato dialogue between husband and wife. When I defended it, as appropriate to this exchange, Professor Fehrenbach responded, "Allof Hemingway's characters talk that way." And the world opened up for me, into a maze of texts.   I realized that, to speak with authority about this one story, I needed to read them all.  And so I become an English major, and begin to read, sort of conversationally, sort of systematically, as each text led me into the others that inform it (Dalke 119).

The realization of all I was expected to know, in order to read well, motivated decades of work, and resulted in my career as a professional literary critic. For others, such moments may lead instead to paralysis, or to a general dislike of reading (or at least to reading-under-instruction). You are not interested in playing a game that seems to be about reading the teacher's mind, guessing what you should notice, if you were adequately trained to see what is to be seen--that is, the "right" answer.

Such moments of fear have been addressed (if also exacerbated) by a well-known methodology in literary studies known as reader-response theory (see Jane Tompkins' collection for a good overview). Meaning comes into existence not when the text is written, but when it is read and responded to. Reader-response theory focuses on the transaction readers make with texts, in the ways they actualize them in their own experience (cf. Waldspurger). And meaning is persistently revised as readers compare and collate their readings with one another, searching for patterns common among them, recognizing when the patterns break down, where new stories are needed.

Reader-response theory is generally traced to Louise Rosenblatt's influential 1938 Literature As Exploration, which distinguished between what happens when you read a text primarily to extract information from it, and the "lived through" experience of the text, with what happens "during the actual reading event" (Hall). It is the claim of this essay that enjoying--actually exploiting--what readers do, the variety of life experiences and activities that they put to use in their reading of texts, makes great good sense in terms of emergence. Reader-response theory has elaborated at length on how to do this; emergence offers a framework for understanding why it works.

As the single literary scholar in our Working Group on Emergence, I have often found myself groping to understand the terminology of physics and philosophy, of biology and computer science. I have also found, in my repeated requests for definitions and answers to my questions, a newly refigured disciplinary tool box of my own: a means of understanding that helps me make sense of the way literary study operates within the complexities of the larger world. I have found some ways of expanding my understanding of how literature and literary theory evolves. So what I want to talk about here is my own disciplinary angle on--and application of--this thing called emergence: how an English professor has made sense of the process whereby words emerge from words, stories from stories, interpretations from interpretations, meaning from them all--and further meanings out of those.

Here's the main thing: emergence creates a problem for the nature of knowing. Because of the complexity of the interactions that produce emergent effects, it is difficult both to predict such effects and to reliably trace particular effects back to particular causes. This unpredictability of the future and irreducibility of the present--results of the emergent nature of the universe--lead (among many, many other things) to those remarkable constructions we call language and literature. Indeterminacy prods us to make up stories that explain how we got from what was to what is, from what is to what will be. Literature--and, building on that, literary theory--are what we name the places where this meaning-making occurs. They are two of our ways (among many others) of acknowledging and responding to the unknowability that emergence creates. They are also ways of generating further uncertainty.

I'll illustrate this process by working my way through three levels: looking first at the generation of words (in puns and etymologies), then at the production of stories we call literature, and finally at the interpretation of their meanings which is literary criticism and theory. The space I traverse is the gap between the sounds of words and what they mean, the places where we take what is not yet known, or not understood, and apply to it logic, form, and the rules of symbol manipulation--and then step back again to see what else might arise in this new configuration. The movement is a "loopy" (and endless) one: from disorder--what we do not comprehend; into order--the meaning we make of it; back to disorder--what cannot be incorporated into the story we tell; back to order--revising the story (cf. Dalke and Grobstein).

