Disbelieving some or all of the Profession of Faith negate one being Christian?

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Why does the Church have the Profession of Faith in the Sunday Liturgy? When and why was this Creed established? If one does not believe in one of the articles in the Profession of Faith, does that disbelief negate ones being a Christian?
 
In order to be properly defined as a Christian, one must believe in the Trinity as understood by the Church. However, to be properly defined as a Catholic, among other things a person must believe the Creed in its entirety. Is this simply a hypothetical question, or is there some part of the Creed that you are struggling with?
 
JMJ

The “Profession of Faith” in the Mass is the Nicene Creed, simplified by Pope Paul VI. It was formulated in the Council of Nicea to state a brief summary of the most important dogmas of the Church founded by Christ and delivered to the leadership of St. Peter.

To “be” or to “not be” a Christian has taken on many contemporary meanings. In the formal sense, Christ founded One Church, and One Church only, which He will be with until the end of time. To be a follower of Christ, a Christian, you must be a member of that Church. To be a member of that Church you must accept and profess **all ** of its defined dogmas, no exceptions. The “Profession of Faith” names a few of the important defined-dogmas. Failure to accept any one of those dogmas is heresy. Heresy separates one from communion with the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church. Therefore, one excommunicates one’s self from the Church by failure to accept any of its dogmas…

In “modern” terms, most refer to a “Christian” as one who “believes” in Christ. The word “believes” has as many meanings as can be imagined by the human mind. This decomposes the general use of the word, “Christian,” to an undefined mixture of beliefs and disbeliefs. The use of the names, Christian and Catholic, have refered to the same Church since 110 A.D. Although many protestants refer to Catholics as non-Christian. It is the protestants who broke away from the Church after 1500 years, now claiming they are the followers of Christ, although they deny the Truth of the dogmas that Christ guaranteed by direct reference in the New Testament.

My answer to you is that ALL of the dogmas stated in the “profession of Faith,” and many more MUST be accepted and professed to be a member of the Churh founded and protected by Christ until the end of time.
 
Dr. Colossus:
In order to be properly defined as a Christian, one must believe in the Trinity as understood by the Church. However, to be properly defined as a Catholic, among other things a person must believe the Creed in its entirety. Is this simply a hypothetical question, or is there some part of the Creed that you are struggling with?
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I, too, understood the Creed to be an integral part of being a Christian and that if one did not believe any one article in the Creed that they, then, are not a believing Christian. I have two reasons for trying to clarify the significance of the Profession of Faith that we profess in the Sunday Liturgy. First, I don’t think most Catholics know the importance of the Creed they profess. Other than reciting the Creed, I don’t know of any way to objectively prove one believes what he or she says they profess to believe, except perhaps one article. Second, I stated my understanding of the significance of the Creed to being a Christian on the Al Kresta Message Boards, a Catholic site, and was rebutted by a knowledgeable gentleman that claimed if one was baptized that one would still be a Christian even if the person did not believe all the articles in the Creed. For the sake of discussion, I only had church-going Catholics in mind.

Any thoughts on these two points?
 
jim orr:
I, too, understood the Creed to be an integral part of being a Christian and that if one did not believe any one article in the Creed that they, then, are not a believing Christian. I have two reasons for trying to clarify the significance of the Profession of Faith that we profess in the Sunday Liturgy. First, I don’t think most Catholics know the importance of the Creed they profess. Other than reciting the Creed, I don’t know of any way to objectively prove one believes what he or she says they profess to believe, except perhaps one article. Second, I stated my understanding of the significance of the Creed to being a Christian on the Al Kresta Message Boards, a Catholic site, and was rebutted by a knowledgeable gentleman that claimed if one was baptized that one would still be a Christian even if the person did not believe all the articles in the Creed. For the sake of discussion, I only had church-going Catholics in mind.

Any thoughts on these two points?
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The creed really doesn’t address anything that Jesus taught and is more a test of allegiance to the institutional church than to the principles of Jesus. Now if an allegiance to the church is considered an infallible requirement of being Christian, than by definition one would have to believe the creed to be Christian.

