The Seventh-day Adventist-Roman Catholic Dialogue

The Seventh-day Adventist-Roman Catholic Dialogue - Part 6
John Mann (Seventh-day Adventist)

Stephen

Here are some more replies

> Apostle, I have no doubt about that. And when you see how all the
> Christian theologians and writers interpreted the Bible on this matter, it
> becomes clear that the Church, from the beginning, viewed Peter as the
> leader of the Church, along with his successors, who continuously claimed
> authority and were continuously acknowledged as having it, right from the
> first century on down. Historically, the early Church cannot be claimed to
> be Protestant. All the evidence shows that it was Catholic in nature.
> That's why I can't accept your position on this - God would not have let
> the Church go wrong for 1500 years before correcting the situation,
> especially when he said he would remain with it and show it the truth, and
> when the Bible itself says that the Church is the foundation and pillar of
> truth.

Now this is something I have been thinking about recently. Traditionally the church has seen "freedom" as free to follow the truth - where the "truth" is some fixed, single thing. In other words we are only free when we obey and follow God's narrow path. However this just doesn't make sense.

Freedom in the usual understanding of the term means free to choose our own way, free to make up our own minds - that there is no "one" right way, but a multitude of possible ways to follow. Now is freedom important to God? Certainly - after all, sin is a pretty nasty thing, yet every Christian says that we have sin because God holds freedom so highly that it is better that we are free to choose - even if this means making the wrong choice - that not having that choice at all.

However "freedom" can't simply mean free to fail, free to suffer, free to sin. For it to actually have any real value, freedom must mean that there are 1000s or millions of ways to be - and that these are all perfectly good and ok to God, and that in order to allow these millions of ways - in order to allow freedom - God also must allow some bad ways to keep this whole "open" nature to the universe.

This means just because the Church held a particular belief for 1000s of years, that it may not be the only truth or the best truth, there may be other truths which are just as good or better, why not try them for a while now, why always keep to just one truth and never change?

John Mann

Stephen Korsman is a Roman Catholic
John Mann is a Seventh-day Adventist