CalvinDude.com

Speculation is running wild.

After years of playing second fiddle to Mary’s appearance in a pancake, a grilled cheese sandwich, an overpass water stain, etc. et cetera &c, Pope John Paul II has apparently had enough.

He’s burst into flames.

For the unbeliever, here’s proof:

Granted, it looks more like him if you squint your eyes and put on Rosary-colored glasses. Ignore the chuckles from the Protestant gallery asking if the reason the Pope is appearing in flames is so he can warn Catholics of their eternal destination. What we have here is the ultimate proof that JPII has not died, but merely changed professions.

Batman beware. The pontiff is now Pyropope.

Yes, I made that part up. Unfortunately, I didn’t make up the part about how the flames supposedly look like John Paul II.

Heh heh.

This really cracks me up. Armstrong has been upset with the tone that James White (who is the debil and h8tz0rz all the Catholics in the universe, even those in the outer reaches, like Cleveland) uses. Armstrong goes so far as to say: “One always has to ignore insults to deal with anti-Catholics at all: their ludicrous beliefs about Catholics are one huge perpetual insult.”

Yet Armstrong feels free to say, about lil ol’ me:

Lo and behold I am a prophet today, as anti-Catholic Peter Pike idiotically stated at Triablogue:

I see Armstrong is continuing his defining of “anti-Catholic” as “whoever disagrees with Dave Armstrong.”

Welcome to the club, Saint & Sinner, from your fellow “anti-Catholic”

http://triablogue.blogspot.com/ 2…776049876026031

Either these guys must be brain dead or they are so incredibly hostile that their minds literally cannot comprehend things that they disagree with. How could one misunderstand such a simple and patently obvious thing? It’s a marvel to observe . . .

Note that this comes on the heels of Jon Curry (yes, the same Curry who was banned from Triablogue recently) saying:

What’s difficult about talking with White is the same thing that makes talking to a lot of apologists difficult. Some apologists (especially James White and Steve Hays) have a staggering inability to empathize with their opponents. By that I mean that the attitude is never “Reasonable people differ over these matters, and I can see why someone wouldn’t agree with my position.” It’s always “If you don’t agree, you must be insane.” And when White says that, he’s not lying. He really thinks that if you disagree with him it can only be because of poor moral character, because no clearly thinking rational person would ever see things any other way than the way he sees them.

Got that? Curry says: “White disagrees with you by calling you insane” and Armstrong voices agreement, only to turn around and say of me: “Either these guys must be brain dead or they are so incredibly hostile that their minds literally cannot comprehend things that they disagree with.”

Pot-kettle.

I am rather interested in how Armstrong got it into his mind to start attacking me though. Before today, I hadn’t posted anything on Roman Catholicism since MAY, and that was actually a critique of modern evangelicalism! How is it he thinks I’m an anti-Catholic apologist?

I, for one, would like for Armstrong to put up or shut up. He can document why I am an anti-Catholic, or he can be exposed as the liar he is.

In the meantime, I’ll continue ignoring him from this point on. (Unlike Armstrong, I actually can ignore people I say I’m going to ignore.) I’d rather spend fifty hours reading Dawkins than one hour reading Armstrong.

UPDATE: I forgot to add the link to Armstrong’s site, but it’s in the previous post if you’re masochistic enough…

Dave Armstrong really, really likes me. Just read the comments on this post of his where he says:

I should say that pretty much the only ones even trying to make arguments at this point are the lesser-known anti-Catholics (and probably a lot of younger guys) like Turretinfan, Saint and Sinner, Cory Tucholski, Peter Pike, and so forth: mostly fundamentalist Calvinists and young earthers, it seems. The arguments remain just as pathetic and weak, and I reserve the right to decide not to respond to them if their “argument” is too silly and frivolous.

I really loved this, especially since I’m not even YEC (as if YEC has any bearing on Dave Armstrong’s misuse of Scripture). In any case, I apparently got on Armstrong’s radar even before (if the time stamps are correct) I pointed out to Saint and Sinner that an “anti-Catholic” is by definition anyone who disagrees with Dave Armstrong! I’m shocked that Dave remembers little ol’ me.

