More on Hank Hanegraaff from Dr. White - excellent analysis

"Can a Consistent Eastern Orthodox Believer be "the Bible Answer Man" ?

More like the "Bible in the light of sacred oral tradition in the liturgy of EO history-Answer Man"

https://apologeticsandagape.wordpress.com/2017/04/14/can-a-consistent-eastern-orthodox-believer-be-the-bible-answer-man/

Catholic Nick and obstinacy

It still amazes me, though it shouldn't, how a clearly intelligent man like Catholic Nick can interact with Reformed bloggers for years and years and yet still fail to grasp the most elementary distinctions because of his Rome-leaning bias. A robust Protestant view of ecclesiology seems so foreign to him that maybe he is literally too far under the surface of the Tiber that everything looks muddy and brown.

We continue:

Sure, I can understand that's what you think about what infallibility is, but it does not exist in real life. And a false claim to infallibility doesn't get us anywhere.
Who cares about infallibility, BTW, if one is RIGHT about something?

The Judaisers DID go on Judaising. That's why Paul had to write Galatians and parts of 2 Corinthians and Philippians. Did you just forget that part? You keep acting like true authority or infallibility would lead to everyone agreeing, including enemies of the faith, but that's not true in the early church nor in RCC throughout history.


Take (almost) any doctrine and notice how some Protestant somewhere will deny it on the basis that the Protestants who believe it are not infallible.

But what do I care about "some Prot somewhere"? Why don't you actually argue in a way that is relevant here? I certainly don't argue that way! If a Prot is wrong about something, it's b/c he's WRONG; I never mention infallibility unless someone falsely claims it for himself.


This is precisely why no Protestant is bound to accept the Westminster Confession,

But what relevance does this have? The Confession is the authority for Presby churches; it serves to make it easier to identify who really agrees with them and who doesn't and thus to call ppl to comply with the set doctrine or to join another church (or to be called out as heretics).
LOok, you HAVE to realise that it's the exact same situation with RCC. Either someone submits himself to RCC and its confessions, or one doesn't. It's as simple as that. There's no force involved, and the authority you think RCC has is only applicable to those who agree to listen to that authority. It's the same with WCF and Presbys.


People can submit to it in the same way an employee submits to the office rules, but that's by no means infallible or binding on all Protestants.

Trading on an inconsistent comparison, like you always do.
It's binding on all WCF-PRESBYTERIANS. Just like CCC and Magisterial docs is binding on all RCs. But you need to compare church to church. Not "Protestants" as a whole.


And from that you can see that it's plainly ridiculous to speak of each and every denomination having their own distinct formally established dogma.

Why is it ridiculous? Each one DOES.


You're not distinguishing between "The Church" and "A Church".

Actually, I did so very carefully. That's why I said "A Prot church".


There is only One Church in reality, with various local manifestations (e.g. parishes), but not in Protestantism

That's completely untrue. I completely affirm that there is only One Church in reality, with various local manifestations (e.g. local churches). Just like in the NT.
There are no "parishes" in the NT, BTW.


In Protestantism, everyone is autonomous

Your Romanist blinders don't let you see the double standard you're using.
What do you mean by "autonomous"?


there is no single denomination where everyone comes together.

So?


You make my point for me, by saying it depends on the denomination you have made church authority worthless.

How so? What authority does the church have over outsiders?
What authority does RCC have over outsiders?


Now anyone can go and start their own denomination and make themself pastor

Anyone can do that with RCC as well, and RCC either intervenes and says "you're not of us" or it doesn't.
Same with PCA as well - someone could do so and call themselves PCA and PCA either intervenes and says "you're not of us" or it doesn't.
Further, there is always the question of the JUSTIFIABILITY of that guy's going off by himself. How does RCC handle the problem that there will always be split-offs? We've seen clearly how they did it in the 16th century - they threaten the lives of the splitters.
You're evincing a 16th-cent mindset; you apparently prefer RCC to operate with force against those who leave RCC. Nice.


All a dissatisfied Presbyterian has to do is go start his own Presbyterian denomination and just rename it.

All a dissatisfied Roman Catholic has to do is go start his own Roman Catholic denomination and just rename it.


That means the PCA is just a bunch of men pretending to have authority over Christians when in fact they hold no divine authority at all.

