Behavior of average Evangelical vs. Catholic

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JesusforMadrid said:
The more interesting question for my Roman church brothers is: Why are Roman Catholics as a whole less passionate about their faith than Evangelicals are?

For me, if the RC church doesn’t change lives, all your fine apologetics is rather useless, ¿no?
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This is a silly question. Evangelicals are, by definition, passionate Protestants. When there is a Protestant group with passionate, conservative members and lukewarm members, the passionate ones always inevitably split off and form their own new church…Catholics don’t form new churches to suit their own preferences and cliques, or else they would no longer be Catholic. If the poll simply read “Protestants” and “Catholics”, I bet Catholics would come up as being much more passionate about their faith. It’s unfair to select a particular group of Protestants to compare with all of Catholics. A more fair poll would compare self-identifying Evangelicals with self-identifying Traditional Catholics.
 
Does the average evangelical or average catholic behave in a more christian manner?
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My question is more fundamental. Why does the question discriminate against Orthodox Christianity? WHy have they not also been asked and their views taken into account?
 
santaro75 said:
Funny, at work yesterday it so happened that all of us in the cabin (i am a pilot with a crew of three) were catholic and were discussing how hard it is for a young&single catholic(me) to find a well behaved, young and seriously practicing catholic girl to date. It was funny that we all had the same experience that Catholic youth do not lead Catholic lives normally. We seem to find their way back to the church later in life. (as was the case for me). The flight attendant suggested i find a protestant girl and convert her.

I think of an analogy to wine and grape juice. Wine is for adults and grape juice is for kids. The Catholic liturgy is like fine wine. We are serving fine wine to kids and they spit it out. Not until they are older and can appreciate the complex flavor of a fine wine will they appreciate it.

does that analogy work?

peace
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It does :yup: ! Have you tried some of the Catholic Dating Sites?
catholicsingles.com/index.html :love: !!!

PS…there is a thread here and they are looking for good Catholic Men 🙂 forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?p=1826078#post1826078
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santaro75 said:
i have tried the services. usually winding up meeting someone 1500 miles away. And to tell you the truth a lot of the people go to mass but aren’t really all that catholic.
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This is true. Just because someone goes to Mass does not mean that they are really Catholic. But at least they go to Mass. Perhaps they are looking for something more in their life and that is why they keep going to Mass. Perhaps the faith that they have is not enough so they want to deepen their faith so they continue going to Mass.

I also believe that they join a Catholic dating service becaues perhaps if their faith is not enough maybe they want to find someone to help deepen their faith. Even though we know that only God could do that. But it would help coming from a significant other. 😉 Something to think about.
 
JesusforMadrid said:
That is how statistics work. But please don’t do this. It would leave a lot of beautiful buildings very empty on Sundays.

I don’t watch a ot of televison and don’t get US programmes anyway.

As for crossing the Tiber, that would be a complete disaster.
Leaving aside all theological differences, my style would not fit in with your local parish and you would ask me to leave in about 6 months.

Month 1: I request 30 minutes of praise and worship time before mass. I bring in the rock group. The parish priest reluctantly complies.

Month 2: I request 30 minutes of “ministry time” after mass, during with time people are free to confess to one another, pray for one another, lay hands on one another and use whatever Spiritual gift they feel appropriate, within the guidelines set out by St. Paul in I Cor. 12 and 14.

Month 3: I request that we begin an Alpha course or other evangelistic outreach. I suggest that I lead it.

Month 4: I request that we begin a number of programmes to help the needy, including drug abuse recovery and homosexual recovery. I bring in the guys to lead the groups.

Month 5: I get hundreds of little cards printed up with the name of our parish and directions on how to get there. Then I visit every street person, homosexual bar and prostitute in your town and invite them all to mass, same time as you and your family. We sit behind you and take up more than half the pews.

