Baylor prof Beckwith returns to Rome …

May 15, 2007

Baylor prof Beckwith becomes Catholic, resigns as head of evangelical society

By Greg Warner

Published May 8, 2007

WACO, Texas (ABP) — Renowned evangelical philosopher Francis Beckwith has become a Roman Catholic and, as a result, has resigned as president — and also as a member — of the Evangelical Theological Society. Beckwith, associate professor of church-state studies at Baylor University in Waco, Texas, said the decision he made to seek “full communion” with the Roman Catholic Church grew from his desire to find “historical and theological continuity” with the early Christian church.
Beckwith has been a member of the Evangelical Theological Society since 1984. He said his return to Catholicism was unexpected.

“[M]y work in philosophy, ethics, and theology has always been Catholic-friendly, but I would have never predicted that I would return to the Church, for there seemed to me too many theological and ecclesiastical issues that appeared insurmountable,” he said in his blog. “However, in January, at the suggestion of a dear friend, I began reading the Early Church Fathers as well as some of the more sophisticated works on justification by Catholic authors.

“I became convinced that the Early Church is more Catholic than Protestant and that the Catholic view of justification, correctly understood, is biblically and historically defensible. Even though I also believe that the Reformed view is biblically and historically defensible, I think the Catholic view has more explanatory power to account for both all the biblical texts on justification as well as the church’s historical understanding of salvation prior to the Reformation all the way back to the ancient church of the first few centuries.

Notice, Beckwith basically says much of his decision is based on reading the works of men rather than the Scriptures.

Read the complete article here at Associated Baptist Press.

Posted in Apostacy, Catholicism, Church History