Name ONE teaching that the Church has abandoned.
If the power is with God then there can be NO power shift - just people shifting sides. What there can be is people turing their back on God and His Church. We saw people turn their back on Gods Church when they followed kings as the head of their church instead of the Bishops Jesus gave authority to. The power is with Jesus and His Church - allways. Not some politician.
VERY WELL SAID INDEED! I agree with you 100% That is the problem with so many non-Catholics. They just abandon their Tradition given by Jesus to His Catholic Church and just invent things like “faith alone” or assurance of salvation, or the Bible is the source of all authority, or we can just take out 7+ books of Scripture that don’t fit our opinions that day.
Catholics have something called Dogma. If the clergy errors (and they do from time to time, look at Luthers errors
. We had 72 out of 73 Bishops follow a king (who liked his wives, well the next wife anyway) into schism - the 73rd Bishop (loyal to Jesus not a horny politician) was put to death of course by the king.), that does not change the Dogma of the Church Christ gave us. The clergy makes an error and then they get corrected back to the truth by the Church i.e. Jesus.You’re right, it has had great success with the Protestants and non-Christians - but not the Catholic Church! Our country is reforming God out of morals and politics. We now have practicing gays and women as ordained clergy in Protestant sects. Even the Baptist sect has three practicing gay preachers I know of. This is what happens when everyone becomes their own pope instead of sticking to the Tradition God gave us. When we put a book above the Church Jesus founded and promised to protect. When we let everyone self-miss-interpret from a book whatever they feel like that day. When anyone with any motive with ink and paper can edite, delete rewrite a Bible and sell it. When a king can write a Bible to protect his throne and HIS church. (HIS = the kings church not Gods)
You obviously don’t read the same news papers I do or live in the same country I do or watch the same TV news I do. The Catholic Church is persecuted daily by the media for its stance against homosexuality. Against abortion. Against war (the Iraq war to be clear). Against female clergy. Against birth control. Etc… People are anti-Catholic in this country (the USA) because the Church Christ founded IS vocal! Take a few scales off your eyes and let some “Good News” in.
Maybe not in your society, but it is in mine. I vote for Republicans for moral issues even though my union supports the Democrats. I voted for moral issues I learned from Christs Chrurch even though the the party I voted for is trying to eliminate my job! I voted morals above my pocketbook. I voted morals because my soul and the souls of my family and the souls of the unborn are more important then my job. I can live flipping burgers at McDonalds, I will NEVER live again without God first in my life or as a Protestant changeing my faith depending on who the king is that day or which church has the biggest youth group.
What vacuum? I do not hear the sucking sound in my Church but of course I am Catholic. We’re short on clergy perhaps but not on Faith. I do not pick a church based on its ratio of clergy to membership, I pick THEE Church that has stayed the course, preserved the Faith, kept Christ first.
To quote someone earlier, “This is just plain silly. Do you really intend this to be a serious question?”
Sure. I see little effort to enforce the Church teaching on artificial birth control. In the past there was more effort. While it is not correct to say it has been abandoned by the Church leadership, it is certainly losing their attention, and it has nearly been abandoned by the laity.
Has the influence of the Catholic Church in America increased, decreased, or remained the same since 1950? How about Europe?
I am only talking about human power. People shifting sides is a power shift.Part 1,
If the power is with God then there can be NO power shift - just people shifting sides. What there can be is people turing their back on God and His Church. We saw people turn their back on Gods Church when they followed kings as the head of their church instead of the Bishops Jesus gave authority to. The power is with Jesus and His Church - allways. Not some politician.VERY WELL SAID INDEED! I agree with you 100% That is the problem with so many non-Catholics. They just abandon their Tradition given by Jesus to His Catholic Church and just invent things like “faith alone” or assurance of salvation, or the Bible is the source of all authority, or we can just take out 7+ books of Scripture that don’t fit our opinions that day.
GREAT point! You said it so well.
It’s a good thing Jesus established His Catholic Church in 33 A.D. and promised to be with it so that Catholic “DOGMA” can be protected by Him.Catholics have something called Dogma. If the clergy errors (and they do from time to time, look at Luthers errors
The reformation is an example where numerous Catholic clergy who where horrible at theology left the Church. The reformation was one of the greatest periods in the Catholic Church because it was a good house cleaning to get all the bed bugs and dirt out. Now we have a stronger cleaner Church closer to it’s Dogma and not some “ME”-ology popular in so many poor clergy of that day.
