Atheists: What is the mean of life?

[cheddarsox]

YinYangMom:

That’s a good argument against baptism at birth, but for now, infant baptism is but the beginning of the journey.

If you did not receive the other sacraments (communion, confirmation)** and** you were not trained to do so (proper formation) then in the end you will be judged based on what you were given, and you will not be condemned to hell.

Besides, we’ve already ascertained that you recognize and live your life according to the Divine so you’re not on a terribly shaky road.

But if you were properly formed in the faith, received communion, made your confirmation and later in life, as an adult, walked away from Church teaching, then, yeah…your judgement will be harsher than under other circumstances. I still don’t believe you’ll be damned to hell, especially since there are so many people praying for your soul. But the fact of the matter would be that you were cognitive and mature enough at your confirmation to promise to God to continue on the Catholic path so you, yourself broke that promise. Just because you no longer acknowledge God, you did at the time of the promise and the promise still stands. You’re going back on your word and that has consequences, even within the design of your Divinity scenario, let alone ours.

The confirmation thing bothered me alot. But no, I was not mature (I was 12) and did have doubts, I was told that is was just Satan trying to get me to throw God’s grace back in his face, to ignore them. I really had no choice, so I got confirmed. They said we had a choice, that we could say no, but we didn’t have a choice, and were never given the chance to say no. I would have.

cheddar

 

[cheddarsox]

YinYangMom:

But isn’t it possible, that upon further reflection on all that has been revealed to you, that what has been revealed does indeed coincide with Catholicism?

**It doesn’t coincide with Catholicism. I believe that Catholics worship the divine, but a very twisted, poor, inadequate metaphor of the divine. What I believe is heresy to the church.
**
Couldn’t it be a matter of your not having yet reached the end of your journey?

**I absolutely know I am not at the end of my journey! Or at least I dearly hope not, I hope I never grow so smug and static that I think I know all their is to know concerning the divine.
**
You think you’ve figured it out and that you have what you need to move forward, but if you reflect further, seek more information, you may be able see the whole picture. Since all information leads to the Truth and God is Truth, then further study of your beliefs in conjunction with Catholicism may bring you home.

All information does not lead to the Truth. There is lots of erroneous information (lies, fallacies, misrepresentations etc) out there. I think the teachings of the church are full of them. Because I was raised and trained Catholic, of course I automatically compare my beliefs with those of the church, as we have both said, you can’t unknow something. I cannot accept many of the church’s teachings. They do against what I know and have experienced. Since I neither expect nor desire the church to change its teachings to suit me, (or the truth), I can’t see how I would return.

Your revelations have proven to you that what you were taught about Catholicism was wrong. That is not the same as proving God does not exist, or that Catholicism itself is wrong. Thanks to the information age a lot more has been written and is accessible to you to find clarification. I honestly believe that if you visit the Vatican website to read some of the writings available there, and gave the Catechism a shot - along with the study of the bible (Jeff Cavins’ Great Adventure is the best way to read the bible, imo), and the Lee Strobel series of books (The Case for God, The Case for Christ, The Case for Faith, and more), you’ll find there is more to your revelations than what you have so far.

**I do not believe the catholic concept of God exists. If you are willing to call my understanding of the divine God, that is up to you. And I believe much of Catholicism is wrong. I’ve studied it, and the Bible and many other religions as well. I think religion is fascinating.

I am not saying there is no truth in the teachings of the Church, There is, but there is so much more truth that it does not have, and so much more than the distractions the church teachings tend to focus on, And there is so much nonsense, misinformation and trash in the teachings that seperate people from experiencing the divine, and replace love and worship with fear and resentment.**

You see, it’s not just a matter of faith. It’s a matter of Truth. Truth doesn’t change so where we’ve already agreed your Divine and our God are one in the same…why not find out what other pieces line up together?

**I agree Truth does not change. And we do not agree that our concepts of divinity are the same. They are not. What I worship is not the Catholic God. Though I do believe what Catholics worship may be some gross misunderstanding and misrepresentation of the true divine.

I feel like the church is a maze with a piece of cheese as a reward. Why would I give up the entire universe to reenter the maze, in the hope that I might gain that bit of cheese? I already have all the cheese I could ever want.

cheddar! (no pun intended!)
**

 

[Neithan]

Though I do believe what Catholics worship may be some gross misunderstanding and misrepresentation of the true divine.

