Does a particular religion matter if its the same faith?

[Lizzard85]

Hello!
I was born into a Roman Catholic family. I was baptized as a baby and went to church as a child but my parents never had me go to communion or do confirmation classes. After leaving the church for a while my parents started attending Protestant churches. I attended with them. I learned about the faith as well. Into college I took several Religious Studies courses.

After being absent from church for about 2 years I decided to check out a local Catholic church. I found that what was being preached by the Father was the exact same thing as did the Protestant pastor. Afterall we are worshipping the same God and we read from the same Bible. I found that the interepretations of the scriptures were almost exactly alike. Now as an adult I can make a decision of what church to attend. I remember many Protestant pastors stating that Jesus did not come to create religions, He came to create followers for Him. In seeing that many Catholic and Protestant churches preach the same stuff, without any bias answers, I want to know does belonging to a specific sect matter if the faith is the same and the heart is in the same place?
Im only asking this because ive become very interested in that Catholic church but I don’t want it to be about religion but about my faith and personal relationship with God.

Thank you!
God bless!

Lizzy

 

[Fr.Vincent_Serpa]

Hi,

You are operating under the false notion that there is a dichotomy between faith and religion; faith being good and religion being bad. Objectively, faith stands for the sum of truths revealed by God in Scripture and tradition, and which the Church presents to us in a brief form in her creeds; subjectively, faith stands for the habit or virtue by which we assent to those truths. (See: oce.catholic.com/index.php?title=Faith)

Religion, broadly speaking, means the voluntary subjection of oneself to God. It exists in its highest perfection in heaven, where the angels and saints love, praise, and adores God, and live in absolute conformity to His holy will.

(See: oce.catholic.com/index.php?title=Religion).

You seem to be using religion to mean organized religion. The Protestant pastors were implying that Jesus did not come to create organized religions, but to inspire people to follow Him. There are some problems with this. Since Jesus did not plan to remain on this earth, how were people to learn about Him so that they could follow Him?

In order to extend His mission on earth Jesus Himself, founded a Church as Matthew 16:18-19 says: “So now I say to you: You are Peter and on this rock I will build my Church. And the gates of the underworld can never hold out against it. I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven: whatever you bind on earth shall be considered bound in heaven; whatever you loose on earth shall be considered loose in heaven.”

So Jesus founded a specific Church—not a sect or a number of sects. He gave it authority that He would back up in heaven. He said that it would endure and hold out against evil until the end of time. It’s no wonder that the various sects would not want to acknowledge that He founded one Church that preceded them by centuries and still remains strong today----and they are not it.

If all the interpretations of Scripture were the same in all the many churches that call themselves Christian, they wouldn’t exist as separate from each other. It is precisely the fact that they differ in their interpretations of Scripture, that each one is separate and insists that its’ own interpretation is the correct one.

The Catholic Church has no founder other than Jesus Himself and it alone has the authority to interpret Scripture. It was the Catholic Church that compiled the New Testament and determined which books it would contain—all by the authority that Jesus gave it.

It is only though the Church that He founded that we can know Him personally, have faith in Him and rest assured that what it teaches is true. It matters immensely that one belong to it and not any number of others that He did not found.

Fr. Vincent Serpa, O.P.