Jesus does not change. Reformers just try to change Jesus. I’ll stick with God not some opinion invented for human pleasure.
(It also sounds like Pope Benidict XVI is going to clean house again! The Church will only get stronger as a result.)
Gays have had just as much success with Catholics as with anyone else. The population of Massachusetts is 50% Catholic. The litany of problems you cite is evidence of a loss of power.Part DEUCE,
You’re right, it has had great success with the Protestants and non-Christians - but not the Catholic Church! Our country is reforming God out of morals and politics. We now have practicing gays and women as ordained clergy in Protestant sects. Even the Baptist sect has three practicing gay preachers I know of. This is what happens when everyone becomes their own pope instead of sticking to the Tradition God gave us. When we put a book above the Church Jesus founded and promised to protect. When we let everyone self-miss-interpret from a book whatever they feel like that day. When anyone with any motive with ink and paper can edite, delete rewrite a Bible and sell it. When a king can write a Bible to protect his throne and HIS church. (HIS = the kings church not Gods) You obviously don’t read the same news papers I do or live in the same country I do or watch the same TV news I do. The Catholic Church is persecuted daily by the media for its stance against homosexuality. Against abortion. Against war (the Iraq war to be clear). Against female clergy. Against birth control. Etc… People are anti-Catholic in this country (the USA) because the Church Christ founded IS vocal! Take a few scales off your eyes and let some “Good News” in.
When I go to the fairs I see Mormons and Baptist in booths trying to convert people to their sects. I see the Catholics in the Right To Life booth getting sneers from passers by. Catholics trying to save the unborn, Baptists trying to make friends. (I do not say that the Baptists are wrong here by any means, just make a point)Maybe not in your society, but it is in mine. I vote for Republicans for moral issues even though my union supports the Democrats. I voted for moral issues I learned from Christs Chrurch even though the the party I voted for is trying to eliminate my job! I voted morals above my pocketbook. I voted morals because my soul and the souls of my family and the souls of the unborn are more important then my job. I can live flipping burgers at McDonalds, I will NEVER live again without God first in my life or as a Protestant changeing my faith depending on who the king is that day or which church has the biggest youth group.What vacuum? I do not hear the sucking sound in my Church but of course I am Catholic. We’re short on clergy perhaps but not on Faith. I do not pick a church based on its ratio of clergy to membership, I pick THEE Church that has stayed the course, preserved the Faith, kept Christ first.To quote someone earlier, “This is just plain silly. Do you really intend this to be a serious question?”
See my signature below…
Power is worldly. The Church holds authority–and the Church will never lose it’s authority because it comes from Jesus Christ.
I am only talking about worldly power.
And I’m talking about authority.
OK. What about authority? Has the authority of the Church increased, decreased, or stayed the same over the past fifty years? Does authority fluctuate with fluctuations in worldly power?And I’m talking about authority.
The Church’s teaching on birth control is solid. It has not changed. Society and culture has changed. Lax Catholics who do not bother to read up on their own Church’s teachings, or worse, those who ignore them – do not constitute WHAT the Church teaches. Sin abounds everywhere, probably even You have committed one or two…
Well thankyou for your warm answer, I have since surfed around in here and do see what you speak of but I guess we have all come short and utimely comparision comes out and the us them flags come out. Im just hearing that people need to come back to the catholic church and while I agree that may be true I cannot believe because someone decides a baptist church suits them more that they have lost anything. As long as the Creed is the core.I have to tell you, this is one of the very few sites that I have ever been on, where there is no one telling me anything of the sort…And I speak as the“friendly neighborhood Methodist”, as I
I arrived at CAF, through a series of events that don’t need repeating here, & I was immediately impressed by the sense of Christian charity shown here.
One person–one, in nearly a year–attacked & that person has been banned…Not suspended, banned. (I don’t flatter myself that this was just over me; it was an unpleasant person) And I had PMs from a flock of other people, apologizing for what someone else had done, & assuring me of a welcome.
And here I am, all this time later, happily posting away, enjoying the fellowship that I find all but unique to CAF.
