World religions. Рахимбергенова М.Х. - 11 стр.

     Reduction of the sacramental system. The Reformers abolished all sacra-              – Up to the point.
mentals, because of their Pelagian character, and five of the seven Sacraments,           – It looks very much like it.
keeping only the two explicitly mentioned in the New Testament: baptism and               We often agree by continuing with the same opinion or adding to it:
the Eucharist. These are effective only through faith.                                    – That’s just what I was going to say. And I’d like to point out that….
     Different understanding of the Church. The Church is not the intermedi-
ary between God and man, but only the association of those who believe. It ex-             It’s very common in English to begin with a short expression of agreement,
ists wherever the word of God is preached sincerely and the Sacraments are            and then give a different opinion. Here are some expressions used to introduce
duly administered. Consequently the Church does not possess any absolute au-          the disagreement:
thority. The word of God comes to us authoritatively from the Bible, not from              Perhaps/ maybe/ possibly,          but don’t you think…
the Church.                                                                                Yes, that’s true,                  but I’m not sure that…
     In principle the Reformers believed in the right of the individual to inter-          You could be right,                but don’t forget…
pret the Bible as his or her own conscience dictates, but they assumed that all
men of good faith would agree with the Reformers, and were extremely dis-                 If you strongly disagree with someone you can say:
tressed to find that this was not the case. The Reformers’ doctrine of the right of       – I’m afraid you are wrong (mistaken).
private interpretation of the Bible made possible the multitude of divisions that         – I disagree with you (on that point).
have since taken place within Protestant Christianity.                                    – On the contrary.
     Virtue the consequence of being saved. In the view of Catholic and Or-               – It is (just) the other way around.
thodox Christianity, whether a person is saved depends on the kind of life he             – Far from it.
lives. The Reformers rejected this view. Instead they taught that if a person             – Certainly (surely) not.
leads a good life that is a sign and consequence of the fact that God has decreed         – Oh, but you’ve got it all wrong, I’m afraid.
his salvation and granted him faith. God does not save us because of our good             – I (rather) doubt it.
deeds; instead, he saves us first, and that leads us to follow His commandments.          When you want to disagree but not completely, we can use these phrases:
For the Catholic, salvation takes place only at death; for Luther and Calvin,             – Yes, I partly agree (with you), but…
however, it takes place essentially during life, though it does not reach comple-         – I agree to some extent, but…
tion till death.                                                                          – There’s something in what you say, but…
     The elimination of prayers for the dead. Since our salvation is entirely the
work of God’s grace, and owes nothing whatsoever to human achievements,                    Practise them in pairs, giving your partner right or false statements about
there is no place for a doctrine of Purgatory, that intermediate state of purifica-   the text below.
tion into which, according to Catholic doctrine, the soul enters when it has mer-
ited neither heaven nor hell. In the view of the Reformers the individual is ei-
ther saved or not saved, is either chosen by God or not chosen. At death, then,
                                                                                      Part II
the soul must immediately enter either heaven or hell. Thus there is nothing to
be gained by praying for the dead.                                                    Task 1. Read this entry from the dictionary, then the definition of the word “or-
                                                                                      thodox” from the same dictionary and state suitability of the word
Task 2. Use the following cliche to agree or disagree with the statements:            ORTHODOX as the equivalent of the Russian word “православный”.
    If we want to make it clear we agree, we can use these expressions:                                            The Orthodox Church
    – I fully (quite) agree with you.                                                 The phrase is used in reference to the Eastern or Greek Church, having the Pa-
    – Beyond all doubt (no doubt).                                                    triarch of Constantinople as its head, and the national Churches of Russia, Ro-
    – Exactly! Just so.                                                               mania, etc. in communion with it. Separation from the Western Church came in
    – Quite so.                                                                       the 4th century, originally through cultural and political factors, focused from
    – I suppose so.                                                                   the 5th century onwards on differences of doctrine and ritual, and took formal
                                        21                                                                                   22