Bible alone?

[mclees8]

I am not advocating that we do not respect those who are in authority over us. We are not to be rebels against any leadership, but we are to be as lambs What the papacy did was a shift of power from Christ who was veneered  up front, to men who claimed they were the authority of God upon the earth. They were a pseudo authority. Even thought the reformation was a bloody rebellion, still something good came out of it. Men were no longer in the dark, and truth was now in their hands. If then they still abused it as the papacy abused it then they are culpable before God.   

   They still want the church to blindly follow after men who can be false shepherds more the Christ and to a certain degree still play on ignorance. Do not look to ploitics or the kings of the earth as to find peace and safety in the world, nor to the churches that lean on it. 

Rev 18.>1 And after these things I saw another angel come down from heaven, having great power; and the earth was lightened with his glory. 2 And he cried mightily with a strong voice, saying, Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird. 3 For all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth are waxed rich through the abundancea of her delicacies. 4 And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues. 5 For her sins have reached unto heaven, and God hath remembered her iniquities. 6 Reward her even as she rewarded you, and double unto her double according to her works: in the cup which she hath filled fill to her double. 7 How much she hath glorified herself, and lived deliciously, so much torment and sorrow give her: for she saith in her heart, I sit a queen, and am no widow, and shall see no sorrow. 8 Therefore shall her plagues come in one day, death, and mourning, and famine; and she shall be utterly burned with fire: for strong is the Lord God who judgeth her.
 

[winsome]

Again they re-invented Christianity when they became a politically ambitious system that ruled the empire and the known world that  Jesus never ordained nor Peter.

Tertullian

"Was anything withheld from the knowledge of Peter, who is called ‘the rock on which the Church would be built’ [Matt. 16:18] with the power of ‘loosing and binding in heaven and on earth’ [Matt. 16:19]?" (Demurrer Against the Heretics 22 [A.D. 200]).

"[T]he Lord said to Peter, ‘On this rock I will build my Church, I have given you the keys of the kingdom of heaven [and] whatever you shall have bound or loosed on earth will be bound or loosed in heaven’ [Matt. 16:18–19]. . . . What kind of man are you, subverting and changing what was the manifest intent of the Lord when he conferred this personally upon Peter? Upon you, he says, I will build my Church; and I will give to you the keys" (Modesty 21:9–10 [A.D. 220]).

 
The Letter of Clement to James

"Be it known to you, my lord, that Simon [Peter], who, for the sake of the true faith, and the most sure foundation of his doctrine, was set apart to be the foundation of the Church, and for this end was by Jesus himself, with his truthful mouth, named Peter" (Letter of Clement to James 2 [A.D. 221]).

 
The Clementine Homilies

"[Simon Peter said to Simon Magus in Rome:] ‘For you now stand in direct opposition to me, who am a firm rock, the foundation of the Church’ [Matt. 16:18]" (Clementine Homilies 17:19 [A.D. 221]).

 
Origen

"Look at [Peter], the great foundation of the Church, that most solid of rocks, upon whom Christ built the Church [Matt. 16:18]. And what does our Lord say to him? ‘Oh you of little faith,’ he says, ‘why do you doubt?’ [Matt. 14:31]" (Homilies on Exodus 5:4 [A.D. 248]).

 
Cyprian of Carthage

"The Lord says to Peter: ‘I say to you,’ he says, ‘that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of hell will not overcome it. And to you I will give the keys of the kingdom of heaven . . . ’ [Matt. 16:18–19]. On him [Peter] he builds the Church, and to him he gives the command to feed the sheep [John 21:17], and although he assigns a like power to all the apostles, yet he founded a single chair [cathedra], and he established by his own authority a source and an intrinsic reason for that unity. Indeed, the others were that also which Peter was [i.e., apostles], but a primacy is given to Peter, whereby it is made clear that there is but one Church and one chair. . . . If someone does not hold fast to this unity of Peter, can he imagine that he still holds the faith? If he [should] desert the chair of Peter upon whom the Church was built, can he still be confident that he is in the Church?" (The Unity of the Catholic Church 4; 1st edition [A.D. 251]).

"There is one God and one Christ, and one Church, and one chair founded on Peter by the word of the Lord. It is not possible to set up another altar or for there to be another priesthood besides that one altar and that one priesthood. Whoever has gathered elsewhere is scattering" (Letters 43[40]:5 [A.D. 253]).

