TOPIC: Sola Scriptura & Sola Fide

We are still working on these topics . . . . This post is a work in progress

How to Answer the Sola Scriptura & Sola Fide Challenge

aka:  "The Bible Only & Only Faith is Needed"

TOPIC: Sola Scriptura

OrbisCatholicusSecundus

Q: What is Sola Scripitura? 

In the Protestant view, the whole of Christian truth is found within the Bible’s pages. 

Q for a Protestant friend:  Where is that in the Bible?    

A:  It isn't 

Q: Do Catholics believe that the Bible is the only rule of faith?
A: No.

Catholics recognize that the Bible does not endorse this view and that, in fact, it is repudiated in Scripture.
The true "rule of faith"—as expressed in the Bible itself—is Scripture plus Apostolic Tradition.

Apostolic Tradition is manifested in the living teaching authority of the Catholic Church, to which were entrusted the oral teachings of Jesus and the apostles, along with the authority to interpret Scripture correctly.

#1) Protestants will usually go to 2 Timothy 3:16-17

¹⁶ All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness,
¹⁷ so that the servant of God^[a] may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.

 Response to a Protestant friend:  Yes, Catholics agree with 2 Timothy 3:16-17, but where in the Bible does it tell us to use only the Bible? 
A:  It doesn't

DIG DEEPER: Go to the Scriptures to learn that Apostolic Tradition is also needed:  

2 Thessalonians 2:15: *

¹⁵ Therefore, brothers, stand firm and hold fast to the traditions that you were taught, either by an oral statement or by a letter of ours.

1 Corinthians 11


See also: 2 Thess 3:6

⁶ We instruct you, brothers, in the name of [our] Lord Jesus Christ, to shun any brother who conducts himself in a disorderly way and not according to the tradition they received from us.

MEMORIZE THIS: 

Obeying St Paul, the Church bases its doctrines on Sacred Scripture and Apostolic Tradition. (Tradition with a "Capital T")

Human tradition is condemned in the Bible. Apostolic Tradition is necessary and prescribed.

Read Newman’s argument @

http://www.catholic.com/tracts/scripture-and-tradition

see also: 1 Corinthians 11:2 

TOPIC: Sola Fide

#1) Protestants will often go to Romans 5:1 which is a wonderful verse but insufficient, in and of itself, to be a scriptural proof for faith "only."

#2) Protestants will also refer to John 20:31 as a proof text for Sola Fide.

      (Upon closer inspection, it actually refutes both Sola Scriptura AND Sola Fide)

"These are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in his name"

First, the verse from John refers to the things written in that book. Read it with John 20:30 (the verse immediately before it) to see the context of the statement in question. If this verse proved anything, it would not prove the theory of sola scriptura but that the Gospel of John is sufficient.
 
Second, the verse from John’s Gospel tells us only that the Bible was composed so we can be helped to believe Jesus is the Messiah. It does not say the Bible is  a) all we need for salvation, much less that 
b) the Bible is all we need for theology; 
c) nor does it say the Bible is even necessary to believe in Christ. 

After all, the earliest Christians had no New Testament to which they could appeal; they learned from oral, rather than written, instruction. Until relatively recent times, the Bible was inaccessible to most people, either because they could not read or because the printing press had not been invented. All these people learned from oral instruction, passed down, generation to generation, by the Church.

In order to explain and defend Catholic teaching go to:

James 2:14-26 

 • James 2:17  See how Faith without works is dead

 • James 2:19  Even the devil "believes" but his faith is obviously dead

 • James 2:24  "See how a person is justified by works and not by faith alone." 

Roman 3:28  (Martin Luther added a word)

1 Corinthians 13:2 (Faith without love is nothing)

SCOTT HAHN: 

"Sola Fide. That's a Latin phrase which means Faith Alone or By Faith Alone. It's actually the phrase that Martin Luther used to launch the Protestant Reformation. He said that we are justified, we are made right with God by faith alone, not by any works that we might do. And for him, that was the article on which the church stands or falls, as he put it."

~Conversion Story

" I came to the conclusion that sola fide is wrong. 

First, because the Bible never says it anywhere. 

Second, because Luther inserted the word "alone" in his German translation, there in Romans 3, although he knew perfectly well that the word "alone" was not in the Greek. 

Nowhere did the Holy Spirit ever inspire the writers of Scripture to say we're saved by faith alone. Paul teaches we're saved by faith, but in Galatians he says we're saved by faith working in love."

~The Fourth Cup



sources:
http://www.catholic.com/tracts/scripture-and-tradition
http://orbiscatholicussecundus.blogspot.com/2013/08/the-protestant-heresy.html
http://backoftheworld.com/2013/05/28/i-dont-believe-in-sola-fide-and-neither-do-you/