In the comments section of the post on the Pope not being “Catholic,” there has been some question on the issue that the original WCF and several of the Reformers call the Pope the Antichrist. These are good questions on this issue, so let me say a few things in answer to these objections:

First, i have not, and never have, sworn to uphold any version of the Westminster Confession that calls the Pope the Antichrist. Neither the ARP Church (a presbytery of which ordained me), nor the PCA Church (a presbytery of which currently holds my credentials) include the phrase in its version of the WCF. If they did, i would take exception to that point (though, thankfully, i don’t have to), but not because i think the Roman Church is so wonderful (anyone who would try and impute that view to me is nothing less than neglegently ignorant, or just plain can’t read English), but rather because i don’t believe that it is the place of any Confession, least of all the WCF, to lock ministers into a particular understanding of eschatology. So, while i readily admit that there are some statements in various Confessions that refer to the Pope as the Antichrist, and there are some statements in Reformers that speak similarly, i am free to disagree with any of those, as any other manmade statements that are apt to err, especially since i have not agreed to support or teach such a view. However, there is also good support in other Confessional and Church statements for the view that holds Roman baptism as valid Christian baptism, which implicitly holds the Roman Church is still, in some sense, a member of the visible Church. For example, the Canons of the Synod of Dordt, specifically forbids the repetition of baptism for those who have received Roman baptism. Likewise, the Synod of the Reformed Church of France, in 1581—long after the Council of Trent made its terrible statements—also affirmed that the Roman Church and Roman clergy had the authority and ability to baptize in Christ’s place (though it did specifically exclude monks from such authority for lack of proper sanction).

Second, the decision of the General Assembly of 1845 (Old School)—leaving aside the issue of the schism of the Church at that time, which means that it could not speak with a unified voice, and for such a decision to be binding, it would have had to be reaffirmed after reunion—as far as i know, was not or has not been ratified in the ARP or the PCA. Even if it were in the PCA (which it has not been), it would not have been in the ARP Church, which ordained me, and the views of which i am more apt to uphold, and i have been honest in this regard with my own presbytery (PCA) of original jurisdicion (e.g., my view that images of Christ are not inherently idolatrous, though i deny that they may lawfully be used in any form of worship; and my view that woman may and should be elected as deaconesses in Christ’s Church, as per Scripture’s teaching in 1 Timothy 3). Dr. Thornwell, as gifted a pastor and professor he was (incidentally, the Church that Thornwell co-pastored for many years is now an ARP Church: First Presbyterian Church, Columbia, SC), he was wrong about his protestations about the Roman Church, Roman baptism, and Roman clergy. Thornwell’s assertions have not gone unanswered; Dr. Hodge answered them astutely in his essay (indeed, Thornwell’s arguments were no different from the assertions of the findings of the decision of the OSGA, and Hodge answered them clearly in the Princeton Review). All the objections levied against viewing the Roman Church in any sense as part of the visible Church Catholic, Dr. Hodge addressed them adroitly. As Dr. Hodge said, it is a matter of definition. So long as you admit of false professors to be members of the visible Church Catholic, then there is no reason to exclude Roman Christians, many of whom, i am willing to admit, are indeed false professors of Christ and the true religion—but they are professors nonetheless. The only other option is to have a Baptist ecclesiology, which holds that only the truly regenerate are truly members of the Church in any sense. This i deny, and so the conclusion that Hodge advocates seems to me to flow from the principle of the visible Church’s mixed character.

Third, even as Hodge argued, and as the Reformers implicitly affirmed as well, there is a distinction between the Roman Church considered as a system of religion, which has, to say the least, departed from what Scripture teaches about many things, and the Roman Church considered as the people who profess faith in Christ who happen to be under the oversight and dominion of the Papal system. Anyone who has studied logic will know what i mean when i speak of the fallacy of composition (or, as in this case, decomposition, which is the mirror image of the fallacy of composition). It is the fallacious argument that what is true of the whole, or of an entity considered as a whole must necessarily be true of the parts. I may be able to say that the the Roman Church considered as the system of the papacy is unfaithful and has apostatized to a certain extent, but it is not necessarily the case that the Roman Church considered as the sum total of its members is similarly unfaithful and apostate—indeed, such an argument is inherently fallacious. But beyond the logic of the thing, just consider the way Jehovah and all of the prophets treated Israel and Judah under the Old Administration. When Israel was divided from Judah and officially codified idolatrous and anti-biblical worship, did Jehovah immediately brush it aside and say that it was no more in Covenant with him and no more to be considered part of the visible Church? Not at all. Quite to the contrary, the prophets who went to preach to Israel preached (even as the mouthpieces for Jehovah’s messages) to it as part of the visible Church that was being unfaithful to God and what he called them to be and to do. Their circumcision was a valid circumcision regardless of their idolatrous ways, and their Covenant obligations were not rendered void by their unfaithfulness, but they were rendered even *MORE* answerable and guilty precisely because of what they were sinning against—which, incidentally, could not have been true if they were not members of God’s visible Covenant people.

If you haven’t read it yet, do read Hodge’s essay where he takes the affirmative position on the question of Rome being part of the visible Church, and also the essay in which he similarly argues that Roman clergy are lawfully ordained ministers of the Gospel. Hodge’s statements speak for themselves, and they are quite compelling, which is why i hold to them—not to mention the fact that his view is the same view that Calvin, Knox, Luther, Bullinger, Cranmer, Zwingli, Witsius, a Brackel, Ursinus, and many, many other Reformers and post-Reformation divines held. To borrow an argument used so prevalently these days, “How could they have *ALL* been wrong?” It may be possible that they could have been all wrong, but i have read nothing that has convinced me that they were. They would never have violated the principles upon which Amos could preach to Samarian citizens as violaters of God’s Covenant rather than aliens to it, and i don’t intend on being so obviously unbiblical either. My suspicion is, though, that Thornwell’s unhistorically Reformed views on lots of things, not the least of which was his view of Covenant Children, also informed his view of the Church. He may have been, in certain respects, an Old School theologian, but his overall ecclesiology was so obviously closer to that of Baptists than that of the Reformers that it is hard to deny that the influence of New School theology and revivalism had an effect on him or his view of the Church. I’ll stick with the *REAL* Reformers and their view on this until God’s Word convinces me otherwise.