We see that process, paradigmatically, in the playful constructions we call puns.  There is a moment of puzzlement, followed by a solution ("Oh, I get it!"), followed by more puzzlement ("Isn't that curious; what is the logic of the resemblance?"), followed by another answer, a recognition of how shallow--or how deep--the resonance is. When we "get" a "perfect" pun ("Why couldn't the pony talk? He was a little horse/hoarse"), we are seeing simultaneously--or perhaps in such rapid oscillation that it seems simultaneous--two alternative meanings of the same word, or two alternative spellings of the same sound. What constitutes the peculiar pleasure of punning is the ability to switch rapidly back and forth, to hold two meanings in mind at (nearly) the same time ("What do you get when you drop a piano down a mine shaft? A-flat minor/a flat miner"). Writing the puns out, as I have here, can ruin the fun, because it breaks apart what is the key to the game: the delight of doubling. But, once its logic is recognized, such doubling can also produce further play ("What do you get when you drop a piano onto a military base? A-flat major/a flat major").

Imperfect puns work quite similarly, although the delight here is in the near misses, the not-quite-exact identity of two closely sounding words. What operates in an imperfect pun is the perception that what appears momentarily as the same is actually different. What pleases here, as in perfect puns, is the perception of distinction emerging out of identity:
A man wanted to buy his wife some anemones, her favorite flower. Unfortunately, all the florist had left were a few stems of the feathery ferns he used for decoration. The husband presented these rather shamefacedly to his wife. "Never mind, darling," she said, "with fronds like these, who needs anemones?" (Zwicky).

The literary critic Jonathan Culler argues that this action of puns, providing "the surprising coupling of different meanings," is akin to that of etymologies, which "show us what puns might be if taken seriously." In the elaborately constructed histories we call etymologies, what gives pleasure is our ability to identify connections between two words--or two meanings of a word--that puns refuse to make explicit. Etymologies "give us respectable puns" by laboriously articulating such connections, consciously ordering the playful associations that are generated by the unconscious, or emerge serendipitously over time. Etymologies function as "a structural, connecting device," offering the mind "a sense and an experience of an order" (Culler, On Puns, 1-6).

Not surprisingly, the accuracy of such word-histories constitutes an ongoing debate among literary scholars. Renaissance writers, for instance, were always constructing faux-etymologies. They also took puns seriously as etymologies (as when Edmund Spenser suggested in Book VI of The Faerie Queene that "coward" was derived from "cowherd"). George Herbert shared a similar understanding of the resemblances among words. His poem "The Flower" observes, for example, that such resonances are not accidental, but bear the weight of cosmic meaning: "Thy word is all, if we could spell." That is, the shape and sound of words are God's doing, and--could we but read them--expressive of the natural order (Hedley).

But contemporary linguists, whose business is to identify the underlying structures that guide language use, are not entirely comfortable with the disequilibrium which can result from punning. Linnea Lagerquist observes that "puns make it clear that the boundaries" of the performance of competence, the knowledge of language and the knowledge of the world "are both highly mutable and indefinite." Catherine Bates expresses considerable discomfiture over what she calls "pun's perfidious status as an aberrant element within the linguistic structure"
Puns give the wrong names to the wrong things--and they disturb the proper flow of communication....in confusing sense and sound...normal rules governing etymology and lexicography are temporarily suspended while speculation and fancy roam free.
Puns must be "contained," according to Bates, within a structure of rule-determined connections.

My claim here, however, is that the fundamental "uncontainability" of puns--as well as of those etymologies that surprise, that seem to us like "stretchers"--is important both as an exemplar of the unpredictability of language use, and of our insistent response: ordering what seems to us "aberrant." We make meaning out of the interaction of a set of rules for the use of words, a history of their relations, and the insistently random action of generating, then editing and elaborating, connections between them and new experiences. From our three years¹ worth of early morning conversations about complex systems, I have come to see that this activity is an extension of the process we call emergence, that the back story to this way of understanding the relationship between words and their meanings is the irreversibility and unknown potentiality of evolution. As described in a fall 2004 "Report on Our Progress,"
Emergence is a perspective and story-telling genre that is distinctively characterized by efforts to make sense of observations on the presumption that there is no Šone anticipating future outcomes, nor need there be any conductor. There is only an originally and still largely undirected play of entities which become parts of larger entities which become parts of still larger entities and so on. Over a long period of time, the process has, in a quite recent development, created entities that wonder and ask questions about the process itself and, in doing so, are able to find ways to influence and mimic that process (Grobstein, Emerging).

