Was it worth Dividing the Church??

[MaxPC]

i’m not sure if you’re misunderstanding, or just annoyed with me in general. i have no quarrel either way.

Once again, you are reading far too much into the posts and making assumptions. This thread's main theme is about past divisions of the Church and not about baptism.

Sleep on it. Sleep can only bring a refreshed mind and perspective. Good night.

[temporal1]

Have a nice sleep, Max. i’m on PDT, too early for sleep just yet.

i’m wondering if ohio jones, heirby, RZehr, Josh, GaryK or others up on church history know what i’m trying to get at?
i was not raised with infant baptism at all, but neither was i informed about it.

[Sudsy]

I still find this confusing when you say 'churches who have not yet entered the Kingdom of God'. Perhaps we need a new thread on what is believed to be entering the Kingdom of God. Churches, as in local congregations, don't enter into the Kingdom of God but individuals who are born again do enter the Kingdom of God whether their local church preaches nonresistance or not. And not all who are members of a nonresistant teaching church are guaranteed to be members of the Kingdom of God.

NT scripture does often refer to what the Kingdom of God is like but I don't find any direct verse that requires a belief in nonresistance for anyone to have 'entered the Kingdom of God'. But I'm open to have this pointed to.

Sudsy, perhaps Ernie considers teachings like literal nonresistance (such as taught by Jesus in Scriptures such as Matthew 5) to be straightforward enough in the Scriptures that any confession of Jesus as Lord which does not adhere at least to His explicit teachings is not a true/full submission to His Lordship. But I'm just speculating on his thought process here, perhaps he can expand on that for us.

I was actually talking about pople who have not yet entered the Kingdom of God, who are joining churches. But what you say Heirby is also true.

Thankyou. I think I understand now.

So do you think the Anabaptist belief in nonresistance is a big factor in the unsaved not coming to, at least, check out an Anabaptist church ? I would think getting past the ethnicity issue is perhaps the biggest issue especially if a church retains the name 'Mennonite' in it's church title.

Not the same but I remember as a young Christian the main issue that was used to discourage us from fellowshipping with Baptists was their belief in eternal security. Although in my family my father's closest Christian brother was an eternal security believing Plymouth Brethren. Our home was an open door to any professing Christians to come in and share their Christian views. One time my dad invited two Mormon fellows who visited us to come to one of our Pentecosttal services. And they came.

Speaking of those not yet born again but have joined Christian churches, before my father was born again he made fun of some friends of his that were church members that lived the same as he did. They said what they needed to and were baptised to join the church but they had showed no indiications that they had entered into a Kingdom way of life. Thanks be to God he got past this presentation of Christianity when he came in contact with real born again believers.

[ohio jones]

My question is, what were infant baptisms at the time of Luther and Simons? Were they tripartate?

To quote Wikipedia on the timeline (and I know Max will object, but give us a better source):

After the Fourth Lateran Council [1215], Communion, which continued to be given only after confirmation, was to be administered only on reaching the age of reason. Some time after the 13th century, the age of confirmation and Communion began to be delayed further, from seven, to twelve and to fifteen.

Now of course there were dissenting groups prior to and during this time, well before the Reformation era, but the Catholics either ignored or persecuted them. I don't think either group influenced the other on this issue (or most others).

As a side note, this council is the one that formally established transubstantiation, which Reformers and Anabaptists alike cited as a reason for dividing from the Catholic church.

Going back a little farther, per Brittanica:

During the first several centuries of Christian history, when most of those who joined the church were adult converts from paganism, the baptism of these adults and the ceremony admitting them to the full rights of membership (equivalent to, but not yet called, confirmation) probably coincided. Early Christian theologians, therefore, closely connected the meaning and effects of confirmation with those of baptism. But as the baptism of infants rather than of adults became customary, a sharper distinction between baptism and confirmation became necessary.

Well no, it wasn't necessary. The two could have been kept together and maintained as adult ceremonies.

What's interesting to me is that Confirmation (Chrismation, for the Orthodox) involves an anointing with oil and laying on of hands that (supposedly) confers the Holy Spirit, subsequent to baptism. The counterpart of this in Pentecostal and Methodist traditions (and others influenced by them) is the Baptism of the Holy Spirit as a second work of grace separate from and subsequent to water baptism. Historic Anabaptist theology, like the Orthodox and the early church, keeps them more closely linked.

[temporal1]

i just found this: (i added some underlines+spacing to help me read.)

