European Catholicism

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palmas85 said:
I am afraid not Thistle. A Catholic is required to attend Mass. It is not optional as some apparently believe. The failure to attend Mass is an indicator that the person is more than just as you phrased it a “lukewatm” Catholic’ In actuality, a Catholic who stops attending Mass jas in effect rejected Catholic teaching. By rejecting teaching that person has rejected the faith.
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A fallen Catholic is still a Catholic and you do not know why a person does not attend Mass.
I would still be interested to see what uptodate statistics say on Mass attendence. For example in England Catholic attendence at Mass is higher than the Church of England attendence now
 
palmas85 said:
I am afraid not Thistle. A Catholic is required to attend Mass. It is not optional as some apparently believe. The failure to attend Mass is an indicator that the person is more than just as you phrased it a “lukewatm” Catholic’ In actuality, a Catholic who stops attending Mass jas in effect rejected Catholic teaching. By rejecting teaching that person has rejected the faith.
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Well…most of us have gone through periods of spiritual laziness. We’re not all made of oak.:o
 
thistle said:
A fallen Catholic is still a Catholic and you do not know why a person does not attend Mass.
I would still be interested to see what uptodate statistics say on Mass attendence. For example in England Catholic attendence at Mass is higher than the Church of England attendence now
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Is the Church of England dying? I sounds like it. Wouldn’t it be poetic justice if England became predominantly CATHOLIC. Ha.👍
 
thistle said:
A fallen Catholic is still a Catholic and you do not know why a person does not attend Mass.
I would still be interested to see what uptodate statistics say on Mass attendence. For example in England Catholic attendence at Mass is higher than the Church of England attendence now
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I don’t don’t that for a second given what the Church of England is up to these days and with England having large numbers of eastern Europeans moving in who still actually have a Catholic belief system, .but that is hardly the point. When does non participation equal abandonment? A fallen away Catholic is certainly still Catholic unless he renounces, but not a practicing one, and cannot really be counted as one.

Under that equation the millions upon millions of Central Americans and Mexicans who have abandoned the Church in favor of evangelical Christian sects or cults are still Catholics. So in that case how long does one need to be non practicing before it equals equal abandonment? One year, ten years 30? If I am a member of a Church with 1,000 registered members and only 50 show up for Mass does that Church truly have 1,000 members?

I don’t think so…
 
Interesting thread. My family is from Albania and though we were one of the firsts to accept Catholicism in Europe the ottoman invasions have drastically changed our country and a good portion of it became Muslim. What I have noticed though is a drastic drop in Islam followers and a major increase in Catholics. About 10 years ago it was 70% Muslim and today it is about 45-50 with Catholicism being 2nd and Orthodox being 3rd followed by a good 10% being atheist.

I seen someone mention this being western European thread, though it doesn’t say it in the title, but I thought I’d speak from an eastern European perspective. Many neighboring countries of ours are also predominantly Christian besides Bosnia, most being either orthodox or Catholic with very few other types of Christianity.

There is a quote I learned just recently, “Catholicism is like a turtle, it moves slowly but each step is firmly secured.”
 
Kristofer88 said:
Interesting thread. My family is from Albania and though we were one of the firsts to accept Catholicism in Europe the ottoman invasions have drastically changed our country and a good portion of it became Muslim. What I have noticed though is a drastic drop in Islam followers and a major increase in Catholics. About 10 years ago it was 70% Muslim and today it is about 45-50 with Catholicism being 2nd and Orthodox being 3rd followed by a good 10% being atheist.

I seen someone mention this being western European thread, though it doesn’t say it in the title, but I thought I’d speak from an eastern European perspective. Many neighboring countries of ours are also predominantly Christian besides Bosnia, most being either orthodox or Catholic with very few other types of Christianity.

There is a quote I learned just recently, “Catholicism is like a turtle, it moves slowly but each step is firmly secured.”
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Do Albanian Catholics and Serbian Orthodox get along all right? For example, in Kosovo? Generally, in the news we hear about how the Serbian Orthodox are being killed and their Churches destroyed in Kosovo?
 
