Thursday, March 20, 2008

Erik Twist, Part X: No Loopholes

Part 10 of his Why Catholic? series:

[...] Fr. Scott’s way of approaching issues was, well, Magisterial. He spoke with clarity and confidence and in such a way that as I listened to him I was remembering why Catholicism had initially intrigued me; it had the audacity to speak as though it was authoritatively true. But most of all I was mesmerized by the philosophical consistency which under girded Fr. Scott’s responses. There were no loopholes. There was no jumping from one assumption to the next. There were reasonable answers for each reasonable question. In his responses I was constantly amazed by how they both upheld the dignity of mankind while not overshadowing the sovereignty of God. In Protestantism this never seemed quite possible. Either the former was emphasized to the point of secular humanism, or the latter was emphasized to the point of rigid Dutch Calvinism. [...]

3 comments:

Don said...

I made observations along the same lines about Catholic theology in my review of Rob Bell's Velvet Elvis.

To my mind, the biggest problem with Roman Catholic theology is that the institution itself gets in the way.

Abu Daoud said...

Hi Don, I think it's safe to say that the most negative aspect of the Catholic Church is simply pastoral failure. That is, failure to catechize and evangelize its people properly. But I see signs of that changing in the US, though not here in the Middle East, where the Catholics tend to oppose evangelism of Muslims.

But that having been said if you come to realize that it is, as Erik says, the true church, then it becomes your duty to enter it and improve its ministry instead of doing what you and I are doing--complaining.

Don said...

Been there. Done that. Have the website section to discuss the issue.