A Look at the Reformation - Marcus Grodi - Deep in History

[Music] now in the past conferences I've often begun with a presentation and this year I'm doing it a little differently and part of it is because I've grown a little bit I had a friend recently a speaker who if I mention his name you all would recognize and he we happen to be at a conference together and he he said Mark are you mad at me I said no well what do you mean he says well you have this great conference but you haven't invited me to speak at it yet and I had to very creatively tell him that it has nothing to do with whether I like him or not or whether we're in good you know and it it has to do with the fact that our deep in history conferences are kind of unique and I admitted to him that if I wasn't the president of the coming home network I wouldn't be invited to speak either because I am certainly not an expert on history or especially the English Reformation I've read a lot about it in fact as I've been thinking through my presentation tonight most of the time had to kind of hold back my opinions because I've got some really strong opinions about the English Reformation that sometimes wouldn't be very charitable because of what I've read or what I've seen as an effect of the English Reformation and the reason I'm cautious is because I know that I'm not at a well-trained historian and in fact it may be true that every single one of us here suffers from a common ailment and that we well let me ask you this how many of you here would raise your hand and believe that you have all the data there is on the English Reformation could I see a hand well there's a couple of experts here in the front row because very often isn't it true that when we look back in history that as we understand an event we are limited to the data that we have received through our formation whether we were taught in public school or private school or Catholic school or Protestant school what books we read what teachers we sat under and what their perspective was and maybe their slant their spin have all influenced us and I'm for that reason it's very excited for this weekend and I believe that we have invited a wonderful group of speakers dealing with different aspects of this event happened about 500 years ago now why are we doing these deep in history conferences I thought the first thing that I would do tonight is just take some time to tell you why are we doing these and there's five reasons that I can think of the first has to do and I have to admit it's personal you don't need to take notes on these because there won't be a test later on these five things and they won't make a difference of your justification either whether you have them but I have to admit personally that in my own spiritual journey the discovery of history was one of those things that turned me home to the Catholic Church I was brought up Lutheran and I I'm giving you my a little bit my history not just to recount it like I've done many times but because we connect some of us have the same experience I was brought up Lutheran through all the hoops of Lutheranism and had a truncated understanding of church history that coincided with how I learned it as a young Lutheran and I didn't learn very much about church history I knew about Martin Luther I knew about biblical history and that was it I didn't know the name of a Christian between the time of the Apostles and Martin Luther I may have thought of Saint Francis or someone like that possibly Agustin but I didn't know who they were but basically that was my understanding of history and to a certain extent that was my understanding of history of the first 20 years of my life I had picked up a variety of things in elementary school in high school but you realize in many ways the history that we in America learn about the English Reformation is to a certain extent a created history an official history established under Elizabeth the first that became the official history of Oxford and Cambridge that you had to teach and believed if you wanted to survive in England and that understanding of the Reformation is what most of us here in America have inherited we were colonies it's a part of our history I ended up having a life-changing adult conversion in my early 20s and from the say age 21 until I was 26 when I entered seminary a day didn't go by when I didn't study Scripture on fire for the Bible I'm reading the Bible every day reading commentaries every day about the Bible but the thought never crossed my mind to pick up a book on history the history of the church why because the Bible was sufficient the Bible was all I needed to be a better Christian I needed to study the Bible I went away to seminary and had my eyes opened we had history classes in seminary I went to a great seminary gordon-conwell Theological Seminary it was an evangelical school was a little more open to history we studied church history but even my what I received in seminary about church history was truncated I learned now more Christians during those 15 hundred years that existed before the Reformation but often it was with a slant a Ben they were good Christians is too bad for their Catholicism often we looked at the history of the church in relation to the missionary movements the great missionaries that went Colombo and st. Patrick and others and we studied them almost as individual missionaries they happened to be sent by the Pope in Rome but that was you know that was a hindrance rather than a positive effect we looked at all these churches as independent churches trying to break away but they didn't realize their need for breaking away until this may have been my truncated way of understanding it until all