Interesting, could you elaborate on the main points of misunderstanding? How does the Catholic view of God differ in the grossest aspects from your own? Furthermore, on what do you base these judgements?

 

[cheddarsox]

Neithan:

Interesting, could you elaborate on the main points of misunderstanding? How does the Catholic view of God differ in the grossest aspects from your own? Furthermore, on what do you base these judgements?

I have already done this in this thread, scroll up a bit and read.

cheddar

 

[reen12]

My understanding is, that in terms of logical argument,

no one is required to prove a negative.

On the other hand, if one makes an assertion
“X exists”, then that individual is required to “prove”
the assertion.

A simple example:

**A ** “Unicorns exist!”
**B ** “Unicorns don’t exist.”

Only A is required to provide proof, in terms of logic.

reen12

 

[YinYangMom]

**I agree Truth does not change. And we do not agree that our concepts of divinity are the same. They are not. What I worship is not the Catholic God. Though I do believe what Catholics worship may be some gross misunderstanding and misrepresentation of the true divine.

I feel like the church is a maze with a piece of cheese as a reward. Why would I give up the entire universe to reenter the maze, in the hope that I might gain that bit of cheese? I already have all the cheese I could ever want.

cheddar! (no pun intended!)
**

Cute, even though unintended

Interesting in that when I re-read this post of yours your rejection is based on how you ‘feel’ or what you ‘believe’ Catholic worship is.

Do you not see in how you respond that you don’t ‘know’?
We do worship the same divine because our Catholic representation of God is the Divine - one in the same…it just is the way it is.

Everything you describe in your interpretation of the Divine coincides with our Catholic God, but you don’t believe that because the Catholic God you were introduced to as you were growing up isn’t like the Divine you’ve come to discover as you’ve grown and matured. You alone, cognitively, cannot reconcile the two concepts of the Catholic God you were exposed to and the Catholic God of which we speak of here on the boards. And since you are so comfortable with the Divine which was revealed personally to you, I can understand your resistance to having anyone suggest yours is anything like the not-so-loving, understanding God you were taught about.

When you hear the term God, in your mind and in your being you conjure up the loneliness, the abandonment, the anger of what God was like for you back when. But now that He has revealed Himself to you as the Divine, you would see, if you opened your heart and mind, what we see. You’d have to be reintroduced to our Catholic God though and be willing to toss aside any prior recollection of the older version in your mind.

Again, much has been written and recorded which is now available at your fingertips to meet the Real Catholic God that if you’d give Catholicism a chance you might be able to complete your spiritual journey. Of course if you really want to meet the Real Catholic God, sit at Eucharistic Adoration regularly for a while. Being in His Real Presence is an awesome experience.

The Catholic Church is not a maze at all. I’m sorry your experience with it left you feeling that way. You would give up nothing to come home. You’d have the whole cheese **and **the milk from which it came.

 

[cheddarsox]

YinYangMom:

Again, much has been written and recorded which is now available at your fingertips to meet the Real Catholic God that if you’d give Catholicism a chance you might be able to complete your spiritual journey. Of course if you really want to meet the Real Catholic God, sit at Eucharistic Adoration regularly for a while. Being in His Real Presence is an awesome experience.

The Catholic Church is not a maze at all. I’m sorry your experience with it left you feeling that way. You would give up nothing to come home. You’d have the whole cheese **and **the milk from which it came.

I have spent lots of hours at Adoration, that was where I first learned that what the church said about the divine was untrue! I am in the real presence all the time, I just need to take the time to acknowledge it, and you are correct, it is awesome.

If the church knows the truth about the divine, as you insist they do, and if they know what I know about the divine, why do they put up the maze? I don’t know what else to call the endless piles of nonsense concerning the relationship between God and man that the church also claims is true.

I have often felt that the passage speaking of it being better to have a millstone tied around one’s neck than to lead an innocent one astray applies to the Catholic church. I have read much of mystics and some Saints experience of the divine, I have experienced similar things, so I know that at least some in the church KNOW the divine.But then the church goes and adds all this useless **** that hides the divine nature.

