Talk:Church

I know that quite a few people haven't liked the style of the contents pages and overview pages in WikiChristian. I've liked how they have allowed for a nice tree-structure with topics and also how they've allowed for clear links to opinion articles. Still, I see why people don't like the style. What do people think about this style? --Graham grove 05:15, 31 January 2007 (EST)

Visible church

@Graham You added: "Protestant churches, especially those with Baptist leanings in theology, tend to emphasize the invisible church, whereas the Orthodox and Roman Catholic churches have often emphasized the visible church." For me this sentence makes no sense. From what I understand Protestants claim that the invisible Church is something different from the visible church whereas Catholics (and Orthodox? I'm not so sure about them) claim that both are identical. This is not a matter of emphasizing. In catholic doctrine the supernatural aspect of the church is quite important. --Benedikt 14:01, 23 July 2008 (PDT)

Okay. I can see what your saying. At the same time, I was trying to fix up the sentence you put in that is contradictory to what you've just said above. In your sentence you said something about the Catholic church recognizing some people outside the Catholic church to be part of the invisible church - or at least that is what it seemed to be saying. Perhaps we should just simplify the sentence for the time being to "Different denominations have slightly different understandings of the meanings of visible church and invisible church." We could start two new articles titled "Visible church" and "Invisible church" and expand in that. --Graham grove 14:11, 23 July 2008 (PDT)

I'm looking at your sentence and wondering if the confusion is simply an English thing. You wrote: "In roman catholic doctrine the invisible and the visible church are identified although it is admitted that elements of the invisible church are present outside the visible (i.e. the Catholic) church." Did you mean "In Roman Catholic Doctrine the invisible and visible church are mostly considered identical although there is recognition that some elements of the invisible church can be present outside the visible (i.e. Roman Catholic) church." - Is that what you meant? --Graham grove 14:14, 23 July 2008 (PDT)

Since Vatican II the matter has become complicated. I avoided the word "identical" because the council admitted that both are separated and at the same time closely connected. The common phrase is now that the Church of christ (i.e. the invisible church) "subsistit in" (i.e. existed, exists and continues to exist) the Catholic church (i.e. the visible church). I don't know how to phrase that in a way which is at least a little bit understandable. Seemingly "identified" was the wrong word. Just use "closely connected"? Separated articles for visible and invisible church would be inappropriate for this reason because such a strict separation doesn't exist for some denominations. Rather create an article Church (theology) or similar where such viewpoints can be presented. IMO this touches a common problem of Wikichristian articles. You can always see from which theological viewpoint they are written. F.ex. Baptismal regeneration is not a word from Catholic theology but instead a word from an evangelical theology to describe Catholic (and others) doctrine. --Benedikt 14:33, 23 July 2008 (PDT)

Fair enough. I think I understand better what you mean. I've tried rewording it to be more accurate. How does it look now? Have I got it right or am I still not quite there yet? Good point about Baptismal regeneration - that's worth adding into the article on it. Thanks. --Graham grove 14:58, 23 July 2008 (PDT)

Very good change. Thanks. :-) --Benedikt 16:12, 23 July 2008 (PDT)