Al Mohler – “No I’m not offended”
Pope Benedict XVI recently came out with a statement that the only true church is the Roman Catholic Church. An initial tendency might be to be upset at a statement like that because it is declaring that Protestants Churches are invalid.
However Al Mohler makes a great point that a statement like this is a good thing because it makes more clear the lines that were blurred by Pope John Paul II. Pope Benedict’s statement is much more dogmatic then anything Pope John Paul would have said, since he was almost ready to embrace all religions as being equally valid.
In a world that is increasingly adopting post-modernism it is encouraging to see the RCC taking a step away from it, even if their absolutist position is erroneous.
Here is a good quote from Al Mohler:
… I am not offended because this new document actually brings attention to the crucial issues of ecclesiology, and thus it presents us with an opportunity.
…
Evangelicals should appreciate the candor reflected in this document. There is no effort here to confuse the issues. To the contrary, the document is an obvious attempt to set the record straight. The Roman Catholic Church does not deny that Christ is working redemptively through Protestant and evangelical churches, but it does deny that these churches which deny the authority of the papacy are true churches in the most important sense. The true church, in other words, is that church identified through the recognition of the papacy. Those churches that deny or fail to recognize the papacy are “ecclesial Communities,” not churches “in the proper sense.”
I appreciate the document’s clarity on this issue. It all comes down to this — the claim of the Roman Catholic Church to the primacy of the Bishop of Rome and the Pope as the universal monarch of the church is the defining issue. Roman Catholics and Evangelicals should together recognize the importance of that claim. We should together realize and admit that this is an issue worthy of division. The Roman Catholic Church is willing to go so far as to assert that any church that denies the papacy is no true church. Evangelicals should be equally candid in asserting that any church defined by the claims of the papacy is no true church. This is not a theological game for children, it is the honest recognition of the importance of the question.
So now that this crucial difference between the RCC and protestants is defined, this issue can be addressed theologically head on.