of a sudden because of the Renaissance we became smart and courageous and broke free we broke free first on the continent and then we broke free in England and the way I kind of looked at Henry the eighth and that whole Kadri of folk was that you know I mean how do you start a religion because you wanted to divorce but the point was to me that was a sign of the decadence of the church and the need for further breaking away and words the great what is the great sign of the freedom from all of that religious oppression in Europe we celebrated in a couple weeks Thanksgiving the pilgrims they landed here free from religious oppression it was to be a New Jerusalem on a hill free well those of you who know your New England history how free was the religion in New England in some ways it was worse than Europe but I was being ordained a Congregationalist and I love New England Congregationalism the freedom the independence the autonomy free to covenant together to follow Jesus without any of these oppressive hierarchical corruption twisting our true following of Jesus I was ordained a congregation about a year quickly became a presbyterian because I realized that institutionalized autonomy was a mess when I recognize that every individual in independent group could decide on whatever creed they wanted and the point was there was no connection to any historical faith because every individual Church could decide for itself what it needed to believe often they believed Trinitarian views but there are lots of congregational sort of Unitarians there's a disconnect from history but I never put my finger on what the problem was I became a presbyterian because at least in Presbyterian there were Creed's there was a book of confessions there was a connection with history you had a you're connected with the faith of thousands and thousands back to Jesus I served as a Presbyterian fast for nine years the confusion was a drove me from the pastor confusion in the sense that the Bible alone wasn't enough because the Bible out of its context can be interpreted in hundreds of different ways I'm not going to give my whole story tonight if I told that the first conference but my decision to become Catholic was a gift because friends of mine who had known in seminary good Scott Hahn got one of them here Jerry manna takes is here visiting us shared the faith with me there were lots of reasons why I turned to the church but one of them that I didn't expect was the power of history to discover the importance of history it was the witness of these converts and then good faithful Catholics like Karl Keating and others helped me discover things that I had missed the early church fathers the writings of the Saints the lives of the saints the consul's and the Creed's and then I read a book by Newman and in the introduction of that book there was the statement to be deep in history is deceased to be Protestant and a light went off because that described my journey that it isn't history that saves but its history and understanding our faith that helps us make sure that what we are believing is true because it's in history that we discover the church the authority of the church the liturgy our doctrines so much of our faith is historical why is our face historical because there was a day when a historical man died on a cross there was a day when that historical man rose for our sins we have a historical faith and tradition didn't necessarily end with the last day the Apostles died because tradition continues it's the history of the church and so in my own journey I realized how important history was and now being a Catholic for 13 years and I love history it just made me more convicted of my Catholic faith the first time I gave my journeys story to an audience was that of defending the faith conference about 13 years ago and I ended that talk with the statement that Newman says to be deep in history is a cease to be Protestant in other words when you study history you discover that many of the pillars the most important things that Protestants build their faith on don't hold the way to faith Sola scriptura Sola fidei but I also twisted that statement around you see to cease to be deep in history is to become Protestant Catholics if you forget if you don't know your history if you don't study and understand the battles that the church has fought then you will forget why do you realize that every Sunday in Mass when we say the Creed in all those little phrases we say God from God True God begotten not made one in being with the father I mean some might say what what a bunch of collected bunch of words but you realize historically every phrase is there for a purpose because it was fighting against an alternative inaccurate heretical view of Christ and so that's why every word is significant and you learn that in history so part of the reason for these conferences is I realize deep in my heart the importance of knowing our historic faith a second reason was in this work in the coming home network we became began to encounter other converts and it seemed like every single one of them had the same message that history was a big reason they came home to the church especially the discovery of the early church fathers and again the writings of the saints and the writings of the church leaders and the consoles and the Creed's and and also learning that we had some bad Pope's and a few bad bishops we're all sinners it didn't turn us away it doesn't mean the church is less holy it's always need for renewal and as we began realizing we had this common this common message especially the guests on my journey home program have you seen the journey home program just curious of anything oh you don't