They say one thing, then contradict it with another teaching, then spend lots of ink explaining how what looks like a contradiction really isnt…At the end of the original Wizard of Oz movie, there is a scene where Dorothy and her friends have come to see the Wizard, they bring all the evidence of their quests, which he sent them on, hoping he will finally grant their wishes, A curtain is blown aside, and an unassuming man is standing there speaking through a microphone, making a big booming angry voice come out on the face on the screen. He says, “Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain…I am Oz the great and terrible…”

That, to me, is the church. God is, the church is the big, fake , booming, angry face on the screen. The divine has been working change in the characters all along, the face on the screen sent them on a dangerous fool’s errand, making them “prove” themselves. The church uses all sorts of distraction to lead people all around the block and back again, telling them they must do this, and suffer that before they can see god.

God is already here, the kingdom is already here! Jesus said that himself. But it is always, wait, go slay this passion, go say this penance, go believe this unbelievable thing, and maybe, if you are lucky and god is feeling merciful, he’ll let you stew in purgatory a few thousand years before sharing paradise with you.

They have made it about the church, about human legalism, about nonsense, and have put the truth of the divine so far off, made god seem so inaccessible that most people feel there is no hope of ever finding him.

The Catholic church is not my home, so to enter it would not be coming home, anymore than returning to the crazy dynamics of my abusive family would be coming home. I have struck out in different directions in my life. I have learned what the divine is, and what real familial love is. To return to someone’s false and twisted version of these things would not compleat me. It would brand me as crazy and self destructive.

I am glad that the church is not a maze to you, and that you have been able to access the wheat for the chaff. I was also, and was set free. Thank the divine!

cheddar

 

[YinYangMom]

cheddarsox:

I have spent lots of hours at Adoration, that was where I first learned that what the church said about the divine was untrue! I am in the real presence all the time, I just need to take the time to acknowledge it, and you are correct, it is awesome.

We are in the presence of the Divine 24/7, yes. But at Eucharistic Adoration we are in the presence of the Risen Jesus Christ, Himself.

If the church knows the truth about the divine, as you insist they do, and if they know what I know about the divine, why do they put up the maze? I don’t know what else to call the endless piles of nonsense concerning the relationship between God and man that the church also claims is true.

I see now the real stumbling block you and I have - it must be around the belief in Jesus. The Church doesn’t put up a maze, She helps us to know Jesus, personally, recognize that He is Risen - today - alive as much now as He was before the Ascension. She guides us to Him and by doing that we come to know the Father better as well. It’s just more revelation about the Divine you’ve already received. You know the Divine, but not completely…not yet. There’s more. Can you imagine that? As wonderful and awesome as the Divine is - as revealed to you personally so far - there’s MORE!

I have often felt that the passage speaking of it being better to have a millstone tied around one’s neck than to lead an innocent one astray applies to the Catholic church. I have read much of mystics and some Saints experience of the divine, I have experienced similar things, so I know that at least some in the church KNOW the divine.But then the church goes and adds all this useless **** that hides the divine nature.

It probably seems useless to you because you do not know the history from which the customs and practices come. Most of the things we do were being done by the first generation of Christians who actually lived during the time of Christ. The Church has preserved Tradition…it has not made it up.

They say one thing, then contradict it with another teaching, then spend lots of ink explaining how what looks like a contradiction really isnt…At the end of the original Wizard of Oz movie, there is a scene where Dorothy and her friends have come to see the Wizard, they bring all the evidence of their quests, which he sent them on, hoping he will finally grant their wishes, A curtain is blown aside, and an unassuming man is standing there speaking through a microphone, making a big booming angry voice come out on the face on the screen. He says, “Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain…I am Oz the great and terrible…”

This is a matter of not knowing the distinction between the different levels of shared knowledge the Church protects. There’s Dogma, Doctrine, Tradition, tradition, Sacraments, sacraments, and so on. With all the hub-bub around the ‘infallibility of the Pope’ too many people don’t realize the Popes have only spoken 5 times infallibly! People misunderstand that the teachings of the Church involve many layers, and they don’t take the time to learn about them, so they erroneously assume whenever the Pope speaks or a Council convenes, that whatever results is etched in stone.

 

[YinYangMom]

cheddarsox:

That, to me, is the church. God is, the church is the big, fake , booming, angry face on the screen. The divine has been working change in the characters all along, the face on the screen sent them on a dangerous fool’s errand, making them “prove” themselves. The church uses all sorts of distraction to lead people all around the block and back again, telling them they must do this, and suffer that before they can see god.