Month 6: You and the parish priest ask to visit me. My home. You suggest another local parish would be “more appropriate” for me. Your parish priest nods his head in approval.
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I will respond by saying before Mass should be a quiet time of prayer not a rock and roll jam. I do like your ideas of outreach to the poor and needy and my parish helps with food donation and help for needy people. After Mass once a month we have a coffee hour just to get together and chat. I agree with a bible study with a catholic view. I would love to have one in my parish but I don’t know anything about Alpha course.
 
catholics are more christian in my opinion, because most of the evanglicals i’ve seen are radical and hate everyone that arn’t evangelical, they have even said the pope is the anti-christ
 
Anima_Christi said:
. Evangelicals are, by definition, passionate Protestants.
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Yes, but not all passionate Protestants are Evangelical - I could introduce you to some really passionate Methodists who would not identify themselves as Evangelical. I’m also not sure of most Mennonites would classify themselves as Evangelical, but I don’t think I know another group as passionate about their faith.

Speaking from a UK perspective, you are more likely to get a greater % of people at a Sunday mass who are culturally Catholic. They’ve been taught non- attendence at Sunday Mass is a sin, so they go, but there may not be an engaged relationship with Christ. A greater % of those at Protestant Sunday services (there’ll be a smaller total number) will be very committed to their faith - because there tends to be a greater choice to go there - they go because they want to, not because they feel they have to.

And btw, not all Evangelicals believe the Pope is the anti-Christ. I’ve many Evo friends who’d be appalled by the idea. They define ‘Evangelical’ as bearers of Good News. To see the positive interpretation, have a look at Richard Foster’s wonderful book ‘Streams of Living Water’.

It also depends how you define ‘good Christian’ and ‘passionate’. Sometimes it’s implied that ‘liberal’ or ‘moderate’ or ‘left wing’ mean someone is not a good Christian and is not passionate about their faith. But often the stance they (we 🙂 ) take is taken out of passionate love of Christ, not out of being lukewarm or rebellious!
 
Month 1: I request 30 minutes of praise and worship time before mass. I bring in the rock group. The parish priest reluctantly complies.

Month 2: I request 30 minutes of “ministry time” after mass, during with time people are free to confess to one another, pray for one another, lay hands on one another and use whatever Spiritual gift they feel appropriate, within the guidelines set out by St. Paul in I Cor. 12 and 14.

Month 3: I request that we begin an Alpha course or other evangelistic outreach. I suggest that I lead it.

Month 4: I request that we begin a number of programs to help the needy, including drug abuse recovery and homosexual recovery. I bring in the guys to lead the groups.

Month 5: I get hundreds of little cards printed up with the name of our parish and directions on how to get there. Then I visit every street person, homosexual bar and prostitute in your town and invite them all to mass, same time as you and your family. We sit behind you and take up more than half the pews.

Month 6: You and the parish priest ask to visit me. My home. You suggest another local parish would be “more appropriate” for me. Your parish priest nods his head in approval.

I appreciate your zeal for Christ and wanting to do the work of the Lord, but unfortunately you demonstrate the very thing that would probably cause you to be asked to leave - a condescending attitude that says several things: 1. only “evangelicals” such as yourself are concerned or actively address issues such as homosexuality, prostitution, homelessness, etc. 2. Evangelicals such as yourself know more about worship than the church which has develop a liturgical form of worship over 2,000 years. 3. Only evangelicals such as yourself have any idea about evangelism and outreach. 4. Evangelicals such as yourself are somehow more accepting of worshiping along side “different” people.

In the end it would be an arrogant disregard for the traditions and history of the congregation and the church that would cause people to ask you to leave. I am not saying asking someone to leave is right either, but people are of a fallen humanity, even within the church. Hopefully an insightful and gracious priest would be able to make a positive situation for all concerned.
Grace and Peace.
272
 
AlegreFe said:
I know of this Atheist who is the nicest, kindest and most polite person you could meet. He was also baptized Catholic. But somehow I believe that deep down inside his heart and soul he believes in God. He only believes the way that he believes because he lost his father at an early age. Of course it could be for other reasons also. I still think he believes deep down inside. I pray for him.
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Can one who was baptized “Catholic” (Christian actually) ever be an atheist? Once washed in the water of baptized and claimed by Christ can one ever give back the grace imparted? So perhaps grace is still working within him though he might not consider himself Christian. I have found through personal experience, one’s atheism is directly related to one’s anger with God.
 
