Beckwith Reversion, or what we really believe

Like lots of others, many a bit angry and a few more confused about Catholic doctrine, I followed a link from Open Book to Dr. Francis Beckwith's discussion of his return to the Catholic Church of his childhood. I noticed, as did many others, the venom directed at Dr. Beckwith, former President of the Evangelical Theological Society (ETS) in the nearly 300 comments.

The ETS statement of faith, pretty minimal, does actually seem to be something that most Christians would be able to support. If it was meant to exclude Catholics, they didn't do a good job setting it out exclusively enough.
(Points for an against this argument are debated between the "Congrats, Welcome Home" and "How could you, you heretic?!" responses to Dr. Beckwith's announcement.)

The Bible alone, and the Bible in its entirety, is the Word of God written and is therefore inerrant in the autographs. God is a Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, each an uncreated person, one in essence, equal in power and glory.

After folks have had a weekend to think about Dr. Beckwith's reversion, this appeared on Mission Territory: A papist in Dixieland. It's Edmund C's list of answers to lots of the mis-informed anti-Catholic writing that appeared over the weekend. I'm posting it here, so as to not lose the great summary of what we as Catholics actually believe, plus FAQ answers.

Discover for yourself that the old myths about Romanism and Popery aren’t true. The evidence is all there, if you just take the time to look:

• We don’t believe in salvation by works. We believe in salvation by the grace of God, which will be manifested in good works. As St. James put it, faith without works is dead.
• We don’t pray to saints in the same way we pray to God. We ask the saints, who are in heaven, to intercede for us to God, much as we ask friends to pray for us here on Earth.
• We don’t worship the Blessed Virgin Mary in the same way we worship God. We honor her for her example, for her purity, and for her constant intercession with her Son, but we know that she isn’t God.
• We can’t buy our way into heaven with indulgences. Indulgences, which can’t be bought or sold, are means of reducing time in purgatory.
• And speaking of purgatory, it’s simply a place beyond space and time where we who are saved will be cleansed before entering Heaven. Nothing impure can enter the presence of God, and a snow-covered dunghill is still a dunghill.
• Indulgences are earned by actions that increase our purity here on Earth, therefore reducing the amount of cleansing needed.
• We don’t re-sacrifice Christ every Mass. We re-present the one Sacrifice.
• Infallibility doesn’t equal impeccability. The pope, unless he’s declaring something of faith and morals, in a specific manner, is just like you and me. he’s a sinful human being.
• Yes, we’ve done bad things in the past, but we’re sinful, too. It may not have been a good idea to burn Protestants at the stake, although if you take heresy as seriously as we do–and by your comments, I know you do–then to keep someone from infecting others with their salvation-denying views is perfectly understandable. There were bad popes and good popes, there are bad Bishops–lots of ‘em. But, that does not take anything away from the preaching of the Gospel.

I could go on and on, but I think you get the point. Please don’t bother reading some hysterical anti-Catholic to learn what Catholics believe. Ask us. We are not the members of a vast conspiracy designed to preach a false Gospel; we were preaching the Gospel before the Canon was set.

Finally, Open Book also pointed to this comment left at the Boar's Head Tavern on Catholic converts from Evangelical Protestantism. I'm copying it to here since it does seem to ring true from some of the dissatisfaction that I read in St. Blog's:

Meh. I have this theory that a large plurality of evangelicals who become Roman Catholics think they’re becoming Lutherans. I mean, a lot of them think they’re getting a historic liturgy, ancient practice, and an evangelical understanding of grace with a sacramental package providing assurance. But what they’re really getting is crappy Marty Haugen rites, medieval novelty, and dogmatic doubt. I mean, you almost never see evangelicals swimming the Tiber because they’re really excited about being able to get indulgences, sacrificing Masses to get their grandmas out of purgatory, or doubting whether they’re in the state of grace.

Yikes! True?