have to clap I'm just wondering a marketing survey you know but if you've listened to the program you realize week after week how many of the guests part of their journey was a rereading of history filling in the gaps correcting misunderstandings having a few Mayacamas because of things that we said that we believed were true that were dead wrong a third reason for the deep in history conference is I'm about 910 years ago my staff and I were talking and it came across our thinking that within our lifetime we would be celebrating the 500th anniversary of the Reformation I had not heard anybody talk about that I'd mentioned a few and they think oh that's right and I realize that on the earth on the day October 31st 2017 that'll be the 500th anniversary of the ninety-five theses and the probably lots of conferences and books TV interviews celebrating the great Reformation and our thought was what are we going to do to get ready for that and the idea of a conference we also began printing books one of them was the roots of the Reformation by Carl Adam a wonderful book a fine short history of the Reformation primarily the Continental Reformation a fourth reason besides seeing this pending need for combating the misinformation out there was I travel every week right and four planes a week minimum and I'm often asked by people hey what do you do for a living and oh I'm the president of the coming home network international oh really you do help orphans come home well actually what we do is we we help Protestant ministers lose their jobs give up their ministry become bankrupt and become Catholic and the discussion stops real fast and I was I thought that I need a better discussion starter on the airplanes other than something that says the coming home network it just gets me into trouble every time and as I was thinking about that the idea for our our symbol came to mind the idea of having a coffee cup or a bookmark or a hat or something that had the picture a collage of historic figures with the phrase deep in history deep in Scripture deep in Christ would be a wonderful discussion starter so let me look over and say deep in history deep deep in Scripture Democrats interesting what's that all about and then it could be a discussion about scripture or about history about Christ and evangelistic outreach I could get him around in the coming home network but the the point was again reminded me of the the need for people to discover the true history of our faith a fifth reason that led to this conference was the reading of a book in fact by one of our speakers tonight I read a wonderful book by Joseph Pierce called literary conference as Joseph sitting here as he I wonder if Joseph this year I want him to know that I I love that book have you read that book literary converts I was in England looking through a just a regular old bookstore and I didn't have never heard of Joseph and I saw this book sitting in a bookshelf it hadn't gotten to America yet I picked it up I had no idea where the author was coming from I did not be a good book but interesting I read this book this book traces all the great convert writers of England and America for the last 150 years it's a tremendous book and as I read the book what it made me realize as these are great men and women of faith that are forgotten they had great influence in their writings but to a majority of people they are now forgotten and the idea for a conference to bring them back was another impetus behind our conference so he began the conferences we've done for this is our fourth the first one and this is a bit of an infomercial if you weren't at the conference's we got a great batch of tapes out there because the the talks those of you have been here I hope you affirm that the talks of the last four years have been superb they have been excellent on all aspects of the faith the first year we had a variety of speakers Joseph Pearson was there talking on literary converts a number of our board members father Ryland and Paul Thigpen and Kenneth hall and a variety of speakers I can't remember all of them on history in general the importance of history is kind of our first step into it the second year we went to the what we considered the most common need for most moderns and that is to discover the early church fathers the beauty of the early church fathers and how Catholic they were then last year we took our first step into the Reformation we did the Continental Reformation and Germany began with what were the roots what caused the Reformation then we looked at the different reformers and the Catholic responses good set of tapes and now this year we jump the pond and we're in England the English Reformation now I mentioned a little earlier that all these talks are important and I want you to hear the flow so you understand where we're going when I'm done gabbing Dwight longnecker will speak not Dwight is a convert to the church he was originally an American pastor we student went to England went to Oxford study became an Anglican minister I think he was on Isle of Wight I have an Isle of Wight I get a little bit heavy official introduction he came into the church and has this great perspective kind of an English Anglican American English slant the things he is going to give an overall history what was the church like in England from the Romans all the way up to the Reformation what was the church like and was it in need of renewal then we'll have Monsignor Frank Lane how we've heard from Monsignor Lane before he's a local local priest great preacher great speaker a great gift every year roy's glad he comes he is going to look directly at the Schism Henry the influences from Henry the eighth to Elizabeth the