Family's anti-Catholic remarks via facebook

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Casilda

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My husband’s family is vehemently anti-Catholic. My sister-in-law has been sending vile anti-Catholic messages to my daughter who us attending Catholic college. My daughter promptly un-friended her then told us.

Daughter is shocked. I am angry and tired of dealing with this, so cutting all ties with my husband’s family. It’s just vile and evil to attack someone’s child.
 
People who do such things as was done to your daughter aren’t doing it out of love, even if they claim they are. It’s a form of control and bullying. As sad as it is when it’s family, boundaries have to be set with such people. The best thing is to ignore them because they want to get you upset. Not a very convincing or effective means of proselytizing–attacking someone’s deepest held beliefs, but hatred knows nothing about loving others, does it. :console: They need your prayers, but you don’t have to put up with such behavior.
 
OP, you did the correct thing. Pray for SIL but maintain firm boundaries.

Honestly, one of the reasons I took down my Facebook account (which I rarely used) is because of all the negative stories I heard from either friends or family members who used it on a regular basis. It seemed like prime feeding ground to hurt people.

I’m overly sensitive as it is. So, this could have been a disaster waiting to happen for me.
 
I’m very sorry. It’s one thing if they just don’t agree with you, but the sending of messages like that is abusive and clearly crosses the line of decency. I think you’re doing the right thing.
 
Casilda said:
My husband’s family is vehemently anti-Catholic. My sister-in-law has been sending vile anti-Catholic messages to my daughter who us attending Catholic college. My daughter promptly un-friended her then told us.

Daughter is shocked. I am angry and tired of dealing with this, so cutting all ties with my husband’s family. It’s just vile and evil to attack someone’s child.
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Apart from this incident are you and your husband and daughter on good terms with those relatives?..I don’t know what to suggest as its not like you can make them suddenly change the way they think about your religion…all you can do about that is pray to God and ask him to change them and their anti catholic views and to grant them the grace of conversion…

Maybe avoid those relatives for now and if they ask why then calmly say you dont attack their beliefs and their children so you don’t appreciate them attacking your daughter and your religion…and say what makes it more hurtful is that it has been done by your daughters own relatives…

Dont let it stress you though…at the end of the day they sound like they need a lot of prayers if they act like that …

God bless you

Crystal waters
 
Casilda said:
My husband’s family is vehemently anti-Catholic. My sister-in-law has been sending vile anti-Catholic messages to my daughter who us attending Catholic college. My daughter promptly un-friended her then told us.

Daughter is shocked. I am angry and tired of dealing with this, so cutting all ties with my husband’s family. It’s just vile and evil to attack someone’s child.
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Sorry that happened. I am pretty blessed that even though I am the only Catholic in my family, nobody attacks my beliefs. My relatives that always post quotes from prosperity gospel preacher’s or other protestant sources, I do not unfriend them, I simply “Unfollow” them so that we remain friends but their posts do not show up in my news feed. I would have to go directly to their page to read what they are posting. And if they do not like when I post something about my beliefs, they of course are free to do the same but we never attack each other. Though if one day someone in my family does try to attack my beliefs or try to convert me back to protestantism, they will come to understand why I abandoned protestantism because I will refute any false accusations they throw at me about The Church and our beliefs. But I would so it charitably. I would not come at them like “you are wrong about x y and z” I would simply explain why I no longer believe “X Y and Z” and explain what I believe now. Thank God nobody in my family is really “Anti Catholic” though. They of course believe The Church is wrong about a lot of things but they also believe Catholics can be saved (The ones who have accepted Jesus in their hearts) 😃
 
Sadly, I think this is your only option. There are people like that who simply cannot accept that we Catholics are Christians. many get fresh doses of it from whatever pulpit they attend and having their minds made up, are no longer interested in facts.

Be advised that you and your family will now be remembered in my prayers and at Mass.

As a knight of the Militia Immaculata that St. Maximilian Kolbe founded, let me share with you our daily variant of the Miraculous Medal prayer.

O Mary conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee, and for all those who do not have recourse to thee, especially the enemies of holy church and all those recommended to thee.

Please pass that on to your dear daughter and I suggest that you pray it often and especially whenever you think of these unkind relatives.

May your New Year be safe, blessed, and prosperous.🙂
 
Just include them in your prayers, someday they may be worthy of your friendship…
 
Hi,

Sounds like you husbands family is a little hypocritical, most protestants believe the individual can read the Bible (alone)🤷 and the Holy Spirit will guide them to the truth. They must not believe that.
 
Casilda said:
My husband’s family is vehemently anti-Catholic. My sister-in-law has been sending vile anti-Catholic messages to my daughter who us attending Catholic college. My daughter promptly un-friended her then told us.

Daughter is shocked. I am angry and tired of dealing with this, so cutting all ties with my husband’s family. It’s just vile and evil to attack someone’s child.
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This is the choice I would have made myself. Life is too short to deal with peoples hate, misunderstanding, and outright ignorance. If they are playing an infantile game, ignore them and move forward with your lives. You wouldn’t believe the relief it brings. Your daughter is learning an important lesson about humanity and how people interact. Emotional outbursts, rather than rational responses, is what moves people these days. Now she sees the ugliness of that truth and hopefully will refuse to ever become what the world has devolved into being.
 