But one could act as Jesus wanted without the creed. As a matter of fact the creed doesn’t address any of the practical aspects of being either Christian or more importantly, Christlike.

Peace
 
According to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the articles of faith in the Creed “require the assent of theological faith by all members of the faithful. Thus, whoever obstinately places them in doubt or denies them falls under the censure of heresy, as indicated by the respective canons of the Codes of Canon Law” (emphasis in the original).
 
jim orr:
Why does the Church have the Profession of Faith in the Sunday Liturgy? When and why was this Creed established? If one does not believe in one of the articles in the Profession of Faith, does that disbelief negate ones being a Christian?
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Since only Catholics are Christians (non-Catholic “christians” are actually heretics, not Christian, which means to believe ALL Christ taught), it follows that if one rejects any part of the Creed (including, as eastern schismatics do, Filioque, whcih is that the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Father and the Son), then he is not a Christian.
 
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EENS:
Since only Catholics are Christians (non-Catholic “christians” are actually heretics, not Christian, which means to believe ALL Christ taught), it follows that if one rejects any part of the Creed (including, as eastern schismatics do, Filioque, whcih is that the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Father and the Son), then he is not a Christian.
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If we are know by the fruits of our actions, it is obvious that believing ALL that Jesus taught is not a requirement of being a catholic or else our church’s leaders are not Christians. (In a relitively benign yet clear example,compare the structure and the structures of the vatican to what Jesus taught about exaltation)

(But can we reliably hold any humans to the standards of Christ?)

Peace
 
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ricatholic:
If we are know by the fruits of our actions, it is obvious that believing ALL that Jesus taught is not a requirement of being a catholic or else our church’s leaders are not Christians. (In a relitively benign yet clear example,compare the structure and the structures of the vatican to what Jesus taught about exaltation)

(But can we reliably hold any humans to the standards of Christ?)

Peace
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Your problem is that you personally interpret the Bible, which is a translation of a translation, and then misunderstand Our Lord’s words, so as to come to the conclusion that there should be no structure or hierarchy in the Church. This is an absurd idea! (However, I may have missed your point because it seems there is an error in your parenthesis that make it difficult to understand.) God bless.
 
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ricatholic:
If we are know by the fruits of our actions, it is obvious that believing ALL that Jesus taught is not a requirement of being a catholic or else our church’s leaders are not Christians. (In a relitively benign yet clear example,compare the structure and the structures of the vatican to what Jesus taught about exaltation)

(But can we reliably hold any humans to the standards of Christ?)

Peace
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That doesn’t seem to make sense, since it was clearly stated before, that believing ALL that Jesus taught is a requirement to being a Catholic. We all believe what Jesus taught, however we still sin, in spite of our best intentions not to.

It seems to me that you already knew the answer to this. It seems that I have heard your name before and it was also paired with “troublemaker” That this has been discussed on the beliefnet forums…

Am I right? If you are genuinely interested in what Catholics believe then you are at the right place, if you want to discuss it then fine. As long you are respectful and charitable, then we will be as well.

Sid
 
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Faustina:
That doesn’t seem to make sense, since it was clearly stated before, that believing ALL that Jesus taught is a requirement to being a Catholic. We all believe what Jesus taught, however we still sin, in spite of our best intentions not to.

It seems to me that you already knew the answer to this. It seems that I have heard your name before and it was also paired with “troublemaker” That this has been discussed on the beliefnet forums…

Am I right? If you are genuinely interested in what Catholics believe then you are at the right place, if you want to discuss it then fine. As long you are respectful and charitable, then we will be as well.

Sid
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Sid, do you really want to discuss anything with a “troublemaker”?

Where to start?

Do you want to discuss the conditional "best intentions " in your first thought?

How about the fruits concept and whether it is enough to say you believe, which amounts to faith alone, or must we show we are catholics and that our leaders must follow the same standards?

Do you want to discuss whether the profession of the faith really is a profession of faith or if it is a test of allegiance?

Or do you just want to cut and run?

Peace
 
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