Thess,
In regards to the Mass:
"THE LORD'S SUPPER. in the Roman Catholic Church, is called "The Mass" a word which in itself has no significance, being merely a modification the phrase, "Ite, missa est,"-"Go, the assembly is dismissed," which was uttered in the early assemblies of the church at the dismissing of the congregation, after which those who remained partook of the emblems in the Lord's Supper. By a strange use-or rather misuse-the words of dismissal uttered at the end of one service became in the word "Mass" the name for the service which followed.
But that which this word "Mass" represents-in itself so meaningless -yet having an overshadowing significance in Romanism, a system to which it is distinctive and peculiar-goes far beyond any idea or conception that can be found in the New Testament.
The Christian sees in the Lord's Supper a memorial, a communion, a feast of thanksgiving, and some indeed regard it as a sacrament, but in Rome it is a "Sacrifice"!â€â€ceremony in which the celebrant boldly claims to offer for the living and the dead, a repetition of the atoning sacrifice of Christ on Calvary. That this involves not merely a difference in words, expressions and forms, but of vital faith and practice will at once be seen. It includes the belief that the officiating priest actually changes the elements of bread and wine into the real body and blood of Christ, the process by which this change is effected being called "Transubstantiation."
This is Rome's bold and fearless, yea uncompromising avowal, and as we look upon it, so clearly presented, we see the very heart of Romish error.
Rome has many superstitions, follies, misleading forms and erroneous doctrines such as Mariolatry, purgatory, confession, saint-worship, prayers for the dead, priestly absolution, spurious sacraments, etc., etc., but none of these can be compared in point of danger, to the blasting power of the Mass.
Let this doctrine be accepted, and there logically follows the belief that a priest can create God! And having created Him, that he can and does offer Him as a sacrifice for sin!
For the testing of such a claim, there can be only one tribunal, and that is the Word of God. But when tested here we find only, and everywhere, definite and conclusive contradiction. If there is one thing the Word of God does not teach, it is this. If there is one thing the Word of God opposes, it is this.
These assertions may be easily sustained, forâ€â€
First: The doctrine of the Mass denies the all-sufficiency of the sacrifice of Christ,-the Atonement,-a truth which the Bible has safeguarded at every point, in language that cannot be misunderstood. For example, in Hebrews 9:12 we read, "By His [Christ's] own blood He entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for s." If the believer's redemption is eternal is it not in itself sufficient? Again in Hebrews 9:28, "So Christ was once [not 'many times to be'] offered to bear the sins of many." Again, Hebrews 10:10, "By the which [God's] will we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all." Again, Hebrews 10:12,14, "But this Man [Jesus Christ] after He had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down on the right hand of God....For by one offering He hath perfected forever them that are sanctified." And all this is corroborated by the Holy Spirit, for we read in Hebrews 10:15, "Whereof the Holy Ghost is a witness to us." Added to these clear statements are the conclusive words found in the 17th and 18th verses of the tenth chapter. "And their sins and iniquities will I remember no more. Now where remission of these is, there is no more offering for sin." How definitely do all these quotations harmonize with the dying testimony of our Lord, sealed with His own precious blood, "It is finished."
The truth is also at once brought to light by the simple question, Where is our Lord Jesus Christ right now? Is He still a curse? Is He still forsaken as He was when He hung on the cross as a sacrifice for sin? The priest in his claim of sacrificing (crucifying) Christ afresh answers, "Yes!" Surely that is what the offering again of the body and blood of Christ means; that He is still a curse, still forsaken of God. But the Word of God answers, "No!" by telling us distinctly that Christ is now at the right hand of God, Himself the High Priest making intercession for His people. That is, the Bible tells us that Christ is now Himself performing the very office which the priest on earth claims to be fulfilling for those who resort to his ministry in the Mass.
The glorious fact is, that the presence of the High Priest in heaven there performing His appropriate work of intercession, renders it altogether unnecessary that there be any priest on earth, and accordingly we find that in all the New Testament there is no such thing known to it, for this age, as a human priest. If any were needed we would certainly expect to find them among the apostles, but among them, there was not one who claimed priesthood! Peter himself never claimed to be a priest, and is never even referred to as such! The only priesthood recognized in the New Testament for this dispensation of grace is the spiritual priesthood of all believers, as we find it stated in 1 Peter 2:9, "But ye [all believers] are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should show forth the praises of Him who hath called you out of darkness into the His marvelous light."
