James White and Romans 4:8

Dear Dr. Sungenis,

I wanted to make an observation in good spirits. Let me preface my comment by saying that I have always liked you and your work in apologetics. I am acquainted with some other apologists, whom I won't name who I know have a bone to pick with you over some of your views on differing issues and I have always told everyone that I think that you are a good guy and have some great information. I have enjoyed listening to you crush that knucklehead James White and aside from you, Jimmy Akin and Bart Erhman, I have not observed anyone beat him in a debate. I felt terrible for poor George Bryson when White basically tormented the guy on stage in his debate on Calvinism. As much as I like Tim Staples I didn't feel that he did a good job in at least one of his debates with Dr. White, however that is just my opinion as I am certainly not the final word or an expert.

My point is that you are a good guy and I'm behind you. I just have a suggestion and you can take it or leave it. I think that you should put the Israel and Jewish thing on the back burner and not focus on that anymore. Even though I don't agree with you on that issue, i understand where you are coming from. The reason that I say that is because since most people don't understand the issue, they automatically assume that you're a bigot or racist and I think that you lose a huge audience. Since this is not really a salvation issue per se I think that you would appeal to a huge audience if that was not such a hot topic for you.

I understand your criticism of the Church too as it has become far too liberal. I was talking with another apologist a few months ago and he said, "Robert Sungenis is going to become a sedevacantist and I retorted to him that I knew that you were not going to become a sedevacantist or a member of the SSPXer's. I figure that your theology is probably similar to Mel Gibson's in that you are more traditional and tired of the b.s. that has gone on in the Church for the past 50-60 years.

As Christians the best thing that we can do is to preach the Gospel to an unsaved and unrepentant world. My father died a year ago at 79 and died a good ole fashion pagan and atheist. Even on his deathbed he refused any spiritual help from Hospice, saying, "No I don't want a priest or minister, because there is nothing on the other side." My father died four days later. That is truly sad. I don't want to see anyone go to hell and as you know all of us Christians need to let everyone know just how serious this is and that Jesus died for us and left us His magnificent Church. I just believe that these controversial issues such as The Church and Israel and the Jews takes our focus off on the Lord and His death on the cross for us. It's not to say that they are never important, but we have so little time and so many people are lost and need the cross of Christ.

Either way if I'm ever up in your area some day, beers and steaks are on me.

God Bless,

Keith W.



Keith,

My good man, thank you for sharing your concerns. We have shared many issues over the years, and I respect your opinion. But as you know, there are always two sides to a story. Let me tell you my side. First, if I had to decide what I was going to teach based on whether people would consider me a “bigot” or a “racist” or that I would “lose a huge audience,” that is the day I will leave the profession of Catholic “apologetics.” You, and all my critics, need to understand one thing about me. I’m in this for the truth. The minute I compromise on the truth, I’m not fit for this job.

Some people may not like me for my particular views and that is to be expected, but they know one thing about me – I am a straight shooter and they will always get what I consider to be the truth on any subject of concern to Catholics. I never hide anything under the rug. My goal is to educate Catholics to ALL that is important for them to know: the good, the bad and the ugly. That is why I tell them about the corruption in the Church, from pope to priest, and everything in between, including how the Jewish Zionists are corrupting the world and the Catholic Church.

My detractors, who like to hide their heads in the sand and pretend that everything is well in the Church and that the Zionists are of no concern and are still God’s chosen people (and thus never tell their patrons of the bad and ugly things), distress and dismay me to no end. They limit their teachings to whatever pleases the crowd (and brings in the money). They have built their whole apostolates on the “us/them” Protestant/Catholic paradigm since Protestants make the least controversial boogeyman, all the while ignoring the plethora of problems in the Catholic Church coming from its liberal and modernist clerics who spread heresy and live immoral lives.

When it comes to the Jews, they preach Vatican II ecumenism. When it concerns Protestants and Muslims they take their polemical script right from the Middle Age Church. Yet it is the Jews who deny, as a part of their very core of being, that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. Go figure. This hypocrisy only proves my point – the Jewish Zionists have intimidated the Catholic Church and its “apologists” into thinking that the Jews are not the enemies of Christ but are actually on our side! Arius couldn’t have done a better job (and, incidentally, he was a Jew).

The bottom line is this, Keith. You and your fellow Catholics need to wake up to who is the real enemy of the Catholic Church. The Protestants are two-bit players. Most of them are controlled by Jewish Zionists, which is why the Christian Zionists teach the false belief that the Jews are still the Chosen People and have a bright future ahead of them in the land of Palestine under divine mandate. That is a doctrine of the devil, and it is going to lead right to the ominous prophecies in the Apocalypse.

Unfortunately, many Catholics have been deceived by that same teaching, and that is the main reason why I am at odds with them. They loved men back in the days when my guns were turned toward only the Protestants. I was their golden boy. EWTN put me on television and away we went. But when I began using the same apologetic tools on the Jews, all of a sudden I was persona non gratis. Why? Because the Jews have convinced the world that any such “apologetic” is not directed against their aberrant beliefs and practices but against their race, which is why they continually spew out the “anti-semitic” canard.

