CATERING TO ROMANISM by W. N. G.

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Oct 27, 1898

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 24, No. 43.

CATERING TO ROMANISM.

By W. N. G.

The Literary Digest credits the Michigan Christian Advocate with expressing gladness to hear that “in Fernando, Cal., the Methodist Church adjourned its services to attend the dedication of a Roman Catholic Church.” What would Wesley or Whitefield say of the professed Protestantism of such a Methodist Church or such a Methodist paper? But here is an utterance from another Methodist paper which still further flatters the Roman institution, or at least indicates a marvelous misconception of Protestant principle in this most numerous of all nominally Protestant denominations. The Western Christian Advocate says:—

“Protestantism has no louder call than to Roman Catholic countries. Its influence there is not to destroy the Roman Church, but to quicken it. None better than Protestants understand the greatness of that organization, and none more sincerely pray that it may become a purely spiritual power, quickened into a new and mightier activity for the renewal of mankind in righteousness and true holiness.”

There is a strange inconsistency between the claim that the influence of Protestantism “is not to destroy the Roman Church, but to quicken it,” and the prayer that “it may become a purely spiritual power,” etc. For if the Roman Church, that is, the people composing that church, were to become “quickened into a new and mightier activity for the renewal of mankind in righteousness and true holiness,” then the Roman Church institution would cease to exist. The consummation of the thing prayed for would be practically the destruction of that institution. While the quickening of the people composing that church in the way of “righteousness and true holiness” is not an impossibility, if they will but surrender themselves to God, it is impossible to so quicken the church as such, for it is founded in its own infallibility—in self-righteousness. If it should be so “transmogrified” as to be a channel for the “renewal of mankind,” it would no longer be a Roman Church. We agree that “Protestantism has no louder call than to Roman Catholic countries,” but that call is not to flatter the Roman Church, or to deceive the people of those countries, with the idea that that organization is or can be in any sense an instrument of “righteousness and true holiness.”

Another misrepresentation of Protestant principle is found in the same paper, in connection with the sentiment last noted. The Advocate further says:—

“Protestantism will follow the flag into Cuba and Porto Rico and the Philippines, and to the ends of the earth.”

Now Protestantism has lost its way when it begins to follow earthly flags. It started out to follow the Word of God, and any attempt on its part to follow any other ensign than that of King Immanuel is to depart from the principles that gave it its original prestige. Had Protestantism gone forward in the way marked out for it by divine Providence, instead of leaning on the arm of flesh, it would have encompassed the “ends of the earth” long ago, without waiting to follow any earthly flag. Jesus says, “All power is given unto Me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations.” “Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world.” Again He commands, “Follow Me.” What then have Protestants to do with following any other standard, when the God of heaven says, “Speak unto the children of Israel, that they go forward;” when He who has “all power” has promised that “the Lord will go before you; and the God of Israel will be your reward”?

All this dependence upon the governments of earth to go before, and the arm of human flesh to sustain, in the spread of the Gospel is just so much catering to Romanism; for it was the entrance and encouragement of that principle in the church that made Romanism and the Roman Church possible.

W. N. G.