"There [John 6:68–69] speaks Peter, upon whom the Church would be built, teaching in the name of the Church and showing that even if a stubborn and proud multitude withdraws because it does not wish to obey, yet the Church does not withdraw from Christ. The people joined to the priest and the flock clinging to their shepherd are the Church. You ought to know, then, that the bishop is in the Church and the Church in the bishop, and if someone is not with the bishop, he is not in the Church. They vainly flatter themselves who creep up, not having peace with the priests of God, believing that they are
secretly [i.e., invisibly] in communion with certain individuals. For the Church, which is one and Catholic, is not split nor divided, but it is indeed united and joined by the cement of priests who adhere one to another" (ibid., 66[69]:8).
 

Firmilian

"But what is his error . . . who does not remain on the foundation of the one Church which was founded upon the rock by Christ [Matt. 16:18], can be learned from this, which Christ said to Peter alone: ‘Whatever things you shall bind on earth shall be bound also in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth, they shall be loosed in heaven’ [Matt. 16:19]" (collected in Cyprian’s Letters 74[75]:16 [A.D. 253]).

"[Pope] Stephen . . . boasts of the place of his episcopate, and contends that he holds the succession from Peter, on whom the foundations of the Church were laid [Matt. 16:18]. . . . [Pope] Stephen . . . announces that he holds by succession the throne of Peter" (ibid., 74[75]:17).

Ephraim the Syrian

"[Jesus said:] ‘Simon, my follower, I have made you the foundation of the holy Church. I betimes called you Peter, because you will support all its buildings. You are the inspector of those who will build on earth a Church for me. If they should wish to build what is false, you, the foundation, will condemn them. You are the head of the fountain from which my teaching flows; you are the chief of my disciples’" (Homilies 4:1 [A.D. 351]).

These letters do not support what the papacy became. What is disturbing about them is the emphasis on obeying the bishop which the papacy is quick to use to justify itself. It is one thing to look to a leader who is displaying true humility godliness and Christ likeness and another to blindly follow after ambitious men who desires are of the flesh and are no longer of Christ The papacy was in position to play on ignorance and that they did untill the bible was made public. The Papacy made up its own rules and who could challenge them.

You are shifting the ground of your argument.

Your claim was  Jesus never ordained nor Peter. The quotes I gave you showed just that. Now you are saying they don't show what the papacy became. Well that is quite another argument.

I do not support denominationalism, but it was born out of what was already corrupt. yet catholics defend it blindly. Confused??

You keep making this claim but provide no evidence. I suppose it gives you comfort.

Those who blindly follow men with out any measure of them are blind being led by the blind. They are those who are led about by every wind of doctrine.

A great explanation of Protestantism

[mclees8]

I guess love is blind...

"It is impossible to be just to the Catholic Church. The moment men cease to pull against it they feel a tug towards it. The moment they cease to shout it down they begin to listen to it with pleasure. The moment they try to be fair to it they begin to be fond of it. But when that affection has passed a certain point it begins to take on the tragic and menacing grandeur of a great love affair."

- GK Chesterton

Funny I have never in 30years of my faith have I ever felt drawn to it. But i am drawn to Christ and that is a great love affair  

[winsome]

Yes the RCC was born in corruption. You might find it interesting to check out "The Donations of Constantine in you own Catholic encyclopedia." I can also post a history lessen about it and the fifth century  power hungry Bishops of Rome who commited fraud saying that Constinetine gave them their position. Not to mentionthat they didn't get it from God.

You mean this entry from the Catholic Enclyopedeia about the "Donation of Constantine"?

By this name is understood, since the end of the Middle Ages, a forged document of Emperor Constantine the Great, by which large privileges and rich possessions were conferred on the pope and the Roman Church……….

This document is without doubt a forgery, fabricated somewhere between the years 750 and 850. As early as the fifteenth century its falsity was known and demonstrated. Cardinal Nicholas of Cusa (De Concordantiâ Catholicâ, III, ii, in the Basle ed. of his Opera, 1565, I) spoke of it as a dictamen apocryphum. Some years later (1440) Lorenzo Valla (De falso credita et ementita Constantini donatione declamatio, Mainz, 1518) proved the forgery with certainty. Independently of both his predecessors, Reginald Pecocke, Bishop of Chichester (1450-57), reached a similar conclusion in his work, "The Repressor of over much Blaming of the Clergy", Rolls Series, II, 351-366. Its genuinity was yet occasionally defended, and the document still further used as authentic, until Baronius in his "Annales Ecclesiastici" (ad an. 324) admitted that the "Donatio" was a forgery, whereafter it was soon universally admitted to be such.