twosevendeuce said:
Can one who was baptized “Catholic” (Christian actually) ever be an atheist? Once washed in the water of baptized and claimed by Christ can one ever give back the grace imparted? So perhaps grace is still working within him though he might not consider himself Christian. I have found through personal experience, one’s atheism is directly related to one’s anger with God.
(emphasis added)
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Why do you think I said this in my post?.. "He only believes the way that he believes because he lost his father at an early age." So with that, he is angry that God took his father away from him. I call him an athiest because someone I know that really knows him says he doesn’t believe in God. But I think it’s because he’s angry at God. If he doesn’t believe in God then why be angry at Him? Or why be angry at “anyone” who could have control over life so as to not stop the end of someone’s life? So deep down, this person really does believe in God but is angry or disappointed or very upset or all of the above.
So could you please pray for him? :gopray2: God knows who you’re talking about. :yup:
 
MariaG said:
👍 :gopray:
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Thank you so much Maria. This person is half Mexican and half Polish. You can’t get any more “Catholic” than that! He was baptized into the Catholic Church so I know the Grace of Jesus Christ is with him. He just has to realize it, be open to it, and accept the Grace. :gopray2:
 
AlegreFe said:
Thank you so much Maria. This person is half Mexican and half Polish. You can’t get any more “Catholic” than that! He was baptized into the Catholic Church so I know the Grace of Jesus Christ is with him. He just has to realize it, be open to it, and accept the Grace. :gopray2:
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You are welcome:)

I completely believe that the grace of Christ is there with him just waiting for him to accept that grace.

When I was in the Protestant Churches, I learned a statistic. It said that 80% of people who are Christians today, went to Sunday School as children.

As a person who was a baptized cradle Catholic but never went to church or any kind of “Sunday school” after age of 4, that has always fascinated me. By their view, I am the “20%”.

I have come to believe that I am very fortunate to have been baptized as an infant. I DO believe God is able and does give us grace through that baptism, and “work” on us as adults.

I WILL add my prayers to yours:)
 
MariaG said:
I completely believe that the grace of Christ is there with him just waiting for him to accept that grace.

I have come to believe that I am very fortunate to have been baptized as an infant. I DO believe God is able and does give us grace through that baptism, and “work” on us as adults.
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I believe the same. I am also a “revert”, baptised as an infant, did all the “right Catholic stuff”, even went to Catholic college, then stopped going to church altogether for about 5 years. Then I had a born again experience after going to a Christian music festival and went back to the Catholic Church. I never “got it” when I was growing up and thought church was a chore. It wasn’t until I was an adult that I had my born again experience and finally understood God’s grace; but I think He was definitely working on me because I had been baptised and He didn’t want to let me stay away! He never forces anybody to belong to Him, but He definitely gives us all nudges gently to bring us back. I will pray for your friend also.
 
MariaG said:
You are welcome:)

I completely believe that the grace of Christ is there with him just waiting for him to accept that grace.

When I was in the Protestant Churches, I learned a statistic. It said that 80% of people who are Christians today, went to Sunday School as children.

As a person who was a baptized cradle Catholic but never went to church or any kind of “Sunday school” after age of 4, that has always fascinated me. By their view, I am the “20%”.

I have come to believe that I am very fortunate to have been baptized as an infant. I DO believe God is able and does give us grace through that baptism, and “work” on us as adults.

I WILL add my prayers to yours:)
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Wow, for being the so-called “20%” you did pretty good. 😃
 
lak611 said:
I believe the same. I am also a “revert”, baptised as an infant, did all the “right Catholic stuff”, even went to Catholic college, then stopped going to church altogether for about 5 years. Then I had a born again experience after going to a Christian music festival and went back to the Catholic Church. I never “got it” when I was growing up and thought church was a chore. It wasn’t until I was an adult that I had my born again experience and finally understood God’s grace; but I think He was definitely working on me because I had been baptised and He didn’t want to let me stay away! He never forces anybody to belong to Him, but He definitely gives us all nudges gently to bring us back. I will pray for your friend also.
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Thanks so much for your prayers. :gopray:

God’s amazing isn’t He? 😃 I like His little nudges.
 
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