Is Catholicism Really Pushing for That Unity?

It’s Time to Take a Stand Against Catholicism’s Push for Unity
Wretched / Fortis Institute | 31 Oct. 2025
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2VwYlZWQAAw

3:53 Indeed, imputation and infusion are very different.

Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.

Sounds like King David was expecting infusion.

What's your fav. on "imputed"? Romans 4?

In the promise also of God he staggered not by distrust; but was strengthened in faith, giving glory to God Most fully knowing, that whatsoever he has promised, he is able also to perform And therefore it was reputed to him unto justice
[Romans 4:20-22]

He did a good work of immense sacrifice, and he did so in a faith not in "Christ died for my sins" but "God can do what he has promised" ... even when it doesn't look like it.

1) Was that faith infused or just Abraham's own doing?
2) If you say it was infused, are you saying that it wasn't righteous in itself, it was only imputed as righteousness?

4:22 Indeed. That's exactly why Pope Leo X would have preferred the excommunication to effect a total social isolation of Martin Luther, so no one would be contaminated.*

5:11 And avoid them.

Precisely what Leo X told Germans to do with Martin Luther.

6:31 You teach Ephesians 2:8—9. We Catholics teach Ephesians 2:8—10.

GhillieCapone

@ghilliecapone

Ephesians 2:10
[10]For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@hglundahl

@ghilliecapone Here is the Douay Rheims:

For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus in good works, which God hath prepared that we should walk in them
[Ephesians 2:10]

Note that the "for" indicates this preparation of good works and us being supposed to walk in them has a relation to the previous two verses about our justification.

Meaning, at justification, no one is justified by his own previous good works, but (apart from baby baptism) his preparedness (at least in principle) to walk in God's good works is required. Exactly the point that Catholicism makes against the Reformers.

GhillieCapone

@hglundahl Which doesn't make sense, even the translation you posted says it very plainly "that we SHOULD walk in them". Works don't justify you, only faith. God's prepared works are what we SHOULD do, not to BE saved, but because we ARE saved.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@ghilliecapone There is anyway a previous willingness to walk in the ways of God:

Cause me to hear thy mercy in the morning; for in thee have I hoped. Make the way known to me, wherein I should walk: for I have lifted up my soul to thee.
[Psalms 142:8]

Without the willingness, one is not justified.

We Catholics tend to distinguish "justified" / "in the state of grace" / "finally saved (at a good death)" even if the Bible habitually uses "saved" or"eternal life" of more than one of them.

It's wrong to press the Biblical terminology as if it were a precise terminology, which allowed you in each case to determine which it is.

You are "saved" = justified, without your works.

You are "saved" = dead in Christ, in for a glorious resurrection, not without your works.

I would say, when the Bible speaks of "salvation" about people presently alive, it means the former. You cannot press it to mean no one can lose salvation.

6:58 Yes, at Baptism. = Not of works (that the baby has done).

GhillieCapone

So other people's works saves other people(babies)?

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@ghilliecapone No, Jesus' work (through other people) saves other people.

And in general, to some degree obviously yes.

Someone is saved because someone else witnessed. Someone is saved because someone else forgave his misdeed. You can't ignore that practically, but somehow the one item or two items when you can't accept it is when:

• the work actually is God's work, through a man's hands and voice
• or when the Church hierarchy transmits a teaching from the Apostles.

GhillieCapone

@hglundahl No, other people cannot save other people. Only by a conscious admission to Christ can they be saved.

Other people can help lead someone to be saved, but it would be ridiculous to say that they "save them" even if you say it's "Christ working through them". Jesus doesn't save people who don't want to be saved which eliminates the whole saving others thing. Jesus saves those who put their faith in him.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@ghilliecapone "Jesus doesn't save people who don't want to be saved"

Jesus doesn't save people who positively disagree to being saved (including by disagreeing to "sign up for" the good works God has prepared).

Jesus does save people, just as Adam damns people, before they really have a say of their own. Otherwise the sin of Adam would be mightier than the justice of Christ, which is absurd.

When it comes to sacraments received by adults, the one receiving must intend to receive the effect of the sacrament.

GhillieCapone

@hglundahl Everyone knowingly sins, you would be a liar to say you don't. By your view everyone would be in a constant state of jumping between saved and unsaved between times of confession, otherwise you would be choosing not to do God's will, which by your belief means you would be unsaved.

Galatians 5:4 comes to mind

Please explain yourself with your claim "the sin of adam would be greater than Christ's sacrifice".

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@ghilliecapone Sinning knowingly is a necessary, but not a sufficient criterium, for sinning mortally.