They have authority over THEIR OWN CHURCH - Matthew 18, Hebrews 13, Titus, 1&2 Timothy.
Just like RC priests and the Magisterium have authority over THEIR OWN CHURCH.


You have not given any indication there is one church Jesus approves of above all others. I

You didn't ask.
He probably approves most of the church that has the best doctrine and conduct. Like in Revelation 1-3.
Just b/c He approves MOST of a given church doesn't mean that other ones aren't true churches.


I have, which I why as a Catholic I say the Catholic Church is the one true Church.

Good for you, but your mistaken assertions mean nothing more than that you are mistaken.


What you're saying is that either there is no way to know which denomination Jesus approves of above all others, or that Jesus doesn't really care where you go as long as you join one.

As long as you join A GOOD CHURCH, there is plenty of reason to think you're doing your due diligence.


In other words, the original Church Jesus established flopped at least once, if not multiple times, and fresh new start ups had to arise from the ashes whenever a prior church went bad. That's pure Mormonism

Yawn. Of course the original church***ES*** flopped. When's the last time you read the NT?
The epistles to the Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Colossians, Titus, Timothy, of John, and Jude, and 3 of the 7 churches in Revelation 1-3 show that early churchES had serious doctrinal problems even in the lifetime of the apostles.
It's not Mormonism, since no one is claiming that the true church totally disappeared, only to reappear in the form of a polytheistic cult later.
Maybe you could exegete Matthew 16, showing that "the gates of hell shall not prevail against it" means necessarily that "the church in Rome will never experience deadly doctrinal error" or "21st century people will always be able to find definitive historical evidence that Jesus' followers existed in force for a continuous flow throughout history". I'll be happy to see your exegesis along those lines.


There is no historical continuity from Christ upto now in your view. To you the Early Church Fathers practiced an extinct form of Christianity.

Your Romanist bias prevents you from dealing with my true position. You've had so many opportunities to be corrected on this; I'm losing hope that you'll actually ever even be able to deal with a real Protestant position. It's like you're stuck arguing against fading memories of Chick tracts.



The NT does not give a list of Majors/Essentials

Not a list per se, but it certainly seems a pretty shallow mindset to demand a list. Perhaps God preferred to reveal His essentials differently.
And the NT does split out majors/minors quite clearly in numerous places. John 8:24, pretty much all of Galatians (which, of course, condemns RCC quite vociferously), Revelation 1-3, etc. And 1 Corinthians 8 and Romans 14.
It's like you're not even reading. I've now told you 1 Cor 8 and Romans 14 thrice; when are you going to interact with them?


If it did, then there would never have been debate on issues such as paedobaptism between folks like White and R Scott Clark in the first place.

Proof ≠ persuasion.
Be consistent; your argument proves too much - The RC Magisterium does not give a list of Majors/Essentials, nor can such a list be derived. If it did, then there would never have been debate on issues such as filioque between folks like RCC and EOC in the first place.
Or ...then there would never have been a debate on issues such as predestination in earlier RCC. Or of various Marian dogmas. The role of relics.
The list goes on and on. When will you actually take this into account? RCC does not have the unity it claims it has!



There is no "the church" in Protestantism to be able to follow Our Lord's instructions.

Sure there is. There's the local church.

CatholicNick seems not to have learned much

...at least not on the issue of "church unity" and the 29,000 30,000 33,000 58 zillion denominations argument.

Here is the comment to which I reply.


 I don't see why infallibility is necessary to have formally-established dogma. If a group gets together and says "this is our formally-established dogma. Nobody is infallible of course but this is our formally-established dogma, b/c although nobody is infallible, this dogma is actually true", what's wrong with that? You need to give an argument that infallibility is a necessary precondition for formally-established dogma. A Prot church DOES have a single, unified hierarchy. I have told you this many times; it's disappointing to see you haven't learned anything in the years since I pointed it out to you.

Instead, every pastor is self-appointed and does their own thing. That depends entirely on the church/denomination.

What makes you think these overgeneralisations do anyone any good?


  The PCA has no authority over someone like James White

Duh, but PCA does have authority over someone like a PCA pastor.
Just like an EO priest doesn't have any authority over someone like CatholicNick


  You're stopping short of asking the full question: not "join A church" but WHICH?

