(Note: This video is not being circulated by the SDA church, but some members.)
You won't know it by watching, but this clip is from The Carter Report, a Seventh-day Adventists evangelistic outreach. There is nothing in the video clip that suggests it is a Seventh-day Adventist production. It is made to look as if a real Catholic bishop is standing in front of a secular audience at some type of international or press conference. All of it is fake folks!
And the Catholic Bishop isn't a bishop at all. He's an actor.
A few minutes ago I just talked on the phone to the Carter Report and they are claiming that someone cut a clip out of the service and without their permission is circulating it as if it is real. This isn't even a former bishop who converted to Adventism as some are wondering. This is an actor pretending to be a bishop misquoting Catholic sources.
The Carter Report better be careful or they will end up being charged with fraud. On many levels. First they went to the trouble of purchasing or making bishop's vestments, then even wore the scholarly biretta, nice touch. Then they clip Catholic quotes and distort them repulsively. Catholic scholars have often implored the SDA church to quit falsifying their doctrines and history. Adventists still use these bogus quotes as if they have "exposed" a hidden agenda.
The quotes are as concocted as the bishop.
This is a SDA evangelist Carter Report television SET! All you see and all you hear is for entertaining and indoctrination purposes. Learn the truth about Catholicism. This is a distortion.
Read the Catechism and specifically read Pope John Paul II's Dies Domini.
(UPDATE: Someone just wrote me and told me that the people who edited this from its original context are an independent group of SDAs. It's source may be 3ABN. We're still looking into it. However, even if John Carter clearly told his audience that it was an actor, and the transcript shows Mr. Carter said nothing, the visual adds authority to the misinformation.
32 comments:
Rather amusing watching your enthusiasm and quickness in posting criticism of the "clip" without checking the facts. As your blog unfolds minute by minute and the facts are revealed it makes me question other "facts" you state on your blog that maybe you didn't research them either but rather just enjoy blowing off steam and creating sensationalism. Using a more truthful approach with less sensationalism would definitely make your posts more convincing though probably less entertaining.
Fraud? Misquoting? Bogus? Misinformation? Distortion? These are serious accusations, instead of just making accusations why don't you show how they are everything you say?
All I see is that through the years some Catholics have had the integrity to admit that the Catholic church by her own authority abandoned the 4th Commandment to keep the Sabbath Holy, and propped up the third commandment to keep Sunday holy. Are you suggesting this is not true?
Yes, please lets read the Catechism and see for ourselves that the Catholic church recognizes the ten Commandments as still binding and obligatory (2068),has not been abolished (2053) recognizes them as moral and as an expression of the twofold commandment of love (2052,2055,2067), recognizes that the ten commandments are not the same as the laws handwritten in a book by Moses (2056), all of which confirms and agrees with Scripture and the SDA position. Now where in Scripture is the third commandment to keep Sunday holy? The Catholic church created it! So please don't work your self up, it's just the facts period!
What facts did I get wrong?
I have changed no facts at all. I have simply added to them.
Some Adventists PUT TOGETHER this program where an unidentified man who was called a bishop on the Carter Report, an SDA sponsored evangelistic program, read from outdated quotes from Catholic sources that are not authoritative nor binding on Catholics as if this bishop was confessing to all of us. The Carter Report told me that the SDA person who posted the Youtube video cut out where John Carter told the audience that this guy was an actor. The transcript of the show at the Carter Report archives shows NO attempt at all of clearing up this was not a real bishop but an actor. In fact the transcript made it look like John Carter thought the bishop was a "friend." (As if he had some inside connection with a Catholic bishop.) When the actor left the stage, John Carter clearly said, "Thank you, bishop." There is nothing there that indicates this was a set up.
Why would they even do such a thing? To try and visually add authority to the quotes that have so often been debunked.