Continuing our argument, we find the Word of God declaring in Hebrews 9:22, "Without shedding of blood is no remission." So then to remit sins by sacrifice of the Mass the priest must shed blood. But does he shed blood when he offers the Mass? No, he eats the bread, and drinks the wine, after claiming to transform them into the flesh and blood of Christ. He does not even go through the form of shedding blood. How then can he remit ? He cannot. The only way in which sins can be remitted is by faith in the Blood of Christ that was shed on Calvary.
We see further, that if the priest offers Christ upon the altar as a sacrifice, the Resurrection of Christ has not power or meaning. With Rome, Christ is ever upon the altar (i.e., the Cross). Here is a fatal defect, for the Word says, "If Christ be not raised, your faith is vain, ye are yet in your sins," I Corinthians 15:17.
The Mass tells only of Christ's death and nothing of His resurrection. But how sweet to the heart of the Gospel believer are the words of assurance Romans 5:1, "Therefore"â€â€since Christ "was delivered for our offenses, and raised again for our justification"â€â€"Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ."
Second: The second charge against the Mass is that it misrepresents the nature of the elements in the Lord's Supper. Against the doctrine of Transubstantiation, or the change of the bread and wine in the Lord's Supper into the real body and blood of Christ, some one has well written: "The question is simply this : In John 6, when the Savior states "Whoso eateth My flesh, and drinketh My blood, hath eternal life, and I will up at the last day'; 'He that eateh My flesh, and drinketh My blood, dwelleth in Me, and I in him,' is He figuratively or literally?
"In answering this question would take this ground: In every instance in Scripture where a figure is intended, the words cannot be understood to be literal. 'Except a man be born again'; 'I am the vine, ye are the branches'; 'This rock was Christ'; and hundreds more, could not possibly be meant to be literal. The manna was evidently real food, as we learn in Exodus. But when Jesus says, 'I am the bread which came down from heaven,' it could not possibly mean that He was a loaf of bread from heaven. Was not bread used here as a figure of Jesus sent from heaven, as seen incarnate among men? He says, 'I am the bread of life.' This He says whilst He was here a living Man. No change into bread, or bread into Himself, but ‘I am the bread of life.' Then He says, 'I am the living bread which came down from heaven; if any man eat of this bread, he shall live forever; and the bread that I will give is My flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.' To take this literally, then, would be to say that Jesus was a piece of bread which might be eaten! and that bread would become fleshâ€â€His fleshâ€â€and be given for the life of the world. Would it not be just as true to say that He was literally a vine?
"As a figure of the incarnate Jesus, bread was very striking. As we receive bread for the nourishment of the body, so by faith we receive the Person of Christ as the incarnate Word. But, not only so, we must also receive Him offered on the cross for the life of the world. 'Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink His blood, ye have no life in you.' We will look at this literally, and what would follow? If eating the flesh and drinking the blood means eating the wafer, or the wafer turned into, or changed into, the body and blood of the Lord Jesus in the Eucharist, then what would the following words mean: 'Whoso eateth My flesh, and drinketh My blood, hath eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day.' Mark, these words are absolute, without any condition whatever. ‘Whoso’ would teach that any wicked man, unrepentant, or unbelieving, living in sin, yet, if he only ate the Eucharist, had eternal life, and was sure to be raised up by the Lord; and that no Christian can believe.
"Taking these words spiritually, everything becomes clear and no Christian need have a shadow of difficulty indeed, this is in perfect harmony with all Scripture. ‘Verily, verily I say unto you, He that heareth My word, and believeth on Him that sent Me, hath everlasting life. John 5:24. But we must not only by faith receive Him as the bread, but drink His blood. We must receive the solemn word of His atoning death-the shedding of His blood, for ‘without the shedding of blood is no remission.’ Thus, the more we study this Scripture, the more we see the impossibility of , as in every other figure, applying the words in a carnal, or literal way. To put the Eucharist, then, in the place of receiving Christ Himself, by faith, would be a fatal mistake.
Third: The third charge against this stupendously wicked institution, is that by it Rome has held and is holding millions of souls in bondage the end of which is eternal despair. All the blessings of the Gospel are withheld from those who accept the doctrine of the Mass, for it is in complete and deadly opposition to the Gospel. Believing in the Mass none can say, "Unto Him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in His own blood," Revelation 1:5. The Mass practically says that the sacrifice of Christ is of no more value than the death of a goat under the old Dispensation. It says the work of Christ is not finished, but must be repeated and continued. It practically denies His resurrection and ascension to glory, for He is kept in the place of death. If so, He is still forsaken of God, made sin, then there no Savior who has delivered us from the wrath to come and no salvation is possible, and thus the Mass entirely destroys Christianity.
