In a timely column about Christians respecting other religions, Dr. Al Mohler writes regarding the Roman Catholic church’s belief that sincere Muslims can be included in Christ’s provision of salvation due to their belief in one God and the “faith of Abraham.” This is what respect  means now, folks. If, as a Bible believing Christian, you say that a Muslim cannot be saved, you do not respect them according the new definition. But as Dr. Mohler points out, we can never respect beliefs that are sending souls to an eternal hell. There is only one Name under heaven, given among men, whereby we must be saved: the name of Jesus Christ. Believing Jesus is the only way, truth, and life is not, and never will be, popular. Then again, God’s truth never is.

Catholic hospitals are not going to go along with Barack Obama’s death march, praise God. Here’s the story from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Unlike the Presbyterian, Baptist, Methodist and other assorted Protestant hospitals that seem eerily silent, the Roman Catholics are demonstrating their commitment to the sanctity of human life and are suggesting that they will either close their hospitals or engage in principled civil disobedience if the government tries to force them to allow child-killing on their premises.

I salute the consistency of the commitment to pro-life principles by these people and once again wonder aloud where the Protestant crowd is on this most basic issue of morality.

In light of my post about Pastor James MacDonald’s glowing praise for pro-abort, Barack Obama, I want to contrast that kind of leadership with real moral leadership. It does not come from a Protestant evangelical. It comes from the Archbishop of Denver. I have asked this before, and I will ask it again. Why are a handful of Roman Catholic bishops and the Pope the only voices being heard across the nation on the life issue and our current President’s affection for death? Well, let me answer the question. The mainline “Protestants” are the ones running Planned Parenthood clinics and defending abortion. The evangelical Protestants, having failed to end abortion despite their millions of members and unbelievable resources, have decided to turn to issues like global warming instead. Some, of the emergent variety, have actually decided that abortion isn’t that big of a deal anyway and have decided that if they can’t beat them, they can find common ground with the pro-death crowd by trying to “reduce” abortion.

There are a handful of committed and godly pro-life Christians who are active in every way possible to oppose this evil. But recognized Protestant leaders like Rick Warren, Joel Osteen, and Franklin Graham are largely AWOL on the issue of abortion and the sanctity of human life. That leaves the Catholic leadership to take a stand, including the Archbishop of Denver who made headlines today with the following:

24-February-2009  — Catholic News Agency
Denver Archbishop Warns against “Spirit of Adulation” Surrounding Obama

Toronto, Canada, Feb 23, 2009 (CNA).- Canadians packed St. Basil’s Church in Toronto on Monday evening to hear Archbishop Charles Chaput speak about how Catholics should live out their faith in the public square. He warned that in the U.S., Catholics need to act on their faith and be on guard against “a spirit of adulation bordering on servility” that exists towards the Obama administration.

The public lecture by Archbishop Chaput took place on the campus of the University of Toronto at St. Basil’s Church and was attended by an overflow crowd of more than 700 people.

After giving a sketch of the basic principles in his New York Times Bestseller “Render Unto Caesar,” the archbishop offered his insights on the need for an honest assessment of the situation of the Church in the public square.

“I like clarity, and there’s a reason why,” began the archbishop. “I think modern life, including life in the Church, suffers from a phony unwillingness to offend that poses as prudence and good manners, but too often turns out to be cowardice. Human beings owe each other respect and appropriate courtesy. But we also owe each other the truth — which means candor.”

The Denver prelate then provided his critique of President Obama.

“President Obama is a man of intelligence and some remarkable gifts. He has a great ability to inspire, as we saw from his very popular visit to Canada just this past week. But whatever his strengths, there’s no way to reinvent his record on abortion and related issues with rosy marketing about unity, hope and change. Of course, that can change. Some things really do change when a person reaches the White House. Power ennobles some men. It diminishes others. Bad policy ideas can be improved. Good policy ideas can find a way to flourish. But as Catholics, we at least need to be honest with ourselves and each other about the political facts we start with.”

Yet this will be “very hard for Catholics in the United States,” Chaput warned.

According to the archbishop, the political situation for Catholics is difficult to discern because a “spirit of adulation bordering on servility already exists among some of the same Democratic-friendly Catholic writers, scholars, editors and activists who once accused pro-lifers of being too cozy with Republicans. It turns out that Caesar is an equal opportunity employer.”

Looking ahead to the coming months and years, Chaput offered four “simple things” to remember.

“First,” he said, “all political leaders draw their authority from God. We owe no leader any submission or cooperation in the pursuit of grave evil.”

“In fact, we have the duty to change bad laws and resist grave evil in our public life, both by our words and our non-violent actions. The truest respect we can show to civil authority is the witness of our Catholic faith and our moral convictions, without excuses or apologies.”

In a reference to the messianic treatment the Barack Obama received from some Americans during the presidential primaries, Archbishop Chaput delivered his second point: “in democracies, we elect public servants, not messiahs.”

Noting that Obama actually trailed in the weeks just before the election, the Denver archbishop said that this places some of today’s talk about a “new American mandate” in perspective.

