Its a shame the Catholics put more authority in the teachings of the Catholic Church and less authority in the teachings of the Holy Spirit who did write the Bible for us to read and study.
Like i said before its a waste of time to debate or argue with the Catholics because they are walking in darkness and cannot understand what The Holy Spirit is saying in the Scriptures.
We need to bring the Gospel of Salvation to the Catholics.
Romans 1:16-17 (NASB77)
[SUP]16 [/SUP] For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.
[SUP]17 [/SUP] For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, " BUT THE RIGHTEOUS man SHALL LIVE BY FAITH."
Galatians 1:6-9 (NASB77)
[SUP]6 [/SUP] I am amazed that you are so quickly deserting Him who called you by the grace of Christ, for a different gospel;
[SUP]7 [/SUP] which is really not another; only there are some who are disturbing you, and want to distort the gospel of Christ.
[SUP]8 [/SUP] But even though we, or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel contrary to that which we have preached to you, let him be accursed.
[SUP]9 [/SUP] As we have said before, so I say again now, if any man is preaching to you a gospel contrary to that which you received, let him be accursed.
The Catholics need to return to the Gospel taught by Jesus Christ and toss away all their teachings from evil men who have deceived them into following Idols like Mary.
So when your argument is proven false, you return to anti catholic soundbites.
I went to the trouble of illustrating some issues to do with mary from scripture, including davidic roots, and you have not challenged on any single one.
You have a blindspot when it comes to history!
It is a shame you have failed even to research where the new testament comes from! evidently! We have the gospel of salvation, indeed as Luther pointed out, Christians everywhere are eternally indebted to the catholic church, because it was what became called the catholic church that gave you your new testament on the basis of what they thought it meant.
If you regard the church as false, or those church fathers not inspired you must bin your new testament same day!.
Mary is not an idol! She really was the mother of christ, and awarded high honour, "full of grace, blessed" and so on.
I could throw both of those scriptures back as applying you with whatever you now believe, but what is the point? You will see on this forum take on OSAS groups arguing passionately for "their version" of what scripture means, all arguing they discerned the holy spirit for its meaning so with several opposed views most of them are wrong. So there is no merit in your argument.
Absence of agreement proves the need for authority.
Unlike the typical evangelical of today, who rarely ventures past the new testament the jewish culture was obsessive about its own history and sense of identity. And they knew all the scriptures.
So when Jesus referred to the "keys of the kingdom" it is inconceivable they would not have associated that with the meaning to davidic kings. If you accept the working language was aramaic , then peter was the rock given the keys, and authoity to bind and loose. Another expression well grounded in judaism. So there is the authority.
It is only later protestants who have tried to sidestep the link of peter and rock. Put together Peter was given an inheritied office as second in command not king. Even Calvin and Luther thought that, although they tried to pretend that unlike the office of steward, clearly referenced in davidic times, they try to pretend it stops with peter!
I have yet to find an evangelical that can give me an alternative but scriptural alternative for the meaning of "keys of the kingdom". It is not the catholic church that has problems with scripture, it is others who will do anything to avoid the obvious.
Take the obvious revelations 12:1 is mary. Why , because all the rest of the gospels tell the same story! But the way protestants strain at gnats to avoid the obvious and say it is something else is amazing!
I am happy for people to disagree with interpretation but to pretend that catholics are not bible christians is convenient but untenable.
The saddest thing of all, you were given a gift of teaching about the catholic faith, and did not even do the research to discover what it meant. No wonder the family won't talk to you, if the above is the level of argument.