When I meant the Catholics have a more liberal view of the Bible I just meant they(Catholics) are more open to interpretation than most non Catholic churches.
I think we could debate this comment into meaningless nuance and not help either your understanding of us or our understanding of you, but perhaps it will suffice to say that our interpretation differs from yours on points of theology and how to live it.
I spent time in college with non-denominational Christians who consistently (and sometimes angrily) told me that there is no such thing as interpreting the Bible - yet they too differed on their understanding, even among one another.
Perhaps the most accurate statement you could make is that the Catholic Church sees spiritual truth always in the Bible but does not require literal truth at all points where spiritual truth is expressed. If a historical event is incorrectly placed (ie, if Judith was placed during the reign of the wrong king), that to us is a narration, a good story that helps us to approach the intended spiritual truth of reliance upon God, or the need for a holy life separate from the passions of the world, for example. Do the parables need to be actual recountings of people and events in order for Our Lord to make His point? Were there necessarily five wise virgins and five foolish bearing their lamps, in order for Jesus to have healed the blind and the lame? I don’t require that the parable be proven to have happened in order to believe in those miracles or in the point of the parable, but it is something to be taken prayerfully. Nothing that is a part of the narrative abrogates the need for Christ’s death and resurrection - the most important spiritual truth of Scripture.
Likewise, not all non-Catholic churches take Genesis literally. Some are ludicrously liberal - and when I hear the adjective “liberal” I generally think more of the Presbyterian (PCUSA, not PCA) in which Biblical sexual moraes are questioned and God is sometimes described in the feminine, or certain non-denominational churches out here that focus on a “Gospel of Wealth”.
Also when I said liberal I said that because Catholics are open to more books that could be inspired by God than just the Bible.
I see where you’re coming from - if you start with the premise that the Bible has the entirety of the answers, with no further understanding needed, then anything extra-biblical is automatically suspicious.
At the same time, consider our history, and the challenges we as Church have faced from those who, using the same Bible, attacked the Truth revealed therein. We have had many instances when it is not enough to counter one passage with another. This is where we see the merit in the patristics and other scholars who have defended the Bible and the Church for centuries. Some of the arguments you hear being made by Catholic apologists are the exact same ones made by Ignatius of Antioch in the 2nd century, or St. Jerome, who compiled the first translation of the Bible from Hebrew and from Greek into Latin (then the local and common language), or Augustine or Aquinas.
I guess that is another reason why non-Catholics don’t have a problem visiting another church or joining another church because more than likely the Pastors are preaching the same thing… what is coming out of there mouth, about God, Jesus, Heaven, the Rapture, and Salvation is all the same.
We’ve had different experiences on this. I’ve worshipped with Presbyterians, Baptists, congregations who claim no denomination, Methodists, and Lutherans. Some believe in the Rapture, others dismiss it as an american-centric invention out of the Restorationist movement. Some believe “once saved always saved”, others that you can lose your salvation - still others that if you lost it, you never were really saved to begin with. What they hold in common is a belief in Christ’s death, resurrection and Second Coming, that faith in Christ, the Son of God, is essential for salvation and life in Heaven. Where they disagree is on what exactly constitutes a saving faith - is it enough to have head knowledge, or is a ‘born-again’ experience required? Is baptism an outward sign offered to the Father, or something the Father does to us and we remain only recipients?
And, very pertinently I noticed as the Catholic visitor, what role did the Catholic Church play in the end times? My experience with this last item was markedly different. At one church (International Church of Christ), I was directly and personally challenged by the pastor to leave the Catholic Church. At others, I was told, quite happily, that their congregation was full of ex-Catholics. A few handed me Chick tracts, or other literature. Others were glad I was there and a few even offered to attend Mass with me.
Basically they want there members to be saved. They don’t want any of their members to perish.
This is common to the Catholic Church as well. I do notice, though, that Catholic priests tend to assume all in attendance are believers - though we don’t go so far as to say “I’m saved” (Rom 8:24) without adding “I am being saved” (1 Cor 1:18), and “I will be saved” (Rom 10:9). In contrast, I’ve found that non-Catholic pastors tend to approach their flock as though there are non-believers present as well. I cannot say which is the better approach - a good pastor knows the flock and approaches them where they are. When I talk with my non-Catholic friends about Fr. Nick who gives homilies directly out of the Catechism (and they are as dry as that sounds), they mention Pastor Chuck who essentially gives the same sermon every Sunday that faith in Jesus Christ alone saves, and both of us express our appreciation for the fundamentals of faith but also the desire for more mature teaching.