Please read the explanation of the Catholic Church and Sunday via JPII's encyclical instead of cutting out parts of old and now non-authoratative documents.
http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/apost_letters/documents/hf_jp-ii_apl_05071998_dies-domini_en.html
Pope John Paul II realized that there had been some great confusion about Sunday and Sabbath even among the priests. That is why he chose to deal directly with the subject in this encyclical. This is where you need to go to get the Catholic Church's understanding. And read the whole document. If you disagree that is fine, but let's at least discuss what the church actually believes rather than spend all your time as SDAs fighting a strawman.
The video was meant to confuse and deceive. It is an Adventist set up at all phases of production.
You said "misquoting Catholic sources", is this really true? Would you please be specific and define exactly what is being misquoted?
You said "they clip Catholic quotes and distort them repulsively", would you be specific and show where these Catholic quotes were distorted repulsively?
I suspect you will just shrug these quotes off as just your Catholic colleagues' "opinions" just as you did in your book, when you wrote it off as such when Eusebius said "And all things whatsoever it was the duty to do on the Sabbath, these we have transferred to the Lord's Day" pg 208.
Or maybe you will just claim that you just simply disagree with these quotes like you did on pg.215when the Archbishop of Reggio at the Council of Trent stated "The Sabbath, the most glorious day in the law, has been changed into the Lord's day."
The fact of the matter is that it matters not what excuse the Catholic church "officially" gives for the observance of Sunday in place of the Sabbath. Any truth seeking Bible student can clearly see in Scripture there is no 3rd commandment in the still binding still obligatory Decalogue (2068) to keep Sunday holy. In the Decalogue there is only the 4th commandment to keep the Sabbath Holy because God Himself made it and blessed it.
All that the Catholic quotes do is show (unlike you) that through the course of time some priests, bishops, cardinals, and archbishops have shown integrity and admitted what is plain and simple; the Catholic church has indeed created the 3rd commandment to keep Sunday holy in place of the 4th commandment to keep the Sabbath holy.
Arik,
I just posted the answer to your question.
Arik,
Look at history.
The early church undisputedly went to church on Sunday as a celebration of the Lord's resurrection. In fact the early church met to worship daily. There was no such thing as an "official day" to worship for centuries. That pretty much came along with the Puritans, not the Catholics.
I have repeatedly answered your questions. As an Adventist I am not surprised that you don't like my answers.
Shouldn't all these people posting to your blog be in their respective camp meeting meeting's and classes!?
LONG LIVE THE BISHOP OF ROME AND EMIRTUS BISHOP OF ROME TOO FOR THAT MATTER!
God bless TB and her blog!
This video is very distasteful. I can't believe anyone would approve of an actor being paid to act as a bishop! Is the SDA preacher or 3ABN now playing "Hollywood"?! This video was clearly made to deceive people. Why else would they pay an actor to do this? The host could have read out whatever quotes he wanted his audience to hear himself. I'm wondering if they paid this actor because the program target audience are still practicing Catholics? What a great impression that would be on a Catholic watching what looks like a bishop at an SDA event reading what "sounds" like Catholic quotes or Catechism.
I pray for the SDA church and its members. I pray that the light will come into their dark worlds and shine so bright that they can no longer ignore their rest in Jesus Christ.
Matthew 11:28-30
28 “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”
"Arik,
Look at history.
The early church undisputedly went to church on Sunday as a celebration of the Lord's resurrection. In fact the early church met to worship daily. There was no such thing as an "official day" to worship for centuries. That pretty much came along with the Puritans, not the Catholics."
"I have repeatedly answered your questions. As an Adventist I am not surprised that you don't like my answers."
The early church is found in Scripture, and in Scripture there is no undisputable evidence that Sunday became the 3rd commandment of the Decalogue. Your church list Sunday as an "official day" to keep holy, you have not at all answered any of my questions, When did the 3rd commandment to keep Sunday holy become part of the Decalogue? Its a simple question Teresa.
Arik,
Read Dies Domini for your answer.
Teresa, You are being evasive. Dies Domini does not answer the question-when did the 3rd commandment to keep Sunday holy replace the 4th commandment to keep the Sabbath holy? It is a very simple question and strikes at the heart of the matter. Scripture does not record a 3rd commandment to keep Sunday as a holy day. So please when did the change in the Decalogue take place?
