Can one be catholic an agnostic?

[AndrewAnime]

can one be catholic an agnostic?

 

[Robert_Sock]

I think the answer would most likely be no, but the reason im asking is because for several years now I feared hell or eternal punishment. I been thinking about heaven and hell way too much after learning about the unforgivable sun ( blasphemy against the holy spirit). This fear has caused me to get OCD, which causes me to have unwanted blasphemous thoughts. This thoughts occur when I think about god or the holy spirit, the thoughts goes rampant while im at church which led me to avoid going to church, because I would start twitching and sometimes breakdown. I tried to talk to several different priests about my problem though I keep getting different answers, and one answer actually made my thoughts worse. For several years I stop going to church though I still believed in god, and I gotten better when I stop believing in heaven or hell. Though I still believe in an afterlife, just not heaven or hell. i still want to be catholic but i don’t want to think there is a heaven or hell because i been obsessing over it way too much. but again i still believe in the afterlife.

my question is it okay to be catholic and not believe in heaven or hell?

You’re always welcome in the Catholic Church! You got to start somewhere, and going to church seems to be the perfect starting place. I did not believe in Heaven or Hell when I first became religious!

 

[1ke]

If you have OCD and compulsive thoughts, you MUST get help from a mental health professional.

 

[DavidFilmer]

The Catholic Church is almost the most agnostic-friendly church on earth (second only to the Unitarians).

There are no beliefs that must be held to be a Catholic. Catholics may question or doubt any (or all) Church teaching and remain in good standing. This may come as quite a surprise to many people who think Catholics are required to believe all sorts of things. In truth, we are not required to believe anything.

But we don’t get to just thumb our noses at God while we wallow in our disbelief. There are some rules. The person must realize that his doubts or lack of belief is a personal fault that should be corrected. He must make a genuine, good-faith (and ongoing, if necessary) effort to correct that fault (CAF is good for that, as is the Catechism). He must not knowingly teach others anything contrary to the Faith.

If an agnostic wants to become or remain Catholic, he presumably believes that the Church knows more about God than he does. So long as he tries to understand and accept Church teaching, he may remain in a state of Grace and in good standing with the Church even if he cannot (yet) accept Her teaching.

Lots of people have doubts. Here at CAF, most of the questions we field come from people who identify themselves as Catholic.