Arrogance Of The Roman Hierarchy
Many times over the radio and through the press the Roman Hierarchy makes use of its opportunities to call upon the Protestant world and the church of the Lord to "return to the Catholic fold." Catholics apparently believe that Roman Catholicism is the religion of Christ and his apostles, and that all other religions of so-called Christendom are departures from the divine order and that a return to Catholicism is the only wise and safe course for the rest of the religious world, and that no one should have any religious freedom, except the freedom to become a Roman Catholic.
Many Catholics are sincere in this belief. They do not seem to know that Catholicism itself is an apostasy — an abandonment of the divine order — a slow, gradual departure from the divine pattern given for the churches in the New Testament. They think the New Testament is a book "where there is no pattern," therefore, they go to Rome for their "pattern," which may be as good a place as any to go for a pattern, if the New Testament "pattern" is rejected. But Catholicism is as far as Protestant denominationalism from that system advocated in the New Testament by the inspired apostles of Christ. And anyone with an "honest and good heart" (Luke 8:15), who will read carefully the New Testament, should be able to see that the doctrines, traditions and ecclesiastical government of the Catholic system are as foreign to the revealed will of God as any sect of Protestantism.
Roman Catholicism, as it exists today, is the result of one departure after another through many centuries from the will of God as revealed in the Bible. The whole governmental machinery, from the "parish priest" to the so-called "pope," is contrary to everything the New Testament teaches on the faith, life, work, worship and government of the church of Christ.
The name, "Roman Catholic," praying to "saints;' the religious use of relics, pictures and images, auricular confession, transubstantiation, sprinkling for baptism, purgatory, indulgences and the doctrine of infallibility of the so-called "pope" are only a few of the many Roman Catholic dogmas and doctrines which the New Testament never mentions, except to forbid and condemn them.
The claim that the Roman Catholic Church never changes is contrary to the facts of history, including Catholic history. All history is replete with Catholic changes. Pontiff after pontiff has rescinded and contradicted the decree of his predecessors. New doctrines have been adopted and old ones abrogated by almost all the conventions of Roman Catholic Council. The Catholic Church changed when it authorized the veneration of relics and images in the council of A. D. 787; again when it set up "auricular confession" in A. D. 1215; again in the same year and the same Council when it changed from immersion to sprinkling for baptism; again when it placed its stamp of approval on the vile doctrines of purgatory and indulgences in A. D. 1438; again when it proclaimed the so-called pope's infallibility after a lengthy quarrel in the Vatican Council of A. D. 1870. Yes, this claim that the Catholic Church has not changed is almost as absurd as the contention of Guy N. Woods that he has not changed on institutionalism.
On one particular point the Roman Hierarchy has never changed. It has not changed in its persistent efforts to destroy religious freedom in the nations of the world where it has gained control of the government. No religious freedom, except the freedom to become Catholics, is enjoyed by the citizens of any nation on earth today that is predominantly Catholic. The Catholic Dictionary defines "Freedom of Worship: the inalienable right of all men to worship God according to the teaching of the Catholic Church." It has never broadened, altered or changed in any way that concept of religious freedom.
The general public is quite familiar with the report that a Catholic Cardinal ordered John Kennedy, then a U. S. Congressman and now a candidate for the office of U. S. President, neither to speak nor appear in a meeting arranged by Dr. Daniel A. Poling in a hotel in Philadelphia in memory of four chaplains — two Protestants, one Jewish, one Catholic — who gave their life preservers to four sailors when the American ship, Dorchester was sinking during the second World War.
According to these documented reports, John Kennedy did all he could to get the Roman Cardinal to change his position and let him keep his promise to Dr. Poling and appear on the program. But the Roman Cardinal was the boss of this young congressman and Kennedy is quoted as saying, as a member of the Church, he "had no other alternative but not to come" to the meeting, even though it was not held in any Protestant building, but in a hotel.
John Kennedy is still a member of the same Church. If he had to take orders from a Roman Catholic Cardinal because he was a member of the Church, would he not have to do so, if he were President of the United States?
The President of the United States is president of all the people of the nation — Protestant, Jew, Catholic, and all — and should not be forbidden by any foreign authority to go anywhere in the country that he wants to go. If John Kennedy is elected to the office of President of this nation, John XXIII, the Vatican dictator of Rome, will not permit him to put his foot on the inside of any Jewish synagogue, or touch the doorknob of any Protestant meeting house in America, or go near the place of worship of any church of Christ. When the Italian pontiff in Rome orders him to stay away from such places, as a member of the Roman Church he will have "no other alternative but not to come" near such places.
I know not what course others may take, but as for me, I am not yet ready to promote to the Presidency of the United States an inexperienced young man who has demonstrated to the world that he has learned the bad habit of taking orders from an Italian dictator who sits on his throne in the Roman Vatican.
May God speed the day when Catholics all over the world will lift the benighted curtain of the Dark Ages and turn to the inspired, apostolic, New Testament revelation of the will of Christ and study the word for themselves, as the Lord teaches they should. (Acts 17:11) The Lord is calling on them to do so and they should heed the call instead of calling arrogantly on others to partake of a poisonous plant which the heavenly Father has not planted, but which he says shall be rooted up. (Matt. 15:13)