Yale Books / “A Baby’s First Visit to Church in 1500”
https://yalebooks.yale.edu/2021/08/31/a ... h-in-1500/

This is a scene from a fifteenth-century stained-glass window at Doddiscombsleigh: a country church in Devon, in the south-west of England. It shows what would have been a familiar event. A baby is brought to church to be baptized.
The ceremony takes place at a font: a stone column supporting a basin, large enough for the baby to be totally immersed in water. Thousands of such fonts still stand in English churches. A priest, on the right, lifts the baby from the water after the baptism, and gives it into the hands of its senior godparent. His clerk behind him holds the book containing the service.

The role of godparents at a baptism was to promise on the baby’s behalf that, in return for it becoming a member of the Church, it would follow the Church’s rules and teachings. Every baby was required to have three godparents: two of its own sex and one of the other. This baby, with two men and a woman, is therefore a boy. Images of this kind usually featured men, reflecting the belief that the human race was first created by God in the form of a man. Woman was made later, out of man.

A baptism was also a naming ceremony. You were baptized using your name.
Nowadays children who are baptized have already been named, and the name has been shared among family and friends long beforehand. It is also usual today for parents to choose their children’s names. This sometimes happened in the Middle Ages, and certain families kept to particular names. But the most common practice was for the senior godparent of the baby’s own sex to give his or her own name to the baby. This set up a close relationship between that godparent and the baby. It could mean that you might have a brother or sister with the same name as yourself.

Godparents were expected to make gifts on the day of baptism, and to take a close interest in the baby thereafter.
Parents often chose godparents with status and wealth, in the hope of getting good gifts and patronage for the child in years to come. Godparents were also expected to help the parents look after the child, and see that it was brought up to be a good member of the Church. In an age of high mortality by modern standards, they provided an extra group of carers in the absence of the parents.
But as in all human arrangements, some godparents took their duties more seriously than others. It was sometimes remarked disapprovingly that people of the latter kind did nothing for their godchildren after leaving the church.

Images of people and events are often selective, and this image omits a good deal that we know about from other sources.
Where were the baby’s parents? The father was probably present in church, but the mother was not.
That was because it was the day of the birth, and she was in bed. Medieval children were brought to church soon after they were born.

The Church taught that baptism was essential for salvation and eternal life, which meant that a child who died unbaptized would not enjoy heaven. Accordingly if a baby was born in danger of dying, it had to be baptized immediately at home by the midwife, saying simple words in English and sprinkling on some water.

Baptism then redeemed a child from sin and gave it eternal life. If it died thereafter, it would go to heaven.
But baptism also made it a member of the Church, like it or not. From early times until the Toleration Act of 1689, everyone in England was required to be a member of the one Church, first Catholic then Protestant. Membership began at birth, without any kind of consent. As you grew up, you had to obey all the Church’s rules about attending church, fasting in certain periods such as Lent, paying dues to the Church, and observing the Church’s moral code.

Not that the Church took much interest in children after their baptisms.
It told their godparents to have their baptisms confirmed by the local bishop, which could be done at any date after baptism.
But it did not require them to come to church or observe fasting days or go to confession until they reached puberty.
Until that age was it believed that they lacked the knowledge and capacity to sin. Nevertheless children were often taken to church, especially if they were small and could not be left at home, or went of their accord because it was an interesting place where their adults went.

Only when children reached their early teens did they become closely involved in a church’s everyday life.
Then indeed they were required to attend church regularly, go to confession in Lent, receive communion at Easter, and take part in all church activities. Girls in a parish formed their own group of “maidens,” youths one of “young men.” They held social activities and raised money for the parish church.

So a baptism was not a ceremony without any consequences.
On the contrary it was very important.
It brought you into a Church that you would have to belong to, like it or not, for the whole of your adult life.

Simon Bening, page from a former Book of Hours, c. 1550, people going to church at Candlemas
(Los Angeles, J. Paul Getty Museum, MS 50 (93.MS.19)).

It’s understandable that parents would be anxious for their infants to be baptised at birth.
There would have been great fear. So much real life in history was so harsh.

It would have been so difficult to turn away from that.

Valerie,
please let me know if this is off-topic or unwanted. i think this Yale article pretty much answers my questions.

[temporal1]

My question is, what were infant baptisms at the time of Luther and Simons? Were they tripartate?

