Harold Camping and Authority: An Ex- Protestant Pastor's Perspective

Owen Swain blogs and draws at Luminous Miseries and Drawn to Catholicism. He is  former evangelical pastor from Canada who lost his livelihood 5 years ago when he converted to Catholicism. Check out his thoughts about the Camping Non-Event Prediction:
http://owenswain.com/drawntocatholicism/?p=2311

Harold Camping is Yet Another Good Reason to Become Catholic

Well, May 21st came and went and as Bruce Cockburn said

"Sun's up, uh huh, looks okay

The world survives into another day

And I'm thinking about eternity

Some kind of ecstasy got a hold on me..."

As expected, Harold Camping was once again wrong in attempting to predict the day and the hour when "the rapture" would occur. I would like to believe this is a great living example of the failings of sola scripture but in reality it's just plain and simple disobedience to scripture. Jesus told us know one would know the day or the hour and yet Harold and countless others through history have attempted to tell us just that very thing.


So it's not truly an example of the failings of sola scripture per se (we already have  greater than 20,000 denominations which provide ample evidence of such). Harold's recent heresy is an example of what sola scriptura has spawned: The belief that each of us carries within us the authority to interpret God's word and that we are not beholden to any other outside authority (read Church) other than our conscience and the way in which we believe scripture is guiding/forming it.

Why isn't there somebody out there to condemn Mr. Camping and put him in his place? Who should we turn to? His pastor? Naw, he doesn't go to church since he believes we are no longer in the Church age. His denomination? Can't because he is his own denomination. How about his board of directors? Naw, he owns Family Radio lock, stock and barrel. How 'bout Pat Robertson,  Billy Graham, or the Evangelical Theological Society? What authority do they have over him? None.

So basically, this gentleman makes a prediction about the end of the world, spends millions of dollars donated to his ministry to promote it, then causes many to leave jobs, houses, family, etc, to follow this heretical belief, and poof! Nothing happens, and no repercussions. Nada. Perhaps Harold has a little egg on his face but will go on without any rebuke and I suspect, if he lives long enough, will pull the same shenanigan again at some point.
If there is any lesson learned here, I pray that some of these deceived folks will begin to process the non-event and realize the need to come under some type of religious authority not based on one man and his personal private interpretation of Scripture.
   I left the Catholic Church in 1973 and spent several hours per week listening to Mr. Camping's teachings. I suspect they were partly responsible for my decision to ultimately leave Catholicism, so I do have a small dog in this fight and it bugs the heck out of me that 40 years later Camping is still deceiving others leading them away from the true faith. I pray that God will ultimately write straight with crooked lines and use Harold's heresy to ultimate bring people back to the faith that is guided by the authority given  from Christ himself.

Left Behind?

Harold Camping- Wrong Again!

Harold is a living example of why solo scriptura is dangerous.

"Man Made Religion"

"Heretical teachers pervert Scripture and try to get into Heaven with a false key, for they have formed their human assemblies later than the Catholic Church. From this previously-existing and most true Church, it is very clear that these later heresies, and others which have come into being since then, are counterfeit and novel inventions. "
 (Pope St. Clement I 80 AD)  (this is incorrect, see below)

When I read this quote, I immediately assumed it must have been written after the reformation in response to the novel doctrines brought in by the reformers. Examples of these early false teachings was the heresy that the Eucharist was not the true body and blood of Christ, or that Jesus was not equal, con-substantial with God (of the same substance)

The reality is that this was written by the fourth pope who was responding to heretical teachings that were already arising in "human assemblies" that claim a "false key" as early the end of the first century.

Note the language Pope St Clement uses to describe the non-Catholic churches: "human assemblies." Implicit in this statement is that the early Christians who remained in succession from the original apostles truly believed that Church was "God-made", not "man-made."  By definition, the Church was the assembly of  Christian believers that could trace their spiritual patrimony to the gentleman named Peter who received the "true Key" from the hands of no one less than Christ Jesus himself.

Isn't it sad and ironic that one of the most frequent claims made against the Catholic faith passed on to us directly from the apostles is that it is a "man-made religion?"

NOTE: Correction of the Above. The author of this quote was from Clement of Alexandria in his Stromata

(125-200 AD)

Shrine of the North American Martyrs

Altar in the Coliseum Church at the Shrine

Deborah and I took a road trip this week up to New England for a medical conference and visited the Shrine of the North American Martyrs in Auriesville, NY.
St. Isaac Jogues and his companions were martyred by the Mohawk Indians in their efforts to share the gospel with them in 1646.
St. Isaac Jogues had his fingers chewed and torn off so he was unable to celebrate Mass. Despite this, he eventually escaped after a year of slavery and returned to France. He remained there for only short time, (receiving a dispensation from the Pope to consecrate the Eucharist with just the stubs of his fingers) and returned to the same tribe that had tortured him. Initially things went well, but shortly thereafter he was killed.
The shrine at Auriesville to St. Isaac Jogues and his two companions is a testimony to a faith that is hard to comprehend. St. Jogues knew he would be martyred on his return yet was compelled by love to share the faith with those who had not yet heard the gospel.
Blessed Kateri Tekawitha, a Mohawk Indian, who converted to Christ, was born in the Mohawk Indian village that killed Isaac Jogues 10 years earlier.
Truly Tertullian was correct in the 2nd century when he said "the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church."
If you get a chance to, drive to the Shrine of the North American Martyrs to see how the Catholic faith was first heroically shared in the New World.

St. Isaac Jogues, intercede for us that we would have the boldness to share the gospel and live our faith heroically. Amen.

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