Well, of course, but we each have to answer the same question. Which church? Which infallible interpreter? EOC? WatchTower? Salt Lake City? Seriously, these answers have been around for many years. Why haven't you advanced the argument any?


Surely Jesus wasn't saying "I don't care which denomination you attend, just as long as you attend one".

Please argue for this assertion.



Suppose Jason (Stellman) wants to dump the PCA and go solo, so now he's attending his own start-up church. Is that just as good?

If he did so b/c he doubted paedobaptism and embraced credobaptism, that would be a good thing*. If PCA went apostate like Rome has, it could be a good thing. If he did it to reach previously unreached ppl, sure, why not? For reasons of swapping out doctrine, no, it wouldn't be good, b/c PCA's doctrine is very, very good. But all churches are "start-up" churches, so I don't really understand what you're saying. RCC does not extend back from Jesus and the apostles; neither does EOC or any other church.



This only begs the question as to what is "Major" and what isn't. 

Of course it does, but the NT tells us. And I already reminded you of it. A shame you once again refused to advance the argument.


It further raises the question why join a Church that is wrong on "smaller things" rather than seek out or form one that is right on both Major and Minor?

I did, and I found one that is about the closest to right on things major and minor that's in my area. I'm blessed; there are several like that and I am a member of one of them.


Once you start making a list of "Majors" then you'll see things begin to break down.

That's false; I've done that before and it worked out fine. There are also these things called confessions that have stood for hundreds of years. Those also work quite well.


 The difference between Jason and others is that Jason was willing to attempt to derive such a list.

No, the difference between him and others is that he had already given up on Sola Scriptura.


You don't realize that you're essentially acting as Pope when you go around saying "smaller issues like pædobaptism or church polity".

You need to argue for this. I don't think I'm infallible; I merely recognise that I have responsibility to do what Jesus told me to do. And I've already pointed out where the NT teaches the major/minor distinction.


Who says those are "smaller issues" when HISTORICALLY those and similar issues have bitterly divided Protestantism.

The fact that they don't corrupt the Gospel or necessary doctrine fundamentally "says" those are smaller issues. As for whether they have bitterly divided ppl, why should it bother me that men before me have been sinners and let conflicts go farther than they should have? And why doesn't it bother YOU that the same is true of RCC and RC history? One of us can deal with his own history.



Luther and Calvin hated and damned the anabaptists, and the more traditional Confessionally Reformed and Baptists would still find each other objectionable and closed communion.

So? RC and EO bishops/popes/patriarchs have hated and damned each other, and they would still find each other objectionable and closed communion.


  it's absurd to suggest a hierarchic, democratic, and individualist polity are equally acceptable.

I didn't suggest that. I"m afraid you may be having difficulty with the idea that people can recognise that a given idea is a minor matter and also that someone else is wrong on that minor matter and also that, since it's minor, it does not merit wholehearted anathemas. Since Jesus and the apostles did that, who am I to demur?


If you are in a debate about some major point of doctrine or morality with a good friend who's of a different denomination, which "church" do you approach for correction as per Christ's instructions in Matthew 18 to "tell it to the church"?

At the risk of stating the obvious, no church. How am I supposed to address "the church" when we're not part of the same church? How would you deal with an EO friend about his disaffirmation of the filioque?

*It should go without saying that I am a Baptist. I'm speaking as a Baptist here, since Nick asked me the question. 

Catholics for Excommunication

Seen in the right-side advertisement column on my Facebook page today (which, if you think about it, is ironic and sort of funny):

Links to here.


Is not the Roman Catholic Church's teaching on contraception crystal-clear? Perpiscuous Perspicuous?

Or, let us ask it another way:
What might we label a so-called Roman Catholic who advocates ignoring what the Magisterium teaches and instead agreeing with a group of laymen over against what the Magisterium has clearly taught?

Well, what might we label a so-called member of a PCA church who advocates ignoring what the Westminster Confession of Faith teaches and instead agreeing with a group of laymen over against what the WCF has clearly taught?
What might we label a so-called member of a Reformed Baptist church who advocates ignoring what the London Baptist Confession of Faith teaches and instead agreeing with a group of laymen over against what the LBCF has clearly taught? 

In the latter two cases, would not many of our Roman Catholic friends point excitedly to the fact as evidence of the 29 30 33-thousand denominations myth? And/or of disunity among Protestants and chaos? A blueprint for anarchy?

