Former RC: has your view of the RCC changed?

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For all those who were once Roman Catholic but who changed to another church, or another religion, or who simply left: has your view of the Roman Catholic Church changed since then? If yes, what has helped shape this change of understanding? If no, please explain.
 
Yes it has changed. I had left the church in my teenage years until I was 23. My return was prompted by the death of my maternal grandpa. He was a devout Catholic man, he even read the bible. I finally realized there was more to life. So,I went back to my parish church and started to going to Mass. I noticed in the bulletin there was a parish young adult group. I finally attended my 1st meeting after 4 trys. With their help, I then enrolled in the RCIA program. At this time I only needed Confirmation to complete my saramental initiation. I was confirmed in my parish, on Easter Vigil, 21 April 1984, by my parish priest and pastor. And to this day I remain steadfast in my Catholic faith.

I’m going to date myself even further. I was born in 1958. When I was 6 my Mom enrolled me in the 1st grade of our parish school (1964) During the Vatican II session. I had stayed until after 4th grade. After Vatican II had ended and the changes were slowly being implemented (Note: Our Pastor at the time refused to move the altar from the wall to the center of the sanctuary, until the Archbishop told him to do so.I think he finally did move the altar in 1976) Even though I was a child between 6-10. I remember a few things from Mass and parish life. The altar against the back wall, and on that wall was a mural of the crucifixation, communion railing w/ Father going back and forth giving communion to the people kneeling, the altar boy holding the paten, some Latin being spoken, church organ playing, the bells at the elevation of the Eucharist and the wine, striking the breast 3 times during the Confiteor, Father’s back to the congregatgion, our parish school nuns wearing a full head to toe habit. These are few of what I remember.

I think I’ll continue on another post with a part 2, as this one is starting to get too long.
 
Madaglan said:
For all those who were once Roman Catholic but who changed to another church, or another religion, or who simply left: has your view of the Roman Catholic Church changed since then? If yes, what has helped shape this change of understanding? If no, please explain.
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I didn’t realize there was such a thing as the Roman Catholic Church. 🤷

Al-Masih Qam!
Andrew
 
PART 2

As I said in my first post I went to RCIA. During the 2 year process I had questions and concerns. One of first changes I had noticed that the Sister who was in charge of the program wore street clothes and had no type of habit. I felt that odd until I realized that church gave it’s approval to the orders to make their own decisions on what to wear. I’m okay with that(although no habit, I not so sure, it could at least be a school uniform type. Same color skirt and same color blouse with an identifying pin, scalpular, rosary, whatever). In regards to Mass changes I slowly understood the reasons why they were changed. And I came to fully embrace them. Another problem I had was that God was a judge and he’s going to punish me. I learned this from my family and religion in school. I learned that is part of God, but also He is a Father,Creator, a loving God, one who watches over us not to do harm but to help us. We tend to limit God,to define the infinite God, with our finite minds. To put him into a box. I grew up from my childish thoughts, experiences and ideas. To a Holy Spirit guidance and understanding of my faith.

There’s still more I wish to relate. So, on to part 3
 
PART 3

What are the some of the areas that helped my faith maturity? Well aside from my family and parrioral school. I’d have to say the RCIA process for starters. In this I was exposed to the bible, church history,contemporary Catholic liturgical music, silent mediative prayer, sharing my thoughts, questioning and getting answers, attending church together, hospitality of some of the parishioners by opening their homes to my class(we didn’t have class in the church or school room),going on a field trip to a local Catholic Melkite rite parish and attended the Divine Liturgy w/ acknowledgement from the priest. On my own I went to 3 different Protestant churches on 3 different Sundays. One week it was a Lutheran church, another week it was an Episcopalian Mass and another week it was a Methodist service. As I sat there respectfully, I noticed two main things. All of them were so close to Catholicism in some areas, but still dry and lacking. I thought that even with the changes from Vatican II and post-V 2 documents and practices we are still Catholic. We are so much different from the rest. I saw the difference, no question in my mind.
Also at this time while I was with the Young Adult Group of my parish I have experienced a weekend retreat, discussing matters of faith, having home Masses, attended a neighboring parish liturgy with a clown ministry (at that time an interesting, novel and unique way to explain things.Today, NO WAY! I draw the line), going to our parish Youth Ministers concerts and hearing a Catholic/biblical/contemporary problems based easy rock music. Seeing and hearing these I felt glad to be a Catholic, because the church was allowing it’s faithful different avenues to be better Catholics and to follow Jesus. I also went to my first Youth Day and Los Angeles Religious Education Congress in 1983. I saw a much larger Catholic Church than my local parish. I learned many new things or reenforced some other beliefs. (To this day, I still go to LAREC, this year marked my 23rd one.)

On to part 4.
 
