I also have found Mormons very nice people.
Some of the meanest Catholics I ever met were in the region we left. Inward…priests very supportive of me…strange.
True religion is when we recognize each other as brothers and sisters and are detached from our material goods. You can find a true person of God in any religion and in any culture, even pagan…
Because the Holy Spirit goes where He may.
But the Lord called us who have His name to be one. And it is sad that we are not one.
I think the Mormons have the best youth programs. I have been overseas and see the Italians having great programs and ministry for their teens and young adults. The secular world here in America has always been hard for Catholics. We are more mystical and sacramental. I know the Catholic Italians had a very hard time integrating here. When I came back home after being with them, everything seemed so cold and ethereal.
Christianity in the United States is essentially protestant. We are more detached, the devout that is, and not inclined towards the prosperity gospel so to speak, and being attached to the Cross…myself speaking from my Irish roots.
I think the Evangelicals do alot better as a community and in ministry reaching out to the down and outers…because those people need black and white approach to the Scriptures…they are dealing with not obeying the 10 commandments or mental illness or alcoholism.
The Catholic Church has really done alot of such reaching out with the 12 Steps program.
In my ministry formation, the overall sense you have here is that Catholics don’t want to be like fundamentalists with the black and white and the condemnation of more refined or higher nuances of Scripture…Adolescents need black and white, what is right and what is wrong, a rather fundamentalist approach to faith because of all the anti-faith and destructive behaviors of their peers. And this is where they are not doing so well is because they are not serving teens’ needs to be taught faith with great conviction, self-sacrifice in the cross, this personal relationship with Jesus, the 10 commandments and morality, and taking the time to teach them with the fundamentals to not judge others because they don’t live like that.
For example, a teen group came with this evangelical Catholic teen group from another diocese in this state . This 15 year old Catholic boy got up and gave his testimony. They had an made a great impact on our youth. Well, then someone asked him how did he know he had God…and the boy could not give a theological answer…So that group was banned from coming back. This was the meanest Catholic region…how do you expect a kid to relate to theology? I thought it unfair. I told them the kids need be taught conviction and believe and we make the effort they don’t fall into judgementalness…anyway, i left and don’t want to be the Lone Ranger and have my own teens to raise.
The American Catholic Church is getting reset now after alot of purgation and hopefully things will get going again. Life Teen is now being implemented in my parish that reaches teens on their level and their needs.
If only all of us could be one, we would have a much stronger witness. America has the greatest number of denominations, sects and cults of Christianity…34,000 and it really detracts from our witness. Think of how the church would be if all came back, shared their gifts…and be such a witness in our country.
I believe if all Christians would be one, not just in attitude, but coming together, atleast for now in the Our Father for the first step, it would be a great help. The other is to rebuild the Church in the spirit of Christian Brotherhood…I see the southern Italians the best model of living faith in brotherhood and joy and much support of one another.
