Mary, the church, the bride, and the mystical body of Christ are all things that can only be seen through the eyes of true faith as a reality, not as the metaphor that is prevelant among Protestants.

It is why when christ says "what you do to the least of my brothers...." Catholics know it isn't a metaphor, but in reality when they disobey, it is an attack on Christ himself.

It is also why we know Mary is our mother, and Christ our brother along with all the saints, living and dead. Although Protestants acknowledge the Sovereignty of God but not his fatherhood as "Abba" (except maybe intellectually), He is still too far removed. The relationship with God for Protestants is the slave/master relationship, not the Father/Son relationship of filial adoption because it lacks the family relationship Christ adopted us into.

This Catholic/Protestant gap will not be bridged with that chasm of the understanding of our relationship to God and Jesus Christ.

What Catholics see among Protestants is Sacred Scripture as a rule book. But what Christ taught and the apostles handed down was typology and allegory, not proof-texting. We see Protestants balking at the law and quoting Romans, yet Catholics feel Christians are set free by the law of liberty. We are all still under the law but it is the law of love. The law of love is to be loved precisely because it is from God. Yet among Protestants sin is a badge to be displayed, with frequent citings of Romans.

Protestants will balk at what I wrote and protest against it (possibly find it offensive) though it isn't meant to be, but an observation of the differences of how we approach Sacred scripture.

The reason tradition is so important is that the Holy Spirit speaks to us and through us as a people and sons, and has for two thousand years of Christianity. But this very notion is rejected when one believes in the "Bible alone." Inherantly, Sola Scriptura says the Holy Spirit is marginal at best and that God was absent from his children for 1,900 years after the Bible was written.

Catholics reject that outlook. For Catholics, God is the final authority. It is a fundamental difference in how we view God. As Father, Authority, and family.

Posted by: Nicene

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