A reader asked:
Never heard of this before until recently. Covenant theology vs dispensationalism. What is the meaning of each and what is the Catholic stance on these ideas?
Covenant Theology and Dispensationalism are two rival Protestant systems for understanding salvation history. Both attempt to explain how God relates to humanity over time, but they couldn’t be more different—and both miss the Catholic mark entirely.
Covenant Theology (Reformed/Calvinist): This system says God relates to humanity through a few overarching covenants—like the Covenant of Works (with Adam) and the Covenant of Grace (post-Fall, culminating in Christ). It heavily spiritualizes the Old Testament and sees the Church as the “new Israel.” It tries to flatten the Bible into a tidy Calvinist blueprint.
Dispensationalism (Evangelical/Fundamentalist): Think of it as the Scofield Bible with charts. It chops history into “dispensations” or eras where God tests man in different ways. Most notably, it insists on a sharp divide between Israel and the Church—Israel gets earthly promises, the Church gets heavenly ones. This leads to wild eschatology: secret raptures, 7-year tribulations, rebuilt temples, red heifers, and a theology that reads more like Left Behind fan fiction than the Gospel.
Catholic stance? Rejected both. The Church doesn’t reduce salvation history to rigid systems cooked up in the 16th or 19th centuries. Catholic theology sees continuity between the Old and New Covenants, fulfilled in Christ and His Church. The New Covenant isn’t a backup plan or a spiritualized version of Judaism—it’s the fulfillment of what was foreshadowed.… Read the rest
