The Roman Catholic Controversy: Tradition and the Magisterium

This sixth post in my series on James R. White’s The Roman Catholic Controversy. I am really getting bogged down with this. White’s chapters aren’t getting longer, but my responses to them are. I reckon his accusations are growing more and more onerous and his tone more and more condemning, and I feel there is …

The Roman Catholic Controversy: Sola Scriptura

The fifth post in my series on James R. White’s The Roman Catholic Controversy. I said in beginning this review that I was prepared to give praise where it was due. It is due here: James White has constructed a really splendid and solid case in favor of the doctrine of sola scriptura — “by …

The Roman Catholic Controversy: Claims of Authority

The fourth post in my series on James R. White’s The Roman Catholic Controversy. Come on, y’all. I am actively courting controversy here. And I’m not doing it just to talk to myself. I know there are readers out there who disagree with me and with my critiques. Please don’t be shy about challenging me. …

The Roman Catholic Controversy: The Gospel of Peace

The third post in my series on James R. White’s The Roman Catholic Controversy. I must confess, this chapter, “The Essential Issue: The Gospel of Peace,” leaves me rather baffled. Despite James White’s claim that his many debates with Catholics have given him “insight into the best Rome has to offer to defend her own …

The Roman Catholic Controversy: The Essentials

The second post in my series on James R. White’s The Roman Catholic Controversy. In James White’s second chapter, “Cutting through the Fog,” he aims to pierce through the “fog” of obfuscation that both Catholics and Protestants, he acknowledges, tend to get lost in in their debates with one another. Both Catholics and Protestants believe …

The Roman Catholic Controversy: What is the Gospel?

The first post in my series on James R. White’s The Roman Catholic Controversy. Catholics and Protestants — do the differences still matter? That is the question The Roman Catholic Controversy presents us with from the start. From the very first pages, the book makes clear that the question is merely rhetorical: In the foreword, …

The Roman Catholic Controversy

My new friend Julia has suggested that I read a book called The Roman Catholic Controversy, by James R. White of Alpha and Omega Ministries. As chance would have it (or as God would have it, since I’m not so sure I believe in random chance anymore), I picked up this book a few months …

The Other Side of Calvin

I’m about to enter the scriptorium exeuntis, the paper-writing cave, from which there may be no return. But I suppose I shouldn’t leave everyone (all one or two of y’all?) hanging. Here is the second half of my post about Calvin. I have felt pretty bad about the tone of that last post. I very …

Discovering Calvin

Last Christmas, I received a couple of books of theology: For Calvinism by Michael Horton and Against Calvinism by Roger Olson. I had asked for them; they had come highly recommended. I had never given Calvinism a fair shake, I felt. Every time I had tried to approach it through personal study in the past, …