I see where your coming from. You do a good job sharing your perceptions. It still reveals that your understanding of the Church is based on poor education. Particularly with regard to the part about the church using distractions to lead people to have to do this or that and suffer before they can see God. That is absolutely not the case at all, though I can understand where you would have come to that conclusion based on misrepresentations to you by others during your life and through what you experienced.

God is already here, the kingdom is already here! Jesus said that himself. But it is always, wait, go slay this passion, go say this penance, go believe this unbelievable thing, and maybe, if you are lucky and god is feeling merciful, he’ll let you stew in purgatory a few thousand years before sharing paradise with you.

THE Kingdom is not here…it is not of this earth, of this space of this reality. Jesus said that Himself. He ascended to some other reality and told us He is holding a place at His table for us. When He said it was here, in the context you mention, He was speaking about the fact that He, Himself, was the Kingdom made present for that time on this earth.

They have made it about the church, about human legalism, about nonsense, and have put the truth of the divine so far off, made god seem so inaccessible that most people feel there is no hope of ever finding him.

Teaching us that Jesus is alive and well, physically with us through Eucharistic Adoration and the Eucharist itself does not seem to me that the Church is making God inaccessible. She is the only religious institution which believes in Christ’s fully risen presence being of this time, this reality, by preserving the Eucharist and celebrating it every day of the year (except Good Friday).

The Catholic church is not my home, so to enter it would not be coming home, anymore than returning to the crazy dynamics of my abusive family would be coming home. I have struck out in different directions in my life. I have learned what the divine is, and what real familial love is. To return to someone’s false and twisted version of these things would not compleat me. It would brand me as crazy and self destructive.

Because you were baptized into the Catholic faith and confirmed, the Catholic church **is **your home. You can’t undo that which took place. When you chose to leave your dysfunctional familial home behind, so it appears you left your spiritual home as well. But your abusive family is still your family. Your mother and father are and always will be your mother and father, though you have chosen not to maintain relationships with them. God and Christ and the rest of us Catholics are your family as well, though you have chosen not to maintain relationships with us. We will never abandon you, however.

I am glad that the church is not a maze to you, and that you have been able to access the wheat for the chaff. I was also, and was set free. Thank the divine!

At least you acknowledge the wheat is present in the Church. That’s a good start. You still are not up for the challenge of sorting the wheat from the chaff for yourself, and I understand that. I hope someday you will, though. Until then, I am glad you are connected to the Divine in your own way, and will continue to pray for your well being.

cheddar

 

[Savonarola]

Originally Posted by cheddarsox.
Now, wouldn’t that be something! I would be condemned to hell because when I was a few days old someone else poured water over my head and said the magic words! Yeah for an all loving God who has created such a wonderful means for my condemnation when I was too young and senseless to do for myself. No, that is not the divine I know.

Cheddar, I have been reading the previous posts where others have been challenging your beliefs and I must say that your words are like a breath of fresh air. I agree with much of what you are trying to say and I understand the diffuculty in expressing the true nature of a divine universe using only words. Language is very limited and the nature of the universe is very not.

I agree that the universe is supportive, cooperative and magical by nature. I don’t believe that there is some egotistical God that demands obediance.

I, like you, have found so much more peace in my life after having moved more away from the traditional Catholic teachings I grew up with. How is it possible to be truly at peace when you think there is a possiblity that God is going to send you to Hell for being human? That is not to say there is not truth burried in Catholic teaching but it is so mixed up with distortions and lies that it no longer represents any truth I recognize.

 

[Savonarola]

cheedarsox:

God is already here, the kingdom is already here! Jesus said that himself. But it is always, wait, go slay this passion, go say this penance, go believe this unbelievable thing, and maybe, if you are lucky and god is feeling merciful, he’ll let you stew in purgatory a few thousand years before sharing paradise with you.

YinYangMom:

THE Kingdom is not here…it is not of this earth, of this space of this reality. Jesus said that Himself. He ascended to some other reality and told us He is holding a place at His table for us.

Jesus said

Luke 17:21: “behold, the kingdom of God is within you.”

Jesus says it is within you, not outside of yourself in some foreign land or dimension of existence. If you are here, now, then you can experience “heaven” here and now. You can also deny yourself this experience.

The Catholic church does make you believe what they say and deny yourself of one thing after another so that when you are dead, if you’re lucky, you can be one with God in his kingdom. But Jesus says

Matthew 22:32: “God is not the God of the dead, but of the living”.