To quote Wikipedia on the timeline (and I know Max will object, but give us a better source):

After the Fourth Lateran Council [1215], Communion, which continued to be given only after confirmation, was to be administered only on reaching the age of reason. Some time after the 13th century, the age of confirmation and Communion began to be delayed further, from seven, to twelve and to fifteen.

Now of course there were dissenting groups prior to and during this time, well before the Reformation era, but the Catholics either ignored or persecuted them. I don't think either group influenced the other on this issue (or most others).

As a side note, this council is the one that formally established transubstantiation, which Reformers and Anabaptists alike cited as a reason for dividing from the Catholic church.

Going back a little farther, per Brittanica:

During the first several centuries of Christian history, when most of those who joined the church were adult converts from paganism, the baptism of these adults and the ceremony admitting them to the full rights of membership (equivalent to, but not yet called, confirmation) probably coincided. Early Christian theologians, therefore, closely connected the meaning and effects of confirmation with those of baptism. But as the baptism of infants rather than of adults became customary, a sharper distinction between baptism and confirmation became necessary.

Well no, it wasn't necessary. The two could have been kept together and maintained as adult ceremonies.

What's interesting to me is that Confirmation (Chrismation, for the Orthodox) involves an anointing with oil and laying on of hands that (supposedly) confers the Holy Spirit, subsequent to baptism. The counterpart of this in Pentecostal and Methodist traditions (and others influenced by them) is the Baptism of the Holy Spirit as a second work of grace separate from and subsequent to water baptism. Historic Anabaptist theology, like the Orthodox and the early church, keeps them more closely linked.

Many thanks.
Somehow, i had a sense that Catholic infant baptism as i’ve witnessed likely is not identical to 1500’s, and earlier.
Just trying to grasp differences in understandings of what infants/children are understood to be in these various times, is a big deal.

Even in my one lifetime, beliefs and attitudes about infants/children, even the unborn, have significantly changed.

One constant i will speculate on, is desire of parents to protect their children’s minds-bodies-souls to the greatest extent possible.
Not being literate, not understanding the Latin mass, not having scriptures in common language makes church members completely dependent on what they’re told. The printing press put legs under what some had been working on for centuries.

[Valerie]

I have read quotes of Early Christian writers that i dicate there were Christian soldiers before Constantine- their quotes are from the 1st & 2nd century.- so difference of opinions are before Constantine. In a couple of their quotes they bring up what's been brought up here before about John the Baptist not telling the soldiers to quit serving, and.think about how Jesus marveled at the faith of the centurion. Im not advocating for or against but pointing out there was no sudden change because of Constantine, because Christian soldiers apparently existed way before him, and also there seems to be different interpretations early on.

Without wanting to get into a "quote war", lol, I'm curious if you could share a couple of those quotes, Valerie? I realize the early church had more diversity that any of us may like to admit, but I do find several quotes that suggest just the opposite of what you are referencing, and I'd love to hear a couple of the ones you have in mind if you have a few minutes. I recognize that soldiers who converted were not always able to LEAVE the military, but it seems that this was addressed differently than going INTO the military AS a Christian.

Just to share the sort of quotes I'm referring to which I come across, Hippolytus' thoughts on the matter offer one example (200AD): "A military constable must be forbidden to kill, neither may he swear; if he is not willing to follow these instructions, he must be rejected. A proconsul or magistrate who wears the purple and governs by the sword shall give it up or be rejected. Anyone taking or already baptized who wants to become a soldier shall be sent away, for he has despised God.”

Right- i don't have a desire to get into a quote war either- and most the time when I quote the early church writers father's bishops etc they are from "A Dictionary of Early Christian Beliefs"by David Bercotl and is a topical book. Under the topic of "war" is 2 sections. I Opposition to War. Ii. References to Chrostians in the Army. From this book if we got into a quote work you being in the opposition quoting and me being in the references to Christians in the army quoting, you'd win the war. There's far more quotes opposing the war as a Christian then the quotes referencing Christians in the army and I'm not advocating for either one necessarily just realizing before Constantine there were Christians in armies- it seems Constantine gets the blame for much of what I have found took place before he came along.