A forged document is not much of a basis for your claims

You say not a basis.  How so? The ambitious bishops wanted power and lied that Constantine gave it to them as a gift.  The whole papacy was granted its position  because of it. 

How can a forged document be the basis of any claim? It's a forgery.

These men were not of God and the papacy was born of corruption. Just what is that you think you are defending. There was nothing Holy or of a divine calling about the papacy.
Are you still going to tell me Jesus was in it? The church had no political ambitions for over three hundred years, and Jesus never said it was ever to The ruling power of the Roman empire, and these so called men of God  Lied to have power.

And you say it has no basis. Sloan must be right   

You keep making these claims but provide no evidence except a forgery . What kind of evidence is a forgery?

[winsome]

I am not advocating that we do not respect those who are in authority over us. We are not to be rebels against any leadership, but we are to be as lambs What the papacy did was a shift of power from Christ who was veneered  up front, to men who claimed they were the authority of God upon the earth. They were a pseudo authority. Even thought the reformation was a bloody rebellion, still something good came out of it. Men were no longer in the dark, and truth was now in their hands. If then they still abused it as the papacy abused it then they are culpable before God.   

   They still want the church to blindly follow after men who can be false shepherds more the Christ and to a certain degree still play on ignorance. Do not look to ploitics or the kings of the earth as to find peace and safety in the world, nor to the churches that lean on it. 

Rev 18.>1 And after these things I saw another angel come down from heaven, having great power; and the earth was lightened with his glory. 2 And he cried mightily with a strong voice, saying, Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird. 3 For all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth are waxed rich through the abundancea of her delicacies. 4 And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues. 5 For her sins have reached unto heaven, and God hath remembered her iniquities. 6 Reward her even as she rewarded you, and double unto her double according to her works: in the cup which she hath filled fill to her double. 7 How much she hath glorified herself, and lived deliciously, so much torment and sorrow give her: for she saith in her heart, I sit a queen, and am no widow, and shall see no sorrow. 8 Therefore shall her plagues come in one day, death, and mourning, and famine; and she shall be utterly burned with fire: for strong is the Lord God who judgeth her.
 

No, Christ gave his authority to the apostles, who in turn passed it on to their successors.

I guess this is where the thread actually started.

[mclees8]

Yes the RCC was born in corruption. You might find it interesting to check out "The Donations of Constantine in you own Catholic encyclopedia." I can also post a history lessen about it and the fifth century  power hungry Bishops of Rome who commited fraud saying that Constinetine gave them their position. Not to mentionthat they didn't get it from God.

You mean this entry from the Catholic Enclyopedeia about the "Donation of Constantine"?

By this name is understood, since the end of the Middle Ages, a forged document of Emperor Constantine the Great, by which large privileges and rich possessions were conferred on the pope and the Roman Church……….

This document is without doubt a forgery, fabricated somewhere between the years 750 and 850. As early as the fifteenth century its falsity was known and demonstrated. Cardinal Nicholas of Cusa (De Concordantiâ Catholicâ, III, ii, in the Basle ed. of his Opera, 1565, I) spoke of it as a dictamen apocryphum. Some years later (1440) Lorenzo Valla (De falso credita et ementita Constantini donatione declamatio, Mainz, 1518) proved the forgery with certainty. Independently of both his predecessors, Reginald Pecocke, Bishop of Chichester (1450-57), reached a similar conclusion in his work, "The Repressor of over much Blaming of the Clergy", Rolls Series, II, 351-366. Its genuinity was yet occasionally defended, and the document still further used as authentic, until Baronius in his "Annales Ecclesiastici" (ad an. 324) admitted that the "Donatio" was a forgery, whereafter it was soon universally admitted to be such.

A forged document is not much of a basis for your claims

You say not a basis.  How so? The ambitious bishops wanted power and lied that Constantine gave it to them as a gift.  The whole papacy was granted its position  because of it. 

How can a forged document be the basis of any claim? It's a forgery.

These men were not of God and the papacy was born of corruption. Just what is that you think you are defending. There was nothing Holy or of a divine calling about the papacy.
Are you still going to tell me Jesus was in it? The church had no political ambitions for over three hundred years, and Jesus never said it was ever to The ruling power of the Roman empire, and these so called men of God  Lied to have power.

And you say it has no basis. Sloan must be right   

You keep making these claims but provide no evidence except a forgery . What kind of evidence is a forgery?

