“I studied Calvin for years before the real significance of what I was learning began to sink in. But I finally realized that Calvin, with his passion for order and authority, was fundamentally at odds with the individualist spirit of my Evangelical tradition. Nothing brought this home to me with more clarity than his fight with the former Carmelite monk, Jerome Bolsec.
In 1551, Bolsec, a physician and convert to Protestantism, entered Geneva and attended a lecture on theology. The topic was Calvin’s doctrine of predestination, the teaching that God predetermines the eternal fate of every soul. Bolsec, who believed firmly in “Scripture alone” and “faith alone,” did not like what he heard. He thought it made God into a tyrant. When he stood up to challenge Calvin’s views, he was arrested and imprisoned.
What makes Bolsec’s case interesting is that it quickly evolved into a referendum on Church authority and the interpretation of Scripture. Bolsec, just like most Evangelicals today, argued that he was a Christian, that he had the Holy Spirit and that, therefore, he had as much right as Calvin to interpret the Bible. He promised to recant if Calvin would only prove his doctrine from the Scriptures. But Calvin would have none of it. He ridiculed Bolsec as a trouble maker (Bolsec generated a fair amount of public sympathy), rejected his appeal to Scripture, and called on the council to be harsh. He wrote privately to a friend that he wished Bolsec were “rotting in a ditch.”2
What most Evangelicals today don’t realize is that Calvin never endorsed private or lay interpretation of the Bible. While he rejected Rome’s claim to authority, he made striking claims for his own authority. He taught that the “Reformed” pastors were successors to the prophets and apostles, entrusted with the task of authoritative interpretation of the Scriptures. He insisted that laypeople should suspend judgment on difficult matters and “hold unity with the Church.”3″
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I knew some of what the author of this article, David Anders wrote. I already knew that Calvin was not such a wonderful man in many ways. He had his good points, but he also had very high negatives. Sure, no one is going to be convinced, since Calvin’s apologists are always willing to defend his actions. I didn’t leave Protestantism because Calvin was not such a nice guy. Calvinists can always point to the fact that we are all sinners, but the grace of God is what we rely on. They are correct.
However, what should be hard for Calvinists to defend is the authoritarian nature of John Calvin’s actions. It should be easy to figure out why. One of the main arguments used against the papacy and papists, as Catholics are called, is that the Pope was authoritarian.
Calvin had no trouble with authoritarianism as long as it was his brand of it.
What I take away from this - and what I came to realize myself - is that there really was no reason to separate from the Catholic Church in the first place. If there was no reason to separate, then there is no reason to stay separated.
Everything good about the Evangelicalism I loved - and love - is found in Catholicism, only more so. I discovered the Communion of the Saints for one thing. That communion is very much alive and well.
Sure, there are many things that people can and do criticize about the Church. It would be good to take a close look at what she actually is and what she actually teaches.
The comments section below the article is very interesting as well.
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