“Americans, including many Catholics, elected a gifted man to fix an economic crisis. That’s the mandate. They gave nobody a mandate to retool American culture on the issues of marriage and the family, sexuality, bioethics, religion in public life and abortion. That retooling could easily happen, and it clearly will happen — but only if Catholics and other religious believers allow it.”

The third point to focus on when the beliefs of Catholics are challenged is that “it doesn’t matter what we claim to believe if we’re unwilling to act on our beliefs,” Chaput counseled.

“The fourth and final thing to remember, and there’s no easy way to say it,” remarked Archbishop Chaput, is that the “Church in the United States has done a poor job of forming the faith and conscience of Catholics for more than 40 years.”

“And now we’re harvesting the results — in the public square, in our families and in the confusion of our personal lives. I could name many good people and programs that seem to disprove what I just said. But I could name many more that do prove it, and some of them work in Washington.”

American Catholics need to realize that many in the current generation haven’t just been “assimilated” into the American culture, but have in fact been “absorbed and bleached and digested by it,” Archbishop Chaput asserted.

If this realization doesn’t happen, the coming generations will continue on the same path and “a real Catholic presence in American life will continue to weaken and disappear,” said Chaput.

Citing the example of “unhappy, self-described Catholics who complain that abortion is too much of a litmus test,” he stated, “We can’t claim to be ‘Catholic’ and ‘pro-choice’ at the same time without owning the responsibility for where the choice leads – to a dead unborn child.”

The archbishop also addressed the “abortion reduction” argument being made by some in politics.

“We can’t talk piously about programs to reduce the abortion body count without also working vigorously to change the laws that make the killing possible. If we’re Catholic, then we believe in the sanctity of developing human life. And if we don’t really believe in the humanity of the unborn child from the moment life begins, then we should stop lying to ourselves and others, and even to God, by claiming we’re something we’re not.”

“Catholic social teaching goes well beyond abortion,” Chaput noted. “In America we have many urgent issues that beg for our attention, from immigration reform to health care to poverty to homelessness.”

Winding his talk down, the Archbishop of Denver remarked on the misunderstanding of the word “hope.”

“For Christians,” he explained, “hope is a virtue, not an emotional crutch or a political slogan. Virtus, the Latin root of virtue, means strength or courage. Real hope is unsentimental. It has nothing to do with the cheesy optimism of election campaigns. Hope assumes and demands a spine in believers. And that’s why – at least for a Christian — hope sustains us when the real answer to the problems or hard choices in life is ‘no, we can’t,’ instead of ‘yes, we can.’”

###

The vacuum of godly, moral leadership in the Protestant evangelical world has left the moral leadership in the West to the Roman Catholics. There is absolutely no excuse for this. As for the Archbishop of Denver, thank you. At least someone is saying it. At least someone sees this. At least someone is pointing out the obvious and defending the preborn, and while evangelicals are conducting sex campaigns and motocross stunts, at least someone with an intact moral compass left is willing to let his voice be heard publicly in defense of life.

Chuck Colson is still working hard at bringing Catholics and Evangelicals together. This interview with Christianity Today reveals Colson’s assertion that the Pope now agrees with Luther on justification as long as works flow from love. I somehow missed that news story in the world of religion. Did you know that the Pope now agrees with Luther on justification? Chuck Colson says so. In that most evangelicals wouldn’t know Luther’s stance on justification if it lived in their refrigerators, this seems a little fishy to me. Paging the Vatican: please have your PR department release a statement that the Pope now agrees with Luther. Nobody is aware of this about-face, nearly 500 years after the 95 Theses were pounded in the door at Wittenberg.

We all worship God in one big cosmic mosque anyway, right? That’s the apparent message the Roman Catholic church is sending with their “landmark” talks with Muslims this week. Rome says that there is salvation only through their church. All they have to do is EXPAND the meaning of what the “church” is and, voila! Billions of new Catholics are made all over the world, even though they worship in socks in big cathedrals that they affectionately like to call “mosques.” With George Bush at the United Nations this week to encourage inter-religious cooperation on an unprecedented scale to solve world problems, and with the Bishop of Rome working to solve the little differences between Muslims and Catholics, we’re just a few short steps from that one-world religion Barack Obama will need to implement his political/spiritual program for the world. Mysticism in each tradition will tie it all together. You were warned.

People continue asking, “Did Vatican II change the dogma of Roman Catholic Church concerning what they teach about the Church and salvation?” And it seems that no matter how many times we try and tell people that it did not they continue to ask.

So as Apprising Ministries answers this query from the recent Vatican document “Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith” Ken Silva asks: Will the pope do?

Christianity Today is now promoting Catherine of Siena and holding her life up as one from which we can learn much about following the Lord Jesus Christ. I challenge Slice readers to read two pieces from Apprising Ministries on the life of this mystic who claimed to have undergone a betrothal to Christ himself. If Christianity Today has abandoned justification by faith alone, and its editorial board believes that we can/should encounter and please God through starving ourselves, beating ourselves with whips, wearing hair shirts, and conjuring up erotic experiences with Christ himself, they should come out and say so. But to continue to feature these mystics as laudable and exemplary when many of them understood nothing of salvation through the grace of God, in Christ alone, through faith alone, and many of which fatally abused their bodies in their attempts to please God, is a betrayal of Holy Scripture.

