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St_Francis
Guest
Christ told us one route to Heaven. Any other route *might *get someone to Heaven–we don’t know; we only know the one sure way. Thus people’s leaving the Church ought to be of concern to us.
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Sailor_Kenshin
Guest
No.
You can’t read people’s minds. No one can.
Every single snowflake is different. Every single person’s journey is different.
One would hope that this isn’t the case for Lutherans. For a Lutheran, it ought to be doctrine, and word and sacrament. One might shift to a different Lutheran parish because of a pastor, bit if they are well catechized and grounded in word and sacrament, going to a different protestant communion would be extremely difficult, one would think.
Amen
Jon
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GangGreen
Guest
It’s really a circular battle. Everyone has a role to play and they all need to pick up the slack when someone isn’t doing their part. We’re talking about the salvation of souls here, it’s no matter that we should be taking carelessly.
If the family isn’t doing the job, then yes, the clergy/religious need to pick up the slack in education. Likewise, it goes the other way.
If parents are truly devout, they need to sit down and really learn the faith. We live in an age where there are so many resources everywhere. Learn the faith and teach it to your children. As you said, this is a key in the home. Kids look to their parents as an example.
Also, with Catholic schools we have mostly lay teachers these days. Do these teachers follow authentic Catholic faith? Is that even a requirement? Do they teach Catholicism authentically? These are many questions for the pastors and bishops to figure out… and if you are a teacher, are you holding up your end of the bargain? Do you realize the importance of what you are doing?
If the parents and teachers weren’t educated properly, then they surely won’t educate their children properly and again you have this cycle.
Also, from the pulpit we do need priests to change their tone a bit. I’m not saying that we need fire and brimstone every week, but young people need to be appealed to a more. This doesn’t mean dumbing it down. It means challenge them. Give them something that they can walk away with. I’ve heard some people tell me that when they go to church they never feel like they get anything out of it. You can only hear that Jesus loves you so much when we know that Jesus also wants to challenge us to grow in faith and to grow to be like him. He wants us to take up the Armor of God and fight against the evils of this world. So tell us. Challenge us. Give people that push to want to learn and grow. I like what Michael Voris said in a recent Vortex. Appeal to young men’s desire for war and battle. Is this not what we are fighting? We fight a war against the forces of evil every day. People Leo XIII said “Catholics are born for combat.”
Teach authentic Catholic faith. Teach a love for Christ. Teach a love for our Holy Mother and the Saints. For our treasury of history, theology, writing, music, art, and culture. The love for our devotions. This church is the most rich of any religion, we have so much to offer yet people are so unaware of it. I get tired of seeing people who were born as Catholic quoting the Dalai Lama and other eastern people. Do they not know Christ? Do they not know the Saints?
It all starts with education in the home, the schools, and in the church.
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rcwitness
Guest
I certainly did not judge any individual.
Every snowflake is different, but they all are still snowflakes…
You seem to be coming from a Relativistic point of view here. Do you mind me asking,… are you Christian?
Paz
Michael
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Sailor_Kenshin
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I am the least relativistic person you’re likely to meet.I certainly did not judge any individual.
Every snowflake is different, but they all are still snowflakes…
You seem to be coming from a Relativistic point of view here. Do you mind me asking,… are you Christian?
Paz
Michael
And if God made every snowflake different from every other snowflake, how much more so human beings!
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rcwitness
Guest
Maybe I dont know what point you are making with your snowflake analogy.
Are you Christian? Do you believe in the Gospel, have received Christ’s Baptism, and receive Communion with believers who share the same faith?
Paz
Michael
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Sailor_Kenshin
Guest
My points are not intended to be personal. They are philosophical observations.
Why do you insist on making it personal?
Because it helps when in dialogue knowing what faith community a dialogue partner is a part of. It isn’t personal as much as it is providing an availability of background information so as to dialogue with a measure of accuracy. If I know your faith community I can better understand your posts.
If I, as a Lutheran (and more specifically evangelical catholic), merely listed myself as Christian, or non-Catholic, or even protestant, then dialogue partners can’t be sure of the framework of faith that I come from.
Really, it is simply common courtesy.
Jon
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Sailor_Kenshin
Guest
Common courtesy, or harrassment?
I have said that these are impersonal philosophical observations. I would hope for enough common courtesy to leave it at that.
Check my post count. I’ve been here a long time. I’m not a Catholic in communion with the Bishop of Rome. Rarely have I received harassment here. Eric Hilbert, the moderator, is quite fair, and CAF wants non-Catholic posters. Further, Michael (rcwitness) is one of the least likely to harass anyone.
Do as you wish.
Jon
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rcwitness
Guest
You put forth an analogy without making much of a point. I do not accuse you of not having a point. Maybe others here understand your point better than me.
I was curious if you are coming from a Christian faith, so that I can understand your point by means of deduction. If you would rather not declare wheather or not you are Christian, I will not harrass you about it. However, it would be natural for me to assume you are not Christian by neglecting to profess faith in Jesus.
I will not pursue your response.
Peace,
Michael
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Sochi
Guest
Is it realistic to think of a place inside or outside the Church? Isn’t the actual “category” Child of God? From my perspective as a former Catholic, it is very simplistic to think that Catholicism as an institution is the be all and end all of a way “to” God, something I find intellectually not possible anyway. People leave the Catholic or any other christianist church or Abrahamic church, or any such thing, for the same reason they might leave a political party: they start to think, or feel, or both, beyond the level of their initial indoctrination.