Speaking of Dies Domini: Quote:
"14. In the first place, therefore, Sunday is the day of rest because it is the day "blessed" by God, "and made holy" by Him, set apart from the other days to be, among all of them, "the Lord's Day." pg 33 (PDF).
"Insofar as this "rememberance" is alive, full of thanksgiving and of the praise of God, human rest on the Lord's day takes on its full meaning. It is then that man enters the depths of God's "rest" and can experience a tremor of the Creator's joy when, after the creation, he saw that he had made "was very good." pg 33 (PDF).
As an SDA I maintain that Catholicism did indeed replace the Sabbath with Sunday. In your book you say "If Sunday had become the Sabbath, then the verbage of the day would have reflected this." pg. 200. Certainly the verbage in Dies Domini, an "official" Catholic document expressing "official" Catholic teaching, shows unequivocally that all attributes that are given in Scripture to the Sabbath are now transferred to Sunday. You mention in your book under the chapter "Worship in Third Century Chritianity" pg 200 that "much historical evidence has been offered to prove that Christians were fully aware that the Lord's Day did not replace the Jewish Sabbath nor was it an obligation of the fourth commandment." So, it is clear by your own words that at least by the 3rd century there was no 3rd commandment to keep Sunday as a holy day. So again I ask when did the Catholic Church change the 4th commandment to the 3rd commandment to keep Sunday holy?
Arik,
I didn't realize that was a genuine question.
The Ten Commandments are not numbered in scripture.
The Catholic Church numbered them in the Middle Ages and they numbered them differently than the Jews did. It was nothing sinister. The commandments are all there, intact, same wording, only we combine what the Jews broke into two commandments. We broke into two commandments what the Jews had as one. Very simple. Nothing missing or hidden or even meant by it. Independently we numbered them and Christians and Jews numbering was different. That isn't a big deal at all.
A quick google search could have easily answered that so I just assumed you would have done that.
The rest of this question is answered in the comments of another post--the one about analyzing the quotes from the fake bishop.
Teresa- I did not ask how the church numbered the commandments. You still are being evasive. When did the commandment of the Decalogue to keep the Sabbath holy become the commandment to keep Sunday holy? Scripture records no such change of the law, you quote in your book that atleast by the third century Sunday observance was not law, so when did Sunday sacredness become LAW? It's like you are not even reading my post.
Arik,
There is some weird miscommunication here because I have answered that many many times over and over on this blog.
Please search the blog with the word "sabbath" and you will find that dealt with extensively numerous times.
I don't see the problem here, Arik. The bogus quotes are addressed well in Teresa's follow-up post.
You asked "when did the 3rd commandment to keep Sunday holy replace the 4th commandment to keep the Sabbath holy?"
Clearly you have some numbering issue going on there, which she has answered.
The Decalogue contains only one commandment about the Sabbath. The Sabbath, as Teresa has pointed out on her other blog post (which you have seen and commented on) was the sign of the Old Covenant (Exod 31:13-18, Lev 24:8), and the Sabbath and the Old Covenant point to the New Covenant. So there is no need for Christians to keep the Sabbath. Some do, some don't. Nearly all who do keep it acknowledge that they don't have to, but wish to for various reasons.
The Catholic Church is clear, as Teresa has pointed out, that the Catholic Church teaches that the Apostles began observing Sunday. Clearly the Catholic Church neither teaches nor acknowledges the idea that Sunday observance was a later invention. What WAS the later invention - as Teresa has pointed out - is that the application of some of the aspects of Sabbath observance were applied to Sunday. Why not? - after all, the early Christians didn't see the need to keep the Sabbath on Saturday, so why not apply non-obligatory practices to another day? Which is all irrelevant to the topic - which is really whether the Catholic Church claims to have changed the Sabbath to Sunday.