When applied to literary studies, this means that every story falls short, needing to be extended and exceeded by its interpretation. We make "meaning" as we try to bridge the gap between what we know and what we do not understand, between past and present, between present and future: our stories are the explanations we "make up" to explain how we got from A to B, how we might have gotten to B from A. The task here is neither discovering the past or dictating the future, but rather making use of the past to create something for the future. Following the logic of emergence, students need not worry when confronted with a poem they don't "understand," since their task is not to "get it right," but rather to contribute to this process of exploration (Grobstein, Science).

Strikingly, the process is facilitated by the inexactness with which we hear one another's accounts. Recognizing the productivity of our in ability to hear exactly what one another says constitutes a fundamental revision of one of our primary myths about what is needed to facilitate human interaction. In the Genesis story of the building of the Tower of Babel,
the LORD said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language...and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do....let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another's speech.
In the Biblical version, the people are powerless to act without a common language, and the building of the tower ceases.

But emergence offers a contemporary counter-story and alternative explanation: lacking a common language, people have a means of discovering things they didn't know. Their gap in understanding is itself productive of new meaning:
In a class session devoted to analysis of some poems...the conversation turned to the question of differences between "languages". If indeed there were highly unambiguous "languages" (mathematics, as well as, for example, computer programming languages), how come ordinary "language" was invariably highly "ambiguous" in interpretation (so much so that poetry was a legitimate art form and "literary criticism" a legitimate profession, with a method not dissimilar from "science")? What emerged from the discussion was the idea that ordinary language is not "supposed" to be unambiguous, because its primary function is not in fact to transmit from sender to receiver a particular, fully defined "story". Ordinary language is instead "designed" (by biological and cultural evolution) to perform a more sophisticated, bidirectional communication function. A story is told by the sender not to simply transmit the story but also, and equally importantly, to elicit information from/about the receiver, to find out what is otherwise unknowable by the sender: what ideas/thoughts/perspectives the receiver has about the general subject of the story. An unambiguous transmission/story calls for nothing from the receiver other than what the transmitter already knows; an ambiguous transmission/story links teller/transmitter and audience/receiver in a conversation (and, ideally, in a dialectic from which new things emerge) (Grobstein, Two Cultures; cf. also Norretranders).

The use-value of literary criticism, of the literature it interprets, and of language more generally, emerges in these transitional moments or interstitial places where negotiation is necessary--and where (therefore) meanings need to be constructed. We see this in the evolution of new words, new literary forms, new literary interpretations, and in re-making the meaning of old ones of each of these. Each time a new story is told, at each of these levels, it identifies--in ways that are unpredictable beforehand--other tales not yet articulated.

New stories get generated in an emergent process, as interactions in the environment leave traces (in literature) that are continuously picked up (in literary theory) and re-combined in new configurations. Literary analysis makes new stories out of the stories we have preserved; the most useful of those are continuously generative of that which surprises. There is no general theory of this activity, only multiple individual practices of criticism, in which the work a reader does while reading becomes the meaning of a literary work (Dasenbrock).

Reader-response theory is the application, in an academic context, of this notion that every story leads to the making of new ones. Encouraging students to recognize and articulate their own responses to a story is not only "legitimate," but an expression of--and essential in furthering--the process of emergence. Rather than trying to "guess the right answer," what is useful here is students' relying on their own sense of what is happening in, as well as missing from, a story. Stories fill gaps, and in doing so create new ones. Readers fill those gaps--and thereby make new ones. Making meaning unsettles meaning--and so generates new meanings.