Well who can argue against that kind of logic? You can keep saying that  till the calls come home. Its called  like blind denial. You are like a man who sees in a mirror and say there's no reflection there.

Sure it was a forgery but who wrote and Why. what did they want? Were they men of Christ? Don't answer just think  I've  had enough.
God bless

[mclees8]

I am not advocating that we do not respect those who are in authority over us. We are not to be rebels against any leadership, but we are to be as lambs What the papacy did was a shift of power from Christ who was veneered  up front, to men who claimed they were the authority of God upon the earth. They were a pseudo authority. Even thought the reformation was a bloody rebellion, still something good came out of it. Men were no longer in the dark, and truth was now in their hands. If then they still abused it as the papacy abused it then they are culpable before God.   

   They still want the church to blindly follow after men who can be false shepherds more the Christ and to a certain degree still play on ignorance. Do not look to ploitics or the kings of the earth as to find peace and safety in the world, nor to the churches that lean on it. 

Rev 18.>1 And after these things I saw another angel come down from heaven, having great power; and the earth was lightened with his glory. 2 And he cried mightily with a strong voice, saying, Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird. 3 For all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth are waxed rich through the abundancea of her delicacies. 4 And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues. 5 For her sins have reached unto heaven, and God hath remembered her iniquities. 6 Reward her even as she rewarded you, and double unto her double according to her works: in the cup which she hath filled fill to her double. 7 How much she hath glorified herself, and lived deliciously, so much torment and sorrow give her: for she saith in her heart, I sit a queen, and am no widow, and shall see no sorrow. 8 Therefore shall her plagues come in one day, death, and mourning, and famine; and she shall be utterly burned with fire: for strong is the Lord God who judgeth her.
 

No, Christ gave his authority to the apostles, who in turn passed it on to their successors.

I guess this is where the thread actually started.

Jesus also said to obey the Pharisees but don't be as they are. Paul said follow me as i follow Christ . form where do we get a true measure of truth, from men who change with the wind or Gods word that is the same yesterday, today, and forever. 

[winsome]

Yes the RCC was born in corruption. You might find it interesting to check out "The Donations of Constantine in you own Catholic encyclopedia." I can also post a history lessen about it and the fifth century  power hungry Bishops of Rome who commited fraud saying that Constinetine gave them their position. Not to mentionthat they didn't get it from God.

You mean this entry from the Catholic Enclyopedeia about the "Donation of Constantine"?

By this name is understood, since the end of the Middle Ages, a forged document of Emperor Constantine the Great, by which large privileges and rich possessions were conferred on the pope and the Roman Church……….

This document is without doubt a forgery, fabricated somewhere between the years 750 and 850. As early as the fifteenth century its falsity was known and demonstrated. Cardinal Nicholas of Cusa (De Concordantiâ Catholicâ, III, ii, in the Basle ed. of his Opera, 1565, I) spoke of it as a dictamen apocryphum. Some years later (1440) Lorenzo Valla (De falso credita et ementita Constantini donatione declamatio, Mainz, 1518) proved the forgery with certainty. Independently of both his predecessors, Reginald Pecocke, Bishop of Chichester (1450-57), reached a similar conclusion in his work, "The Repressor of over much Blaming of the Clergy", Rolls Series, II, 351-366. Its genuinity was yet occasionally defended, and the document still further used as authentic, until Baronius in his "Annales Ecclesiastici" (ad an. 324) admitted that the "Donatio" was a forgery, whereafter it was soon universally admitted to be such.

A forged document is not much of a basis for your claims

You say not a basis.  How so? The ambitious bishops wanted power and lied that Constantine gave it to them as a gift.  The whole papacy was granted its position  because of it.  

How can a forged document be the basis of any claim? It's a forgery.

These men were not of God and the papacy was born of corruption. Just what is that you think you are defending. There was nothing Holy or of a divine calling about the papacy.
Are you still going to tell me Jesus was in it? The church had no political ambitions for over three hundred years, and Jesus never said it was ever to The ruling power of the Roman empire, and these so called men of God  Lied to have power.

And you say it has no basis. Sloan must be right    

You keep making these claims but provide no evidence except a forgery . What kind of evidence is a forgery?

Well who can argue against that kind of logic? You can keep saying that  till the calls come home. Its called  like blind denial. You are like a man who sees in a mirror and say there's no reflection there.