My only question is this: does your husband concur? I believe a spouse ought to give as much latitude as can be mustered for the in-laws for the sake of the spouse who has a difficult family, keeping in mind that no one ought to make herself a near occasion of sin to others by willfully leaving herself open to predictable occasions of abuse. That is a mercy I believe will be rewarded. Most spouses count it as loyalty–again, provided it is not an outright invitation to be abused.

By “cut off,” I assume you mean “treat them as you would an unbeliever (Matt 18:17),” which is to say to continue to be charitable (patient, kind, and so on) towards them but to remove them from a place of trust in your life. You are never free to give someone else the cold glare at family weddings.

You must love her and pray for Heaven’s mercy on her, as you have been commanded to do for any person who has made herself your enemy. You don’t have to give her a position of respect or trust that she does not merit or that she is likely to abuse to her own spiritual detriment.
 
1990Domer said:
OP, you did the correct thing. Pray for SIL but maintain firm boundaries.

Honestly, one of the reasons I took down my Facebook account (which I rarely used) is because of all the negative stories I heard from either friends or family members who used it on a regular basis. It seemed like prime feeding ground to hurt people.

I’m overly sensitive as it is. So, this could have been a disaster waiting to happen for me.
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I’ll say it again: The more I hear about Facebook, the more I think it is the work of the Devil.
 
EasterJoy said:
I’ll say it again: The more I hear about Facebook, the more I think it is the work of the Devil.
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I concur, 110%.

I have an account but almost never go on Facebook. The odd time it’s handy to look up a business that doesn’t otherwise have a website, or to search for a long-lost relative or high school friend or teacher. Other than that, I rarely use it.

When faced with anti-Catholic venom, I use Catholic anti-venom: prayer. I include them in my LOTH prayer intentions and try to muster kindness for them when I have to deal with them directly.
 
EasterJoy said:
I’ll say it again: The more I hear about Facebook, the more I think it is the work of the Devil.
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👍

Honestly, to send a post to one’s niece with the intent to criticize her choices is obviously trying to do something behind the parents back. There is no word to express how wrong that is
 
EasterJoy said:
I’ll say it again: The more I hear about Facebook, the more I think it is the work of the Devil.
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Same here! Only I was never questioning it… seems like a really good way of breeding narcissism… If people want to share what is going on with their lives with other people whom they know… email them! (it can be done by sending one email to multiple people-its that easy) or do what is the most awesome thing… call them up, talk, or better yet go visit them to say hello. Facebook is like endless chatter and noise- talking* at,* not with.

Op, I’m sorry you have been dealing with this. Its not at all kind of them to do that. Just ignore them “resist the devil and he will flee”. … Seems like a desire for power kind of thing. If that’s the kind they want, let them have it. It won’t get them anywhere, though they may think so. Hopefully, God will knock some sense into them!
 
You did the right thing for you as did your daughter.

I have never received anti-Catholic private messages on facebook but I do engage with various friends who are atheist, muslim, non-catholic christians if they post untruths or misunderstandings about Church doctrines.

98% of the time they have a perception that this is what the Church teaches when in fact it is not. I may post a vatican website link of Catholic Answers, Bishop Barron, Dr Marshall or Trent Horn article as a reply to their post, I follow those 4 on facebook, their posts are so informative, easy to read so I also re-post on my wall for my friends to read at their own leisure. 😛
 
I agree that it is highly inappropriate for an adult family member to do this.

Your husband can address this with them via the phone as well-just so they have a clear understanding as to why they are unfriended–and it also gives them the opportunity to say they are sorry.

If this can happen without a fight, then this is what I would do. Sometimes people are clueless about their behavior, and they need to explain what compelled them to share things like this with your daughter.
 
AnneElizabeth said:
Same here! Only I was never questioning it… seems like a really good way of breeding narcissism… If people want to share what is going on with their lives with other people whom they know… email them! (it can be done by sending one email to multiple people-its that easy) or do what is the most awesome thing… call them up, talk, or better yet go visit them to say hello. Facebook is like endless chatter and noise- talking* at,* not with…
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In the old pre-technology days, it would have been almost impossible to replicate Facebook and Twitter. The closest you could get would be to mail dozens of postcards a day to everybody you knew, each with a brief message about yourself like: ‘Finally got that haircut I’ve been putting off.’ Or: ‘Just had a caramel frappuccino. Yum!’ The people receiving these postcards would have naturally assumed that you were a moron with a narcissism disorder. But today, thanks to Facebook and Twitter, you are seen as a person engaging in “social networking.”

–Dave Barry, I’ll Mature When I’m Dead
 
mommy_k said:
If this can happen without a fight, then this is what I would do. Sometimes people are clueless about their behavior, and they need to explain what compelled them to share things like this with your daughter.
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I agree with this. But I have to wonder is it because society has such a ‘live and let live’ attitude that no one knows what the norms are anymore? Just curious but I have often seen situations where one person thinks something is a funny joke and the next will think it is tasteless. What is the answer to this? Just thinking out loud
 
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