Why is your church the true Church?

Discussion in 'Navigating Through Church Life' started by Tuxedo America, Oct 21, 2017.

  1. neutral

    neutral New Member

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    @Tuxedo, are you still following the updates?
     
  2. Tiffy

    Tiffy Well-Known Member

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    :laugh: :facepalm: :disgust:
     
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  3. Annie Grace

    Annie Grace Well-Known Member

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    It is thinking like this (one true church stuff) that drove me away from the RCC. When one group considers itself superior to another, it has lost Christ IMO.
     
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  4. Clayton

    Clayton Active Member

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    And also for attending the Kentucky Derby or Royal Ascot; I understand that fascinators do count, if only according to the letter of the law.
     
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  5. JoeLaughon

    JoeLaughon Well-Known Member Anglican

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    Simple as, my church (the Anglican Church in North America) is part of the visible Church of Christ and as such is a congregation of faithful men, in which the pure Word of God is preached, and the Sacraments be duly ministered according to Christ’s ordinance, in all those things that of necessity are requisite to the same.
     
  6. Tiffy

    Tiffy Well-Known Member

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    :)
     
  7. JoeLaughon

    JoeLaughon Well-Known Member Anglican

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    In English the word men or man is simply a gender neutral term for people. It is only recently we take offense because we forget
     
  8. Annie Grace

    Annie Grace Well-Known Member

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    It is not simply a matter of forgetting - it is how common usage has changed the meaning from people to a gender specific term. I like mankind as a word for people because the inclusion of the word kind somehow makes it more inclusive.
     
  9. Lowly Layman

    Lowly Layman Well-Known Member

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    I believe the Anglican church is A true church, and part of THE true church, but I believe it would be hubristic and un-Anglican to claim that the Anglican church is somehow the ONLY true church.

    As Jewell wrote in his Apologia, "We believe that there is one Church of God, and that the same is not shut up (as in times past among the Jews) into some one corner or kingdom, but that it is catholic and universal, and dispersed throughout the whole world. So that there is now no nation which may truly complain that they be shut forth, and may not be one of the Church and people of God: and that this Church is the kingdom, the body, and the spouse of Christ; and that Christ alone is the Prince of this kingdom; that Christ alone is the Head of this Body; and that Christ alone is the Bridegroom of this spouse."
     
  10. Tiffy

    Tiffy Well-Known Member

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    It used to be 'simply a gender neutral term for people', and for people educated in the use of the English language, still is.

    Unfortunately, given the amount of institutionalised misogny still lingering within traditional Anglicanism, the use of the word man is understood in a similar way to the use of the word man when referring to Adam, which in its original Hebrew form means 'mankind' but many ignorant people still apply it exclusively to a specific and individual man, not to mankind generally, instead of as a literary metaphor coined by the ancient author of the inspired scripture.
    .
     
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  11. Botolph

    Botolph Well-Known Member

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    The English language changes and evolves over time, so some words are added and others dropped, some are recycled, or up-cycled, and some are misused to the point where the original meaning was lost. Changes to language are accelerating, and some changes are being pushed by movements of social change and political agendas. So some of the changes we see happening in our own ere may seem a little more contrived than changes used to be, and at the end of the day we do need to communicate the gospel in the vernacular - or as we used to say - the vulgar tongue.
     
  12. Doctrine Matters

    Doctrine Matters New Member

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    And my answer to this is: The Christian Church is the True Church, and all who embrace the core doctrines of the Christian Church are part of her. TEC has gone so far off and astray that for years I left it, after having been raised in the Church from age 4. Leftist politics, female priests, allowing homosexual-same sex marriages, and the endorsement of homosexual practice as validly Christian, paved the way for many of us to throw up our hands and say, "no more." Radicals took over the Church, and frankly Catholic Clown Masses were more valid than TEC's. The Druid priests were a nice touch, too, not to mention the female corpus on the Crucifix of a well-known Episcopal Cathedral. It just went from bad to worse (I was in the Diocese of Newark with John Spong leading), so my husband and left, moved to NM and we eventually became involved in an ACNA group. The Evangelical tone of preaching was refreshing, and there was nothing remotely like Spong's rhetoric found there. Which came as a relief. We ended up meeting with an Anglican Episcopal Church group in NM with the Bishop presiding. When my husband passed away I came to Florida, and the only Anglican churches weren't within driving distance, so I checked out the local Episcopal Church. Suffice to say the rector or vicar or whatever he calls himself reminded me totally of what I'd experienced in TEC. However, there was also a Latino Ministry group meeting with a very sound Hispanic priest. Since I had lived in NM for so many years, I began attending the Latino Mass - very high Church, very beautiful, very Evangelical - and have been there ever since. So, I'm the only Anglican probably in the world going to a Latino TEC Mass. But, it fits my needs. I fear that when TEC closes, and it most likely will in 20 or 30 years, the faithful Christian Latinos will be sort of displaced. I hope TEC, or even better, the ACNA, makes a provision for these faithful Christians whose Catholic Christianity is above reproach. Not everybody is contaminated with North American Episcopal Heresy! May heretical TEC slowly die out and may the faithful left, come together to serve Jesus without having to be subjected to the bizarre false teaching TEC is well known for. The Remnant will continue.
     
