Old Time Religion

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“Mere Christianity” should lead quite naturally to “Mere Catholicity.” Pentecost marked the un-babeling of the world. In the Church, fragmented humanity is put back together by the power of the Spirit. So we must be about the business of putting the Church back together. If Christianity embraces “one Lord, one faith, and one baptism,” then we must learn to embrace one another.

For many Protestants, October is "Reformation Month." How should we regard that period? What good, if any, can come from a 500 year old protest movement? Why should it matter to those of us for whom conversion to Rome holds as much allure as the prospect of a root canal? Maybe more than you think. It is possible that by reacting against your Protestant forebears, you have fallen backward into the Tiber and the current has already carried you halfway to Popeville, Italy. So, what will it be? Semper reformanda, or "Buongiorno, Papa?" 

In this episode, we had the privilege to sit down with Dr. Miles Smith IV, lecturer in History at Hillsdale College, to discuss the nature and importance of history. 

The Greek word for creed is the word “symbolon,” from which we get our English word, “symbol.” The word refers to two parts of a seal or token placed together in order to prove a person's identity. The Creeds function in just this way. Our individual confession of faith is one half of the symbol, the historic faith shared by the whole Church is the other half. As the two halves fit together as one, we can say that we belong to that undying body known as the communion of the saints. But by saying that the Creeds are symbols, we are not maintaining that that the body of doctrine contained therein is something less than real. Rather, we are suggesting that nothing is more real than symbols.

Shelf Life is an occasional offering of poetry and literature with the odd comment or two thrown in for good measure.

Rejecting the creeds does not leave us standing in a fresh meadow with a newly-discovered Bible. Rather, it leaves us with the latest heretical balloon juice cooked up down at the Knee-Deep-in-Glory worship center, which as it happens, has yet to meet a wind of doctrine that it didn't like. But for those who desire to continue in the Apostles' Doctrine, we have been given the creeds as a rule and guide in order that we might, quite literally, be able to “keep the faith.” https://nojesuittricks.substack.com/p/i-believe?r=2m2ri&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&utm_source=twitter

Many Evangelicals are afraid that confessing the creeds might "lead to a Pope." The fact of the matter is that the opposite is true. A rejection of creeds and confessions leads to popery; a multiplied million little popes scurrying about with their own private interpretations, adjudicated by a magisterium of one. In such a state, one risks becoming untethered from the historic faith of the Church. Every lone wolf then has to wrestle afresh with old heresies against which most moderns are ill equipped, or else struggle over concepts for which they lack the requisite theological (or philosophical) grammar. Learning the language of the creeds is like learning our doctrinal ABC's; understanding the logic behind that language is like mastering the algebra of the Faith. This is just the sort of education we need in order to stand with the Church against Christendumb.

In this inaugural episode, we consider the tradition that formed us and the ways in which God's command to “honor our fathers” has led us to where we are now. When “leaving loud and proud” seems to be the order of the day, we explore a humbler, more honorable way.

Tired of faddish, trivialized expressions of Christianity? Tune in...