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Benadam
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and the serpent said; " you will be like God"
Former Catholic Priest Condemns the Catholic Church and Scott Hahn
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mercygate
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Not in his case. He makes the most ridiculous claims about his experience and about the Church. The Dominicans are dedicated to preaching the Gospel. Scripture is the lifeblood of their training. When he says that the stopped praying the breviary to read the Bible “instead” it’s a dead giveaway. The core of the Breviary is praying the Psalms. And each day’s Office of Vigils gives you a good chunk of Scripture – a chapter or more – in sequence. In his day, when it was all in Latin, the Dominicans LEARNED Latin, and learned it WELL.
Nope. I’m stickin’ with the traumatic brain injury hypothesis. The guy’s profile just doesn’t add up.
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Aleii
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Really? I’d love to hear your rationale for your computer being a pad of paper. I’d probably go with me being crazy to rationalize that one, but everyone around me would tell me otherwise, and my medical knowledge would also tell me otherwise. I could not convince myself of that one. I can think of no way to rationalize that in my mind. I do agree that people are good at rationalizing things, but, I think they rationalize things they believed in the first place, for their own reasons. I do not see any way that I could rationalize honest belief in Zeus, Scientology, or that my computer was a pad of paper. Faith is not a light switch. Inconsistencies between belief and reality would tell me that I’m not looking at something clearly. I really try to look at things from the perspective that my initial conclusions may be wrong, so that I’m more likely to travel the right path. I would truthfully not be able to ignore those inconsistencies. How you would be able to do that is beyond me.
I am not one of these people who can ignore these things.
Each religion has their own reasoning why they are the path that you should follow. Each has its devote followers. But to say I can believe in Catholicism is a lie, since it does not make sense to me. I do realize this is a mountain of a task. All I can do is trust that God will judge me based upon mercy, and that I honestly tried to do what was right in terms of actions and faith.
Wanting understanding to ensure I’m doing the right thing is asking for something spectacular? Its not that I simply don’t comprehend things about the religion(such as its stated mysteries), its that things like basic tenants of the faith seems to actively contradict to me, in a way that it would not be honest of me to say I believe. I do not ask for God to appear to me, nor do I want the stars to spell out a message or anything like that. I merely need a foundation that hasn’t crumbled.
I see life running its course, biology working.
I’ve used the title of Catholic for as long as I could, until I realized doing so would be a lie. Maybe we have a different definition of belief. While I went through the motions during non-belief, I can not lie and say I have belief. How can I “allow” myself to believe in something I don’t? I have given the reasons that I feel it is impossible. I can not force myself to believe. I have gone through the motions of mass, prayer, etc, when I did not believe. I can get past little things not making sense but when big parts of the faith seem to contradict, I have a duty to God to investigate further on the road to truth. I can not follow a religion I think is wrong. That would be the easy way out. The logic that I’m supposed to turn a blind eye to problems seems very wrong to me too. Catholicism is not supposed to have problems with the faith. While I can see small problems with the faith being due to misunderstanding, having numerous, large problems with core tenants of the faith is a problem too big to ignore. Requiring that a religion does not seem wrong to a follower does not seem like a whole lot to ask. Are you saying it is?
I see being humble as being able to admit I was wrong about something. Coming to the conclusion that I may be wrong about the religion I was born into has been very difficult, but required if I am to remain an honest person. Why do you think I am still on this board? I do get a sense from what you wrote, (though it is probably not your intention), that humbleness should be used as a way to cow people in line. You could use this justification on other religions/beliefs too. You certainly would not want to tell a Scientology person that they are not being humble if they don’t “fall in line” when they have concerns too. While I agree that requiring spectacles is not humble, I strongly do not agree that requiring resolution of major conflicts to be a sign of someone not being humble. Its instead, about honesty and integrity.
Were I to turn a blind eye to this, even though I don’t see how I honestly could, I would be doing a disservice to a number of people, including Catholics, God, myself, and my family and friends. I would be living a lie. I will not live a lie.
I appreciate the cordial discussion, CatsandDogs.
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ralphinal
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I simply do not see that. I read the Bible a minimum of 20 minutes a day. IN the last five years, I have read it cover to cover, in order. That was a chore I will not do again. I may read it all the way through, but not in order.
With all due respect, you claim that the Bible has lead oyu from the Church, yet you give us no verses or rational for this statement. Further, and if I am reading this into your posts, please correct me and I ask your forgiveness, I see a certain attitude from you of superiority that you ahve discovered it and we don’t see it for whatever reason. Again, if that is not correct, please forgive me.
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ralphinal
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It very well could be and at times is a rational act. There are former Catholics who can explain their positions quite well. There are also non-Catholics who can defend why they will not join the Church.
