The "unpardonable sin" and Eternal Security

Jason Stellman (former Calvinist, now Catholic) made a brilliant observation a while back about the 'unpardonable sin' that Jesus speaks of in the Gospels. The verse states,

And so I tell you, every kind of sin and slander can be forgiven, but blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but anyone who speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come. (Mat 12:31-32; Mk 3:28-29; Lk 12:9-10)

Catholics have traditionally appealed to the phraseology of forgiveness "in the age to come" as evidence for purgatory, since this is the only reading that makes sense of the idea of sins being able to be forgiven after death. Some Protestants have tried to dodge this by appealing to the parallel accounts where Jesus says "will never be forgiven," but I call this a dodge because it doesn't get around the wording of "or in the age to come," it merely affirms what's already agreed upon: the sin is never forgiven. 

But that's not what Jason pointed out that I thought was worth sharing. What Jason pointed out was that this verse goes against the Protestant idea that salvation cannot be lost (known as Eternal Security or Once Saved, Always Saved). This is because the text says that Jesus is speaking of all kinds of sins being able to be forgiven, just not this one. This suggests a person can go 'too far' with their sins and thus cross an 'invisible line' of no return. They can sin one too many times or they can sin in such a severe way that they wont be forgiven and thus they will be damned. 

The only counter I can envision a Calvinist making is that this 'unpardonable sin' is simply talking about those who were never saved to begin with. But this makes the unpardonable sin synonymous with being in an unconverted/unregenerate state (i.e. born in original sin), which makes no sense for two reasons. First, everyone is born in the unconverted state, so this cannot be the unpardonable sin. Second, the context Jesus is speaking is that of sins that can be forgiven, just not this one, indicating it's a sin yet to be committed by any particular person.

All believe that there is no sin for which the Cross could not atone for, which means this 'unpardonable sin' has to be something more pernicious than sinful acts in general. The traditional Catholic reading of this text gives two interpretations, which overlap somewhat. The first is discerned by the context, where the Pharisees had seen all these miraculous signs coming from Jesus and yet they continued to refuse to believe in Him. What made this moment especially wicked was that they attributed the miracles to Satan rather than the Holy Spirit! This repeated willful blindness caused them to be permanently blind to seeing the light and thus beyond able to repent. They reached a point where God stopped trying to convert them. The second and more generic interpretation is that the 'unpardonable sin' is the sin of 'final unrepentance', meaning willfully refusing to repent of being in a state of mortal sin up to the moment of death. So someone who is out of communion with God who refuses to repent and dies in that way has put them self in a state that precludes forgiveness. Either way, Eternal Security is refuted by this verse.

Why did the Second Vatican Council ignore the issue of Communism?

[UPDATE 2-28-3: This article has undergone significant revision in light of new information. See especially the Endnote] 

My idea for this post came from a recent article on the Ignatius Press blog, which had a link to a Catholic World Report article titled "Why did Vatican II ignore Communism?" When I saw the title of this article I was completely stunned. Did Vatican II really ignore Communism? That's outrageous! But if this is true, then I really want to know why, because that comes off as scandalous.

Have you accepted Jesus as your Lord and Savior? (The Sinner's Prayer & Lordship Salvation)

Evangelicals love to ask "Have you accepted Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior?" but most people are unaware of the damning contradiction behind this question that is tearing Evangelicalism apart daily. The contradiction, or better yet self-condemning dilemma, is summed up in what is known as the Lordship Salvation controversy. The concept of Lordship Salvation teaches that Jesus is not just Savior, but Savior and Lord. This is specifically understood to mean that Jesus doesn't just save you, but He's also your master whom you must obey. This means that anyone living a life of sin cannot be truly a believer, since anyone who has "saving faith" will prove this by obeying Jesus, principally by turning away from sin and producing good fruit. Indeed, there are plenty of texts that would suggest this very thing (e.g. 1 John 2:4; Mat 7:15-23). To Catholic ears, this sounds perfectly reasonable. So what's the big deal?

A sketch of the Catholic view of Salvation

A fellow Catholic blogger asked me to write a post explaining the Catholic view of Salvation. He made a good point: We hear a lot of why Sola Fide is wrong, but we don't hear enough about why Catholicism is right. It's not enough for Catholicism to just disprove Protestantism.

In this post I will try to lay out the main facets of Catholic soteriology (the Catholic understanding of salvation), which can be further appreciated with the Protestant view shown in contrast. Since this is a sketch view, I will not really focus on proving Catholicism here (but I've done so elsewhere).

The first question to address is: What is salvation?
The very essence of salvation means a person is in a relationship with the Trinity. (John 14:23; Eph 3:17; 1 Cor 3:16) A person "is saved" when Trinity indwells in the soul of the Christian. Adam was originally in a relationship with the Trinity, he was created in a "saved" state, but through grave sin he broke this communion and became "unsaved." This is why the Bible describes believers "getting saved" in terms of reconciliation, adoption, in-grafting, etc. (Rom 5:10; Rom 8:14-17; John 15:4-5) It is in restoring of the communion through the Divine Indwelling that one "gets saved."