But, of course, I am such an anti-Catholic bigot, how could he forget me? I mean, just look at the categories section to this blog! It lists the number of posts in each category, and Roman Catholics have 16 entries (it’ll be 17 when this is posted)–which will be 17 TIMES more posts than I put about Reformed Catholics and over 8 times more than I’ve posted on Mormonism, and double what I’ve posted on Islam–that’s how bigoted against Catholics I am!

Ignore the atheist category which has 128 entries so far. That doesn’t fit the template of how anti-Catholic I am. Instead, focus on how I am such a raging fundamentalist Calvinist that I’ve written all of 14 articles on Calvinism (plus another 8 on Arminianism), which when added together is more than the 17 I’ve written about Catholics. Obviously, my focus is on bashing as many Catholics as possible in my zeal toward Calvinistic jihad.

But I appreciate Armstrong lumping me together with Turretinfan, Saint and Sinner, Cory Tucholski, and “so forth” (who must be on Blogger.com). It makes me feel better to know that I’ll always have him at my back. Or on it.

Whatever.

The recent reversion of Francis Beckwith to Roman Catholicism brings to mind some practical issues regarding theology in Evangelicalism. Since Beckwith’s Christianity Today interview was basically subjective, I’ll likewise start with some subjective points.

First, I’ve been meeting off and on with a group of friends on Sundays (I say “off and on” because due to my work schedule and the lack of free-time during the week, I’ve had to use my Sundays to catch up a bit on other things and haven’t gone for a while). This group is composed of my brother and myself on the Reformed front, an Eastern Orthodox man in training for the priesthood, several Roman Catholics (indeed, the Catholics are recruiting everyone at the moment so there are more Catholics than anyone else), and several people who are disaffected with the modern state of Evangelicalism but who would still be considered Evangelicals. The result is a semi-ecumenical forum where we abide by certain rules to keep discussions civil and we discuss various issues, especially from Church history.

Speaking broadly, then, it is not at all surprising to me that Beckwith has abandoned Evangelicalism. There is very little appeal to Evangelicalism in its modern form. Indeed, the reason the group I am in formed in the first place was because one of my friends was so frustrated with the lack of thinking that goes on in Evangelical churches these days that he knew there must be something more out there.

Thankfully, I go to a good church that teaches Biblical doctrine every Sunday. It is intellectually satisfying. But there are many churches in America that have gone to the opposite extreme: pure emotionalism, and indeed a hostile spirit toward intellectual pursuits. As such, modern Evangelicalism can largely be defined today as anti-intellectual. Instead of teaching the Bible, we teach Rick Warren books. Instead of referring to Bible passages in our sermons, we quote 24 or Lost. Instead of focusing on God, we are anthropocentric.

In many ways, the Evangelical church is simply mirroring the anti-intellectual state of our culture as a whole. Thinking—true thinking—is not an easy thing. Wrestling with ideas, trying to defend a position logically, even reading up on opposing viewpoints—all these things take mental energy and stamina. It’s easier to watch American Idol and make fun of talentless singers than it is to think about what the doctrine of Justification means. And even if we pay lip service to doctrines such as this in our church services, how many people can think of an application of this doctrine on Sunday night or Monday morning?

Obviously, Beckwith was one person who could not find an application from the modern version of Evangelicalism. In many ways, though, Beckwith’s movement was not that much different from the movement of many of the apostates over at Debunking Christianity. Both were unsatisfied with the modern Evangelical church, and each picked a substitute philosophy to answer the questions they found problematic in Evangelicalism. While the Debunkers became atheists (thus “solving” the problem by pretending it was an artificial problem in the first place), Beckwith became a Catholic (thus “solving” the problem by substituting group-thought—the papacy—for the anti-intellectualism of modern Evangelicalism).

So the question for Evangelicals is a stark one. The question isn’t “Is there anything wrong with modern Evangelicalism?” The question is: “Since there is a problem with modern Evangelicalism, what is the solution?”