These two excellent articles from Pastor Ken Silva will fill you in on just how bizarre the beliefs and behavior of Catherine of Siena actually were. You fill find yourself asking, “This is what CT finds exemplary for us today?” It’s time for another Reformation.

CT Promotes Catherine of Siena

Who Is Catherine of Sienna?

Pastor Bob DeWaay’s latest Critical Issues Commentary is titled, “Why Evangelicals are Returning to Rome”. We will be discussing the various streams within evangelicalism that are all feeding into this Home to Rome trend, and why the issue of Sola Scriptura is so important to sound doctrine. The foundational teaching of Scripture Alone is routinely rejected today, either openly, or simply in practice by many evangelical churches today. Join us at 2pm Central Time at our website where you can either listen live or listen to the podcast later.

I was about to sign off work today when I opened my mail and received a hard copy of Bob DeWaay’s latest Critical Issues Commentary. This is just a superb overview of what I’ve been warning about for some time. As the chaos of evangelicalism worsens, Rome is looking better than ever to a growing number of befuddled and confused Christians who are looking for moral leadership, reverence in worship, and a sense of history and tradition. But in order to cross the Tiber, some very essential biblical doctrines must be overlooked. Here’s the Commentary from Pastor DeWaay.

Luther called the pope the anti-Christ. Today’s head of the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, Jerry Kieschnick, eagerly turns out for an “ecumenical meeting” with the the pontiff. If Luther were alive today, the first thing he would do would be to post any number of theses on the door at what’s  called the “Lavender Vatican” in St. Louis where the LCMS headquarters is and start a new reformation. Blogger Scott Diekmann comments on the unbiblical conduct of Dr. Kieschnick who is currently overseeing unprecedented turmoil in the LCMS—a battle between man-centered Purpose Driven-style pragmatists and confessional Lutherans who refuse to follow the corrupt church growth model Kieschnick loves so much.

Reformation Nation has an interesting map of the United States that is broken down by church affiliation. Seeing it visually like this is impressive. (Click the map to make it larger.) When we lived in Greenville, South Carolina for a year, my husband and I were perpetually shouting, “Look at that one!…There’s another, and another!” as we drove down the main arteries in town. Never in our entire lives had we seen as many gargantuan and expensive Baptist churches. When you look at the entire state of Wisconsin, you’ll see why we were so amazed. Gargantuan and expensive Catholic churches are the norm here in Southeastern Wisconsin, with old, historic Lutheran churches occasionally breaking the monotony. Baptist churches here are generally small, (there are a couple of independent Baptist exceptions to this). Conservative Reformed churches generally tend to be very small, 40-60 people, that meet in makeshift facilities. The jumbo new churches are usually not Catholic but are the circus-driven evangelical churches that are going either the emergent or Rick Warren route off the cliff. I often comment on how hard it is to find Bible-preaching churches in some parts of the country. This map visually makes my case. I love the line under the map: “I wonder how the chart would look if they charted lukewarmness.”

This news story today talks about efforts on the part of Pope Benedict XVI to reconcile Roman Catholics with the Eastern church. The rift that caused the creation of the Eastern Orthodox church 950 years ago began over a disagreement regarding three words in the Nicene Creed. Things went downhill from there. A unified Catholic church would be a very interesting development. In other news, the Pope is also pushing ecumenical dialog with non-Catholics. Very interesting.

Slice Archive

I read recently about Youth Front in Kansas City, Missouri. Led by a man named Mike King, the former head of Youth for Christ there, Youth Front is a full bore, emerging and contemplative spirituality movement for kids that is taking its lessons on spirituality directly from the Society of Jesus. (Jesuits). Here’s a link to make my point. Here is the home page for the New York Society of Jesus, calling attention to Youth Front’s new Sacred Spaces site. Click here and scroll down to see the announcement near the bottom regarding Sacred Spaces. You will find Youth Front under, and I quote, “Jesuit Links”. Compare this kind of behavior by American evangelicals, (yes, that is exactly Mike King’s provenance) with the faithfulness to Christ of John Huss. Here is an account of his last days as he was hauled before the Roman Catholics to give an account for his biblical preaching and his fearless adherence to the teachings of Scripture. See how he died. Ask yourself what cowardice, spiritual treason and complicity we now have going on in the name of emerging youth ministry. We are now ” friends” with those who teach error that is sending millions to an eternity in hell. (This is taken from Foxe’s Book of Martyrs which accounts for the old English spellings.) read all »

The Christian Post reports that the Pope is supportive of a call for Muslim-Christian unity. If Christians are obeying the call of Christ, however, to go into all the world and preach the Gospel, this unity will dissolve pretty quickly. Obedience to Christ in this life always comes with a price tag and those who are only interested in earthly peace will be willing to join up with anyone to achieve it.