It can be startling when you first really read Galatians, and you realise that Paul declares that some false teachers preying upon the Galatians were under God’s curse, or as in other translations, ‘anathematised’. Wow, that’s pretty serious. These guys must have been doing something disastrous to earn so dire a punishment, right? Surely, they were leading the Galatians after a different God, or encouraging them to profane their marriage bed by sleeping around town with anyone they desired? Perhaps, they were turning the Lord’s Supper into a spectacle of class differences, gluttony and debauchery, as with the Corinthians?
Well, no. It was nothing like that. These Galatian teachers were simply requiring that before you could be a member of the New Covenant through faith in Christ, you had to receive the sign of the Old Covenant with Abram (Gen 17), namely, circumcision of the flesh. That might sound minor, but to Paul, that’s not the difference between different Christian traditions, or just a matter of perspective, or anything like that. To Paul, that puts you in the ‘you have alienated yourself from Christ, he will be of no value to you’ category.
To put it to you straight, Paul shows that even the slightest addition to justification by faith alone will lead to a person’s damnation. Any addition to the gospel of free grace is a total corruption of it.
If that’s the case, why do so many Christians treat the Roman Catholic Church like a denomination of Christianity, as if Presbyterians, Anglicans, Methodists and Catholics share the same gospel? This author has seen this happen several times, and if you draw attention to it, the response is always a variation of the following, “Oh, be careful, I know many godly Catholics, who love Jesus as much as anyone.”
Their response is always to bring it to the direct example of a person they know, an individual Roman Catholic, and uphold that person as a genuine saint. Now ladies and gentlemen, buckle your seats, here is a reminder: the almighty God has saved sinners out of all manner of cults and false religions, such as Mormonism (a.k.a. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints), Jehovah’s Witnesses (a.k.a. The Watchtower Bible and Tract Society) and yes, the Roman Catholic Church. The one thing these three cults have in common is that they use the word of God to some extent, and so it does not surprise this author that God has powerfully quickened that word in the hearts of some to save them, and deliver them out of those cults.
Let us put that to you in another way: there may well be individuals who identify as Roman Catholics, and who are yet true worshippers of Yahweh. This author groans for their souls, because it is a terrible thing for a heart that has tasted the freedom of Christ to then be subjected to the endless wheel of sacraments and penances that Rome imposes upon her faithful.
However, and hear us clearly, for this is the crux of this piece, it is not the personal piety of your friend that determines whether or not the Roman Catholic Church is a Christian denomination or not. The Presbyterian church can have its orthodoxy tested by an examination of the Westminster Confession of Faith. A Reformed Baptist church can likewise have its integrity assessed by a study of the 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith. In the same vein, it is only right and proper to use the official documents and declarations of the Roman Catholic Church to determine whether or not she belongs in fellowship with Christians, or not.
Enter, The council of Trent. This was a set of meetings between 1545 and 1563 in which Catholic theologians gathered to respond to the doctrines that the Protestant Reformers had insisted upon. In short, Trent was essentially the council of the counter-reformation. What these men came up with was not merely a recommendation for Catholics, nor just a rewording of doctrine statement for more clarity, no, the conclusions that these men drew became binding on the conscience of a faithful Roman Catholic. In other words, if you are a faithful Catholic, you must believe what was decided at the council of Trent.
If there is a Catholic who reads this, and who thinks that this description is incorrect, please feel free to contact this author, and edits will be readily made. There is no desire for misrepresentation on the part of this author, so any mistakes can be chalked down to ignorance.
With that aside, let’s see what Rome insists upon for her believers:
If any one saith, that man’s free will moved and excited by God, by assenting to God exciting and calling, nowise co-operates towards disposing and preparing itself for obtaining the grace of Justification; that it cannot refuse its consent, if it would, but that, as something inanimate, it does nothing whatever and is merely passive; let him be anathema.
(Council of Trent, Sixth Session, Canon IV, emphasis mine)
Though the language is a little archaic, if you read carefully you will see what it is that Rome says here: If the human is passive in receiving God’s grace, and if there isn’t some kind of cooperation or preparation of the soul that man works by his free will, that person is anathema (under God’s curse, separated from him). To put it in crude terms, ‘let him be anathema’ might as well mean ‘he can go to hell’.
So that you can see that this was not a twisted example, or a fringe statement, see the same sentiment echoed a short time later:
If any one saith, that men are justified, either by the sole imputation of the justice of Christ, or by the sole remission of sins, to the exclusion of the grace and the charity which is poured forth in their hearts by the Holy Ghost, and is inherent in them; or even that the grace, whereby we are justified, is only the favour of God; let him be anathema.
(Council of Trent, Sixth Session, Canon XI, emphasis mine)
We surely don’t need to make this any clearer. Rome says that if you believe justification by grace alone through faith alone, you are anathema, you’re cut off from Christ, you’re done. If Paul accused the Galatians of leading the people after a false gospel simply because they insisted upon circumcision, imagine what colourful words he’d have for Rome in this rank apostasy of hers.
So, be it settled unequivocally, that the Roman Catholic Church is not Christian, it is not a denomination with which believers have fellowship, rather it is a perverse cult which the church needs to evangelise, and if the Lord wills, bring back to the fold. Granted, there may be individuals who are currently attending mass (that disgusting and abominable charade) who have the regeneration of the Spirit of God working within them, but it is completely inexcusable, and in fact disrespectful to the powerful cross of Christ, to say that one can be a faithful Roman Catholic and a saved Christian at the same time. Gentle reader, if you are in communion with Rome, we exhort you to find freedom. We exhort you to embrace the once-for-all sacrifice that Christ made, which is powerful to save you from all your sins, whether past, present or future. You needn’t work your fingers to the bone cooperating with Rome’s never ending procession of sacraments and penances. Today is the day that the Lord may be found. Come, and come with empty hands.
Distilled Orthopraxy 