As a result, Catholic apologists simply won’t touch the issue, much less teach their patrons the good, bad and the ugly about the Jews. Instead, they give Israel a free pass for every act of malfeasance they do in the US and Middle East, and will never accuse the Jews of perpetrating any of the world’s evils no matter how much evidence is placed before them. Instead, they praise the Jews; and they honor Jewish converts like Roy Schoeman and David Moss who, coming into the Catholic Church, have taught some of the most despicable Jewish racism I’ve ever seen.

But why shouldn’t they, when they take their lead from the most popular Catholic apologist today, Scott Hahn, who himself teaches the heresy that the Old Covenant of the Jews was never revoked! (“The covenant God made with the Jews “is still binding. Yes it is not revoked, and yes, the Jewish people are witnesses of the kingdom…” at http://www.catholicintl.com/index.php/component/content/article/35-covenant/890-scott-hahn-and-gods-covenant-with-israel).

I’m sure Scott Hahn was surprised and dismayed when in 2008 I took a stand against him as I wrote letters to the Vatican and the USCCB telling them that page 131 of the US Catechism was teaching the same heresy that Scott Hahn was teaching, namely, that the Old Covenant was still valid for the Jews. After I exposed that heresy, the US bishops voted 243 to 14 to take it out of the catechism. So you see, Keith, my work paid off, even though I was opposed by every single mainstream Catholic “apologist” on that issue. I helped save the Catholic Church from one of the worst heresies it has ever confronted, but all I get in return are “anti-semitic” charges and wishes that I wouldn’t be so “bigoted.” I work for Jesus Christ and St. Paul, and my guiding authority is the dogma of the Catholic Church, not the popular opinion of its liberal clerics, nor the popular consensus of US Catholic apologists. I hope you understand my position. It will never change on my watch.

Finally, these issues don’t take our focus off of Jesus Christ and salvation. If anything, they help us define them and separate them from false beliefs that are denying people the path to salvation. Many high-profile Catholic cardinals and bishops are teaching today that the Jews have their own covenant and salvation plan with God. This is a heresy of the first order. It is denying salvation to the very people who need it the most, the Jews.

Our own pope wrote a book this past year titled “Jesus of Nazareth,” and in it he claims that we should no longer preach the Gospel to the Jews because God is going to save them all in the future. He based this only on the single statements of Bernard of Clairvaux and some obscure abbess living in Europe. Is this how we form Catholic teaching now?! Although he said this as a private theologian and added that we could challenge him, the fact is that his teaching is heretical. It is a product of Catholic/Jewish ecumenism that has been going on the last 50 years. The Jews have so influenced Catholic thinking that they got us believing they don’t even need to hear the Gospel any longer! I can’t imagine a worse state of affairs. This is the same man who, when he was a cardinal and head of the CDF, said that although Christians are waiting for the Second Coming of Christ, the Jews are waiting for the First Coming! This is one of the most confused eschatological stances I’ve ever seen.

The Jews aren’t waiting for Jesus. They are waiting for a messiah who is someone other than Jesus, and that is because they rejected Jesus’ First Coming! They hate Jesus. That is why they are Jews and want to remain Jews. The Jews do not have a separate program of salvation; they are no longer the chosen people; and God is not giving them special favors here on Earth simply because they are Jewish, yet that is what we are hearing from the high-profile voices coming out of the Catholic Church today.

In light of these things, I hope you don’t mind that I assume the position of St. Athanasius who, in his day, stood up to the same kind of Jewish onslaught against the Catholic Church that was led by Arius. This Jewish heretic managed to convince all the bishops, and even some of its popes, that Jesus Christ was not the man who he claimed to be. The Jews are doing the same thing to the Catholic Church today, and, as it was in Arius’ time, a majority of them are falling for the heresy. As long as I have a breath to breathe, I will do everything in my power to stop it, and they can call me a “bigot” all they want. The opinions of men mean nothing to me. I know that when I stand before the Judge of all the Earth, I will be vindicated.

When you're in the area, stop over and we'll discuss it more over steaks and beer :)

Robert Sungenis

Keith, I've seen pictures of James White's "school". It's a hole-in-the-wall diploma mill in a rented room.

John, Paul says it when he quotes Psalm 32 and 51. Psalm 51:1 says, "A Psalm of David, when Nathan the prophet came to him, AFTER he had gone in to Bathsheba." You can look it up in the originaly Hebrew and the Septuagint. The opposite of this chronology would be the absurd proposition that David was justified BEFORE he sinned with Bathsheba, but which would make the whole pericope of Romans 4:4-8 nonsensical.

@ MB

"The whole argument of Romans 4 is that justification is an act of the gracious merciful God in justifying those who did nothing to deserve it."

This verse is perfect Catholic theology
and thats why Trent affirmed and dogmatically agreed with Romans 4:6

"...but we are therefore said to be justified freely, because that none of those things which precede justification-whether faith or works-merit the grace itself of justification. For, if it be a grace, it is not now by works, otherwise, as the same Apostle says, grace is no more grace". Sixth Session Chapter VIII

The Council also condemned anyone who believes we can have believing faith as to obtain the sanctifying grace without first the Holy Ghost.

You need to be better informed of Catholic teaching before revealing how much you dont know.

MB,

Two problems with your comments:

(1) To "justify the ungodly" is principally about forgiveness, so your argument is actually contrary to Paul's. It isn't about a person being godly enough, it's about God FORGIVING the ungodly person.

(2) Repenting of sin isn't about doing enough or meriting enough, but rather simply the conditions God sets to be forgiven.

Your response essentially dodges all the proofs I made.