Well, we are the living and the kingdom is within us. It would seem to me that Jesus was saying we don’t have to wait or jump through hoops to experience God and his kingdom. God and his kingdom are here, now, within us in the living state.

 

[cheddarsox]

Savonarola:

Cheddar, I have been reading the previous posts where others have been challenging your beliefs and I must say that your words are like a breath of fresh air. I agree with much of what you are trying to say and I understand the diffuculty in expressing the true nature of a divine universe using only words. Language is very limited and the nature of the universe is very not.

I agree that the universe is supportive, cooperative and magical by nature. I don’t believe that there is some egotistical God that demands obediance.

I, like you, have found so much more peace in my life after having moved more away from the traditional Catholic teachings I grew up with. How is it possible to be truly at peace when you think there is a possiblity that God is going to send you to Hell for being human? That is not to say there is not truth burried in Catholic teaching but it is so mixed up with distortions and lies that it no longer represents any truth I recognize.

Welcome to the thread Savonarola,

It is always nice to meet another who has experienced the divine that I know! How ironic that we would meet in this place. But I do come across our kind in the oddest of places…And I find it hopeful that the divine is making its true nature known to more and more people.

cheddar

 

[cheddarsox]

Yinyangmom,

I very much enjoy discussing with you, you are a thoughtful, intelligent person with a gentle heart, an an asset to all the threads I have seen you post on.

I think we have reached an impasse on this one, at least for the time being.

Again,someone is telling me that the reason I am not Catholic is that I don’t understand what the church really teaches, that if I did, I would recognize the truth and “return”. That I am a victim of bad teaching.

This seems to be the Catholic bottom line, that everyone would be Catholic if they knew the “true” teachings of the church. Well, again, I must ask, if the church has these true teachings…why are they not put forth more prominently? Why are they so hidden that a person who was raised in a Catholic family, attended 12 yrs of Catholic school, participated fully in the life of a Catholic church, and read countless Catholic books over the course of several decades…why couldn’t this person see these wonderful, obviously true teachings?

I’m not a fool. I was a straight A student, was in conversation with the Franciscan order about becoming a nun. I was regularly comended by teachers and priests, (and my sister who went to a Catholic University and studiey theology) for my knowledge of the teachings of the church, and for knowing the history of them…But hey, maybe all those people were wrong, and I really don’t know. Maybe there are secrets yet to be learned. Maybe I am just a hard nut to crack.

The truth is, the more I learned about the church, the less I believed it.

So you an others tell me, if I just put MORE time and effort into learning about your church…I would see the truth. But what is my motivation?

If I asked you to read literature on my faith, that you might know the truth…would you? Or would you say, no thank you, I already have the truth? I guess that is what I am saying, no thanks, been there, done that, gave 20 yrs of my life to that, and now I found the truth, so there isn’t much motivation for me to go there again.

On the subject of home…I thought home was were the heart was…If a person were born Jewish, and did all the appropriate Jewish things, but then converted to Catholicism, would Judaism still be their home? Would it be preferable for them to someday return to Judaism because they had been “marked” for it as a child?

I have converted to another faith from Catholicism. Because Catholics only recognize Catholic ritual as valid, I guess that makes no difference to the church, but there it is all the same. I am something else now, the church is not my home. I’ve been adopted out so to speak, and they have lost their claim on me.

Again, I can only implore the church, and the members of the church who keep telling me I am the victim of bad catachesis (like I said, maybe I was) that if you have the truth you would do well to share it, because alot of what is presented as Catholicism is pretty weird and puts up a block between the divine and the people. And how very sad for the church itself, who’s task it is to present the truth,if it has become the very stumbling block keeping people from it.

Jesus’ mission, was to lead us to the divine, to point us that way, not to get hung up on Jesus the person, not to spend countless hours on our knees talking to his mom, not to make statues of other people who did things right, and get hung up on them and what they did, but to keep moving along to the divine. The church institutionalizes distraction and blesses and condones it. Jesus died trying to make us see, and instead people stare at the cross, kiss it, worship it, instead of what it points to.

I know it is easier to hang onto something solid, and talk to something with a face, but that is not the nature of the divine, so we must overcome that, grow up and follow where Christ pointed.

cheddar

 

[YinYangMom]

cheddarsox:

The church institutionalizes distraction and blesses and condones it. Jesus died trying to make us see, and instead people stare at the cross, kiss it, worship it, instead of what it points to.