first alright what happened that'll be tonight and then of a social kick back relax tomorrow now Jamie Bogle isn't going to be here I should know I should have Johanna tell you the details but he couldn't come because he's in Rome attending the wedding of one of the royal family who's Catholic a very interesting what Jonah talk more about that a very important event so Joanna has his notes knows the subject well she's going to begin us in the morning on the attempted return Mary Tudor there's another name for her but I'm not going to mention alright again depending on what history you learned we're going to hear about the attempt and the response to what Henry did tomorrow from Joanna then Joseph is going to deal with I'm not sure if it's pronounced rec use in Syracuse sense either way requisites okay in other words there were in there were Catholics all through the Reformation that had to hide for protection for survival to keep from losing their property and we're going to hear about these secret lies and those that did all kinds of things to defend the Catholic faith and then after lunch Paul Thigpen are going to talk about those who lost their faith the martyrs and it's a sad story when we see how these good men women of faith were massacred and we'll see that tomorrow under Paul Scott Hahn will be here in the afternoon to deal with defenders of the faith to shining lights in the midst of this otherwise difficult time Thomas More and Thomas Fisher Don John Fisher John Fisher sorry then in the evening after dinner father Charles Connor here you also recognize from EWTN is going to look at the English counter-reformation how the church responded to the problems but also to the attacks and then Jean a Joanna Bogle will return to finish the evening with the aftermath what has happened since the Reformation to today how has it affected our lives the church the church in England and then on Sunday morning father ray Ryland who himself is an Anglican clergy convert who's now a priest we'll talk about his own looking back at the Church of England the church that he left when he became Catholic and then we'll have a panel discussion to deal with all your questions that's the flow you see the importance of being there for everything now I'd like to set your thinking though for the weekend as you listen to the speakers and I'm going to borrow something from the talk I gave last year because there's a very interesting Psalm that it's just amazing how this Psalm fits the topic Psalm 11 3 and it goes like this when the font if is giving if the foundations are destroyed what are the faithful to do if the foundations are destroyed what are the faithful to do it's a fascinating question and in since that that little Psalm addresses the Reformation as well as it addresses today there's four questions number one what are the foundations the essentials number two are they destroyed or just in bad shape in need of renewal number three who are the righteous who are the right who are the ones that have a responsibility to do something about it then fourthly what aren't they to do and as we look back we asked the question what did they do and what did what they activate Institute was it right in relationship to their analysis as to whether the foundations were destroyed I'm going to give the same ten points that I gave last year quickly I gave a list of 10 foundation stones that there's a long list of other things but these are 10 things that I believe we would all agree that a Christiaan let's say in the year 1000 in England a year 1200 in England the year 1300 up to the Reformation all of them would agree that these 10 foundation stones should be expected of the church they assumed that this was true there may be more there may be a few of these that you might differ with me on but think about these 10 things the first five are structural dealing with our faith the rest of them have more to deal with the internals evidence of the faith the first thing that all Christians of Christendom almost all I should say it that way would presume is that Jesus intended there to be how many churches 1 there was one Church the record been schisms there had been some breaking away but the understanding was different than what we have today because we live in a soup of most people believing that there's a bazillion churches if there was ever intended to be a church at all but then the unanimous decision was that there was intended to be one Church number two the authority of Peter there were times when there was confusion there were times when that Peter wasn't that Pope wasn't in Rome he was in Avignon there was a time when there were two candidates arguing or they were popes there was a time there were three candidates but there was an understanding that the Pope was the head of the church established by Christ that was a given there were certainly kings that battle against the Pope and but that was a given number three underneath that authority there were bishops the apostolic succession of those men who carried on the mission of Christ and the Apostles that was understood the authority of the bishops under Peter and fourthly underneath those bishops were priests that carried the responsible and the work of the bishops and the Pope in the one church it would agree at least at this point that those were probably foundation stones amongst Christendom they would all agreed with that number five is that there was a set of doctrines creeds that were to be believed that had been established by this hierarchy at councils under the leadership of the Magisterium in union with the Bishop of Rome now again there were maybe a few dissenting voices and what the majority would have agreed