So, Teresa has established the following (across two blog posts):
1. Some of the quotes in the video are bogus
2. Some of the quotes in the video misrepresent what the Catholic Church actually teaches
3. The Catholic Church actually teaches that the Apostles began Sunday observance
4. Modern application of some of the practices surrounding Old Testament Sabbath-keeping have been applied over time to Sunday, which is not prohibited by Scripture. She correctly notes that in the early Church, Sunday was not a replacement Sabbath, and that some chose to continue it and some didn't. That Christians found importance in Sunday, and found no obligation to keep a Saturday Sabbath, can be found as the unanimous view going back to the first century.
And so I fail to see the problem.
A further technicality is that nearly ALL Christians - Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant - acknowledge that the Decalogue is no longer in effect. We all acknowledge that the Decalogue was the actual set of words making up the Old Covenant (Deut 4:13, Exod 34:28). We all acknowledge that the Old Covenant was replaced with the New. Even Paul (2 Cor 3:7) acknowledges that the law written on stone (what other law was written on stone?) has been replaced.
Teresa pointed out in comments on her other blog post that Catholicism sometimes doesn't express every complexity in it's full detail every time it refers to something. So while the Catholic Church definitely teaches that the Apostles began Sunday observance, Catholics sometimes just say "the Church did it" because we all think that the Apostles were leaders of the Catholic Church. And in time, less important things are not always clarified each time the Church says something, and why should they be? We do not define our theology relative to Adventism and its misunderstandings of Catholic teaching.
Back to the Decalogue ...
The Catholic Church - and the Orthodox and Protestants - do actually believe what I wrote above. The average layman, and likely the average priest, has not needed to be taught all of that. To us it's a technicality - because the precepts of the Decalogue remain valid under the New Covenant. Just like we have to dig to find Trent's confirmation (reaffirmed in Dies Domini) that the Apostles were the ones who began Sunday observance, so too do we need to scratch through official Catholic statements (again Trent for one) which affirm that the Decalogue is indeed, *as a legal code*, no longer valid under the New Covenant, while the precepts underlying the Decalogue ARE found - and expanded upon - in the New Covenant. You'll find that more clearly expounded by Evangelical Protestants, but all of us usually simply say "Obey the 10 Commandments" because to obey the 10 Commandments is a sure way to obey the precepts upon which they were based.
An analogy: in Canada, the US laws that outlaw murder do not apply. Canada, however, has its own laws against murder. But anyone in either country knows it's illegal. So it is with the Old vs New Covenants. The Old Covenant had the Decalogue; we have the Sermon on the Mount as well as a host of other biblical admonitions. In accusing other Christians of abolishing all morality by not granting the Decalogue's legal statement re the Sabbath a legal status under the New Covenant, Adventists are making a huge error. The full technical explanation is that in America and Canada there are two different legal codes, neither of which applies in the other country. What the average Catholic/Protestant/Orthodox is doing is the equivalent of an American arriving in Canada and saying "I may not kill people here." What the average Adventist is doing is the equivalent of accusing the American of arriving in Canada and saying "the American law against murder doesn't apply here, so we can murder freely."
Continued from above ...
Somewhere Adventism went wrong, and missed out on what Catholicism and Orthodoxy have taught for 2000 years, and what Protestantism has taught for 500 years - that there is a difference between the legal code having current validity, and the precepts of that code retaining usefulness under another code. Adventism is not even 200 years old. The error probably crept in due to the already-discussed problem of people missing out on the technical details when these technical details are not important to the practical living of a moral life. Catholicism and Protestantism and Orthodoxy all tell us to live moral lives. It's very seldom necessary to say "Live moral lives, but by the way, the legal status of the Decalogue is revoked, but the precepts are still relevant." Ask the average Catholic/Protestant (even Evangelical Protestant)/Orthodox if we must obey the 10 Commandments, and they will say "Yes." The technicalities, with the partial exception of more biblically literate Evangelicals, are hidden in history, and ultimately irrelevant ... except in discussions like this.
While I appreciate your response Stephen, it seems to me that you and Teresa are taking the extra long way around the barn to answer a very simple question of mine.