The issue that I have is that the statements that he is making about the Church are fundamentally incorrect. Those who know the truth about the teachings of the Church see it as a malicious attack made ot turn those who do not know better against the Church. Those who do not know the faith see it as more proof for how wrong we are.
If you want to go, go, but do not lie about how it was.
Further, the level of malice held by this dude against the Church is telling. If it was a logical, rational decision, why the venom?
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thecoach
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You misunderstand what is meant by freedom. Reread Paul.
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thecoach
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It is incorrect, an I do forgive you. What is funny though is you acuse me of superiority, yet spew how many minutes a day you read and how you have read the Bible cover to cover. You dont see me self-aggrandizing like that, do you?
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ralphinal
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I would have been guilty as charged if you had not made the assertion that in reading the Bible, you saw the need to leave the Catholic Church.
Had I simply started to attack your position, would you have told me to read the Bible?
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vocatio
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Have you read the bible all the way through yet?
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vocatio
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That’s not how I read that Coach. It sounds more like realph is engaging in self-criticism…“That was a chore I will not do again”.
Are you a practicing Catholic Coach? I noticed that your profile shows you chose Catholic as your religion. Pardon me for asking, but I am unclear. And if you’re not practicing Catholicism then what are you practicing…are you attending any church and which one…Baptist, Church of Christ, Methodist, etc.
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ralphinal
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Am I alone in finding Numbers and some of Leviticus the cure for insomnia?
Again, millions of Catholics read the Bible and stay Catholic.
I read the Bible as a Catholic. Perhaps those who find the Bible makes them leave the Church already had a position when they started and foudn what they wanted to find. IS that unreasonable?
Again, millions of Catholics read the Bible and stay Catholic.
I read the Bible as a Catholic. Perhaps those who find the Bible makes them leave the Church already had a position when they started and foudn what they wanted to find. IS that unreasonable?
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thecoach
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Unfortunately you are incorrect. I was relating my experience in regard to a poster who said that he came to the church because of such reading. Am I not allowed to post my experience? Is it always to be a power struggle to prove the “superiority” of the RCC?
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vocatio
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Oh…you are very correct. I still have issues dealing with Leviticus.
Again, millions of Catholics read the Bible and stay Catholic./quote]
That may be true, but not everyone. I read over and over many times and ran into scripture that caused me lots of confusion and when I asked “an authority”[priest] I received smug comments like “you’ll never be able to understand”. That is referred to as “clericalism” a more recent remnant heresy in the Chruch that is still being stomped out.
ralphinal:
Yes. My position was “very confused” because the church of Christ got hold of me as a child and planted heresy. But I was not a practicing Catholic. My parents were divorced. My dad was away lolly gagging somewhere in…Veithnam. Mom dumped him within 2 hours of being home. I remember it. I was 5. Mom was anti-Catholic and can only assuem they got married because “they had to”. They tried having 3 children and one misscarriage. They should never have been married. Also, seeing heretics as priest didn’t help. And having a spiritual director make a pass on you also doesn’t help. There is a scripture that says, “and you will know them by their fruits” that rung a bell in me. Baptism by my wife’s family is defined as “only” complete submerging in water in the trinitarian formulas for the forgiveness of sins at the age of reason. That made sense to me. And reading Catholic sources that explained that that was a tradition as if it were a man made interpretation…
That brings up another confusion that I never quite understood until about 3, 4 years now. We discussed "tradition’ in our bible class with a couple of deacons and an elder that seemed to feel freely comfortable about admitting things I had never heard admitted before by the Church of Christ leaders. That is when I pulled out my Catholic bible and re-read the Humana Vitae in the front cover again. It seems that education makes a big difference. I became quite the studious student in my older age - probably from getting away from the knuckleheaded Catholics and my abusive situation growing up. I kept discovering uniquely Catholic passages that got me to thinking… and voila, one of our preachers decided to cover something he discovered or learned at TCU…the Nicene Creed. He even told me around January that the Nicene Creed is probably more profound than Acts 2. I’d have to look at it and post it with quotes. It was short. I think that when he realized we had converted to Catholicism over it it sort of hushed him up.
So yes. most of us that “fall away” have not been educated properly or in our adult years do not realize how much is missing. In fact, the more we study the more we realize the catholicity in the early church. Who was it that said “to be deep in history is to seize to be Protestant”? Cardinal Newman, a covert, now being considered for canonization I beleive.
The main question that haunted me after learning about all the ancient documents “Gnostic Gospels” and such, I struggled with the most faith wounding issue of my life…“how do we know which documents are inspired by God?” I will leave you with that to respond to now.