Hosea 4:6a says: “My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge.” Knowledge is vital for the Christian walk. When pastors speak to the Lowest Common Denominator in the audience, assuming that it is a pagan who has just walked in off the street, there can be no growth in the body. When a church is seeker-friendly (read: seeker-centered), those who believe and are not “seeking” will simply starve to death. Right now in Evangelicalism, there is no place for the flock to go to get fed.

The author of Hebrews chastises those who live on “milk” alone, saying: “For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food, for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, since he is a child” (Hebrews 5:12-13). He then implores the church to move on, saying: “Therefore let us leave the elementary doctrine of Christ and go on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God, and of instruction about washings, the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment” (Hebrews 6:1-2).

Ironically, in the above passages, the author of Hebrews called the very reason Beckwith left Evangelicalism to return to Rome, part of the “elementary doctrine of Christ.” Yet our modern Evangelical churches do not even teach this elementary, foundational doctrine of “repentance from dead works and of faith toward God.”

This is not taught because we live in an anti-intellectual age where teaching anything is considered pointless. But Hosea made it clear that without knowledge, the people of God are destroyed. Indeed, he was even more to the point for our modern church because he continues: “[B]ecause you have rejected knowledge, I reject you from being a priest to me. And since you have forgotten the law of your God, I also will forget your children.” (Hosea 4:6b). It wasn’t just that people had no knowledge, it was that they rejected knowledge, exactly as the modern Evangelical church has done today.

If the rejection of knowledge is the cause of the problem, the cure is simple: gaining that knowledge. And while groups of laymen can gather and do things to promote the knowledge of God (such as occurs on Triablogue), what we really need is for the church as a whole to move on to the solid food. While our culture may be largely anti-intellectual, people cannot live anti-intellectually for very long. It is against our natures, and we will become dissatisfied with our lack of growth. Therefore, when a layman realizes he could preach all the sermons that a pastor who supposedly went through years of seminary can do, what is left for him in that church? Where will he go to be fed?

False religions that promise knowledge are tempting for that reason. If a starving man is offered rotten meat, he will eat it. The Evangelical church should be giving people steak so that they would never feel that starved in the first place. If Evangelicalism wishes to avoid more “embarrassments” like having the president of the Evangelical Theological Society reject Evangelicalism, it needs to start feeding the sheep in every church, abandoning the “seeker-centered” approaches that only serve to inoculate members against Christianity and instead focusing on the weighty theological issues of Scripture. If, instead of mimicking the anti-intellectualism or our culture, the church shone as the beacon of reason and rationality that it was for so long, the church would actually transform the culture instead of being transformed by the culture.

Unfortunately, I do not see much hope that Evangelicalism as a whole will change. Thankfully, these things are ultimately in God’s hands instead of mine.

I just read this article about the tomb of St. Peter found in Jerusalem (H/T: James White). Note: I don’t agree with all the logic of the author when he attacks the Catholic Church as he uses some rather weak, Jack Chick-esque arguments sometimes; however, the archeological information is quite interesting, and the ultimate conclusions are, I believe, quite sound.

I finally have a moment to explain the background to my previous post on Freedom while I have a moment at lunch!  (That’s right, we’re working overtime again…unfortunately, since we’ll have Thursday and Friday off this week for Thanksgiving, we won’t get overtime pay…which kinda makes it hard to be motivated to work overtime sometimes….)

Anyway, on Sundays I get together with some friends for a theological/philosophical discussion at a local coffee shop.  The coffee shop is called Agia Sophia, which is Greek for “Holy Wisdom.”  As one might guess from the name, it’s also run by people who are Greek Orthodox (I’m making the distinction for my parent’s sake, who get to deal with the Russian Orthodox believers in Ukraine–but from now on, I’ll just call it Orthodox for short!).

Ironically, this Sunday we had five people there.  The names: Peter, Andrew, Joshua, Joseph, and John.  Yes, we could practically write our own gospels :-D  In any case, the make-up of the group consisted of myself (PCA Presbyterian) and my brother (Reformed, but non-denominational at the moment), a Roman Catholic, an Orthodox, and a person who is coming out of the general Evangelical church who is now looking intently into Catholicism.