This site is for apologetics; in the natural course of things, debate can be lively. Well, I happen to enjoy that! But I see no unfairness. I really don’t!! That just isn’t what CAF is about,
God bless.
It is possible that a teaching is both valid and abandoned by an organization.The Church’s teaching on birth control is solid. It has not changed. Society and culture has changed. Lax Catholics who do not bother to read up on their own Church’s teachings, or worse, those who ignore them – do not constitute WHAT the Church teaches. Sin abounds everywhere, probably even You have committed one or two…
The fact that Priests are Lax about teaching the Church’s doctrine concerning birth control, or worse, descent from it, does not make the Church’s teachings any less valid.
All shepherds of the Church will be held accountable before God, He will be their judge, only He knows their hearts and their intentions.
To the Extent that they produce confusion rather than clarity among the Laity, I believe, there will be a stricter account.
Reading further down on your next comments, you mention the *Influence * of the Church. Apparently by your assessment, Status in Society is a standard bearer for true religion? Christ said the path to Hell is wide and many choose that way, the path to heaven is Narrow and there are Few that find it. …Wow, by your assessment, His Way is a goner from the git-go!
No, those who Choose Christ and His Church, choose a Narrow Path. We would only expect to find a Few on His road to heaven.
Our Faith rests in the fact that He Promised the Holy Spirit would guide His Church and, the gates of Hell would *NOT * prevail against it.
I Trust God and His promises. Do you?
Well, it is not the Church that walked away from Truth, but Society that has walked away from Truth and in so doing the Church also.
We have no interest in making anyone an enemy, but we do see heresies as the enemy because heresies are the enemy of truth. We want to see everyone embrace the truth because Jesus said “the truth will set you free.”
I must say that this is a very good point. For those Catholics here who have not been harrassed and cross-examined by evangelical or fundamentalist Chrisians on the apostasy of the entire Catholic faith, it is much more personal and difficult than the shoe being on the other foot. The Catechism basically lays it all out for people and Catholicism has no secrets. These types of fundamentalists, though, have no guide to turn to except what they personally feel, through their conversion experience, is the truth as set forth in Scripture. Catholics who know about their religion are, in my experience, far more gentle and humble in dealing with people who are not catholics and have questions.
Well, there’s a natural joy over anyone who had left the Church returning to it. The joy comes from these folks returning to the fullness of the faith. You see, the Catholic Church has a wealth of graces and spirituality found in no other church. Believe me, I speak from the voice of experience having been involved in Protestant denominations of sereval kinds.
When we say people need more what we mean is that having Christ isn’t just belief in Christ, which you too have cited. Also, there is such as thing as sins of omission–that’s sins we do when we don’t do what we ought to have done but wimped out or were selfish, etc. Many Protestants don’t understand this idea and so have no remedy for it.
Actually, spaces are sacred when they are consecrated to God. And there is no need to chose between a building and our bodies being temples of the Lord. They are both not either/or. That is another thing many Protestants can’t understand–that not everything is a choice between one thing and another, it can be both. For a Catholic it would be like having to choose whether Jesus was man or God when Christian teaching is that he is both.
Yes, that’s been my experience with them, too. They got angry with God over something or couldn’t relate to their denomination’s vision of God and so abandoned the whole thing. That’s the easy way out, though, which tells me they are more interested in what pleases them than in actually seeking out the truth.Surprisinley atheists are generally to borrow a fundy word “backsliders” (ps I hate my keyboard ) anyway yes they look for excuses. But they do see from another angle, I have learned alot from them, they tend to keep you on your toes, but too much can lead to depression and hair pulling I reccomend a mild dose.
Well, fuel provides warmth and entertainment has been known to make an impact on people’s attitudes. Maybe that isn’t such a bad thing. :tiphat:Still christians arguing gives them fuel and entertainment, At least they do have the good taste not to like jack chick.
I think this is in response to me, if not well the cat kicks at the topicBaptists (at least when I was one) do not subscribe to any recognized Creed, per se.
What those lose who apostatize to them and their ilk is Christ’s unfailing promise of the fulness both of divinely revealed truth and of the means of holiness and salvation, which can only be found in the One True Church which He personally established - the Catholic Church.
How one “feels about” Jesus doesn’t matter.
