"I expect to die in bed, my successor will die in prison and his successor will die a martyr in the public square. His successor will pick up the shards of a ruined society and slowly help rebuild civilization, as the church has done so often in human history." -Cardinal Francis George

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Repudiation of Postmillenialism

I have learned from Taylor Marshal that the Catholic Church is dogmatically Amillenial. (Johnny Carson voice in my head) "I did not know that." So far in my conversion process, I have "crossed my fingers" and hoped for the best on a few issues that to me are just so crystal clear. One was the 6-day Creation without evolution. I was worried that evolution had been dogmatized or something. What would I do then? I don't know if I could stomach believing such a fairy tale as being true. But lucky for my fragile faith the dogma on Creation not only allows my favored interpretation, but is far more on my side of things. Another was the death penalty. I had thought it was Catholic dogma that the death penalty was wrong. I was surprised that this is not the case. I also thought it was dogma that priests cannot marry. Again not the case. I thought the Church sells indulgences. Not true anymore. I was worried that Catholic belief about Mary would not not find much biblical support. Turns out she is prominant in both testaments and from Genesis to Revelation when one reads the scriptures typologically. There is more but you get the idea. So, I repudiate Postmillenialism and will submit to the magisterium of the Church on this issue. My post on Orthodoxy included some talk about Postmillenialism, and this just goes to show that there is a lot I still need to learn about Catholicism. Now don't get me wrong, I want to remain as positive as I can about the end-times, and I will be considering myself a "positive-Amillenialist". By that I mean that I now believe in a future anti-christ (because that is Catholic dogma) but I still may (and will) hold to partial preterism, which says Nero was the antichrist. Although I must now say Nero was "a" anti-christ and is a type of the one to come. To be perfectly honest, I have had my fingers crossed hoping I could still be a partial-preterist. From what I have studied as far as eschaetology, I just cant see things any other way. So I was relieved that I will not have to conform my mind to pre-millenialism or some such "left-behind" nonsense. This has increased my faith in the truth of the scriptures and the ability of the Catholic Church to interpret them correctly and give definitive interpretations. The magisterium seems to "get it right" even in areas like eschaetology that are not as important as any number of other doctrines. Peace, David

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