Miracles, Suffering, and a Magic Wand

Books questioning God's intervention in the world
Day 59: Prepare for suffering” by kirst19 is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0.

Perspectives of miracles and suffering from a seasoned Charismatic Christian.

If I had a magic wand like the historical characters in the Bible had with prayer, then my little brother’s cancer would be gone.

The wand for my late friend, Mark Typa, whose cancer ravished his body and stole him away. A wish to have walked in his room earlier and confidently stated that he is healed, just like Jesus did with St. Peter’s mother-in-law. Then later to play billiards and have him annihilate me in yet another game.

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Cessationism, Miracles, and Tongues: Part 4

How the doctrine of cessationism percolated within certain Church of England splinter groups and especially those that immigrated to America.

This is part 4 of the series of Cessationism, Miracles, and Tongues. Part 1 was an introduction with a general summary. Part 2 uncovered the medieval psyche surrounding the supernatural, miracles, and magic. This same article also contained how the protestant movement revised the perceptions of miracles in the early church from the traditional catholic opinion. Part 3 demonstrated how the Church of England, especially through the influence of the Puritans, officially formulated the doctrine of cessationism.

The most populous splinter group from the Church of England was the Methodist movement. This is where the analysis starts for Part 4.

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Cessationism, Miracles, and Tongues: Part 3

The protestant view of miracles from Martin Luther to the Church of England.

This is part 3 of a series surveying the doctrine of cessationism.

Part 1 was an introduction and a general summary. Part 2 gave a background to the medieval mindset that was highly dependant on the supernatural, magic and mystery in daily living. It also covered the re-examination of earlier christian history by prominent English leaders to demonstrate that miracles had ceased.

This series has a tertiary focus on the role of speaking in tongues within the cessationist doctrine. Those who adhere to a strong adherence to cessationism categorize tongues as a miracle, and since all miracles have ceased, the christian rite of tongues is no longer available. Any current practice is considered a false one.

This forces this series to shift away from the christian doctrine of tongues, and move into the protestant doctrine of miracles.

This article will demonstrate the Puritans were largely responsible for shaping the doctrine of cessationism through various means, especially the Westminster Confession. This doctrine may be the English Church’s most recognizable contribution to the protestant revolution throughout the world.

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Cessationism, Miracles, and Tongues: Part 2

This is part 2 of the series on cessationism, miracles, and tongues. There are two thoughts addressed in this article. Firstly, why miracles were de-emphasized during the Reformation. Secondly, an analysis on the protestant revision of miracles in the early church.

For information on this overall series and a general summary go to Cessationism, Miracles and Tongues: Part 1

The Excess of Miracles in the Medieval World

Cessationism or the critical examination of miracles cannot be fully understood without first understanding the medieval environment they were birthed from. The following gives a brief portrait of the mystical medieval world and why there was an urgent need for correcting the abuse of miracles.

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Cessationism, Miracles, and Tongues: Part 1

Introduction to a four-part series on cessationism, the de-emphasis of miracles, and especially how it relates to speaking in tongues.

A sample of cessationism graphic from origins until today.
Click on the image for the full version

Table of Contents

  • Part 1
    • Introduction
    • Reasons for the rise of Cessationism
  • Part 2
    • The Excess of Miracles in the Medieval world and the need for correction
    • The earlier De-Emphatics: John Chrysostom, Augustine Bishop of Hippo, Cyril of Alexandria*, and Thomas Aquinas
  • Part 3
    • The Early Protestant De-Emphatics: Martin Luther and Jean Calvin
    • The Church of England and Miracles.
      • The Puritan Influence: William Whitaker, William Perkins, James Ussher, the Westminster Confession, and later Confessions
    • The Latitudinarians
    • The Rationalists and Deists
  • Part 4
    Cessationism from the 1800s and onwards: the Baptists, Presbyterians, B. B. Warfield, Christian higher education, John MacArthur, and more.

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A History of the Rise and Influence of Rationalism in Europe


The book A History of the Rise and Influence of Rationalism in Europe (2 vols., 1865) is a seminal piece of literature. This well written work helps to provide valuable insights for the modern reader with the backstory on the conversion of Europe from a mystical to a rational society.
This book was written by William Lecky, an Irish-Anglican historian and politician (1838–1903). He greatly succeeded in studying and narrating the complex and evolving web of rationalism, morals, miracles, the supernatural, Catholicism, and Protestantism into a systematic and comprehensive portrait.

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Technical Notes on Francis Xavier speaking in tongues

The following are quotes from the principal sources on the real Francis Xavier and the legend of his speaking in tongues. This is a quotes only document — a comparative analysis of all this information is in the final stages and will be posted as a separate article.

The debate and controversy that surrounded St. Francis Xavier’s alleged speaking in tongues was a source of internal friction within Catholicism, especially the among the Jesuits themselves, and a rallying point for Protestants. The real Francis Xavier did not speak in tongues, but the legend of Francis did.

How this legend began and grew is an interesting and complex story.

This leads into a journey about how Medieval Catholics viewed speaking in tongues; what it meant to them, how it was applied, and the politics that surrounded this practice.

The legend of Francis Xavier speaking in tongues ranks within the top five themes throughout the two-thousand-year history of the christian doctrine of tongues. There is no doubt that this legend is the most complex one out of any documents in the Gift of Tongues Project. There are numerous reasons why the mystery of Francis Xavier is difficult. The original documentation is multilingual; spanning Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Latin, and French. The subject is wrapped in Medieval Catholicism, which has its own unique history, customs, personalities and procedures that outsiders such as myself have a difficult time to grasp. Xavier’s gift of tongues is deeply embedded with international and national politics. The topic is shrouded in religious symbols and shifts into the Protestant realm where Rationalists especially took critical aim. It spans across continents and new worlds that most Europeans hardly knew at the time. The maps, names and locations mentioned in the texts are far from the modern English mind.

This article is produced to meet a requirement of the Gift of Tongues Project which is the digital capturing of source texts. The following are actual quotes from testimonies, writers, and publications that highly influenced and perpetuated this myth. These are actual quotes with little or no commentary from myself relating to Xavier speaking in tongues. They are organized according to date; from the earliest publications shortly after Xavier’s death, all the way into the twentieth-century. The Italian, Spanish and Portuguese originals are not digitally captured because I have no knowledge of these languages or the ability to do data-entry in them. However, links to the original text along with an English translation is supplied where appropriate.

This file is designed for the researcher, not for the casual reader. This is the longest article found in the Gift of Tongues Project because of the amount of source material. It may take a few moments to load the full contents into the browser, please be patient.

TOC

  • Pedro de Ribadeneira
  • Giovanni Pietro Maffei
  • Horatius Tursellinus
  • João de Lucena
  • The Book Monumenta Xaveriana:
    • Emanuel Fernandez
    • Thomas Vaz
    • Antonio Peirera
    • Pope Urban VIII
  • Daniello Bartoli
  • Dominique Bouhours
  • Pope Benedict XIV
  • John Douglas
  • Hugh Farmer
  • Charles Butler
  • Henry James Coleridge
  • Andrew Dickson White
  • A Jesuit response to Andrew Dickson White
  • Edith Anne Steward
  • James Brodrick
  • Georg Schurhammer
    • Volume II
    • Volume IV

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Charismatics, Headaches and Healings

A woman with an audience behind her hands up praising God

A new framework is required to remedy an overemphasis on staged healing events in churches. A practice that hampers or even destroys the message of the Good News within the public realm.

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