Shall we expect "Catholics for Choice" to face church discipline pretty soon?

Follow-up: Ratzinger says "Resurrection Merely Symbolic"

Following up on the "Ratzinger-used-to-believe-the-Resurrection-was-symbolic" post (one wonders what this meant for his understanding of "real presence" in the Eucharist), the individual who brought this to my attention was Matthew Vogan, who contacted me via Puritanboard.

It seems as if Ratzinger, at some later time, modified that view. What's less clear to me is, what was his motivation? As a scholar (a "leading Catholic scholar") even at that time, he would have come to that belief ("the resurrection is merely symbolic") only as the result of a long and thoughtful process. To have decided to have changed this view merely because he was moving up the ecclesiastical ladder, seems a bit hypocritical to me.

Matthew wrote this article describing all of this. And he points to what most people would consider to be a fundamental kind of dishonesty (although there is an "official" way to be deceptive that falls within the limits of Official Roman law, and Ratzinger, being a "leading Catholic scholar," knows all the tricks):

How then may the current Pope continue to deny such a statement of the Church’s official teaching? It can be done only by the Jesuitical distinction that he makes between his official and private views (despite the fact that his books are all marketed with 'Pope Benedict XVI' more prominently displayed than his real name). Despite the seemingly-binding nature of the new Catechism, some point to the fact that it was not prepared by a full Council and are able to take some refuge in Ratzinger’s comments that the Catechism seeks to leave debated questions as open as possible.

At this point, the footnote continues:

Joseph A Komonchak, 'The authority of the Catechism', in Introducing the Catechism of the Catholic Church: traditional themes and contemporary issues, ed. Berard L Marthaler, Paulist Press, 1994, pp 18-31). In Instruction on the Ecclesial Vocation of the Theologian issued by Ratzinger in 1990, there are complicated qualifications as to when and how views differing from official doctrine can be proposed: for example, 'witholding assent' is distinguished from 'dissent'.

I'm wondering again, at all of our "inconsistency detectors" out there, if this doesn't seem just a bit beyond inconsistent?

[Beyond this is the whole area of thought behind the papacy that allows that a pope can be as wicked as is humanly possible, just so long as he does not issue an ex-cathedra heretical teaching -- or at least, one that cannot be explained away. Does this not seem to our "inconsistency-detectors" out there, just a little bit inconsistent, if not hypocritical and outlandish and beyond belief?]

Just mull this over for a bit. I'm closing comments on this thread because I'm headed out of town for the weekend, and I won't really have much time or access to respond to comments. But I wanted to throw this out there for those of you who are interested.

Resurrection of the dead is only “symbolically” proclaimed in the Bible, says this author.

Here’s a little word picture for consideration especially by our Roman Catholic friends for whom “intellectual inconsistency” is a dirty word and a dangerous concept.

I have come across this, because it was brought to my attention by a Reformed brother who I met through a Reformed discussion board. He was concerned that this particular author (whom I will cite at length) simply did not believe in the Resurrection. Not the Resurrection of Christ, nor the physical resurrection of the body at the end of the age.

Here is a key passage from our author in question:

The foregoing reflections may have made a little clearer what is involved in the biblical pronouncements about the resurrection: their essential content is not the conception of a restoration of bodies to souls after a long interval: their aim is to tell men that they, themselves, live on; not by virtue of their own power but because they are known and loved by God in such a way that they can no longer perish.

In contrast to the dualistic conception of immortality expressed in the Greek body-soul schema, the biblical formula of immortality through awakening is trying to impart a collective and dialogic conception of immortality: the essential part of man, the person remains; that which has ripened in the course of this earthly existence of corporeal spirituality and spiritualized corporeality goes on existing in a different fashion. It goes on existing because it lives in God’s memory. And because it is the man himself who will live, not an isolated soul, the element of human fellowship is also part of the future; for this reason the future of the individual man will only then be full when the future of humanity is fulfilled.

Now, this seems to me as a classic liberal re-definition of the physical resurrection, and a lot like a kind of pantheism. But I don’t want to rush to judgment. And of course, in the spirit of this blog, we of course intend to provide context, and lots of it.

My dilemma is that I have not read huge amounts from this author, though I likely will read more in the future.

