The Lighthearted Calvinist

The wizards at WordPress show bloggers such as myself what search terms are entered into search engines that direct people to our little corner of cyberspace, where sound theology and pleasant demeanors abound.  Today, two  entries catch the eye of our diligent staff of me, those terms being (terms copied and pasted, poor capitalization and all…):

1) “is charles stanley safe for catholics,” and

2) “romney and the calvinism who belongs to the cast of the insulted”

Well, well.

To inquire into number one, perhaps one should ask the question as to whether or not Dr. Stanley is safe for non-Catholics.  If one dares, pick up his book, “Eternal Security.”  (Dr. Stanley, BTW, is not a Calvinist.)  In that book, he states that all one has to do to obtain “eternal security” is to express one act of faith at one point in time – and it doesn’t matter what you do afterward.  One, according to the book, could apostatize and still obtain eternal reward in heaven for that singular act of faith.   Even we Calvinists do not believe that.

Secondly, with Dr. Stanley being of that mind, he must then necessarily fall under Rome’s anathemas expressed at the Council of Trent – specifically, these three anathemas:

• 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.“ 
• Canon 12:  “If anyone says that justifying faith is nothing else than confidence in divine mercy, which remits sins for Christ’s sake, or that it is this confidence alone that justifies us, let him be anathema.”
• Canon 14: “If anyone says that man is absolved from his sins and justified because he firmly believes that he is absolved and justified, or that no one is truly justified except him who believes himself justified, and that by this faith alone absolution and justification are effected, let him be anathema.”

It would appear safe to say that Dr. Stanley would not be safe for Catholics at multiple levels.

Next, the search for “romney and the calvinism who belongs to the cast of the insulted.”  Last week, we posted on the matter of honoring our leader – biblically – even though we may disagree with him.  In that post, Mr. Romney’s name was mentioned once – and only to say I would not likely be voting for him (and stating that I would not be voting for Mr. Obama, either.  And yes, I will vote.  That post was reposted by a friend and it proves how irrational politics can make people.  Read the post.  The friend who reposted it was rebuked by a relative for calling Mr. Romney ‘evil.’(!!))  Somehow, that one use of Mr. Romney’s name ended up causing a searcher to end up here.  I hope the searcher had an enjoyable time while here, but given the confusing nature of the search phrase, perhaps not…..