88% ? :(

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littlesoul

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I was watching a news show last night and apparently 88% of the Catholic party believe that Catholics should be able to make their own choices while only 11% believe Catholics should make their choices within the laws of the Church.

Does that make sense how I worded it? O.o

Anyway, this makes me very sad.
A relative thought this quite humorous and laughed at me basically for following church teachings. Didn’t bother me though - Jesus lives!

edit:
88% of the Catholic party believes that people should not have to remain fiaithful to the Catholic Church, but should be able to make their own decisions. <— I wrote that in my journal last night after hearing it, so that makes more sense. Sorry for the confusing post :o
 
littlesoul said:
I was watching a news show last night and apparently 88% of the Catholic party believe that Catholics should be able to make their own choices while only 11% believe Catholics should make their choices within the laws of the Church.

Does that make sense how I worded it? O.o

Anyway, this makes me very sad.
A relative thought this quite humorous and laughed at me basically for following church teachings. Didn’t bother me though - Jesus lives!

edit:
88% of the Catholic party believes that people should not have to remain fiaithful to the Catholic Church, but should be able to make their own decisions. <— I wrote that in my journal last night after hearing it, so that makes more sense. Sorry for the confusing post :o
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Your use of the word “party” is a little confusing. Was this a poll simply of Catholics or Catholics in a particular political party?
 
I wouldn’t worry about some unsubstantiated statistic floating around a vauge question.
 
The statistic is lamentable. It is also a reflection of our secular society that demands “instant” gratification and does not wish to truly think for themselves.

God endowed each of us with the wondrous gift of free will. We all must make our own choices. We should seek to do so after being suitably informed about the issue. This process is sometimes refereed to as “formation of conscience” and we are all called to have a well formed conscience in order to make good moral choices.

How does one develop a well formed conscience? By studying the question at hand, learning about the issue, and learning the teaching of the Church on the issue. The process may (should) include seeking advice from a spiritual director, pastor, etc., reading any publications from the Magisterium on the subject, as well an examination of the secular side of the issue.

It takes quite a bit of personal work and engagement.

Once a person has all the facts, it is usually pretty easy to accept the Church’s teaching on an issue. The problem is most people stop forming their conscience on an issue way before they have all or even a majority of the facts on an issue.

I suspect a more correct statement would be 88% of Catholics do not make personal decisions in agreement with Church teachings because 88% of Catholics choose to not become informed about the Church teachings - they are content to believe the 5 second out of context sound bite instead of finding out the truth for themselves.
 
Well, we are free to make our own decisions, that is a fact.
If we make decisions that are outside of God’s will, however, we are not free. We are making decisions, but not in true freedom.

For ex…an addict makes decisions… bad ones. He/she is a slave to accumulated poor choices and bad morality. Freedom is then compromised.

For ex…a husband has the freedom to have sex with any agreeable woman he chooses. If chooses thus, is he really free? No, he is a slave to his passions and reaps the just consequences of his actions.

Making one’s self a god is not freedom.
Huge topic.
 
clem456 said:
Well, we are free to make our own decisions, that is a fact.
If we make decisions that are outside of God’s will, however, we are not free. We are making decisions, but not in true freedom.
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We are free to make the decision. We choose to decide either in accordance with God’s will or against it. There may be extenuating circumstances that limit our ability to exercise our free will, but these are not a result of God’s will for us but usually the result of exercising our free will in a poorly formed manner.
clem456 said:
For ex…an addict makes decisions… bad ones. He/she is a slave to accumulated poor choices and bad morality. Freedom is then compromised.
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The addict chose to use the object of addiction that first time. There may have been pressures or other circumstances that limit the addict’s culpability in choosing a course of action contrary to God’s will, but the addict had the initial choice. The addiction might compromise the future exercise of free will, and it might impair the proper formation of conscience.
clem456 said:
For ex…a husband has the freedom to have sex with any agreeable woman he chooses. If chooses thus, is he really free? No, he is a slave to his passions and reaps the just consequences of his actions.
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Choosing to give in and sin or not IS an exercise of free will. If the adulterous spouse was unable to choose and HAD to have sex outside of the marriage then the person is not free. Every person I have ever heard of who elected to commit adultery knew it was adultery and was wrong, and they made a conscious decision to do it anyway.