In any case, one of the people whom I had not met before gave the presentation Sunday.  This is before I knew what his background was.  It began as a look at when the New Testament Church began.  Eventually, we morphed into a discussion as to what the intent of Genesis 1:1 was.  That is, what is the reason God created anything in the first place?

This person presented the “freedom” argument that I mentioned briefly in that Pensèe previously linked.  This was in response to my pointing out that given Ephesians 1 and the fact that we were chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world and also Revelation 13:8 which speaks either of people’s names being written in the book of Life before the foundation of the world or that it was the Lamb (Christ) who was slain before the foundation of the world (depending on how one translates the Greek) then it would certainly be the case that before Creation, God had already intended to save some and for Christ to be the means by which this salvation would occur (this is also demonstrated in 1 Peter 1:20, which speaks of Christ in the following manner: “He was foreknown before the foundation of the world”).

In other words, my argument was that the purpose of Creation was primarily soteriological.  That is, Creation occured so that God could demonstrate the depths of His love in saving those who are sinners (Romans 5:6-8).  This required there be sin first, and thus part of the intent of Creation included the fact that there would be sin.  This is obviously a hard saying, yet one that is inescapable based on the Scriptures I’ve alluded to here.

Naturally, there was some disagreement from the guy who was presenting the talk.  He gave the freedom argument.  That is, God wanted to create people who were able to either accept or reject Him.  He didn’t want to create automatons.

Yet this doesn’t solve the fact that Christ was foreknown before the foundation of the world, and it doesn’t solve the fact that we who are saved are chosen in Him before the foundation of the world.  Both of these things occured before God created anything.

Thus, we are left with a problem for Arminianism.  Either we must stipulate that God intentionally created people so that they would sin, or else we must argue that it is impossible for God to actually create anyone who would not sin.  You see, if God did not want them to sin, yet He knew that they would sin and He created them anyway, then this means that God is not able to create people who could freely refrain from sinning–for if He could, would He not have done so?

In short, the Arminian must argue that free will necessitates sin!  This is an even stronger version of total depravity than the Calvinist holds to, for indeed the Calvinist argues that it is not man’s freedom that is the problem but it is his nature.  Thus, in heaven, Christians will have freewill but their natures will be sanctified and thus they will continually choose good; but for the Arminian, the nature isn’t the problem–freedom itself is, and therefore there can be no guarantee of salvation even in heaven!  What is to stop the Christian from freely sinning from heaven in such a scenario?

Since my lunch break is over I’ll have to stop here for now :-)  However, a quick question:  Do you know which theological background the presenter had?

That’s right: he was Roman Catholic.  Which only goes to show that when it comes to the mechanics of soteriology, there is very little difference between Arminians and Catholics.

I got to meet with a Catholic Monk earlier today.  It was a rather interesting meeting.  I met this monk through one of my friends, who has been looking into Catholicism recently.  We got together, along with my brother, with a few pre-set questions…that unfortunatley didn’t get to Father Curtis beforehand!

All the same, it was actually an enjoyable experience and I hope to meet with him some more.  We spoke briefly on Justification, Scriptural Sufficiency (he personally hadn’t heard the distinction between “formal sufficiency” and “material sufficiency”), whether works were meritorious, who could be saved in other religions, and I also asked him what he thought of Trent anathematizing me.

His answers were fairly “stock” answers, but also (ironically, and somewhat contradictory to what I just wrote) different from a lot of Catholic internet apologists I could name.  For instance, while he said he had not studied it recently, the Canons of Trent did indeed anathematize my position.  And unlike Dave Armstrong he did not attempt to say that they were not directed at me (as I said that I agreed word-for-word with specific sections that said, “He who agrees with this, let him be anathema”).  Of course, since Vatacan II is in play, he did not say that he considered me damned by that anathema.

