--As we’ve explained, Catholics believe that Jesus saved Mary from original sin at the moment of her conception, thus making her sinless and incapable of transmitting sin to Him when He was born.
--Protestants don’t necessarily reject this view. But we do think it’s speculative and unnecessary or even dangerous, not because of what it says about Mary, but because of what it says about the authority of the Bible.
--See, the Bible is uncommitted on this issue, which is probably the main reason that although belief in the Immaculate Conception of Mary was around for a very long time, belief in it wasn’t mandatory for Catholics until 1854 when Pope Pius IX classified it as a dogma, a belief all Catholics are obliged to believe. Even the Council of Trent (1563) had avoided settling the matter, declaring it optional and non-obligatory.
--But since Catholics believe in the ongoing ability of the Pope or the Magisterium to declare truths infallibly, they are sometimes obliged to believe things the Bible does not alone conclusively prove. And this is all the difference in the world between Protestants and Catholics.
--Whereas Protestants believe only in the authority of the Bible, Catholics believe in the unified authority of the Bible and the Magisterium (the teaching office of the Catholic Church, mainly the bishops under certain circumstances). In all fairness, Catholics do not think of this as two sources of authority. Instead, they believe the Magisterium and the Bible agree perfectly with each other.
--But for Protestants, Biblically uncertain matters like this one are matters of liberty, as the Council of Trent held.
--It’s also important to recognize that just because something is not in the Bible explicitly, that does not mean that it is wrong or even that it is wrong for a Christian to believe it. Protestants simply believe such things must not be held, well, dogmatically.
--This leads us quite nicely to our next topic: Sola Scriptura.
No comments:
Post a Comment