Please note that the Catechism is very clear (2072) that the Ten Commandments are "fundamentally immutable, and they oblige always and everywhere." So I think this means that even if I am in Canada it is against the law to murder.
I really do not know how you can say that the legal status of the Decalogue has been revoked. Scripture does not record this concept at all. Paul tells us that we who know the law will be judged by it (Romans 2:12). He also tells us that we as followers of Christ are no longer under the [condemnation] of the law. This sounds like the law still has legal status to me. Paul says the law is not made void (Romans 3:31) and Jesus says He did not abolish the law (Matthew 5:17). James says whosoever keeps the whole law and stumbles on one point is GUILTY of all. So no, I have to reject that the Decalogue is "no longer valid" or "no longer in effect" or "no longer as a 'legal code' valid." The Ten Commandments defines and convicts us of sin (Romans 7:7, The whole idea of being justified (legal term) by Christ is to be set free from the condemnation of the law.
2 Corinthians 3:7 does not say that the Decalogue has been replaced at all, but rather the ministration of the Spirit in our hearts is a much more glorious witness than the law merely written on tables of stone. What "faded" was not the law, but rather the countenance of Moses' face. So Paul is saying to not externalize the Decalogue (written and engraved on stones vs7) but by the Spirit this law of love will be internalized reflecting Jesus, the very embodiment of love. Paul is correct Love fulfills the law (Romans 13:8). Keeping them outside (the letter) condemns us, bringing them into the heart reflects the character of God (love). This is Paul's main point in Romans 7- serving in the newness of the Spirit (law written in our heart and mind) vs serving in the oldness of the letter (bringing only condemnation, for without the Spirit it is impossible to keep the law).
But this brings me to my next point: 2069 The Decalogue forms a coherent whole. Each "word" refers to each of the others and to all of them; they reciprocally condition one another. The two tables shed light on one another; they form an organic unity.
To transgress one commandment is to infringe all the others.
I would like to suggest that changeing one of the commandments infringes on all the others too. The Ten Commandments is a detailed application of the two greatest commandments. And the Catechism is absolutely correct "One cannot honor another person without
blessing God his Creator. One cannot adore God without loving all men, his creatures" (2069).
It is exactly like Teresa said in her blog "No matter how genius the mathematician you can't get a right answer with a wrong formula" (Reality is Better.) The Catholic Church has changed the formula, and therefore changed the Gospel. By changeing the law it has redefined sin (the transgression of the law). By changeing the law is has redefined love (the fulness of the law). Contrary to Catholic teaching the Apostles did not resolve to consecrate the first day of the week to the divine worship, if that was the case my very simple question would have easily been answered. My question as to when did the Church change the commandments has larger implications. It could be framed this way; when did sin as the transgression of the law (1 John 3:4) become reformulated as no longer breaking the Sabbath commandment, to a sin by breaking the Sunday commandment? When did love, as expressed by the application of the original Ten Commandments, and exemplified in the life of Jesus become redefined by God who is love and changes not?
Actually out of curiosity, and with some effort, I have tracked down the original quotes this actor is reading and all that I have located so far check out. Many of the sources I have found came from unimpeachable catholic web sites.
Anonymous, check out the second post on this video and I explain why the quotes are not sound...
The Catechism is not meant to be a complete theological work going into all the technical nuances.
“The other Commandments of the Decalogue are precepts of the natural law, obligatory at all times and unalterable. Hence, after the abrogation of the Law of Moses, all the Commandments contained in the two tables are observed by Christians, not indeed because their observance is commanded by Moses, but because they are in conformity with nature which dictates obedience to them.”
– The Catechism of the Council of Trent
The 10 Commandments are not important because they are part of the Law of Moses, but because they are in conformity with nature.
The current CCC:
2072 Since they express man's fundamental duties towards God and towards his neighbor, the Ten Commandments reveal, in their primordial content, grave obligations. They are fundamentally immutable, and they oblige always and everywhere. No one can dispense from them. The Ten Commandments are engraved by God in the human heart.