Of all that he said, I probably disagreed mostly with the idea that non-Christians could still be saved.  Father Curtis did insist that they were saved by Christ still; but it was through their ignorance.  I asked him why, then, we should not just cease to evangelize them and let them believe in their own gods in ignorance rather than expose them to the risk of hearing and rejecting the Gospel and thus damning themselves?  He argued that it would be better for them to hear and accept Christ, which is true I suppose; but it still doesn’t answer my first charge.  Is it better to not hear and be saved, or to hear and be damned?

In any case, we didn’t have infinite time so we weren’t able to get in as deep as I would have liked.  Still, we shall hopefully meet again in the future.  I would definitely look forward to it.  In the meantime, he gave me a couple of pamphlets: Pillar of Fire, Pillar of Truth and Handbook for Today’s Catholic.  Since I’ve got my own Catholic Catechism, I’ll be able to use the second one more indepth (since it’s indexed to the Catechism).  I’ll probably end up posting some stuff in this blog about it, although as you can tell just be looking at my categories index and the number of posts under each category, I’m much more interested in debating atheists.  Still, for some reason, Catholics like to debate me too… :-)

Oh well; this is life!  I think I’ll manage.

Dave “I Know What You Did Last Summer” Armstrong has finally gotten something right!  He figured out my secret identity.

Yes, that’s right.  My name is Peter Pike.  I have to wonder… Did he figure it out when he clicked on my debate with Jacob Michael and saw:

AFFIRM: Peter Pike

Or maybe he was one of the people who actually clicked on the music mp3s that I have listed on this site (the classical ones, not the rock–which was done under my band’s name Selenium) and saw that the artist’s name was Peter Pike.

Or maybe he saw the link to the (now never updated) Peter Pike’s Blog of Doom on my blogroll (thanks, Travis, for reminding me I had that there too).

Maybe he even saw my Against Hyper-Calvinism essay and saw the letter was addressed to Mr. Pike, and the editor had the initials PWP.  None of that would require anything more than to…what’s the word I’m looking for?

Oh yeah.  “Read CalvinDude’s website.”

Anyway, I think you’ll find it funny if you read Armstrong’s piece.  Especially since he starts off with:

 

Someone (”CalvinDude” = Peter Pike; see biographical info. at the bottom of this paper) came to my blog and asked a question, and seemed to be a thoughtful person, so I tried explaining this one more time (since it was a rather simple matter of defining terms) and the same old same old happened.

 

But yet when you see our first interaction, you see this:

My question: “Since everyone who disagrees with you is automatically an ‘anti-Catholic’ can I just call you an ‘anti-Calvinist’ from now on?”

Dave’s first response (to a second person who responded to me before he did): “I didn’t have the patience to answer the post, so I appreciate your doing so.”

So much for Dave thinking I ”seemed to be a thoughtful person” so he could try “explaining this one more time” only to find the usual results.  Could it be because the usual results are real instead of in your imaginary dream-world, Dave?

One of the commentors on Armstrong’s blog (referenced in the previous blog post) linked to this article by Jimmy Akin wherein the current definition of anathema is “explained.”

After reading the article, the only conclusion I can come to is that words have no actual meaning in an ecumenical council.  They have no actual meaning because in the future the meaning of the words will be changed to whatever suits the current generation.

Thus, Akin writes:

Originally, the Church did not differentiate between excommunication and anathema, which is why ecumenical councils have traditionally constructed their dogmatic canons using the formula “If anyone says . . . let him be anathema,” meaning that anyone teaching the condemned proposition is to be anathematized or cut off from Christian society.

(In other words, the infallible, unchanging, apostolic Church that has always meant what it means today did not originally mean what it means today in regards to anathema.  But who’s keeping score?)

Akin continues:

Over time, a distinction came to be made between excommunication and anathema. The precise nature of the distinction varied but eventually became fixed. By the time of Gregory IX (1370–1378), the term anathema was used to describe a major excommunication that was performed with a solemn pontifical ceremony. This customarily involved the ringing of a bell, the closing of a book, and the snuffing out of candles, collectively signifying that the highest ecclesiastical court had spoken and would not reconsider the matter until the individual gave evidence of repentance.