to those as foundation stones the second set of five now deal with the condition of those people in a hierarchy number six there is an assumption that those in the position whether it was Pope Bishop or priest were to be servants that's what Jesus taught as at the church Todd they were to model service servanthood they were to lord it over they weren't to have ambition they weren't to seek control and power and position everybody knew that's not what Jesus taught he taught servanthood number six number seven Jesus also taught that these leaders as well as everyone in the church was called to be holy perfect as your heavenly father was perfect holiness seeking to model Christ that was understood there may not have been good catechesis there may not have been very good priestly formation but it was an understood expectation of holiness number eight to fine-tune that holiness there was an expectation of these three things have you heard of these before poverty chastity and obedience at different levels whether you were religious or priest bishop or Pope but all were expected to live by those three things poverty the goal of being a bishop or a pope or a priest was not to be money was not to be greedy it was not to have women on the side children on the side and Families it was an understood thing chastity and obedience the structure recognized the obedience that Christ had established in his apostolate that they were to carry that a ninth understanding foundation would have been from one of a better word internal conversion in other words that the Christian life was not merely externals but that it involved of conversion of heart scripture taught that Jesus taught that that it was to be on the inside as well as the outside that was to be an understanding one last thing as a foundation stone doesn't quite fit with the rest but there was a belief in blessings and curses in other words if we lead a good life somehow God will shine and if things aren't going so well we must have done something wrong there wasn't this a direct connect like you see in the Old Testament but for example when the when the when the plague hit Europe and half the population died one of the questions was what we do wrong there's something going wrong in this church and when blessings came they looked for reasons there was a direct connect now if we just at least assume those foundation stones my question is what were their condition in the years leading up to the English Reformation how did the people of England the hierarchy of England the royalty of England understand one church one poll the authority of Bishops the Ministry of priests so far we're doing pretty well in England Dwight will talk about that I don't think really there were any question in England before the Reformation on one church one poll the authority of bishops and the ministry of priests it's when you start getting down the list though doctrine is probably fine too though there were some challenges on certain issues when we get to the issue of holiness chastity poverty obedience we start seeing problems we start seeing problems one of the reasons I didn't want to get in details about myself and leave it to the other speakers about English Reformation is I have a bit more sympathy for the Continental Reformation than I do the English Reformation you know there was some things that Luther attacked that needed attacking many of the things Luther was attacking the church recognized needed renewal we know that in England it was a bit of a different story now our reason for this conference is not so that we can with haughtily spirit look back and consider ourselves more holy than those folk back then right right I mean it isn't here just to point fingers because that old preacher when I was a kid that said when you point a finger you've got three point back at yourself what can we learn for ourselves when we study the English Reformation what can we learn about our faith what can we learn about the condition of faith in the world from studying the English Reformation what can we learn when we look around us at the church and we come to the conclusion that the foundations aren't doing very well and we decide we're going to do something about it the question is what do we do because people have decided that in the past and sometimes made some awful mistakes what can we do what can we learn from our study of the Reformation to make sure that the church we leave our children is in better shape than we found it I'm not challenging the holiness of the church but you know why I know for at least a fact that the church is a bit sinful because I'm here you know right and we in our life have a responsibility we can't say it's the job of Pope Benedict god bless him we have a great poll and our great bishops we had our bishop here tonight Bishop Campbell is a holy man we can't say it's their job or the priests job because we got three pick three fingers pointing back at each of us and how can you and I begin authentic renewal here to me that's the biggest message of our conference that's how each of us can grow closer to our Lord in all those ten foundations holiness chastity poverty obedience servanthood loyalty to the church to our Holy Father to the bishops to the priests to our doctrines so that together we are witnesses to our church [Music]

Channel: The Coming Home Network International

Views: 17,096

Rating: 4.9016395 out of 5

Keywords: Catholic Church, Reformation, Renaissance, Church History, Martin Luther, Church Fathers, Medieval History, Creeds, Papacy, Church Authority, Protestantism, Scripture, The Journey Home, Deep in History

Id: QL7tJOAcIgc

Length: 38min 34sec (2314 seconds)

Published: Wed Jan 11 2017