2081 The Ten Commandments, in their fundamental content, state grave obligations. However, obedience to these precepts also implies obligations in matter which is, in itself, light.
Note the words "in their fundamental content" and "in their primordial content" and "fundamentally immutable". Not as a legal code, not as the Law of Moses, but as precepts of the natural law.
1962 The Old Law is the first stage of revealed Law. Its moral prescriptions are summed up in the Ten Commandments.
1965 The New Law or the Law of the Gospel is the perfection here on earth of the divine law, natural and revealed.
For the Old Law and New Law terminology, we need to look at Thomas Aquinas, who laid the foundation for the CCC's use of this terminology:
“The Old Law contained some moral precepts; as is evident from Ex. 20:13,15: “Thou shalt not kill, Thou shalt not steal.”
- Summa Ia.IIae.99.2
The Old Law showed forth the precepts of the natural law, and added certain precepts of its own. Accordingly, as to those precepts of the natural law contained in the Old Law, all were bound to observe the Old Law; not because they belonged to the Old Law, but because they belonged to the natural law. But as to those precepts which were added by the Old Law, they were not binding on save the Jewish people alone.
- Summa Ia.IIae.98.5
Continued from above ...
From the above we can see that the Catholic Church teaches that the 10 Commandments are valid in precept, in their fundamental or primordial content, but not as a legal code. The Old Law is not binding on Christians, yet the 10 Commandments form part of the Old Law.
Arik, you and Adventism on the one hand, and I and Teresa and most of Christianity on the other hand, may disagree as to whether the Mosaic Law is currently legally in effect. We may disagree as to whether the 10 Commandments form part of the Law of Moses (there is plenty available on other websites and blogs dealing with Adventism to explain why the Adventist differentiation between the Law of Moses vs Law of God is a false dichotomy and not valid biblically). We may disagree as to whether or not we should keep the Sabbath. We may disagree as to the interpretation of Deut 4:13, Exod 34:28, and 2 Cor 3:7.
The discussion is not about those things, or was not at the start. It is about what the Catholic Church really teaches.
The Catholic Church really teaches that the Apostles began Sunday observance.
The Catholic Church really teaches that we are bound by the "primordial content" or moral principles underlying the 10 Commandments, but the Catholic Church also really teaches that, as a legal code, we are under the New Law, not the Old Law, and the Catholic Church really teaches that the Old Law includes the legal code of the 10 Commandments.
You wrote: "it seems to me that you and Teresa are taking the extra long way around the barn to answer a very simple question of mine."
The problem is that it's not a simple question. We have tried to simplify it, but you don't seem to like that. It's not a simple question because Catholicism has been producing explanations for centuries, and modern ones need to be understood in light of older ones. We can't just quote the CCC because the CCC is based on previous documents, such as Trent and Aquinas. It really takes a lot of digging for apologists to get to the core of an issue.
You wrote, re the writings of Pope John Paul II: "So, chances of them reading something he wrote? Not high."
And that is probably why we see so many Adventists who insist on pitting one quote against another without being willing to acknowledge the whole picture, who cannot acknowledge what the Catholic Church really teaches, and insist on producing their own misinterpretation / selective reading of actual Catholic teaching, and who are willing to make up fake quotes and distort the context of real quotes in order to convince people that the Catholic Church teaches X, when it really teaches Y.
For decades to come, we will have to deal with this, and try to pass on the facts to those willing to listen, and those who come later and read what we wrote. For decades to come we are going to have to listen to people say "Oh, but the Catholic Church teaches X" and provide a shallow selection of quotes and misquotes without going any deeper.
I think I've presented my case. Take it or leave it. Let those hear who wish to know what the Catholic Church actually teaches before arguing with her about why she's wrong.
Yes Stephen you have presented your case,and I thank you for it. The church's concept of "old law" and "new law" is simply not Scriptural. You may not believe in Sola Scriptura, however I think you would agree that what a church teaches should at the very least not conflict with the sacred Scriptures. The Ten Commandments as a 'legal code' have not been invalidated by Scripture, or the New Covenant, they have been invalidated by the church, and though you will stand on "my church said so" I can not.