Sure it was a forgery but who wrote and Why. what did they want? Were they men of Christ? Don't answer just think  I've  had enough.
God bless

The authorship of this document is still wrapped in obscurity. Occasionally, but without sufficient reason, critics have attributed it to the author of the False Decretals or to some Roman ecclesiastic of the eighth century. On the other hand, the time and place of its composition have lately been thoroughly studied by numerous investigators (especially Germans), though no sure and universally accepted conclusion has yet been reached. ……………..

Nevertheless, the earlier view of Zaccaria and others that the forgery originated in the Frankish Empire has quite recently been ably defended by Hergenröther and Grauert (see below). They call attention to the fact that the "Donatio" appears first in Frankish collections, i.e. in the False Decretals and in the above-mentioned St-Denis manuscript; moreover the earliest certain quotation of it is by Frankish authors in the second half of the ninth century. Finally, this document was never used in the papal chancery until the middle of the eleventh century, nor in general is it referred to in Roman sources until the time of Otto III (983-1002, i.e. in case the famous "Diploma" of this emperor be authentic). The first certain use of it at Rome was by Leo IX in 1054, and it is to be noted that this pope was by birth and training a German, not an Italian. The writers mentioned have shown that the chief aim of the forgery was to prove the justice of the translatio imperii to the Franks, i.e. the transfer of the imperial title at the coronation of Charlemagne in 800; the forgery was, therefore, important mainly for the Frankish Empire. This view is rightly tenable against the opinion of the majority that this forgery originated at Rome.
(Catholic Encyclopedia)

[winsome]

I am not advocating that we do not respect those who are in authority over us. We are not to be rebels against any leadership, but we are to be as lambs What the papacy did was a shift of power from Christ who was veneered  up front, to men who claimed they were the authority of God upon the earth. They were a pseudo authority. Even thought the reformation was a bloody rebellion, still something good came out of it. Men were no longer in the dark, and truth was now in their hands. If then they still abused it as the papacy abused it then they are culpable before God.   

   They still want the church to blindly follow after men who can be false shepherds more the Christ and to a certain degree still play on ignorance. Do not look to ploitics or the kings of the earth as to find peace and safety in the world, nor to the churches that lean on it. 

Rev 18.>1 And after these things I saw another angel come down from heaven, having great power; and the earth was lightened with his glory. 2 And he cried mightily with a strong voice, saying, Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird. 3 For all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth are waxed rich through the abundancea of her delicacies. 4 And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues. 5 For her sins have reached unto heaven, and God hath remembered her iniquities. 6 Reward her even as she rewarded you, and double unto her double according to her works: in the cup which she hath filled fill to her double. 7 How much she hath glorified herself, and lived deliciously, so much torment and sorrow give her: for she saith in her heart, I sit a queen, and am no widow, and shall see no sorrow. 8 Therefore shall her plagues come in one day, death, and mourning, and famine; and she shall be utterly burned with fire: for strong is the Lord God who judgeth her.
 

No, Christ gave his authority to the apostles, who in turn passed it on to their successors.

I guess this is where the thread actually started.

Jesus also said to obey the Pharisees but don't be as they are. Paul said follow me as i follow Christ . form where do we get a true measure of truth, from men who change with the wind or Gods word that is the same yesterday, today, and forever. 

Again you make claims with no substance and no evidence.

[mclees8]

I am not advocating that we do not respect those who are in authority over us. We are not to be rebels against any leadership, but we are to be as lambs What the papacy did was a shift of power from Christ who was veneered  up front, to men who claimed they were the authority of God upon the earth. They were a pseudo authority. Even thought the reformation was a bloody rebellion, still something good came out of it. Men were no longer in the dark, and truth was now in their hands. If then they still abused it as the papacy abused it then they are culpable before God.   

   They still want the church to blindly follow after men who can be false shepherds more the Christ and to a certain degree still play on ignorance. Do not look to ploitics or the kings of the earth as to find peace and safety in the world, nor to the churches that lean on it. 

Rev 18.>1 And after these things I saw another angel come down from heaven, having great power; and the earth was lightened with his glory. 2 And he cried mightily with a strong voice, saying, Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird. 3 For all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth are waxed rich through the abundancea of her delicacies. 4 And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues. 5 For her sins have reached unto heaven, and God hath remembered her iniquities. 6 Reward her even as she rewarded you, and double unto her double according to her works: in the cup which she hath filled fill to her double. 7 How much she hath glorified herself, and lived deliciously, so much torment and sorrow give her: for she saith in her heart, I sit a queen, and am no widow, and shall see no sorrow. 8 Therefore shall her plagues come in one day, death, and mourning, and famine; and she shall be utterly burned with fire: for strong is the Lord God who judgeth her.
 