Examples of such practices are many. For instance: in 1899, Joseph Conrad published Heart of Darkness. In the late 1950's, Chinua Achebe critiqued the novel as "An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad's Heart of Darkness." He then created a new work of fiction, the novel Things Fall Apart, to give life and flesh to the sorts of figures Conrad had objectified in his novel. In 1979, the appearance of Buchi Emecheta's The Joys of Motherhood called attention, in turn, to the peripheral role women had played in Achebe's novel. In this sequence a story was repeatedly re-worked--first in criticism, then in fiction--in order to bring into the foreground the sorts of characters whose lives had been neglected in earlier fiction. In each case, the attempt to fill one gap unexpectedly created another one.-

Something quite similar happened with Charlotte Bronte's 1847 novel Jane Eyre. Like Achebe's essay, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak's 1988 discussion of "Three Women's Texts and a Critique of Imperialism" made problematic the fictional use of people of color as representations of the tortured psyches of Europeans. Spivak's analysis helps explain the generation of Jean Rhys's 1966 novel Wide Sargasso Sea, in which Bertha Rochester takes center stage (in Bronte's novel, she had been confined to the attic as a madwoman, a figure of Jane Eyre's unexpressed rage).

Similarly, Herculine Barbin: Being the Recently Discovered Memoirs of a Nineteenth-Century French Hermaphrodite, first printed in 1838 and reprinted with commentary by Michel Foucault in 1980, gave rise in 2002 to Jeffrey Eugenides's novel Middlesex. As Eugenides said in an interview, he found
Herculine Barbin's memoir...quite disappointing...as an expression of what it is like to be a hermaphrodite, from the inside....she didn't have enough self-awareness to be able to understand what was going on....she was pre-psychological in her knowledge of her self.

But Eugenides' fiction ended up, as he went on to say, not being about "a hermaphrodite at all....it's about reinventing your identity on different levels, be that Greek to American, female to male....Reinvention of self is an enduring theme in American literature in general." Setting out to fill in information about someone with a "genetic mutation there's no escaping of," Eugenides instead found himself writing a tale in which
the mutation does not make her who she is, does not determine everything about her life. There is still a great amount of free will and possibility in her life, and that's one of the things the book is strongly determined in.

The evolution I'm tracing here is more complicated than the interrelations among literary texts described, for example, by T.S. Eliot in Tradition and the Individual Talent. Literature emerges out of earlier literature, certainly, but does so in a process that is as much unpredictable as predictable, as much random as it is directed. In accord with the undirected play that is emergence, no "naive reductionism" is possible: the properties of the novels described above are not simply explicable in terms of their original motivations; in each case, the story far exceeds its ostensible "cause" (cf. Grobstein, Emerging).

This same unpredictable process occurs in the production of literary criticism: critics attempt to explain what has been left out, left unarticulated, often left unrecognized by authors. In the process they produce something they cannot quite control, something that surprises them. The writing of literature and the interpretations of its meanings (the results of the encounter between text and reader, code and de-coder which we call literary criticism and literary theory) generate new accounts. These new stories traverse the gaps between what is and what was, what is and what may be--and in doing so create the unexpected. Filling the gap left by Conrad's treatment of Nigerian men, Achebe created another gap, which Emecheta filled, in turn, by creating a fictional world about the lives of Nigerian women. Rhys' novel brought out of the background a figure created by Bronte, Eugenides's novel highlighted what Barbin could not describe. In each of these cases, new elisions arose, further stories clamored to be told. It is precisely the failure of all stories ever to tell the "whole" story, to reliably fill in all the gaps, that makes them endlessly productive of new ones:
talk of the reader opens up talk of psychology, sociology, and history....critics...have clarified the degree to which meaning is dependent upon the reader's performance....reader criticism has made it increasingly difficult to support the notion of definitive meaning in its most straightforward form....how precarious interpretation is as a procedure and how little we can depend on the texts themselves to provide proper interpretive guidance. (Rabinowitz)

To put it more positively: the concept of emergence helps explain not how "precarious," but rather how useful and generative the act of reading can be. In the absence of clear cause and effect, stories arise to explain the distance between past, present and future (it may even be the stories that create the sense of past, present and future). And it is certainly stories that sketch out possibilities for what lies ahead.

This, then, is a contemporary conception of literary theory and literature, of words in the forms of puns, etymologies and stories.  Like biological systems, like artificial intelligence, like history and economics, philosophy and psychology, literature and literary criticism (and their makers) are the products (and the makers) of a process of emergence. Both writer and reader alter and are in turn altered by the shape of literature, and of the world it represents: the world that was, the world that is, the world that is to come.