The Anti-Catholic "Bible"

Loraine Boettner's *Roman Catholicism* (1962) is the source most anti-Catholic organizations rely on. It looks scholarly, but it accepts any charge uncritically, cites Catholic sources vaguely or not at all, relies on bitter ex-Catholics, and ignores the early Fathers.

Uncritical acceptance

Anti-Catholic groups such as Chick Publications, Mission to Catholics International and others produce millions of tracts, nearly all relying on Boettner. He accepts virtually any charge against the Church without checking:

He quotes a speech against papal infallibility attributed to Bishop Strossmeyer at the First Vatican Council in 1870, a well-known forgery that Strossmeyer repeatedly denied.
He calls All Souls' Day "Purgatory Day," a term Catholics never use.
He rejects Tobit for its "incredible" story of an angel disguised as a man, though Scripture he accepts has angels so disguised (cf. Genesis 19; Hebrews 13:2), and Jonah's fish is no less incredible.
He thinks ex cathedra means the pope must sit in Peter's literal chair. It is a metaphor for teaching with Peter's full authority, and Jesus used it: the scribes and Pharisees sit on Moses' seat (cathedra), so do what they teach (Matthew 23:2-3).

Where did he get that?

The book has only two dozen footnotes. Catholic sources are cited so vaguely as to discourage checking, while non-Catholic sources get titles and pages, suggesting he took his "Catholic" quotations secondhand. His inside information comes from bitter ex-priests like Emmett McLoughlin and L. H. Lehmann, the sensationalist Charles Chiniquy, and Paul Blanshard, whom other anti-Catholics disavowed. Of seven Catholic books he cites, none answers Protestant arguments. Converts can write fairly, as Newman did in his Apologia, but rancorous works should be used with discretion.

The Fathers

Boettner says his faith came down through the ante-Nicene Fathers and Augustine, yet he shows almost no knowledge of them: six references to Augustine and nine to Jerome. Works like Johannes Quasten's Patrology or Tixeront's History of Dogmas would have shown that the Real Presence, baptismal regeneration, the hierarchy, the Mass as sacrifice, Rome's authority and prayers for the dead were taught from the earliest years. He claims "Mother of God" originated at Ephesus in 431, as if no one believed Christ was God before Nicaea in 325. Hippolytus, Clement of Alexandria, Cyril of Jerusalem, Athanasius, Ambrose, Jerome and others used the title long before.

"Full and open debate"

Boettner challenged Rome to open debate, yet the groups relying on him generally decline public debates. Catholics should study Scripture, Church history and apologetics, always ready to give a defense of their hope with gentleness and reverence (1 Peter 3:15).