I know it is easier to hang onto something solid, and talk to something with a face, but that is not the nature of the divine, so we must overcome that, grow up and follow where Christ pointed.

cheddar

Cheddar,

It’s been a pleasure conversing with you as well. You have presented your position in a charitable way and I appreciate your willingness to share your beliefs with us.

The part of your post I left above seems to be at the crux of a lot of the moving away from the Church. I don’t understand why so many people view those practices as ‘distractions’ when they are not that way at all, nor are they presented that way. Somewhere along the line I guess their experiences with the rituals did not meet their expectations, so they stopped doing them and when they saw that the world would not fall apart around them after they stopped, then they figure it must not be as important as the Church was saying all along…what else is the Church wrong about? And there they go, looking for something less cumbersome, less restrictive, more open.

At the same time, many people find peace in our rituals and practices - the peace they weren’t finding elsewhere from their other denominations and they enter into the Church renewed.

And you’re right, we do consider the Church as keepers of the Truth and until one gets that Truth they aren’t “home”. I get how that comes off rather brash, doesn’t it? It’s not intended to be that way. The thing is for us, Jesus is the Truth, the Life and the Way. We take that part very, very seriously. If we’re hung up on anything, it’s that. He told us to celebrate the Eucharist “in memory of Me”, so we do. He gave us His mother while He was on the cross, so we honor her as Our Mother.

The statues, the crosses, the things you say we ‘worship’ - we don’t worship those, and with the Catechisis you’ve been given over the years, you know that (or at least should). The Church has always taught that the icons, the statues, the symbols are only reminders to us to focus on what they point to, as you noted, and that is always the Holy Trinity - God, Jesus, Holy Spirit. The reminders are no different than the pictures of family and friends we have displayed in our homes or offices. People put pictures of loved ones up because they want that sense of their presence in their daily lives since they can’t physically be with us. As much as we’d love to spend 24/7 in a Church in front of the Eucharist until the day we die, that’s just not possible. We have to work, tend to our homes, care for those around us. So when we leave the church we carry with us mementos of where we really long to be. I carry pictures of my parents 1500 miles from me because I want to be with them but can’t.

Still, could you share with us how, having been taught all that you have about Catholicism (I can’t believe all the teachings were poor, given as much as you’ve received) you were able to come to the conclusion that some of the basic core teachings were false? I honestly am perplexed about that. Particularly with the part about Mary. All well-trained Catholics know we do not worship her, so how does a well-trained Catholic get convinced that we do?

 

[cheddarsox]

There is a huge gap between the official church teachings, and the actual practice. And while I know that the Vatican cannot keep watch over every church let alone every member, there is at least a tacit, and I feel implicit acceptance of practices that, except on paper, are worship of things other than God.

No matter how many words the official teachings pile on, the truth is many people worship Mary, or a saint, or a particular “aspect” of Christ with a vehemence and devotion that supercedes their attention to the divine. I have seen it, I have experienced it. Words mean nothing, what the church says on paper means nothing when this takes place rampantly and is condoned and in some ways encouraged, with endless prayers, statues, novenas, shrines etc, etc, etc, that have nothing to do with God.

As a young girl I was taught to focus on young female saints, like Rose of Lima, who, when she was told she had beautiful hands, dipped them in a vat of lye so that no one would ever compliment her again, because that would encourage vanity and lessen her focus on God. Hmmm…that’s a good role model. But somehow my family and church were not similarly impressed when I defaced my own body in an effort to please the Lord. No, I was labeled troubled and sinful…

In my Catholic high school, we had a life size statue of St Maria Garetti. She fought being raped to the death (her own) rather than give up her purity. I had been sexually abused, but clearly had fallen short of the mark, because I was still alive. Again, church and family not happy with my efforts to atone for my impurity and follow the example of SAINT Maria Garretti.

I was taught, as a young woman, that rape is a lesser sin than masturbation, because at least in rape the sex act is not disordered, as the male stuff goes where God intended it to.
So, a person pleasuring themself was a greater sin than any sin that had been done against my person! And do you know what? About 10 days ago, I saw that teaching again on these forums. Rape is less of a sin than masturbation.