I was bible only my entire life…evern when I received my first communion at the age of 14, 2 months away from my 15 birthday. I was not a practicing Catholic and learned little to nothing other than I was pleased that I was attending church. It brought me happiness. I received very little catechsis for my confirmation at the age of 17. I discovered that to attend the seminary I had to be confirmed. All of it seemed so foreign to me and I failed to see the struggle of Catholics around me because I had my own family struggles, divorce, absentee dad, not properly living out his faith and an anti-Catholic mother and stepmother. It was very hard. At the age of 18 my spiritual director made a pass on me, which hurled me deeper into a world of pain resulting in hurling bashing comments right back at the "unmarried’ priesthood and the bishop for not even bothering to contact me and apologize. Call it pride if you want, but I call that a lack of good pastoring to ones flock. Since I would have been ordained by the bishop, he should have personally contacted me and pastored to me…not some representative, which didn’t happen either. Instead, they burried it. It is mainly because of the discovery of the ancient church fathers, my much more solid scripture knowledge and the realization that the early church was “one holy catholic and apostolic church” that brought me home. In October 2006 my wife read the Catechism of the Catholic Church and asked a few questions online that had converted from the Church of Christ to Catholicism. She actually understood and thought it was rational. That opened my heart enought to study it more. But I was convinced that the real church was the Orhtodox Church. So I studied that pretty intently while we were enrolled in RCIA. It was just a technicality for me at the time. I was still searching. But after I realzed that the issues I had were “straw man” arguments I became even more open to being Catholic, but after studying Orthodoxy I am really attracted to it and mainly Catholicism in the Byzantine Rite. I would love to become eastern Catholic in other words. But my wife feels funny about it because they scare her.
Bandaging a 7 year old’s wound…talk later.
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vocatio
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That would sound strange if you were posting to an eastern Catholic…Do you mean “Catholic Church” without the Romanism remark? It’s kind of insulting to me. Is that how you would say it to an eastern Catholic’s face? If so, even if you’re an athiest it woud be quite rude. It’s like calling a person of color a [insert one of the many insulting remarks here]. You sound like your in the KKK.
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Dori1
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Perhaps you’re right. But he had no guarantee of anything when he left his position to join the Church.
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thecoach
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Practicing when I filled it out…but no longer.
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thecoach
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KKK? Real Catholic of you to slander someone so. I see your scaraments have had a great effect on your soul. YOu need to be ashamed of making such a comment. Go run to confession now.
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vocatio
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Now how am I slandering anybody…If you want to see what slandering is… I can do it… I am a former member of the Church of Christ. We used to believe everyone that is not a member of our church is hellbound and do in by free will in rejecting the obvious word of God. Now that’s slander. I never slandered you… That is a typical fundamentalist method of defacing their opponent… slander the person that speaks the truth in love. I am defending the Eastern Catholics and trying to educated what I mean by giving an analogy…Now that is just plain Christian. No one is being slandered.
But since you are defending the KKK’s methods of hate then that makes me really wonder where your heart is. That is NOT slander, that is correcting…and if you listened to Fr. Mitch this past week. He said it himself that we are to preach the gospel and when necessary use words. He added that probabaly most of the time we SHOULD be using words…
All of us are supposed to defend the truth. I didn’t slander you. Your pride of being RIGHT is what is slandering you. So be caereful of the mud you’re throwing around. Your bound to get dirty. But from that last post I expect nothing but more scandalizing of me. Typical of prideful people. Something we are ALL capable of doing.
But since you are defending the KKK’s methods of hate then that makes me really wonder where your heart is. That is NOT slander, that is correcting…and if you listened to Fr. Mitch this past week. He said it himself that we are to preach the gospel and when necessary use words. He added that probabaly most of the time we SHOULD be using words…
All of us are supposed to defend the truth. I didn’t slander you. Your pride of being RIGHT is what is slandering you. So be caereful of the mud you’re throwing around. Your bound to get dirty. But from that last post I expect nothing but more scandalizing of me. Typical of prideful people. Something we are ALL capable of doing.
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vocatio
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Whoah!
I re-read my original post and see why your were offended. That’s not what I meant to write…I am VERY sorry. I really didn’t mean it to come out that way.
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ralphinal
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Again, then, I ask your forgiveness. I should not have assumed your next post.
Feel free to post all you want.
There is no need to prove “superiority” of the Catholic Church. It is not that my Church is superior to any other. From my studies, my Church holds more of the answers to the “Whys” about God and life than any other. I would love for everyone to see that. And I want those who cannot or do not to understand why I feel this path is the better path to salvation than any other.
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