A person of sound mind is never a “slave to his passions” - he always has a choice to make: follow the will of God as guided by his conscience or not.
 
pnewton said:
I wouldn’t worry about some unsubstantiated statistic floating around a vauge question.
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👍

It’s hard to give too much credence to these sorts of statistics. Even if we grant that the poll was conducted in the proper manner which would yield statistically significant results, what is often left out is exactly how the question was worded and what we can legitimately conclude from the results. Just because 88% of the respondents answered a specific question in a certain way doesn’t mean they all meant what a news headline says they meant.

In any case, even if the statistic was true, what does that prove? It simply means we need to keep praying and evangelizing. Which is what we should be doing anyway. 🙂
 
frizzgrig said:
We are free to make the decision. We choose to decide either in accordance with God’s will or against it. There may be extenuating circumstances that limit our ability to exercise our free will, but these are not a result of God’s will for us but usually the result of exercising our free will in a poorly formed manner.

The addict chose to use the object of addiction that first time. There may have been pressures or other circumstances that limit the addict’s culpability in choosing a course of action contrary to God’s will, but the addict had the initial choice. The addiction might compromise the future exercise of free will, and it might impair the proper formation of conscience.

Choosing to give in and sin or not IS an exercise of free will. If the adulterous spouse was unable to choose and HAD to have sex outside of the marriage then the person is not free. Every person I have ever heard of who elected to commit adultery knew it was adultery and was wrong, and they made a conscious decision to do it anyway.

A person of sound mind is never a “slave to his passions” - he always has a choice to make: follow the will of God as guided by his conscience or not.
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I think you are trying to disagree with me? I seem to have given you the impression that I am excusing sin somehow. No.
If you read the two posts we actually agree, although you may be objecting to some terms.

The term “slave to sin” is not a new term in our theology. It is an accurate description of free will exercised outside the boundaries of God’s will. If you are reading the word “slavery” as somehow excusing sin, no, that was not my intent at all.
Among other usages, Christ himself uses the term in John 8:34

Some good reference material for the topic is Veritatis Splendor by JP2.
One small tidbit:
“The beginning of freedom”, Saint Augustine writes, "is to be free from crimes… such as murder, adultery, fornication, theft, fraud, sacrilege and so forth. When once one is without these crimes (and every Christian should be without them), one begins to lift up one’s head towards freedom.
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100% of those who mix vodka with their orange juice will live a bit longer than those who don’t!

Something to drink about.
 
People are always free to choose to accept or reject God and His Church… but don’t expect the results to be positive if you choose reject.
 
Do not know what you mean by ‘party’ but am be sceptical of polls on Catholics. There was a poll that was quoted by many that said 99% of Catholics women had used contraception which was debunked
 
_Abyssinia said:
I do not know what you mean by party but I would be sceptical of polls on Catholics. There was a poll that was quoted by many that said 99% of Catholics women had used contraception which was debunked
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Yah, I guess I won’t put much stock into this poll. And like someone said, we just keep marching along. I asked my relative i referred to, about the “party” and he said it was the Democratic party. shrug I don’t know much about politics :o
 
littlesoul said:
Yah, I guess I won’t put much stock into this poll. And like someone said, we just keep marching along. I asked my relative i referred to, about the “party” and he said it was the Democratic party. shrug I don’t know much about politics :o
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Problem is with polls on Catholics, is I think pollsters just ask people whether they are Catholics for most polls, and they do not ask about their adherence to the faith. There are people who never go to Church but they were baptised Catholic and call themselves Catholic. I do not think polls should group non practising Catholics with practising Catholics because the result of the poll will be skewed because those that are not practising Catholicism will have different views on a range of topics than Catholics who adhere to the Church’s teaching
 
I don’t know what you mean by Catholic “party”. But according to this (yes, I know it is the ‘catholic’ Reporter, but this seems pretty legit), around 85% of Catholics disagree with Church teaching, even between both Democrats and Republicans.
 
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