Article on not being Catholic

[Darryl_B]

a friend sent me this article…

challies.com/articles/why-i-am-not-roman-catholic

As she is quite determined that I should steer clear of Catholicism. I was a bit baffled by the unfounded assertions in it (the dismissal of the authority of the church is particularly thin) but more so by the statement that the author ‘joyfully’ accepts there are believers within the Catholic church. Surely that is a bit having your cake and eating it too? Any help on a reply?

Why I am not Reformed. In my journey I went from born into christadelphianism with an inherent superiority and disdain toward Catholic. We were told and assured that we knew the Bible better than all. But knowledge of the Bible produced more problems than solutions with the christadelphian doctrine. I reached a point of realizing I was wrong. I made a difficult transition into evangelicalism, nondenominationalism, losing friends, who are now superior to me.

Things were going fine, but we really had no theology, it was just accept Jesus and thats it. But I like theology, and I listened to Kim Riddlebarger a Reformed with his views on amillenialism. It was then the concept of the Church, what is this Church now in the present the Kingdom of God that got me. I had to find it. But I did not want to get it wrong again. Kim Riddlebarger made one statement that echoed over and over in my head, “maybe the Catholic Church had it right”.

Googled Catholic for the first time in my life, bypassed the Reformed went straight to the core of Christian Faith and for the first time in my life I love my home. It was a difficult transition I lost family. But that is why I am not Reformed, they only pointed me in the direction of home.

 

[Duane1966]

chesterton.org/why-i-am-a-catholic/

 

[mattp0625]

John Martignoni addressed authority in his latest newsletter:

biblechristiansociety.com/newsletter/352-apologetics-for-the-masses-279

 

[Novocastrian]

Next time a Protestant wants to argue sola scriptura, ask them to argue Sproul’s statement first…which is what Protestantism believes. If the canon is fallible then the scriptures can’t be trusted. And who decides anything then?

I just want to pick up on this reference to infallibility and the canon. I also want to be clear that I’m not arguing with your suggestion that the Church is infallible. I just want to make a single thing clear: infallibility and trustworthiness are not synonymous. Fallibility and truth are not mutually exclusive. Plenty of fallible authorities are still authorities and can be trusted.

Furthermore, even if we have infallible authorities to lead us (and we do), we still have the problem of fallible reception of infallible authorities. You and I aren’t infallible, so we have to question our judgement in accepting fallible authorities. There’s no complete escape from human infallibility!

 

[Church_Militant]

Thanks for all those resources, Church_Militant, useful and helpful as ever. I think you’re right, it is probably time to stop engaging with this person, they aren’t actually listening to me and interacting with anything I put forward. Shame, really, we used to be good friends. I think I shall quietly disengage and go back to prayer, which I am better at than apologetics!

I know how you feel. I had a buddy many years ago who moved away and all of a sudden I started getting all these emails from him that were full of anti-Catholic conspiracy theories. For a while I blew them off (deleted) and then began to engage some of it and show that they weren’t based on any facts and he couldn’t provide any but he kept on and they got worse until I finally just sent him an email telling him that I wasn’t going to answer that trash any more and to please stop sending it. He didn’t…so I finally had to tell him that I no longer wanted to hear from him at all and that if he persisted I’d add him to my spam filter.

Haven’t heard from him since. We were pretty tight at one time, but … C’est la guerre.

Don’t knock your apologetics skills Joy. I think you did quite well. No one knows all the answers, but the smart believer is always wise to know where to go looking for the answers and you were smart to come here to CAF. That’s one reason it exists and one of the best reasons that I support them and encourage others to do likewise. (Yes, that’s a blatant plug for CAF’s current fund raising effort.)

forums.catholic-questions.org/images/2016/forums-drive.jpg

 

[rfournier103]

If I weren’t Catholic I would be a militant hedonist.

Anyways… I was not impressed with the article.

 

[mattp0625]

Why I am not Reformed. In my journey I went from born into christadelphianism with an inherent superiority and disdain toward Catholic. We were told and assured that we knew the Bible better than all. But knowledge of the Bible produced more problems than solutions with the christadelphian doctrine. I reached a point of realizing I was wrong. I made a difficult transition into evangelicalism, nondenominationalism, losing friends, who are now superior to me.

Things were going fine, but we really had no theology, it was just accept Jesus and thats it. But I like theology, and I listened to Kim Riddlebarger a Reformed with his views on amillenialism. It was then the concept of the Church, what is this Church now in the present the Kingdom of God that got me. I had to find it. But I did not want to get it wrong again. Kim Riddlebarger made one statement that echoed over and over in my head, “maybe the Catholic Church had it right”.

Googled Catholic for the first time in my life, bypassed the Reformed went straight to the core of Christian Faith and for the first time in my life I love my home. It was a difficult transition I lost family. But that is why I am not Reformed, they only pointed me in the direction of home.

Amen, well done.