But I do have one of the books in question, and so I want to back up from that previous paragraph, a few pages, and to provide, at some length, the “foregoing reflections” from this author, just to be sure we are not misquoting him, or misunderstanding him, or taking him out of context.

We have discovered anew the indivisibility of man; we live our corporeality with a new intensity and feel it as the indispensable mode of realization of the one being of man. From this angle we can understand afresh the biblical message, which promises immortality not to a separated soul but to the whole man. Such feelings have in this [20th] century made evangelical theology in particular turn emphatically against the Greek doctrine of the immortality of the soul, which is wrongly regarded as a Christian idea too. In reality, so it is said, this idea expresses a thoroughly un-Christian dualism; the Christian faith knows only of the waking of the dead by God’s power. But doubts arise at once here: the Greek doctrine of immortality may well be problematical, but is not the biblical assertion still more incapable of fulfillment for us? The unity of man, fine, but who can imagine, on the basis of our present-day image of the world, a resurrection of the body?

“The unity of man, fine.” So this concept of “the indivisibility of man,” “the unity of man,” is what is established by this writer in what precedes. And then, he begins to discuss what implications this has for the Christian doctrine of “the resurrection of the body.” Continuing with this thought:

This resurrection would also imply – or so it seems, at any rate – a new heaven and a new earth; it would require immortal bodies needing no sustenance, and a completely different condition of matter. But is this not all completely absurd, quite contrary to our understanding of matter and its modes of behavior, and therefore hopelessly mythological? Well I think that in fact one can only arrive at an answer if one enquires carefully into the real intentions of the biblical statement and at the same time considers anew the relation between the biblical and the Greek ideas.

Now this is an idea that we can all embrace. We must “enquire carefully into the real intentions of the biblical statement” no doubt mentioned above that immortality is promised “not to a separated soul but to the whole man.” Again, not having read this author, I’m not sure what he means by this statement, but if we assume his prior analysis about “the whole man” is correct, then what follows is certain to be understandable in that light. Right?

For their encounter with each other [Greek and biblical ideas about immortality of man and the resurrection of the body] has modified both conceptions and thus overlaid the original intentions of both approaches with a new combined view which we must first remove if we want to find our way back to the beginning. First of all, the hope of the resurrection of the dead simply represents the basic form of the biblical hope of immortality; it appears in the New Testament not really as a supplement to a preceding and independent immortality of the soul but as the fundamental statement on the fate of man.

Amen and amen!

There were, it is true, in late Jewish teachings hints of immortality on the Greek pattern, and this was probably one of the reasons why very soon the all-embracing scope of the idea of resurrection in the Graeco-Roman world was no longer grasped. Instead, the Greek notion of the immortality of the soul and the biblical message of the resurrection of the dead was each understood as half the answer to the question of the fate of man and the two were added together. It was thought that the already existing Greek fore-knowledge about the immortality of the soul had added to it by the Bible the revelation that at the end of the world bodies would be awoken too, to share henceforth for ever the fate of the soul – damnation or bliss.

As opposed to this, we must grasp the fact that originally it was not a question of two complementary ideas; on the contrary, we are confronted with two different total views, which cannot simply be added together: the image of man, of God and of the future, is in each case quite different, and thus at bottom each of the two views can only be understood as an attempt at a total answer to the question of human fate.

The Greek conception is based on the idea that man is composed of two intrinsically alien substances, one of which (the body) perishes, while the other (the soul) is in itself imperishable and therefore goes on existing in its own right independent of any other beings. Indeed, it was only in the separation from its essentially alien body, so it was thought, that the soul came into its own.

So here we have from our author an articulation of “the Greek conception” of the immortality of the soul. This seems accurate enough. Now for his analysis of the biblical conception:

The biblical train of thought, on the other hand, presupposes the undivided unity of man [there we have that idea again, from above]; for example, Scripture contains no word denoting only the body (separated and distinguished from the soul), while conversely in the vast majority of cases the word soul too means the whole corporeally existing man; the few places where a different view can be discerned hover to a certain extent between Greek and Hebrew thinking and in any case by no means abandon the old view. The awakening of the dead (not of bodies!) of which Scripture speaks is thus concerned with the salvation of the one, undivided man, not just with the fate of one (so far as possible secondary) half of man [italics and parentheses in original]. It now also becomes clear that the real heart of the faith in the resurrection does not consist at all in the idea of the restoration of the body, to which we have reduced it in our thinking; such is the case even though this is the pictorial image used throughout the Bible. What then, is the real content of the hope symbolically proclaimed in the Bible in the shape of the resurrection of the dead? I think that this can best be worked out by means of a comparison with the dualistic conception of ancient philosophy [bold emphasis added].