You said "a couple of quotes"

1.
"I summoned those who among Us go by the name of christians. And having made inquiry, I discovered a great number and vast host of christians. So I rage against them. However this was by no means because becoming. For afterwards, I learned of their power. Because of that power they did not begin the battle by preparing weapons, or arms, nor bugles. In fact such preparation is hateful to them - because of the god they bear about in their conscience. For having prostrated themselves on the ground, they prayed not only for me, but also for the whole army as it stood. They prayed that they might be delivered from the present thirst and famine." Marcus Aurelius (c.172)

"We, on the contrary, bring before you and an emperor who was there protector. You will see this by examining the letters of Marcus Aurelius that most serious of emperors. Four, in his letters, he bears witness that the Germanic drought was removed by The rains obtained through the prayers of the christians, who happened to be fighting under him." Tertullian (c.197)
Clement of Alexandria (c.105) stated in his teaching about Christian clothing themselves said "women good for the most part where shoes. For it is not suitable for the foot to be shown naked. Besides, woman is a tenor thing easily hurt. But for a man, bare feet are quite in keeping - except when he is on military service."
Clement of Alexandria (c.150-215) was a learned Christian teacher at Alexandria, Egypt, who was in charge of the catechetical school there. He probably at least in this book, had the most quotes about how Christians should dress and that would be a big support for "plain" clothing.

So I'm reading the whole section on war I concluded generally speaking the church was opposed to it, opposed to Christians serving in it, seem to allow for it especially if a soldier became a Christian, served as a completely different example of a soldier while serving then his fellow soldiers that didn't know the Lord, and so it seemed there were Christian soldiers long before Constantine.

I don't expect Anabaptists to go along with Augustine's "Just War" beliefs. Even Jehovah Witness would not, and they are considered heretical yet professing Christians. Hippies too were anti-war- but i think that Christians who are not opposed to Christians serving in military do not do so because they ignore Jesus teachings, they seem to have a difference of interpretation. They come to different conclusions.

[Valerie]

I think it is strange to have people complain about the lack of unity of Christian denominations, while upholding the Orthodox church as the true church.

All the while, at this very moment, the Orthodox church is not only splitting again, but each side is killing each other, cursing each other, blessing missiles and submarines, and instead of urging peace, they are urging more bloodshed.

And we are to believe that somehow the Orthodox church has some claim to legitimacy, because they said so, and because some people find them exotic.


As has been said before, at the very least, Mennonites don't shoot each other when they split. Which is more than can be said about some, and is really no small thing.

I think most (but im guessing from reading facebook comments) Orthodox were not in favor of this war.
And Orthodox are not dividing on their faith & interpretations which my topic was about that. I have seen the arguments that supports Putin's supposed Just War action. I am NOT a fan of the direction the Ukrainian leader is taking his country either. This is extremely complicated.

[Valerie]

Regarding the use of the word "sacrament"- it is apparently an understanding and we're used in the early church. I found quotes using the word in "A Dictionary of Early Christian Belieffs" i think the ancient Church has a deeper understanding of the sacraments for sure-
I think it was an understanding that they received from the apostles even if the apostles didn't use the word. Also the word mysteries is all almost interchangeable with it.

My mind just took me to the passage where apostle Paul discussed milk teachings rather than meat teachings, I'm not sure if we really realize all together what he meant when he taught about being ready for "meat"

For example, Ignatius said in (c.105) "it is cutting also that the deacons, as being the Ministers of the mysteries of Jesus christ, should in every respect be pleasing to all. What would he have meant by being Ministers of the mysteries? Ignatius lived 35- 107, was the bishop of the church at Antioch and a personal disciple of one or more Apostles. So he apparently understood these "mysteries" or sacraments in a deep way.

Tertullian in 198 said " "it is not to be doubted that God has caused the material elements to obey him also in his own peculiar sacraments. The material substance that governs the earthly life acts as an agent likewise in the heavenly.

Meat teachings?

It it's kind of funny I originally bought David Bercots dictionary of early Christian beliefs because we were seeking to possibly join Anabaptists. Having read three of his books I ordered this dictionary. But then it also became useful to understanding more of what the early church believed that helped me dismiss some of my former assumptions coming from the Protestant world

[barnhart]

I think most (but im guessing from reading facebook comments) Orthodox were not in favor of this war.
And Orthodox are not dividing on their faith & interpretations which my topic was about that. I have seen the arguments that supports Putin's supposed Just War action.

If the Orthodox church wants to be a sincere voice for the unification of churches, surely they can start by sweeping around their own front door currently before condemning groups who left 100's of years ago. What kind of authority do they have if they cannot condemn Orthodox people killing each other daily. Asking if something is worth dividing the church is one level of inquiry but what can be said for those who will not ask if it is worth killing the church?