PART 4
(Mercifully to you all, I think this might be the last part.)
Thank you for keeping up with my posts.

In 1986, I became a certified Catechist with a Youth Ministry specialization. Later added Confirmation specialization. I still continue to do YM (Parish Life Teen, est 2001) and Confirmation. The teens have and continue to challenge me to learn more about our faith. The 80’s & 90’s were a get better reaquinted with the faith I was baptized into period. Although I still learning today with some help from this forum. I have seen so much and heard so much.

Today the church has changed in many ways. As I learn more I find out that most of the changes of Vatican II and the post-documents I find they were only trying to help the faithful. By not complicating our lives. Aren’t our lives complicated enough? Do we need to make our faith hard as well? Jesus warned the Pharisees not to make things difficult for the people. Everything that Jesus basically taught was not made to be hard. But, anyway

With everything I’ve said to this point, was a little bit of personal background. I have found that I like and/or have no problem with the following: Lay ministers,(Lectors,EMs etc), girl altar servers (In the beginning, wasn’t sure), Youth Ministry, Young Adult Ministry, or any ministry that helps, contemporary Catholic music,(we are finally catching to non-Cath.), lay apologists and evangelists, Charismatics, Life Teen, Catholic radio & TV stations, bible study, communion in the hand, parish councils, The New Mass and others.

Speaking about the Mass, in my parish somebody brought up a suggestion that we as a community recite the Our Father in Latin.This was because our now vastly Hispanic parish and still some primarily English speakers would find it difficult to have a truly meaningful bilinqual liturgies. So, Father agreed. The Latin words have been put into our bulletin for a few weeks. (And probably will still will continue to be.) Father has also explained this at all the Masses. Part of what he said was that it’s the official language of the church and as a sign of our unity. I believe in time it’s Fathers idea to also include the Confiteor, the Holy,Holy (Sanctus), Lamb of God (Angus Dei). Father is 60, in his growing years he had gone to Mass in Latin. But he never said a Mass in Latin in all the years he’s been ordained. Which is amazing. But he is brushing up on his Latin. He did say that he couldn’t and wouldn’t do the whole Mass in Latin.

Sorry, I’m starting to go a little off track. Now back to has my view of church changed? Yes. In fact it’s still changing and evolving. As I’ve previously mentioned I like most of the Vatican II changes. Even to the point where I didn’t like Latin or the Gregorian Chant at all. IToday, I don’t think I would mind too much to have some Latin and/or a Gregorian Chant in our Masses. Especially, our Life Teen liturgy. It is part of our rich and beautiful 2000 year history and heritage.

Okay, maybe ONE more part. Part 4a
 
PART 4a

Please don’t be bored with me. I’m usually have little or nothing much to say while talking in person. Bear with me.

This is all really amazing. Since Father, the YM and myself are basically New Mass people. Furthermore, when I told the YM about Father going ahead with the idea at a Parish council meeting. (I’m on the Parish council as a representative for Life Teen). She said smiling it would be something different and I think she liked the idea.(She is a Mexican-American and bilingual) So, I decided to do some research on the web for a Latin Our Father with phonetics. I did find one. I then made a PowerPoint slide with the Pater Noster to show and pray the Our Father with our Life Teen Life Night. Which we did and I lead it (Although I did study a little bit of the phonetics before hand.) It must’ve been okay, because afterwards I got a few claps and comments of approval from the teens. Which was good since even though the kids are 99.99% Latinos we do the Life Night in English.

Any way there is more to say but I think I’ll finally stop. :extrahappy: :extrahappy:
 
Madaglan said:
Go to a large public place in the U.S., yell out “There is no such thing as the Roman Catholic Church,” and see what kind of reactions you get. 🙂
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I say this because that is not the proper term to refer to the Catholic Church. The largest Church in the Catholic Church is the Latin Church, but there are 22 others. But you knew this already.🙂

Al-Masih Qam!
Andrew
 
I was a member of the Latin Catholic church since infancy and for almost fifty years.

I eventually became an Eastern Catholic, in the Byzantine rite. They nurtured my spiritual development and introduced me to a deeper level of understanding of Christianity. It was there that I finally formulated the basic opinions I hold today.

My movement to Holy Orthodoxy was therefore almost a non-event, due to the fact that I was what some call an “Orthodox-Catholic”, at least in my own estimation. I already believed what Orthodoxy teaches and, as Archbishop Elias Zoghby famously proposed (and to which the Melkite Synod overwhelmingly agreed) “I believe everything which Eastern Orthodoxy teaches.* I am in communion with the Bishop of Rome as the first among the bishops, according to the limits recognized by the Holy Fathers of the East during the first millennium, before the separation.*”

I would still hold to that. The only difference is that I felt like quite the hypocrite claiming to be in communion with Rome while steadfastly denying the later developments of the Papacy, which the Papacy will still claim (at least formally) for itself even today.