"By your view everyone would be in a constant state of jumping between saved and unsaved"

Well. Some of us are. Confession is among other things there to help us beyond that, to when the sins one commits are smaller.

"otherwise you would be choosing not to do God's will, which by your belief means you would be unsaved."

Oh, you meant the implication in Ephesians 2:10, as I stated it?

I didn't state that every omission of doing what I think God would want is an immediate exit from the state of grace. Depends not just on how aware I am, but also how willing I am and how important the matter is. But if one keeps omitting, one certainly will sooner or later commit a mortal sin.

@ghilliecapone "Please explain yourself with your claim"

Adam's sin has the power to make babies sinners. How then can Baptism, as the fruit of Christ's sacrifice, not have the power to justify them, if Christ is more than the First Adam?

GhillieCapone

@hglundahl Sure, they have Adam's sin in them, but it is no match for God's grace. For God's grace is upon all little ones. The God of the Bible doesn't send innocent people to hell, certainly not babies or children.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@ghilliecapone "For God's grace is upon all little ones."

Have they God's grace in them?

"The God of the Bible doesn't send innocent people to hell, certainly not babies or children."

With Adam's sin, as long as it's not yet ousted by grace, we are not perfectly innocent, we are not perfectly pure. Theologians have reasoned, you are right they won't see flames and feel worms, but they will also, unless baptised, not see God (John 3:5).

7:03 "water process and ceremony" ....

Jesus answered: Amen, amen I say to thee, unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Ghost, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God
[John 3:5]
Know you not that all we, who are baptized in Christ Jesus, are baptized in his death?
[Romans 6:3]
Who was delivered up for our sins, and rose again for our justification.
[Romans 4:25]

"but you've got to keep yourself clean" ...

Wherefore, my dearly beloved, (as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but much more now in my absence,) with fear and trembling work out your salvation.
[Philippians 2:12]
In all thy works remember thy last end, and thou shalt never sin
[Ecclesiasticus (Sirach) 7:40]

8:48 You don't have to give to the Church?

And all they that believed, were together, and had all things common Their possessions and goods they sold, and divided them to all, according as every one had need
[Acts Of Apostles 2:44-45]

When Catholics in England gave to monks, a beggar who wanted some quiet could go and stay in a monastery for a week with some work in return, because the monastery existed, because people had given to it.

A few decades later, monasteries were gone, people were confronted with all the beggars all of the time and they thought it was a brilliant idea to force all the beggars into a place where they were forced to work all the time, and one representative got around to do the begging in a "polite" manner (a k a, Englishmen were no longer living what Jesus said in Mark 14:7, so presumably Englishmen had ceased to be His disciples).

9:22 If Luther spoke of the local Church of Rome, in the city in Lazio, we Catholics agree. That's why we say the city has three Apostles.

St. Peter and St. Paul in the time of Nero.
St. Philipp Neri in the time when Popes had despaired about cleaning the house at home.

9:41 John Calvin famously failed to account for where the ministry of truth had been in previous centuries and perhaps up to a millennium.

Here is on Matthew 28:20, his final words:

So much the more intolerable is the wickedness of the Popish clergy, when they take this as a pretext for their sacrilege and tyranny. They affirm that the Church cannot err, because it is governed by Christ; as if Christ, like some private soldier, hired himself for wages to other captains, and as if he had not, on the contrary, reserved the entire authority for himself, and declared that he would defend his doctrine, so that his ministers may confidently expect to be victorious over the whole world.

We totally agree that Christ will not be with those who distort His Gospel. But the thing is, He also promised to be with someone's (present there and their successors) and that all days ...

So, Calvin say for instance that in 1500 Alexander VI and the bishops in communion with him, in 1400 Boniface IX and Benedict XIII and bishops in communion with either of tham and in 1300 Boniface VIII and bishops in communion with him were not fulfilling the Great Commission.

The problem is, he nowhere says, that I know of, who was in 1500, 1400 and 1300 fulfilling it, who was enjoying the fulfilment of that promise. According to Jesus, someone was. And Calvin wasn't born yet in any of these years.

11:00 You can say that again.**

Not sure all Evangelicals are, some look a bit like Alumbrados, but all Protestants are.

11:19 I'm happy that the document, well meant as it can be described as, was not endorsed by an anti-pope and is not obliging on the Vatican II sect.