While the Catholic and Biblical view of salvation is a state of being, the contrast to this is the Protestant view of salvation, which an aftereffect of a performance. The Protestant view of salvation is that to "get saved" one must keep God's commandments perfectly, and upon doing so they are awarded a legal status of "perfect law-keeper." This status makes one legally worthy to enter Heaven. Since Adam and all mankind failed to keep God's commandments perfectly, Protestants reason that the only way to get awarded the status of "perfect law-keeper" is if Jesus keeps the law perfectly in our place and 'imputes' this to us. So when a Protestant speaks of "getting saved" they are speaking of believing that Jesus lived the life you were supposed to live, and the Father crediting you with the status of "perfect law-keeper," as if you yourself had kept the commandments perfectly, making you now worthy of entering Heaven.

The second question to address is: Why are Catholics so concerned about works?
From the previous paragraphs, one can see the radical difference between Protestantism and Catholicism. In Protestantism, one is saved independently of being in a relationship with God. (Protestants certainly believe Christians enter into a relationship with God, but it is not this relationship that determines their salvation.) On the flip side, it is clear why sin can cause a Catholic to lose salvation, because sin undermines the relationship with God, and if the sin is grave enough then it can sever that relationship, causing one to become "unsaved." (John 15:6; 1 John 3:15; Rom 11:19-22) This is why Protestants generally believe one cannot lose salvation, because even when they sin, God only looks at the "perfect law-keeper" status that Jesus credited to them. (Luther described this situation as Christians representing piles of dung covered with snow, where God only "sees" the pure white snow and not their own filth.)

From this it becomes clear what "good works" mean in the Catholic context. In the Catholic view, good works (acts of love) are what grow and deepen the relationship with God. It's similar to when a married couple grows in love and appreciation for each other. The relationship gets stronger or weaker in response to how much love or sin is committed. It is not only a duty, it's crucial for maintaining a strong relationship. But from the Protestant view, "good works" are anathema in the "getting saved" context, because we are law-breakers by nature and we'd be deceived to think our good works could contribute towards a "perfect law-keeping" status. (Recall that in that view, God the Father looks at Jesus' "perfect law-keeping" alone, not our sinful record.) So from the Protestant perspective, "good works" (quite logically) don't "save" us, but Protestants insist that we should do good works out of gratitude for God, as a way of saying thank you and being a witness to others about what Jesus already did for you.

The third question to address is: What about the Cross?
The Cross is viewed very differently by Protestants and Catholics. Most people don't realize this, but after the above sketches it should be apparent that there must be radically diverging views. The Cross was about making Atonement for sins, but what most people don't know is that to make atonement in the Biblical sense means to repair a damaged relationship through offering up something of value. Given this, the Catholic view of the Cross is that of Jesus offering up his life, with His shedding of blood signifying He held nothing back. This act of Jesus offering up everything out of love of God was so pleasing in the Father's sight, that this act of Atonement carried a value greater than all the sins in history combined. The Bible describes this as an aroma that blots out the stench caused by sin. (Eph 5:1-2; Lev 4:31; Gen 8:21) It is from this Atonement that our relationship with God can be restored, for instead of approaching God 'empty handed' asking to restore this, through faith we now appeal to God "in the Name of Jesus," to which God is pleased to listen to the Intercession of His Beloved Son. 

Unfortunately, Protestants don't follow the Bible (or Tradition) on this matter, and so they have a radically distorted view of the Cross. They see "Atonement" in an almost pagan form, in which their sin is punished in a substitute. The reason why Protestants believe this is because they view salvation in terms of a legal status, where the Judge must punish the guilty and acquit the innocent. Before God can look at the "perfect law-keeping" of Jesus credited to them, the sinner's 'criminal record' must first receive the punishments due to those crimes. Thus, Adam's sins and our sins had to be punished in Christ. From this they mistakenly think the Old Testament sacrificial animals were receiving the death penalty in place of the sinning Jew who offered it. But worse yet, from this mistaken idea Protestants think God the Father punished Jesus with the divine wrath and vengeance our sins deserved, which translates into God the Father unleashing hellfire and damnation upon His Beloved Son while He hung on the Cross. (It is no wonder that Protestants don't like to view the Crucifix or the Sacrifice of the Mass, because the conscience rightly shudders thinking that Jesus endured damnation and hellfire.)

Since this is a sketch, I guess that covers three of the most important issues. Other important questions I hope to address in a second part to this post will be the various aspects of the nature-grace distinction (similar to what I wrote in this post). 

Why Protestantism is caving into Homosexuality

In my last post talking about the HomoHeresy (the agenda to normalize homosexuality) having strong roots in the Catholic Church, I felt it important to point out that the HomoHeresy is infact far worse outside the Catholic Church. Things are particularly worse in Protestantism, since they have no good way to stop it. Just last month a prominent Evangelical Pastor of a large congregation came out in favor of gay marriage. The fact that homosexuality is such a central issue today is a clear indication of the failure of the Protestant-Enlightenment experiment in the West. The sin of sodomy has always been around, but never in the 2000 years of Christianity has it received public support on the popular and legislative level. Never has it been viewed as just as normal as a heterosexual marriage. What was unthinkable a generation ago is now mainstream and taking over fast, and there's no stopping it. In fact, the main reason why homosexuality is gaining ground in this country and the world is because of Protestantism, which is caving in more and more each day to this plague.

We all know the Liberal Protestants are already fully engulfed in supporting and even advocating for this agenda, but what most Conservative Protestants don't realize is that it’s becoming more and more difficult to make a case against homosexuality from within a Conservative Protestant framework. The following are the main reasons why.