Here we see how “anathema” changed from being synonymous with excommunication to become a more formal form of excommunication.  Thus, the anathemas contained in the Council of Nicea, for instance, did not mean the same as the anathemas in the Council of Trent.  Likewise, the anethemas in the Council of Trent do not mean the same as they would if used in a Council today.

This isn’t a problem on the face of it.  Words do change over time.  They evolve different meanings, because words are defined by their common use.  The problem is when the Catholic anachronistically reads today’s meaning of the term back into the original Church fathers and pretends that what is meant today is what was meant back then.  This is obviously not the case, if (as Akin has admitted) the meaning of the words has changed.

Thus, Akin concludes:

Yet the penalty was used so seldom that it was removed from the 1983 Code of Canon Law. This means that today the penalty of anathema does not exist in Church law. The new Code provided that, “When this Code goes into effect, the following are abrogated: 1º the Code of Canon Law promulgated in 1917 . . . 3º any universal or particular penal laws whatsoever issued by the Apostolic See, unless they are contained in this Code” (CIC [1983] 6 §1). The penalty of anathema was not renewed in the new Code, and thus it was abrogated when the Code went into effect on January 1, 1983.

He is now saying that there are no anathemas in the Catholic Church.  This is, of course, true since January 1, 1983 (assuming Akin’s sources are correct; and I have no reason to doubt them right now).  But before January 1, 1983, anathemas were in effect.  So how does Akin deal with that?

By denying anathemas meant something different in the past.  He writes:

Because the penalty has been abolished, a word should be said about the status of the conciliar canons that employed this penalty. In addition to prescribing the imposition of a juridical penalty, the phrase anathema sit (”let him be anathema”) also came to be one of the phrases that the Church traditionally has used to issue doctrinal definitions.

Catholic scholars have long recognized that when an ecumenical council applies this phrase to a doctrinal matter, then the matter is settled infallibly. (If a council applied the phrase to a disciplinary matter, then the matter would not be settled infallibly, since only matters of doctrine, not discipline, are subject to doctrinal definition.)

Thus, when Trent and other ecumenical councils employed anathema sit in regard to doctrinal matters, not only was a judicial penalty prescribed but a doctrinal definition was also made. Today, the judicial penalty may be gone, but the doctrinal definition remains. Everything that was infallibly decided by these councils is still infallibly settled.

In other words, Akin ignores the use of the term as Trent used it and instead says, “All Trent meant was that it was speaking infallibly.”

But those at the Council of Trent certainly didn’t think that way.  When they anathematized Protestants, they meant it.  They did not have Akin’s view of the term in mind because that view was completely alien to them.  It would not come about until after 1983!

In short, we see that Akin gets around the use of the term “anathema” only by redefining it in today’s language and anachronistically infusing that meaning back into the original Councils.  This demonstrates A) that the Church in Rome is far from unchanging, B) that words don’t have any actual meaning (after all, in 100 years someone could change the meaning of the words of Vatican II and Akin would have no idea what the “true” Catholic doctrine is), and C) that the only way to remain a consistent Catholic is to deny exegetical and hermenutical sciences.

If one’s ”infallible” authority can only solve the “anathema” problem by making the definition of it Jello, I, for one, see no reason to submit myself to that authority.

The answer to the title of this blog entry is blindingly obvious to any objective historian.  To the Roman Catholic, however, who must interpret the Council of Trent in light of the two Vatican Councils, simple history is insufficient to answer this question.  This is why Dave Armstrong, in the comments on this blog post says:

 

Trent condemned the absolute separation of faith and works. I don’t see that even John Calvin did that. He thought (and so do most Calvinists) that one is saved by “faith alone” but not a faith that IS alone and that any saving faith will necessarily show forth the works that will inevitably flow from it if indeed it is true saving faith.

So there is your cooperation with God; hence that aspect of Calvinism was not, I believe, condemned by Trent. i think what is condemned there is mopre like the extreme faith alone position that John MacArthur opposed in his book, The Gospel According to Jesus (the opposite of Lordship salvation). But that is not classic “Reformation” teaching: it is Anabaptistic or Baptist thinking (even then, one must look at the particular strain of Baptist theology).