While people argue over how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, and how Mary gave birth to Christ without having her hymen torn, people are dying in the trenches, their hearts turned to dust because they might be in a state of mortal sin and not know it, because in spite of their best efforts to please the Almighty, they may have accidentally made a mistake, blinked during the benediction or forgotten a sin during their last confession, and for that,they could lose it all. That is Catholicism in the trenches. If you don’t believe me…read the threads on this forum!

One of the reasons I came to this forum was to revisit Catholicism, to see, two decades later, if maybe my perception as a young person had been wrong. To see if my rejection of the faith had been hasty. But, nope, I see the same stuff alive and well.

The faith is not on paper, The faith is not in a book. It is what is written in the hearts of the people, how they live and experience it. I can only ask again and again, If the church has the truth, why bother with all that other stuff?

I know the explanations for Marian devotion on paper, but I also know that it plays out, for many, as there being a goddess to worship. And many focus on HER, and the graces SHE will give, hiding in the folds of HER skirt from the divine. But do you know what? the divine does not have a mother. That is a distraction, a metaphore that has gotten way out of hand. It is indistinguishable from polytheism. Trust me, I know a LOT of polytheists. The only place it differs is (drum roll here) on PAPER. And it goes on, and in no way is the church ignorant of it.
If a father has two sons, and he asks his sons to do a task for him, and one son say “No father, I will not” but later repents in his heart and does it, and the other son says “Yes father, I will” but does not…which son did the will of the father?

Words do not make up for the truth, the church puts up a screen of words, but in reality…is it doing the father’s will?

The good news is, it does not matter, on the eternal front. the divine will do what it will do, and is not subject to the folly of humans. But oh the sorrow at lives led astray by erroneous teachings, of joy not experienced, of the glory of the divine gone unwitnessed in lives that were buried in guilt and fear.

I know this got harsh, but there is great sorrow in my heart over this. It is one more thing I need to accept about the universe. But it is sad for me that an institution that could do so much more good has rendered so much mischeif and had the nerve to blame it on God.

I’ll stop ranting now.

cheddar

 

[YinYangMom]

cheddarsox:

There is a huge gap between the official church teachings, and the actual practice. And while I know that the Vatican cannot keep watch over every church let alone every member, there is at least a tacit, and I feel implicit acceptance of practices that, except on paper, are worship of things other than God.

One of the reasons I came to this forum was to revisit Catholicism, to see, two decades later, if maybe my perception as a young person had been wrong. To see if my rejection of the faith had been hasty. But, nope, I see the same stuff alive and well.

cheddar

I hear ya on all points.
Yes, too many Catholics have taken too much too literally and do not really live the life they are called to. They get caught up in and bogged down with the nitty gritty details, essentially missing the forest for the trees.

I disregard them as role models and focus my education on what is on PAPER…it’s the only way to keep sane and to remain focused on God through the Church instead of in spite of the Church’s people.

I am not accountable for those who have gone off the path while still claiming to be the authority on how I should or should not behave. I am accountable for whether or not I let them steer me astray so I spend a considerable amount of time filtering what I read here or on various ‘Catholic’ websites.

But still, I have learned much from some of the posters here, and more important, my ‘sorting/sifting’ skills have been gotten lots of exercise.

I used to spend time debating with some posters here, trying to show them how they’ve taken one teaching too far left or right, but in the end, these people cling to what they know is true and are not dense (well, no moreso than I am).

This is how our faith was formed, and I’ve come to believe that God knows what we each need. Some need to cling to a merciful God, others to the Just God, others to the God who would wipe populations off the face of the earth in anger, others to the God who will accept anyone and everyone in the Kingdom. I think God allows their faith to be formed in the manner best suited for them to remain true to Him.

You, after all your trials, have had your own revelations of the Divine. Perhaps that’s what God has in mind for you and you are on the right path…the one which will keep you focused on Him and doing His will with what time you have. Me? With all the reading and listening I’ve done, and with my life experiences I notice I tend to hone in on teachings from the Church from a certain perspective. Five of us could read the exact same document from the Vatican and come away with 5 different interpretations of it…so that each of us would incorporate that particular interpretation into our lives and out into the world.

So, yes, I see what you mean by the Church being appearing to be responsible for all the variations floating around. But the Church’s role is to preserve and disseminate the Truth. She, too, must trust in the Holy Spirit to move the message into the hearts and souls of those who hear. Please try not to hold much disdain for the Church because of the diverse responses of Her people.

Thanks again for sharing. I’ve really enjoyed this exchange.

YYM