Jesus Himself submitted to the commandments when He contrasted God's commandments to the elder's traditions. Much what SDA's are doing today. Part of Jesus' sermon on the mount was based on the Decalogue, His own teaching is a heightening, an intesification of the commandments, and not an antithesis of them. Jesus came "that the righteous requirements of the law might be fulfilled in us" Romans 8:4. This is the Gospel, the perfection of man according to the image of Christ. Love does not "bypass the law" Love "fulfills the law" (Romans 13:10). Unlike the early church of the 2nd and 3rd century, the SDA church recognizes that the Sabbath commandment is moral law just the same as the other nine. To change one, changes the entire precept of which they stand, that is love. No matter how sincere a Christian is, true rest in Christ will not happen as long as the Sabbath, the very symbol of God's rest, is rejected. The church can not "transfer the celebration and observance of the Sabbath to Sunday" Council of Trent.
So I agree Stephen, let those who read see that you and Teresa will not admit what the official teaching of the church admits, that the Catholic Church did indeed change the Sabbath to Sunday. Let them decide if they will follow a church that teaches "as doctrines of men [Thomas Aquinas, John Paul 2] the commandments of God."
PS I did not write "So, chances of them reading something he [John Paul 2] wrote, Not high." In part 2 of this subject I quoted from Dies Domini proving that all the attributes given in Scripture to the Sabbath, has now been given or transferred to Sunday.
I guess we'll have to agree to disagree. If Stephen wants to continue the conversation that is fine.
God bless you Arik!
I searched google and all the early American Newspaper sites I know of, including the Library of Congress site and could find few of the references that you have on your website. (You seemed to have dedicated a lot of time to this, I commend you.) So what search engine do you use and/or what sites do you go to for these early articles?
Excellent research, the only problem is that you seem to misunderstand that these sources will mean nothing to educated Protestants and Catholics. Only Adventists will find the site helpful in perpetuating their Catholic stereotype as the Whore of Babylon.
The vast majority of educated Christians understand that Christians are in the New Covenant and that the Jewish Sabbath (the seventh-day) was a shadow, an ante-type that pointed forward to the rest we would have in Christ. Jesus took authority over the Old Covenant, even with the Ten Commandments and fulfilled them and made them better! Now, instead of being negative commandments, they are positive.... We don't just refrain from killing and adultery and stealing and slander and covetousness and disrespect, we now love our neighbor as ourselves and do good and pray for our enemy. The Ten Commandments are the foundation for a much better law, a law of love and grace.
Think of it this way, the sign of the entrance of the Old Covenant was circumcision. You couldn't be part of the people of God unless the males in your household were circumcised. You couldn't be a part of the temple service and worship, you couldn't offer sacrifices, you couldn't live among Israel. All this was dependent upon the circumcision that meant you were in a COVENANT with the Lord. In the NEW Covenant we also have a sign of entrance to the covenant with God, but it is no longer circumcision (a rite of blood) it is now a rite of water--baptism. Does the fact we gave up circumcision mean we are not longer a part of God's covenant? Absolutely not! Circumcision was made perfect in Christ and His blood and now we enter through water. The foundation of a rite that bring you into a covenant is correct, but it has gone from blood to water. Does this degrade circumcision? No! ..... Baptism FULFILLS what circumcision pointed to.
This is the same thing as the Sabbath commandment. The Old Testament Sabbath was a sign of obedience to the covenant.
Just as the circumcision of blood pointed to Christ's blood shed for us to cleanse us from all unrighteousness, the Sabbath pointed to the rest of the Ultimate Sabbath when Christ was in the tomb and He went a preached to those in the deep. His "REST" in the grave was our REST in HIm and His atonement at the Cross!
Just now as baptism (water) fulfills what circumcision pointed towards. So the Jewish Sabbath day points to the rest we now have in Christ (and many will argue that it even points to the day of Resurrection which is Sunday.)