Having had some insightful experiences in my younger years, I found no one in the Church–who was accessible to me, living or dead, who could reasonably address my experiences and the conclusions made necessary by them. I mean there were answers, but “pray and have faith,” “your hormones are acting up,” or “you have a vivid imagination” do not constitute practical or even remotely useful answers.
Eventually, after what with my resources amounted to an exhaustive search, I was forced to conclude that Catholicism serve many who were willing to give up a sincere inquiry for pat answers, vagaries, and the ever present “it’s a mystery” paradigm. Well, it’s not, only to the extent that having faith prevents one from an assiduous self inventory in terms not necessarily included in standard practice. And in the case of christianisms, all 40,000 or more version, the really useful questions are not even glanced at. So, I left.
It is great if people are happy with what they have as faith. But that happiness doesn’t include that there is greater, far greater depth to human experience than what religion has room for, and restricts intelligent inquiry about, due to adamantine and, I’m sorry, not necessarily accurate, presuppositions. And therein lies the danger, great danger, of faith. Or of abject atheism. Both are the end of curiosity, having presupposed a conclusion about Diety, and therefore there is suffering. At least for christianists, as the atheist has the great psychological advantage of not having a god or devil to blame.
And that is why I often say that atheism is sometimes a necessary interim step to a practical spiritual understanding. But a religion is not. Any religion. It is a temporary and vague involvement akin to blame, if you look sincerely. And many are way too complex, therefore, as a means of keeping one’s attention. Truth is simple. And it is not in a religion, as far as I’m concerned. And it is arrogant to think that in the infinitude of Creation, one recently formed and rather controversial organization is the be all and end all for all of humanity, no matter what its, or its members, rationalizations might be.
So if someone asks me what church I go to, I simply ask them to demonstrate that I am ever out of Church.
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Darryl_B
Guest
The answer is marketing. Evangelical churches seem to take great delight in increasing the size of their church through bigger brighter glitzier and more glamorous marketing techniques (which incidentally costs large amounts of money to finance), the populous usually being stolen from other churches rather than from the lost. Then all one needs do is learn a few slogans and voila saved.
I don’t know which is worse. The protestant church which has resorted to this technique, or the soul who requires it.
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Sochi
Guest
Wow. So you have not noticed the banner ads at and around the tops of most of the CA sections ^? Yes, up there. And all over the site.
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Darryl_B
Guest
Vain attempt at comparison my friend.Wow. So you have not noticed the banner ads at and around the tops of most of the CA sections ^? Yes, up there. And all over the site.
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rcwitness
Guest
We, as Catholics, we know and acknowledge that we did not form ourselves out of nothing. Nor were we formed by mere chance. We were formed by someone who has not neglected us. He has been near to us all along, giving us hope and reconciliation to Him from our faults and shortcomings to what sustains our very life.
Being a child of God comes by being created in His image and then choosing the Spirit He offers us.
The Catholic Church is not the “be all and end all way to God” in the sense that you seem to think. Jesus Himself is the be all, end all way to God the Father. He is the Way, the Truth and the Life. Jesus gave Himself to the Church. Whoever has Jesus Has the Father also.
“And all these, though commended through their faith, did not receive what was promised, since God had provided something better for us, that apart from us they should not be made perfect.” Hebrews 11:39,40
The Apostles brought Jesus to the world just as Jesus brought the Father into the world. Catholic Teaching is that there is a fullness in living in His Spirit. It is only God who sees man in his entirety, but Jesus is working in unity among us. The Sacrament of His body and blood was given for a deep purpose! It is the means of His fellowship in us. We are no longer just ourselves, but Jesus Himself. There is true and real family bond in us and Jesus. We ask for forgiveness when we sin and forgive others who sin against us.
As for the many communions of Christians, this can bring about degrees of faith received. But remember, a genuine Evangelical Christian may be honoring Jesus greater than a Confirmed Catholic. The Church was never Commissioned to seperate the genuine from the deceived within the flock. But whoever comes to the Church confessing the faith will be offered the means of full Communion which Jesus gave to Her. The work that He has for individuals is our own glory. Maybe He will root out a wolf among the sheep through A child of His. Or maybe He will suffer in one of us against a crowd of wicked people. We only believe that He is the light of this world in His one Body. How is this Body confined? The Catholic Church tries not to define a ‘confinement’ on Our Lord’s mysterious work. What the Church does say, is there is a true and real Communion of all the faithfull in the receiving and love of the Word of God. Jesus is the one Word of God became flesh. The Written word which the Church delivered, brought together and bound in canon, has been a means of Salvation to all who accept it. Communion of His Word apart from His body and blood is an act of dysfunction. But the personal reasons for this lacking Communion can be as many as there are people doing so. Receiving His body and blood without reverence through our actions is defiling the grace that brought the Word of God to each one of us.
Paz de Cristo
Michael
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Sochi
Guest
Sorry. Don’t see a fleck of difference. You are in the church, so necessarily have to have the opinion you do.Vain attempt at comparison my friend.
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Sochi
Guest
Thanks Michael. I really don’t interpret much of the Church’s teachings from the same premise you seem to. Far from it. So I’m not sure what the point was of your statement. But thank you for your attention and time.
Mark 4: 33.34
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Sailor_Kenshin
Guest
I guess I must have a different definition of ‘common courtesy’ than anyone else. My definition doesn’t include interrogation.
But I begin to see the mechanism behind the post title, as in ‘How Did We Lose Them?’ Maybe what’s been taking place in this thread explains it.
So long!
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