The reason why that is happening is because Kosova was taken from Albanians by the Serbians and given the name Kosovo which means black bird in Serbian, because our flag is of a black double headed eagle. They persecuted thousands of our people during the wars in 1996-1999 and tried reclaiming it once we took it back though it was ours to begin with.

The reason why they always are at war is because they entered Kosova and try establishing Serbian provinces in it which the Albanians do not want for obvious reasons. It is a rich country in oil which is a little known fact and that is why it was so valuable to Serbia. However, Kosova being much poorer does not control media too well in eastern Europe, and thus Serbia and its ally Russia manipulate the Slavic people to believe we are the bad guys. They attacked u.s embassies in Kosova when they declared independence and killed a few thousand Albanians along the borders.

Nothing to do with religion though, its kind of like the jews and arabs, we’ve always been at war with them.
 
Kristofer88 said:
Nothing to do with religion though, its kind of like the jews and arabs, we’ve always been at war with them.
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I heard it had everything to do with relgiion. Catholics just don;t like the Orthodox Serbs and they have even setup concentration camps for Serbian Orthodox. For example, in WWII, there was a concentration camp at Jasenovac, which was under a Catholic clergyman called Miroslav Filipovac, and the Catholic Croatians tortured and killed many Serbian Orthodox there.
 
Is the Church of England dying? I sounds like it. Wouldn’t it be poetic justice if England became predominantly CATHOLIC. Ha.
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There is a strong chance that England will one day become predominantly Catholic because of increased immigration and the terrible state of the Anglican Communion.

The Church of England appears to be on the brink of disaster because of the warring factions within it’s ranks. Remember the saying of Our Lord: And if a kingdom be divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. And if a house be divided against itself, that house cannot stand. In the same way, the Anglican Communion cannot stand if it remains divided on the issues of sexuality and the role of women within the Church. If the Archbishop of Canterbury is unable to placate both the orthodox and progressive parties, then an inevitable split will occur.

A divided Anglican Communion will lose strength and stature, especially within England. If the Communion is broken, I think that the Church of England will become equal to the many protestant denominations because many faithful will leave; the progressives will leave because they will see the Church of England as out dated and conservative, and the orthodox Anglicans will leave because they will see any moves to appease the progressives as departing from the laws of Scripture.

As consequence of a weaker Church of England and increased Polish immigration, the Catholic Church in England will steadily grow until it becomes the largest Christian denomination in our shores. When this day comes, the Catholic Church will in reality become the established religion of England because the majority of Christians will be Catholic. This may not formally be acknowledged, but it will be true nontheless.
 
bobzills said:
I heard it had everything to do with relgiion. Catholics just don;t like the Orthodox Serbs and they have even setup concentration camps for Serbian Orthodox. For example, in WWII, there was a concentration camp at Jasenovac, which was under a Catholic clergyman called Miroslav Filipovac, and the Catholic Croatians tortured and killed many Serbian Orthodox there.
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The country my family is from doesn’t really care about religion, what I mean by that is they don’t fight over religions they all get along fine, if your Albanian your the same as another regardless of beliefs. What you heard was false, much of the media is controlled by Slavic countries, who can make whoever they dislike seem as good or bad as they wish, since our country is small and rather poor they can’t do much, America has seen it however and helped us during many wars including against Russia.
 
interesting statistics on the european countries. i tend to agree with a lot of what king alfred said in his posts.
i have also heard how the people in europe have become very secular.
which makes it very easy for islam to gain a foothold in countries such as spain and france.
very scary that in italy it is below 50%. are there other christian religions practiced in italy?
at least in the united states there are a lot of people attending religious services over the weekends, however, we have such a hodgepodge of different religions here.
i like the analogy of catholicism and the turtle moving slowly.
 
palmas85 said:
I recently posted that it appears that in many once staunchly Catholic European countries, Catholicism has been pretty much abandoned to a great degree. I was called on this statement so, I decided to post some stats gleaned from various polls taken. Let us remember that in Polls of this sort the number that say they attend Mass is usually about twice that actually do. Recent studies in the US and Canada saw that if 40% said they attended Mass the true figure was closer to 20-25% with similar results coming out of Western Europe. With that in mind lets look at a few figures

Malta 84% The shining star
Ireland 71%, slipping badly, the latest polls show it to be around 50% I posted the higher figure as it compares with the same time frame as the other estimates
Poland 60% the only country which has showed an increase since the 80’s
Italy 48% Really scary when you think about it
Spain 30% even scarier
Austria 28%
Luxemburg and Germany tied with 27%:eek:
Belgium 26%
Switzerland 23%
The Netherlands 19%:eek:
France 12% :bigyikes: :bigyikes:

When you factor in the half that say they attend when they don’t, the figures are truly horrific and I feel are the reason that the Holy Father has made the re-vitalization of Catholicism in Europe a top priority of his pontificate.