 

But who would know better what Trent meant then the people who wrote it?  The historical question is, did those who penned the Canons of Trent consider Calvinists anathema?  Given the persecution between Catholics and Calvinists, the answer certainly seems to be “yes.”  After all, if Calvinists really weren’t anathematized by Trent, there would have been ample time for the authors to say, “Hey, wait a minute!  We didn’t mean those guys!”  But they didn’t do that.

On to the pertinent canons.  I will look only at those that are clearly against my position (as there are others that could be, depending on how they are defined; yet we are looking for certain condemnations, not possible ones).  These will be taken from The American Catholic Truth Society website:

Canon 9

If anyone says that the sinner is justified by faith alone, meaning that nothing else is required to cooperate in order to obtain the grace of justification, and that it is not in any way necessary that he be prepared and disposed by the action of his own will, let him be anathema.

This is indeed the very canon I quoted to Armstrong.  Armstrong insists that this canon does not anathematize me, yet I agree with everything that is declared anathema in the above statement!  That’s right.  I affirm that man is saved by faith alone.  Likewise, I affirm that there is nothing but faith required for justification.  Furthermore, I acknowledge that this has nothing to do with the will of the man (it is instead the regeneration of the Spirit through the Election of the Father).  Therefore, by the above canon, I must be anathema to the Catholic Church.

Armstrong disagrees.  In so doing, he must either acknowledge that Trent is not speaking clearly enough in the above (which is another way of saying that they erred in an “infallible” council), or Armstrong must claim that I do not believe what I do, in fact, believe.

There are other canons though!  Let us continue:

Canon 24.

If anyone says that the justice received is not preserved and also not increased before God through good works, but that those works are merely the fruits and signs of justification obtained, but not the cause of its increase, let him be anathema.

This canon is especially pertinent since it opposes the exact excuse that Armstrong gave for why Calvinists were not anathema!  Once again, I agree with the very thing that is anathematized.  Good works are indeed “the fruits and signs of justification obtained, but not the cause of its increase.”  Justification, after all, is a once-for-all-time event.  Good works are “merely” the sign that someone has been justified.

Thus, when Armstrong says, “He thought (and so do most Calvinists) that one is saved by “faith alone” but not a faith that IS alone and that any saving faith will necessarily show forth the works that will inevitably flow from it if indeed it is true saving faith” he fails to realize that Trent still anathematizes the Calvinist position!

Continuing:

Canon 26.

If anyone says that the just ought not for the good works done in God to expect and hope for an eternal reward from God through His mercy and the merit of Jesus Christ, if by doing well and by keeping the divine commandments they persevere to the end, let him be anathema.

Again, I agree with the position being anathematized here.  The “just” are only just because of the grace of God, not because they do any good works.  Indeed, the good works done by a justified person have no merit unto eternal life in the least.  After all, the justified man is already saved.

Furthermore, because one is saved by the grace of God only, one ought not hope in his own works as if they merited anything.  One must instead hope in Christ.  Again, Trent anthematizes the position I, and Calvinists like me, hold.

One more example shall do:

Canon 32

If anyone says that the good works of the one justified are in such manner the gifts of God that they are not also the good merits of him justified; or that the one justified by the good works that he performs by the grace of God and the merit of Jesus Christ, whose living member he is, does not truly merit an increase of grace, eternal life, and in case he dies in grace, the attainment of eternal life itself and also an increase of glory, let him be anathema.

Again, I agree with the position that is anathematized here.  Good works done by man are not meritorious at all.  The only merit a sinner has is the imputation of the righteousness of Christ.  The works that a man does are in now way adding to his measure of grace.

It should be clear now to anyone who is not forced by a faulty view of infalliblity to re-interpret Trent in light of the Vatican Councils, that Trent most certainly did anathematize the Calvinist position.  Thus, the Catholic must either demonstrate why Trent infallibly spoke so sloppily, or why Vatican must have spoken sloppily.  The two views cannot both be right.