Leo XIV
Newly Minted Pope
A few words here on the new Pope. First, all Popes…. all Roman Catholic Bishops, Priests, Monsignors, and members who embrace the official teaching of Rome (which includes the council of Trent) are anti-Christs without exception. Now many individual Protestants are as well but the Roman Catholic church as an institution is officially anti-Christ. Now, this is not to say that there does not exist within the membership of the Roman Catholic Church genuine Christians but if they are genuine Christians then they are not genuine Roman Catholics.
Second, we already see the post-modern mindset of this freshly minted Pope in the quote above. His words sound so noble… so pious and yet that sentence is stupidity on stilts.
a.) We wonder how is it we come to know Jesus Christ apart from teaching doctrine. What does knowing a doctrine-less Jesus look like?
b.) Underneath this statement is the assumption that experience trumps doctrine. What is being left unsaid is that knowing Jesus (in an experiential way) trumps knowing Jesus in a doctrinal way. However, there is no knowing Jesus in an experiential way that is not first anchored in doctrine.
c.) I would go as far to say that there is no knowing Jesus … no growth in knowing Jesus apart from knowing Christology (the doctrine of Christ). I can’t have Jesus over for a meal. I can’t go to a ball game with Him. There is no knowing Jesus on that kind of a “personal” level. The only way for me to know Jesus is to grow in my understanding of the doctrine of Christ.
Now, I suppose that knowledge could become sterile and antiseptic but a sterile and antiseptic knowledge of Jesus could only be cured by our doctrine of Jesus (Christology) improving. It would not be cured by having a greater experience of Jesus unless that experience was conveyed via a greater understanding of the doctrine of Christ.
Now, we should immediately recognize here that what the Pope says above is not unique to the most recently minted papal anti-Christ. All kinds of Protestants today say that kind of nonsense. Moderns and postmoderns alike have this mad infatuation with all things experiential. Similarly, moderns and postmoderns alike are allergic to the idea of doctrine.
It is a fact that the more we learn of the doctrine of Christ (Christology) the more we have a deep experiential love for our great Captain and Liege-Lord; Jesus the Christ. The more we come to understand the grandness and greatness of His person and work as mediated via the means of doctrine (Christology) as found in Scripture and as illumined by the Holy Spirit the more we are lost in wonder, love, and praise.
As an aside here, we should note that a man’s knowing of Christ will typically look different than a woman’s knowing of Christ. Neither knowing is superior or inferior. The point is that when a man increases his knowing of Christ it is an increased knowing that leads to a response that is akin to how a soldier responds in his increased knowing of his great Captain and leader in battle. When a woman increases her knowing of Christ it is an increased knowing that leads to a response that is akin to how a wife responds to increasingly knowing the way her husband loves her and for the way he cherishes and takes care of her. Men and women are different and so the way they respond to an increased understanding of Jesus via the doctrine of Christology, as drawn from the Scripture and illumined by the Spirit will be different.