What a scourge the Mass becomes in the hands of Rome to drive its votaries to obedience. Armed with it Rome forces them to come continually to her shrines, and to pay unceasingly for the support of her vast ritualistic display, her temporal, material pomp and glory. And after all the gifts and fanatical devotion of her deluded followers what does she offer them at last? Heaven? No!â€â€Purgatory! This awaits them all, form Pope to the humblest devotee. Purgatory! A place of pain and of uncertain release.
But purgatory is only one piece of the whole system of superstition, intimidation and deception. It is quite a logical attendant on what precedes it, for purgatory demands more masses, and consequently a continuance bondage on the one hand and an inflow of receipts on the other.
By contrast how beautiful, comforting and sustaining is the Christian’s belief! For him there are no attractions in the Mass. He realizes he is washed from his sins in the precious blood of Christ, that he is sealed by the Holy Spirit to the day of Redemption (the resurrection), that his name is written in the Lambs Book of Life, and that Heaven is his home. This is the Gospelâ€â€the glorious Gospel of the Blessed God, and enjoying it he can triumphantly exclaimâ€â€"Thanks be unto God for His unspeakable Gift!" To him the Lord's Supper is indeed the Eucharist - the feast of Thanksgiving."
Charles Cook
Have you ever wonder why RCC perform the Mass each and everyday? If they do not, then there is no sacrifice for sin for that day. Thess. in respect to the council of Trent, how much more clear is this:
CANON I.-If any one saith, that man may be justified before God by his own works, whether done through the teaching of human nature, or that of the law, without the grace of God through Jesus Christ; let him be anathema.
CANON II.-If any one saith, that the grace of God, through Jesus Christ, is given only for this, that man may be able more easily to live justly, and to merit eternal life, as if, by free will without grace, he were able to do both, though hardly indeed and with difficulty; let him be anathema.
CANON III.-If any one saith, that without the prevenient inspiration of the Holy Ghost, and without his help, man can believe, hope, love, or be penitent as he ought, so as that the grace of Justification may be bestowed upon him; let him be anathema.
CANON IV.-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.
CANON V.-If any one saith, that, since Adam's sin, the free will of man is lost and extinguished; or, that it is a thing with only a name, yea a name without a reality, a figment, in fine, introduced into the Church by Satan; let him be anathema.
CANON VI.-If any one saith, that it is not in man's power to make his ways evil, but that the works that are evil God worketh as well as those that are good, not permissively only, but properly, and of Himself, in such wise that the treason of Judas is no less His own proper work than the vocation of Paul; let him be anathema.
CANON VII.-If any one saith, that all works done before Justification, in whatsoever way they be done, are truly sins, or merit the hatred of God; or that the more earnestly one strives to dispose himself for grace, the more grievously he sins: let him be anathema.
CANON VIII.-If any one saith, that the fear of hell,-whereby, by grieving for our sins, we flee unto the mercy of God, or refrain from sinning,-is a sin, or makes sinners worse; let him be anathema.
CANON IX.-If any one saith, that by faith alone the impious is justified; in such wise as to mean, that nothing else is required to co-operate in order to the obtaining the grace of Justification, and that it is not in any way necessary, that he be prepared and disposed by the movement of his own will; let him be anathema.
CANON X.-If any one saith, that men are just without the justice of Christ, whereby He merited for us to be justified; or that it is by that justice itself that they are formally just; let him be anathema.
CANON XI.-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.
CANON XII.-If any one saith, that justifying faith is nothing else but confidence in the divine mercy which remits sins for Christ's sake; or, that this confidence alone is that whereby we are justified; let him be anathema.
CANON XIII.-If any one saith, that it is necessary for every one, for the obtaining the remission of sins, that he believe for certain, and without any wavering arising from his own infirmity and disposition, that his sins are forgiven him; let him be anathema.
CANON XIV.-If any one saith, that man is truly absolved from his sins and justified, because that he assuredly believed himself absolved and justified; or, that no one is truly justified but he who believes himself justified; and that, by this faith alone, absolution and justification are effected; let him be anathema.
CANON XV.-If any one saith, that a man, who is born again and justified, is bound of faith to believe that he is assuredly in the number of the predestinate; let him be anathema.