These figures are from the World values Survey with the latest results from 2000.
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What a tragedy it would be if the haerth of Catholicism, a place once re-built and given a second ‘lease on life’, specifically by the Catholic Church, abandoned Catholicism. The greatest civilization on Earth, at one time, was revitalized in the name of Jesus Christ by the Roman Church, and put its indelible iimprint on the entire world. Christian Europe might have to be fought for, by the citizens of ‘Greater Europe’, for the good of all humanity, in the not-too-distant future.:knight1:
 
and then there is someone like bill maher, who has many supporters, who would like european catholics, american catholics, and catholics around the world to abandon our religion along with other christians and the jews and move on so that civilization can move forward.

he has a new movie coming out. i don’t know what the name is, but i am sure it will offend all judeo-christians.

i don’t know why particularly in europe church affiliation is down. i don’t know what is happening over there that is causing people to abandon their catholic faith or christian faith.
 
Rawb said:
You rarely meet a lukewarm or cafeteria muslem.
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You’ve never met an American Muslim then. Where I live probably 25% of the population is Muslim, but none of the American borns care about their faith.
 
deborahaz said:
and then there is someone like bill maher, who has many supporters, who would like european catholics, american catholics, and catholics around the world to abandon our religion along with other christians and the jews and move on so that civilization can move forward.

he has a new movie coming out. i don’t know what the name is, but i am sure it will offend all judeo-christians.

i don’t know why particularly in europe church affiliation is down. i don’t know what is happening over there that is causing people to abandon their catholic faith or christian faith.
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Ultra-multi-culturalism and the relativism it inevitably produces. Also, Socialism has beaten down all things traditionally European. Marxism is one of the most contemptible curses known to humanity.
 
i pray it will not be a sign of things to come here in america. i think in america we might be more spiritually grounded. so, hopefully, our churches, whether they be catholic or protestant will remain full.

i guess we can pray for a revitilization of faith in europe!
 
deborahaz said:
i pray it will not be a sign of things to come here in america. i think in america we might be more spiritually grounded. so, hopefully, our churches, whether they be catholic or protestant will remain full.

i guess we can pray for a revitilization of faith in europe!
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Indeed, we must. And when Europeans dissrespect us, as they’ve gotten accustomed to doing lately, we should consider the source and not worry about it. They hate our President for example, yet find themselves being quietly colonized by radical Muslims from the Middle East. The ‘last laugh’ will be on them, when they awake one day and find themselves living under a brutal, Islamic theocracy. European women will especially feel betrayed and victimized.* Islam is no friend of women.*
 
European women will especially feel betrayed and victimized. Islam is no friend of women.
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Many European women are marrying Muslim men. I often think this will play a massive role in the Islamization of Europe.

You would have to be a fool not to realize what is happening in Europe. The Muslim population is steadily increasing and most people don’t take time to think about the consequences.

Before we know it, Europe will become an Islamic Continent. When that happens, many will not understand how it happened.
 
i agree with both of your posts. and when people in europe speak out they are punished. i believe bridgette bardot the actress has gone before a judge several times for speaking out against the muslims and what they are doing to her beloved country of france. she has had to pay fines for making what they call hate speech. i know a few people in holland have spoken out and are either killed or have death threats placed against them.
the catholic priests in europe must be very sad to see the foothold that islam has in europe and to see their churches empty or at least not at the capacity they would like to see.
at least i know at my church almost every mass over the weekend is packed.
i think there are some states that are more heavily populated by muslims in america. we have several mosques where i live, but we also have many, many churches of all faiths.
all we can do is pray for the Catholics in Europe.
 
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