So unlike Archbishop Elias (Memory Eternal!) who stuck it out under both criticism and praise until the day he died, I decided to place myself under the omophorion of another bishop until such time as the situation in the Latin church and the Papacy is corrected.

It just unfortunately does not appear to be something I will see in my lifetime.

So, in brief, I love the Latin Catholic church and the people in it. I realize it has problems but realistically we must admit all churches do, to some extent. I believe it can be a means to salvation for many. I don’t believe in the Papal dogmas, which is something I did not believe as a Latin Catholic. I do embrace Orthodox theology, which is something I had learned and embraced as a Byzantine Catholic.

I don’t think much at all has changed about my views about the Latin Catholic church, nor the Papacy.

Michael
 
Patrick,

Not bored with your posts at all. I love your passion for the Church.
 
I’ll be short. I was raised Catholic in a mixed faith family. I stopped going to church once I could get on my own at college. When getting married, I took an interest in religion and attended Methodist services for some time. This experience, and the experiences I had when younger going to another Protestant denom, made me miss the Holy Eucharist. This was missing in Protestant churches, and for me, that’s the centrality of worship.
 
Maxply said:
I’ll be short. I was raised Catholic in a mixed faith family. I stopped going to church once I could get on my own at college. When getting married, I took an interest in religion and attended Methodist services for some time. This experience, and the experiences I had when younger going to another Protestant denom, made me miss the Holy Eucharist. This was missing in Protestant churches, and for me, that’s the centrality of worship.
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[SIGN]God Bless You![/SIGN]

Glad to hear that you made it home. We’re happy to have you back! 👍

Al-Masih Qam!
Andrew
 
Well, it clearly has changed or else I would still consider myself Catholic.

I no longer view it as the “One True Church.”

However, I still believe that the people in the church, especially the people in the hierarchy, are men of good intentions and are doing a lot of good in the world
 
Originally Posted by Harpazo:
Click to expand...
I say this because that is not the proper term to refer to the Catholic Church. The largest Church in the Catholic Church is the Latin Church, but there are 22 others. But you knew this already.🙂
Click to expand...
Al-Masih Qam!
Andrew
Click to expand...
The official term is “The Latin Church.” Yes, you are right. I debated in my mind “Latin Catholics,” because that’s the proper term; but most Latin Catholics in the U.S. see themselves as simply “Roman Catholic”–not recognizing that the Church is a communion of Churches.

I chose the colloquial expression “Roman Catholics” (though it be less precise) because my question is geared more towards the Catholic communion as a whole than membership in a particular Catholic Church (e.g. The Latin Church, The Maronite Church, etc.) Plus, many former RC are now Protestants, who don’t see the Latin Church as the “Latin Church,” but as the “Roman Catholic Church,” a term which has become acceptable, even among Latin Catholics, to use in America.
 
Yes my views have changed about the RCC. I was a craddle catholic. I started to study the bible and the reformation act. I started to attend both a lutheran and a episcopal church. The liturgy and scripture is very much the same(where I attended) In fact the Episcopal priest in my town was a catholic priest at one time.( yes this is true heard it from him and several others so …) I viewed the reformation period and martin luther from both sides of the story. When I read the other side of the story (like many things in life) things started making sense. History is what you make it or what you are willing to remeber or to tell others.
I found out one thing from attending those services and also from CAF. Some Roman Catholics have a big misunderstanding and a lot of hatred for non Catholics (Protestant in such a 16 century word). Just read some of these threads and some of the comments posted. Some folks must spend all day on the computer slaming other Christians. In November I joined the lutheran church and have never felt happier or closer to God. Today I attended both my Lutheran Church and Episcopalian last week Catholic mass and Lutheran The exact same Readings Same basic message in the sermon and the same creed. The Eucharist as defined by each group is a the body and blood of christ. We all go through life defining others as we think we see or hear them. We never ask or listening to what they are saying we just assume. We believe what others tell us with out checking the facts and conecting the dots.A great deal of the problem is things are lost in translation and and our own selective hearing limits us. We hear what we want to hear. We judge people by their actions or rather by what we think their actions mean. In the town I live in on the corner of sixth and main are a Catholic Lutheran and Prebyterian Church ( and a funeral home). Come next Sunday when we drive up main street america some will turn left and some will turn right on 6th street. Some will attend catholic Mass others Lutheran or presbyterian services. Fact of the matter is all the pews in are filled with God loving christians. Our neighbors and co workers Friends and strangers all attend these churches. We are all so busy thinking we are right and they are wrong that we lose site of the real important things. Like Jesus died on the cross and we are to follow him. We are all christians lets start acting like it.
 