The "Catholic" signatories are:

Fr. Avery Dulles, Society of Jesus and Fordham University
Bishop Francis George, Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate, Diocese of Yakima (Washington)
Mgsr. William Murphy, Chancellor of the Archdiocese of Boston
Fr. Richard John Neuhaus, former Lutheran minister and Institute on Religion and Democracy
Archbishop Francis Stafford, Archdiocese of Denver
George Weigel, Ethics and Public Policy Center

Note, only Americans. And as they are in the Vatican II Sect, Americans without actual authority in the Church.

I'm not saying all of the document is bad, but saying "Together we search for a fuller and clearer understanding of God's revelation in Christ and his will for his disciples." ... sorry, but this is to deny being the Catholic Church. At least if it means the Catholic understanding isn't full.

The worst news one can say about Charlie Kirk is, he prayed with Evangelicals 20 minutes before he died. Perhaps the Catholic priest who had prayed an exoercism to protect him from a hex misled him on that issue.

11:34 For about 500 years, Catholics and Protestants understood "not together" ...

There weren't Evangelicals all of this time.

Also, not quite true of all Protestants, some actually questioned the Reformation (perhaps the spelling should be with a D and not an R). Some then went the whole hog and became Catholic, my case, some are "technically Protestant" (real issues why counting them as Protestant is OK, but also real issues why one could not accuse them of an open and unmitigated will to be Protestant).

15:05 Totally agree. The Great Commission was pronounced to the clergy of one Church and it is not that of the diverse Protestant sects.

Guess what? John McArthur and yourself totally stand outside the Great Commission.

15:59 You're united to all true believers in the Catholic system.

Which, if you divorce that from the system as such, means, no visible unity.

Does unity have to be visible? Does the Church have to be visible?

Going therefore, teach ye all nations; baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and behold I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the world
[Matthew 28:19-20]

An invisible Church may be a witness to God, if He recognises such a thing, but it certainly isn't a witness let alone a teacher to the nations, not to mention a teacher of a complete cursus of His commandments.

You are the light of the world. A city seated on a mountain cannot be hid Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but upon a candlestick, that it may shine to all that are in the house
[Matthew 5:14-15]

Doesn't sound like Jesus is describing an invisible unity of true believers strayed into a wonky visible non-Church. Sounds like He's describing a visible Church. Here is another one along that line:

And if he will not hear them: tell the church. And if he will not hear the church, let him be to thee as the heathen and publican.
[Matthew 18:17]

He doesn't state whether the Church is constituted with a hierarchy who speak for the Church or more democratically, but He does say it is visible and we have to hear it. We cannot hear the invisible unity of true believers when they are not visibly united in the true Church. It's like hearing a whisper from a mile away.

But on another occasion, He actually does speak up on the Church being hierarchical:

He that heareth you, heareth me; and he that despiseth you, despiseth me; and he that despiseth me, despiseth him that sent me.
[Luke 10:16]

I think I just demolished your position, more effectively than I could in conversation with a Lutheran back when I was converting.

16:39 The council Fathers of Trent were successors of the Apostles.

That's who they were to pronounce "anathema" ...

ejeh daniel

@ekehdaniel3020

Lies. The Council of Trent was in the 16th Century. 1500 years after the death of the Apostles.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@ekehdaniel3020 I didn't say they were "the Apostles" and I also didn't say they were the "immediate successors", I said they were the successors.

That's not a lie, it's in Matthew 28:20, and the Catholic Church is one of very few claimants to have their bishops in unbroken line from the Apostles. The other ones are Eastern Orthodox, Copts, Armenians, Assyrians, and maybe one other Church in communion with Copts, I think called Syriac.

If you prefer to say the Eastern Orthodox were the true successors of the Apostles in the time of the Reformation, be aware that the councils of Jerusalem and Iasi (in Romania) also condemned Protestant propositions (and anathematised those holding them). They are not held to be Ecumenical Councils by the Orthodox, since representing only the patriarcates of Jerusalem and ... Iasi is the patriarcal see in Romania; but they are definitely held to be pretty respected and normative (like we see things like the Councils of Toledo or of Orange).

17:06 No, it actually isn't.

Notes:

* If such an excommunication were pronounced over me, I think I could respect that as an attitude from the Vatican II Sect. I think it would backfire, as it backfired with Luther's countrymen, but openly saying so would be honest. However, telling people behind locked doors to behave in partly similar manners, perhaps pretending (incorrectly) I consider all people in the Vatican II Sect as non-Catholics, when Pope Michael I considered many were "displaced souls" (there was some stealth and delay in the takeover of institutions, but not a question of "100s of years of accretions" which is not so much stealth as making a takeover indetectable).
** Mr. Wretched took it on himself to confront Protestants — in his words Evangelicals — with the anathema of Trent "means you are damned."