Aha, here is a reason to be cautious with this writer.

In conjunction with the statement approaching pantheism that I noted at the beginning, this statement too ought to raise some red flags, especially for our perceptive readers (Sean Patrick, Paul Hoffer, David Waltz) who do not tolerate “inconsistency”. (Of course, these guys, being as perceptive and as well-read as they claim to be, almost certainly have seen through my ploy by this point, and are ready with exceptions to their doctrine of “inconsistency”.)

Like the fabled Peter Lampe, who does not believe that Paul wrote the “Pastoral Epistles,” this writer says that “the hope of the resurrection of the dead” is only “symbolically proclaimed” in the Bible.

We should rightfully be cautious of this man who thinks of the resurrection of the dead as being merely “symbolically proclaimed in the Bible.”

More to follow.

Getting to the Specific Issue

David Waltz wrote:

Do not wish to digress here, but it does remind me a bit of James White’s charge/s leveled against Muslim apologists who quote “liberal”, critical Christian scholars in their debates, whilst James allows himself to use “liberal” and critical Islamic scholars.

That is not the exact charge that Dr. White makes - he is not saying Muslims (or anyone else) cannot quote or use any liberal Christian (or Islamic) scholarship at all, at any time, for any reason; he is saying the specific example of them using liberals/skeptics/agnostics and non- inerrantists ( like Bart Ehrman/Bultmann/Crossan/and even James Dunn, who is not as liberal as the rest) against the text of the NT undermines the Muslims’ whole Islamic religion and the Qur'an, since the Qur'an affirms the Torah, Zobur (Psalms of David) and Injeel (Gospel) of Jesus as revelation from the one true Creator God who is able to speak and inspire books. (Surah 2:136; 5:46-48; 5:68; 10:94; 29:46)

Islam claims it is the third in line of the Monotheistic religions and that the first two (Judaism – in “the law and prophets and Psalms”) and Christianity (Injeel = Gospel) were given truly at that time in a “dispensational” (in stages for each time period) kind of way. Dr. White is saying that their attacks on Scripture undermine Islam as the 3rd religion that "completes all religions", since Islam itself is based on those 2 previous religions and their books.

David, do you see the difference?

For example, we can use Ehrman and Crossan and other liberals/skeptics/agnostics to help affirm the historical reality of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ by the Jewish leaders under Pontius Pilate, around 30 AD, because the specific point where they agree with true history, undermines Islam and its denial of true history (denial of Christ's crucifixion - 4:157), and because at the same time, it is powerful even more because those same liberals reject the miracle of the virgin birth of Christ, which Islam accepts. (Qur'an, Surah 3:45-48; 19:19-21) The inconsistency is with Islam and the Qur'an. Since Muslims believe that God is one and is the Almighty Creator and speaks and gives revelation in books, and even names the books of the previous revelations, "the Law", "the Zobur", and "the Gospel", then it is inconsistent for them to use liberal scholars specifically on the text of the Text of the Bible, as their main attack that under girds all of their apologetic method of the doubting of the Biblical text. Furthermore, the Qur'an never says the text of the NT has been corrupted, although that is their theological belief, because the contradictions of the Qur'an force them to come up with that conclusion.

Everyone should be interesting in listening and watching Dr. White's debates against Muslims, and his recent ABN shows ; here on the NT textand here on the crucifixion; and here on the two natures of Jesus part 1; and here on the two natures of Jesus, part 2getting his DVD's and get prepared to witness to Muslims and deal with their questions. www.aomin.org

Given the times we live in today, I hope and pray that those who only enjoy Dr. White dealing with Dave Hunt or Arminianism or Roman Catholicism will see the crucial and strategic importance of equipping the church to deal with Muslims and evangelize them and reach out to them in speaking the truth, love, boldness, gentleness, patience, and respect.

Therefore, John Bugay can use Peter Lampe, and has used him well in his historical research on Rome against the Roman Catholic Claims of the Papacy and authority, even though Lampe may not be an inerrantist on the Scriptures.