Since we have no direct proof-texts in the Bible for this last position, much of what your site says about Catholics saying that Protestants get this idea of a New Covenant Sunday fulfilling the Old Covenant Sabbath is making this exact point! Sunday (if you wish to argue it as a fulfillment of the Sabbath) is not explicitly written in scripture, however, all early Christians celebrated Sunday as at the VERY least a fulfillment of the Messiah's Salvation history! Later--centuries later---came more developed theologies of Sunday as the reality of a Sabbath shadow.
However, in any case, the apostles worshipped daily and Sunday was a special day to commemorate the resurrection. There was no--NO--misunderstanding that Sunday was a weekly 7th day Sabbath. That theology would be argued later. However, what Adventists fail to understand is that there was NO "DAY" of worship for Christians, then nor now! The Jewish Seventh-day Sabbath wasn't "THE" day of worship for Jews. They worshipped daily at the temple. Sabbath was a day of REST for the Jews.
Today, we rest in Christ as a fulfillment of the Jewish Sabbath, and most Christians have the opportunity to go to daily worship. For the vast amount of Christians today, there is no specified "day" we worship. We all go to church on Sunday as a tradition (and or if you are Catholic/Orthodox as a Sunday obligation), but it is not a "day" of worship. ALL days we are to worship.
Adventists mix a day of worship with a day of rest and that is part of the confusion. When you read these references on your website, you are reinforcing this confused idea of a day of rest and a day of worship. They are not equal. Everyday we worship. The Jews had a day of REST! That is where the question really lies.
NOT whether we have a day of worship in the New Covenant, but do Christians need to REST on the seventh-day. That is a more historically accurate question because that is what the early church was asking? "We worship daily (as did the Jews at the Temple) but should we continue resting on the seventh day?"
That is the question that is worth asking. And worth answering.
The Video https://youtu.be/CrB21mc2fmI
is an illegally copied and trimmed copy of a non-SDA firm (anonymous)
This is what really happened https://youtu.be/cpOK_UH0TT4
The SDA church have nothing to do with all this
Absolutely. We made that clear when we posted the video. This was posted by a group of Adventists unaffiliated with the SDA church--but the video itself WAS filmed and produced in an official "last day" seminar by Adventist televangelists. However they did briefly state that this was dramatized before the actor came onstage. That part was clipped out by the SDA group.
I'm only using "Anonymous" because I don't have a google account, my name is Jacques.
Interesting to read through the comments and thank you to not only Teresa for maintaining the blog and Stephen for his extensive input in support, but also thank you to Arik for clearly expressing the SDA counters.
I know these comments are 5yrs old, but not much has changed between the two camps since then.
One observation that seems to have gone unnoticed and that is that nowhere does Arik (or any of the subsequent SDA respondents) seem to deny the Catholic claim that the apostles began the tradition of worshipping on Sundays ("Every day" technically, but I won't digress). The point is that the SDA charges of the Catholic church changing the Sabbath (even though that charge is technically being denied through extensive argumentation) does put the Adventist sect in a precarious position foundationally.
Even if the charge is true (it isn't but for argument's sake let's admit to the SDA charge to consider the implications for the SDA)
The "obvious blunder" (as Chesterton pointed out in "Orthodoxy" but I'll present in my own words) is that it pulls the authority of scripture right from underneath them.
The canon of scripture was discerned by the the early church councils of the late 4th century (convenned precisely because there was uncertainty amongst different regional churches as to which books were inspired)
Like the creed before it, the bible gains authority by the authoratative power of the church to bind and loose on earth. The historical development of the canon is Catholic.
So the Protestant ultimately rests his "sola scriptura" in a Catholic book (even his reduced 66 book canon). The SDA (like all Protestants) when he appeals to the authority of scripture, already admits to the authority of the Catholic church whether he recognizes it or not.
So even though the charges of changing the Sabbath have been denied, the authority to bind the canon (and the creed) has already been admitted.
The Dead Sea Scrolls predate 4th century councils and are not Catholic
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