catholiconce said:
Yes my views have changed about the RCC. I was a craddle catholic. I started to study the bible and the reformation act. I started to attend both a lutheran and a episcopal church. The liturgy and scripture is very much the same(where I attended) In fact the Episcopal priest in my town was a catholic priest at one time.( yes this is true heard it from him and several others so …) I viewed the reformation period and martin luther from both sides of the story. When I read the other side of the story (like many things in life) things started making sense. History is what you make it or what you are willing to remeber or to tell others.
I found out one thing from attending those services and also from CAF. Some Roman Catholics have a big misunderstanding and a lot of hatred for non Catholics (Protestant in such a 16 century word). Just read some of these threads and some of the comments posted. Some folks must spend all day on the computer slaming other Christians. In November I joined the lutheran church and have never felt happier or closer to God. Today I attended both my Lutheran Church and Episcopalian last week Catholic mass and Lutheran The exact same Readings Same basic message in the sermon and the same creed. The Eucharist as defined by each group is a the body and blood of christ. We all go through life defining others as we think we see or hear them. We never ask or listening to what they are saying we just assume. We believe what others tell us with out checking the facts and conecting the dots.A great deal of the problem is things are lost in translation and and our own selective hearing limits us. We hear what we want to hear. We judge people by their actions or rather by what we think their actions mean. In the town I live in on the corner of sixth and main are a Catholic Lutheran and Prebyterian Church ( and a funeral home). Come next Sunday when we drive up main street america some will turn left and some will turn right on 6th street. Some will attend catholic Mass others Lutheran or presbyterian services. Fact of the matter is all the pews in are filled with God loving christians. Our neighbors and co workers Friends and strangers all attend these churches. We are all so busy thinking we are right and they are wrong that we lose site of the real important things. Like Jesus died on the cross and we are to follow him. We are all christians lets start acting like it.
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👍 👍 👍
 
It has been said that the largest single group of Christians is the Roman Catholic Church. The second largest group are Former Roman Catholics. Most Christians in the world are not Roman Catholic. This is a great thread question where are all those with a view on this thread? My view has changed My view of others that is after I looked around and started putting 2 and 2 together . I found out that I was not being fair to others by just taking for granted what I allowed others to tell me about others. If you want to know something about someone or a group of
people ask the people do not take for granted what somebody else says go to the source. conect the dots !!!:cool:
 
jmeyer3131 said:
Patrick,

Not bored with your posts at all. I love your passion for the Church.
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Hi jmeyer,
Thank you. My passion stems from many sources. Family, personal life experiences, discrimination of our church, going through the RCIA process to receive my Confirmation as an adult, going to Mass, participating in it the Mass as a member of the congregation, or being a Lector,or an EMHC. Others include: Reading the bible, church documents, the Eucharist, understanding church history, being challenged by Non-Catholics and Misguided Catholics, the richness and beauty of 2000 years of the Catholic Church, that Our Lord Jesus Christ established no other church, and just about everything Catholic. But perhaps one of the most important reasons, is Youth Ministry and Confirmation. I have to present our faith in a more positive and enlivened way. Actually I don’t mean HAVE TO, but WANT TO. The teens give me youthfulness, energy, desire to learn more, encouragement ,they help shape my Catholic spiritual life and in turn I help them.

*Come Holy Spirit rekindle and renew the fire within our lives and of the world.:amen: *
 
Madaglan said:
For all those who were once Roman Catholic but who changed to another church, or another religion, or who simply left: has your view of the Roman Catholic Church changed since then? If yes, what has helped shape this change of understanding? If no, please explain.
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I’m not entirely sure I understand what you are asking, but I’ll take a shot at it.

I don’t think my view of the Catholic church has changed much since I left.

My emotions toward the Catholic church have changed quite a bit.

And my understanding of my relationship with the Catholic church has changed.

The longer I live, the more I can see that, as many people here have said to me…I never really was Catholic. In spite of the upbringing, schooling, sacraments of initiation, etc. I see now that I never really believed some key things, that I never really understood the Universe in a Catholic sense and that I never was bonded to the church.

When Pope Benedict was in the USA, I heard so many Catholics talking about how it made them feel. And I recall being in high school when JPII first came, and he came to my city, and I had no interest in going to see him, or all the hoopla. And when I read here what the issues are for Catholics, I see those were never my issues. I never truly had the “gift of faith”, or deep connection to the faith.

I thought I was Catholic because I was raised that way, lived that way, practiced that way, and received the sacraments. But in spite of all that, it doesn’t seem I ever really was. Something didn’t “take”.

That makes more sense to me now than it did before.

The source of that change is the perspective of time and maturity, many discussions with Catholics here and in real life, and many years of living the faith that I truly believe and embrace.

I have never been sorry I was raised Catholic. It gave me a very solid spiritual foundation, and was a really interesting and rich religion to grow up in, but I have never been sorry I left it either.

cheddar
 
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