Know What You Believe

THIS CHURCH OR THAT CHURCH – THAT IS THE QUESTION.

I have served as pastor in the Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod (LCMS) for nearly 50 years and over that time I have been amazed at the lack of understanding about church denominations and other world influences around them.

If Christian denominations were flavors of ice cream, would I be Lutheran simply because I preferred that flavor? Or is there something more? Many people contend that different denominations are not really a big deal - that all Christian churches essentially teach the same thing. Is that true? Ultimately Lutheran concern about right doctrine is concern about justification, the doctrine upon which the church stands or falls. This teaching – that Christians are declared righteous and just on account of Christ’s suffering and death, entirely by grace and received by faith - forms the center and core of all church doctrine.

My intention over the next several months will be to help us understand what this means as I put before you in simplified fashion a look at denominations in the religious “flavors” found around us today.

I will start with the Roman Catholic Church since it was the most prominent church over the centuries and has given rise to numerous denominations since its historic beginnings.

HISTORY The Roman Catholic (RC) church traces itself to the apostle Peter, whom it considers to be the first pope. According to RC teaching, Peter was chief among the original 12 apostles and served as the first bishop of Rome. Many historians, however, consider the RC church to have been instituted in A.D. 590 when Gregory I (also known as Gregory the Great) consolidated the church’s authority and initiated the papacy as it exists today.

The RC church has had far-reaching influence on the world not only in spiritual matters but also in temporal matters, involving itself in politics, war and other societal forces. The conversion of the Roman emperor Constantine to Christianity in A.D. 312. and the rise of Islam in the seventh century were pivotal events that, along with the sending of missionaries, contributed to the spread of Christianity in Europe and beyond.

In 1054, a schism split the church between East (Orthodox) and West (RC). As Roman Catholicism reached the height of its power and influence in the 12th and 13th centuries, the church increasingly began persecuting those who challenged its teachings. This persecution - known as the Inquisition - sometimes led to the execution of the so-called heretics.

In 1517, Martin Luther posted his 95 Theses, setting off the Reformation. In the centuries that followed, one group after another broke away from the RC church and its offshoots, resulting in the Christian denominations that exist today.

CONFESSIONAL DOCUMENTS The RC church subscribes to a “sacred deposit of faith” that comprises both Scripture and tradition and is transmitted to the church through the pope via his bishops. The core documents of the RC church, in addition to the Bible, are the RC catechism; the codes of canon law (rules for the church’s organization and governance); 21 ecumenical councils, including Vatican I and Vatican II; and the official acts of the Holy See (the Vatican). The RC church also recognizes as Scripture Old Testament books, known as the Apocrypha, that are not included in Lutheran or Protestant Bibles.

KEY BELIEFS THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH TEACHES:

• It is the one, true church, deriving its authority from the “apostolic succession” of its popes, who retain the authority granted to Peter by Jesus in Matthew 16:18-19: “And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.”

• The doctrinal pronouncements of the pope are infallible.

• According to the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC), “Justification establishes cooperation between God’s grace and man’s freedom” (CCC 1993). According to RC doctrine, Christ has freed the faithful from eternal punishment for sin, but not from temporal punishment, which must still be paid, either on earth or in purgatory (an intermediate step on the way to heaven). However, the life and work of Christ, along with that of Mary and the saints, has built up a storehouse or treasury of merit that is held by the church and dispensed, as the church sees fit, in the form of indulgences. Indulgences may lessen the time one needs to spend in purgatory.

• The doctrine of Mary as Co-Redeemer has almost no history apart from this century.

Mary is preeminent among the saints and holds a unique place at God’s right hand. She was immaculately conceived, that is, without original sin and remained sinless throughout her life. She also serves as a “co-redemptrix” with Christ by virtue of bearing Him, and she intercedes to the Father on sinners’ behalf (1850sAD). The time of greatest expansion was between 1854 when immaculate conception was defined and 1950 when the assumption of Mary was affirmed.

• The sacraments, according to the CCC, are “efficacious signs of grace, instituted by Christ and entrusted to the Church, by which divine life is dispensed.” The RC church recognizes seven sacraments - Baptism, the Eucharist, Confirmation, Reconciliation (confession and penance), Extreme Unction (anointing of the sick), Holy Orders (ordination) and Marriage - and teaches that they are required for salvation: “If any one saith, that the sacraments of the New Law are not necessary unto salvation, but superfluous; and that, without them, or without the desire thereof, men obtain of God, through faith alone, the grace of justification; though all (the sacraments) are not indeed necessary for every individual; let him be anathema” (The Council of Trent, Seventh Session, Canon IV).

• The Eucharist is both a sacramental (Christ’s work) and a sacrificial (man’s work) act: “We carry out this command of the Lord by celebrating the memorial of his sacrifice. In so doing, we offer to the Father what he has himself given us: the gifts of his creation, bread and wine which, by the power of the Holy Spirit and by the words of Christ, have become the body and blood of Christ” (CCC 1357). When the priest speaks the Words of Institution, the bread and wine are changed, in their substance, into the body and blood of Jesus; they are no longer bread and wine but only appear to be. This is known as transubstantiation.

WE LUTHERANS CONFESS That Jesus’ death on the cross and His resurrection from the dead paid the price totally, once and for all, for sin. The only human who was ever born without sin or lived a sinless life is Jesus Christ. There is nothing a human being can do to add to Christ’s work. Sinners are justified by grace alone through faith alone and this is not their doing but a gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast (Ephesians 2:8-9). This truth is revealed to God’s people only in His Word. Regarding the Lord’s Supper, Lutherans confess that it is God’s gift and entirely His work, and that the body and blood of Christ are present in, with and under the bread and wine; we call this the real presence.