CANON XVI.-If any one saith, that he will for certain, of an absolute and infallible certainty, have that great gift of perseverance unto the end,-unless he have learned this by special revelation; let him be anathema.
CANON XVII.-If any one saith, that the grace of Justification is only attained to by those who are predestined unto life; but that all others who are called, are called indeed, but receive not grace, as being, by the divine power, predestined unto evil; let him be anathema.
CANON XVIII.-If any one saith, that the commandments of God are, even for one that is justified and constituted in grace, impossible to keep; let him be anathema.
CANON XIX.-If any one saith, that nothing besides faith is commanded in the Gospel; that other things are indifferent, neither commanded nor prohibited, but free; or, that the ten commandments nowise appertain to Christians; let him be anathema.
CANON XX.-If any one saith, that the man who is justified and how perfect soever, is not bound to observe the commandments of God and of the Church, but only to believe; as if indeed the Gospel were a bare and absolute promise of eternal life, without the condition of observing the commandments ; let him be anathema.
CANON XXI.-If any one saith, that Christ Jesus was given of God to men, as a redeemer in whom to trust, and not also as a legislator whom to obey; let him be anathema.
CANON XXII.-If any one saith, that the justified, either is able to persevere, without the special help of God, in the justice received; or that, with that help, he is not able; let him be anathema.
CANON XXIII.-lf any one saith, that a man once justified can sin no more, nor lose grace, and that therefore he that falls and sins was never truly justified; or, on the other hand, that he is able, during his whole life, to avoid all sins, even those that are venial,-except by a special privilege from God, as the Church holds in regard of the Blessed Virgin; let him be anathema.
CANON XXIV.-If any one saith, that the justice received is not preserved and also increased before God through good works; but that the said works are merely the fruits and signs of Justification obtained, but not a cause of the increase thereof; let him be anathema.
CANON XXV.-If any one saith, that, in every good work, the just sins venially at least, or-which is more intolerable still-mortally, and consequently deserves eternal punishments; and that for this cause only he is not damned, that God does not impute those works unto damnation; let him be anathema.
CANON XXVI.-If any one saith, that the just ought not, for their good works done in God, to expect and hope for an eternal recompense from God, through His mercy and the merit of Jesus Christ, if so be that they persevere to the end in well doing and in keeping the divine commandments; let him be anathema.
CANON XXVII.-If any one saith, that there is no mortal sin but that of infidelity; or, that grace once received is not lost by any other sin, however grievous and enormous, save by that of infidelity ; let him be anathema.
CANON XXVIII.-If any one saith, that, grace being lost through sin, faith also is always lost with it; or, that the faith which remains, though it be not a lively faith, is not a true faith; or, that he, who has faith without charity, is not a Chris taught; let him be anathema.
CANON XXIX.-If any one saith, that he, who has fallen after baptism, is not able by the grace of God to rise again; or, that he is able indeed to recover the justice which he has lost, but by faith alone without the sacrament of Penance, contrary to what the holy Roman and universal Church-instructed by Christ and his Apostles-has hitherto professed, observed, and taugh; let him be anathema.
CANON XXX.-If any one saith, that, after the grace of Justification has been received, to every penitent sinner the guilt is remitted, and the debt of eternal punishment is blotted out in such wise, that there remains not any debt of temporal punishment to be discharged either in this world, or in the next in Purgatory, before the entrance to the kingdom of heaven can be opened (to him); let him be anathema.
CANON XXXI.-If any one saith, that the justified sins when he performs good works with a view to an eternal recompense; let him be anathema.
CANON XXXII.-If any one saith, that the good works of one that is justified are in such manner the gifts of God, as that they are not also the good merits of him that is justified; or, that the said justified, by the good works which he performs through the grace of God and the merit of Jesus Christ, whose living member he is, does not truly merit increase of grace, eternal life, and the attainment of that eternal life,-if so be, however, that he depart in grace,-and also an increase of glory; let him be anathema.
CANON XXXIII.-If any one saith,that,by the Catholic doctrine touching Justification, by this holy Synod inset forth in this present decree, the glory of God, or the merits of our Lord Jesus Christ are in any way derogated from, and not rather that the truth of our faith, and the glory in fine of God and of Jesus Christ are rendered (more) illustrious; let him be anathema.
Beza
: Your kidding right? You make such claims about a person you do not know. There is no envy in me for those who follow after every wind of doctine based on their own whims or the latest book on pre-trib rapture that comes out.