No, Christ gave his authority to the apostles, who in turn passed it on to their successors.

I guess this is where the thread actually started.

Jesus also said to obey the Pharisees but don't be as they are. Paul said follow me as i follow Christ .  

Again you make claims with no substance and no evidence.

Something is scrambling up my posts with other posts.

This is not about evidences it is about true Character. A true reflection of Christ and living up to what he taught.  The pharisees could also  have been like you saying you have no proof. But what proofs there are, they are enough.

Its been real nice talking to you.

[desertknight]

The "Donation of Constantine" is one of those issues that gets trotted out by those who are trying to "prove" some falsity of the Catholic Church without really understanding what the history of the 'donation' means or how limited an argument it is.  I don't know how many times I have heard gleeful Protestants refer to it with, 'Haven't you ever heard of...!!!"  1. Uh, yes I have, but I don't think you understand what the 'donation' really meant and didn't mean."  2.  So what?  The 'donation', even if perpetrated as a fraud by some members of the Church, and there is no evidence it was, (You guys do realise the unauthenticity of the 'donation' was exposed by the Catholic Church as well, yes?), has no bearing on any religious or doctrinal truth or legitimacy of the Church, it was strictly limited to the political situation of the 8th century AD.

The 'donation' was far less a grab for power than it was a legal cover for what was already very much of a reality on the ground in the mid 700's AD.  Civilisation was rapidly collapsing in the west with the constant invasion of barbarians and the Roman Empire was abandoning it's control over the western provinces.  In order to keep all law, order and Christian life from going into the trash heap a general effort was made by the Christian, largely German inheritors of the western empire to 'legitimise' their rule through asserting the claims of the old empire.  The 'donation' was obviously a forgery that was designed for exactly that purpose.  What it was not, what no reputable historian asserts, is that it was some sort of dark Catholic secret.  The Church believed it's authenticity as much as anyone else did because it simply reflected what was the reality of life then, with or without, the 'donation's' existence.

It had nothing to do with the Church's legitimacy or religious authority.  It had nothing to do with any doctrinal issue.  It was simply legal cover and a reflection of reality of what was happening to the west in the 8th century and has no religious ramifications.  That it was a forgery was exposed by the Catholic Church by Pope Pius II should cause people to wonder just how 'secret' a fraud it could have been by the Church herself.  Whether it would, or would not have existed did not change the fact that the Church's duty was to assist the newly Christianised German tribes in restoring order and preserving Christian civilisation in the face of Attila and his band of savages.  

The Church has an excellent article on the 'donation' in it's official encyclopaedia...

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05118a.htm

[desertknight]

Funny I have never in 30years of my faith have I ever felt drawn to it. But i am drawn to Christ and that is a great love affair  

Then one day, you may actually be drawn to the Body of your great Love, His true Church.  Simply walk into any Catholic church during Mass, and your great love is there.  His Word is being proclaimed, His precious Body and Blood is there to give you true food and true drink, life eternal.  His truth is present and has been unchanging within his Mystical Body, His Church, since he built it on Peter's faith and those of His Apostles and insured that it's authority and truth would pass down as Christ told us, "until the end of time".



"For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink." (Jn 6:51-55).

[mclees8]

Funny I have never in 30years of my faith have I ever felt drawn to it. But i am drawn to Christ and that is a great love affair  

Then one day, you may actually be drawn to the Body of your great Love, His true Church.  Simply walk into any Catholic church during Mass, and your great love is there.  His Word is being proclaimed, His precious Body and Blood is there to give you true food and true drink, life eternal.  His truth is present and has been unchanging within his Mystical Body, His Church, since he built it on Peter's faith and those of His Apostles and insured that it's authority and truth would pass down as Christ told us, "until the end of time".



"For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink." (Jn 6:51-55).

I do love his church and I'm a part of it  when sleep and when I wake. That time came long ago. You are impressed with many things be sure you don't put those things between you and Him.

[Tantor]

Why do you almost always portray Jesus as still on the cross?

Salvation was not completed until he conquered death!

When I see Jesus on the Cross.. i think that people are in denial.

[winsome]

Why do you almost always portray Jesus as still on the cross?

Salvation was not completed until he conquered death!

When I see Jesus on the Cross.. i think that people are in denial.

Denial of what?  He died on the cross. Are you denying that?

And what has this to do the the OP anyway?