    Last edited: Oct 15, 2022
  13. Doctrine Matters

    Doctrine Matters New Member

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    Correction. That should read, ""so my husband and I left." Sorry.
     
  14. Rexlion

    Rexlion Well-Known Member

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    I'm curious to know, do they conduct the entire service en español? Are there interpreters?

    Your comment about "clown masses" puzzled me, so I googled it. Sure enough, clowns on the platform, Halloween costume masses.... unreal! :loopy:
     
    Last edited: Oct 15, 2022
  15. Pub Banker

    Pub Banker Member Anglican

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    Correct. Until recently it was the Queen’s English.
     
  16. Rexlion

    Rexlion Well-Known Member

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    This is what the Roman Catholic Church teaches its members. This is one of the ways in which the RCC makes itself seem indispensible to its laity. It teaches them to rely upon the RC papacy and RC continuity of existence (as if the early church called itself "the Catholic Church" as a name brand in the first few centuries, which it did not), and upon the unique RC Eucharist (only their priests can confect God in all of his divinity under the accidents of bread and wine) and RC absolution in private confession. For centuries the laity were taught, "Outside the (Roman) Catholic Church there is no salvation." The net effect of this teaching is a tendency to believe in the church itself rather than trust strictly on Christ crucified.

    The other hugely major difference between the RCC and other churches is the RCC's doctrine of salvation. It differs from the Bible's teaching that we are saved by grace through faith and not by works. In RC doctrine, one can earn merit for justification through works (and to say otherwise is to be anathema). I've heard that during the Reformation, RC and Reformed theologians met and tried to work together in conciliatory fashion so as to prevent the split, but they were stymied by a difference of understanding of one word: the Greek word logizomai which we often translate "accounted" or "imputed." Because the RC theologians were accustomed to the Latin translation and because of the influence of the Roman legal system upon their thinking, the RCC believed and taught (and still do believe & teach) that justification (righteousness) must be infused so as to be residing within the person; i.e., he must become actually righteous. This is why the RCC says that the good works one performs contribute to one's justification, and why the remaining stain of one's venial sins must be purged after death in the fires of Purgatory, until such time as the person becomes fully righteous in actuality.

    This is very different from Reformed/Protestant understanding of the Bible. As Paul wrote:
    Rom 4:1 What shall we say then that Abraham our father, as pertaining to the flesh, hath found?
    Rom 4:2 For if Abraham were justified by works, he hath whereof to glory; but not before God.
    Rom 4:3 For what saith the scripture? Abraham believed God, and it was counted (logizomai) unto him for righteousness.
    Rom 4:4 Now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt.
    Rom 4:5 But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted (logizomai) for righteousness.
    Rom 4:6 Even as David also describeth the blessedness of the man, unto whom God imputeth (logizomai) righteousness without works,
    Rom 4:7 Saying, Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered.
    Rom 4:8 Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute (logizomai) sin.

    Paul then points out, importantly, that Abraham was reckoned (counted, logizomai) as righteous because of his faith, before he was circumcised. This is a vital point, since the RCs teach that baptism is the instrumental means by which God dispenses the initial batch of righteousness into an infant (the idea is that, as the child grows and sins, the rest of his/her life is involved with striving to get enough additional righteousness to rid oneself of the iniquity). But since Abraham is shown as an example for Christian righteousness, and since Abraham was counted righteous by faith alone and not by circumcision (which is somewhat likened to baptism elsewhere in the NT), this portion of Romans shows something different than what the RCC teaches.

    Rom 4:13 For the promise, that he should be the heir of the world, was not to Abraham, or to his seed, through the law, but through the righteousness of faith.

    Rom 4:20 He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief; but was strong in faith, giving glory to God;
    Rom 4:21 And being fully persuaded that, what he had promised, he was able also to perform.
    Rom 4:22 And therefore it was imputed(logizomai) to him for righteousness.
    Rom 4:23 Now it was not written for his sake alone, that it was imputed (logizomai) to him;
    Rom 4:24 But for us also, to whom it shall be imputed (logizomai), if we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead;
    Rom 4:25 Who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification.

    Because the RCC teaches that one must obtain righteousness into oneself by earning it, and because the Bible teaches the Gospel that righteousness is a gift credited to the account of us while we are yet sinners, the RC message is a false gospel, and regrettably the RCC (which looks very much like a valid church) should be regarded as a false cult much like the Jehovah's Witnesses or the Mormons. Teaching the true Gospel of salvation by God's grace as a gift granted through faith in Christ's atonement for sin & redemption of the sinner is the paramount purpose of any true church; an organization which fails this test cannot be considered a valid church no matter what Brand Name it deceitfully took for itself.
     
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