Most fundamental truth of Christianity

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SirEwenii

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Just interested in your thoughts here:

If you met someone who had lived in isolation from any Christian influence their whole life, what would be the first thing you would say to them about the faith? What would be the key Catholic truths you would discuss with them?
 
God’s Love (Agape).
This would be the starting point because Love is universal. It is easily understood and explained and, since everything else - even creation itself - is predicated on that Love (God IS Love) this would be the best place to start.
All the rest would follow from that and without that as the foundation nothing else will matter (ref 1 cor 13:1-13)

Peace
James
 
To be a more trusting person

trust God more, trust jesus

and trust others

that is whats wrong with the world now, people are distrustful now…

not good:thumbsup:
 
“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”

Then, the Apostolic Creed.
 
SirEwenii said:
Just interested in your thoughts here:

If you met someone who had lived in isolation from any Christian influence their whole life, what would be the first thing you would say to them about the faith? What would be the key Catholic truths you would discuss with them?
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The Resurrection of Christ, as is said in 1 Cor 15:14: “And if Christ be not risen again, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain.”

Additionally, essentially all Catholic teaching can be derived from the Resurrection. There is no better way to explain our liturgical calendar, there is no better way to explain the significance of His Passion (and from there, the Mass), the Incarnation, etc etc.

I do have some reservations against making lists of the most fundamental truths though - not that they don’t exist, but some people use them to excuse their heresies through claiming that “we agree on the fundamentals”. Problem is we don’t - the Mass, for example, is unique to apostolic Christianity, and I’d say it’s a very fundamental part of the Christian Faith. And Christianity can’t be reduced to a lowest common denominator anyways.

However, in the situation you describe, my reservations fall - for someone who is not acquainted by Christianity at all, we have to start somewhere. I’d say the best starting point is the Resurrection, others might say the Incarnation (kind of makes the chronology easier, I guess).

Edit: And before I was done writing, we have (including mine) four different answers from four different people 🙂 . That is the beauty of Catholicism in a nutshell.
 
Rin said:
The Resurrection of Christ, as is said in 1 Cor 15:14: “And if Christ be not risen again, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain.”

Additionally, essentially all Catholic teaching can be derived from the Resurrection. There is no better way to explain our liturgical calendar, there is no better way to explain the significance of His Passion (and from there, the Mass), the Incarnation, etc etc.

I do have some reservations against making lists of the most fundamental truths though - not that they don’t exist, but some people use them to excuse their heresies through claiming that “we agree on the fundamentals”. Problem is we don’t - the Mass, for example, is unique to apostolic Christianity, and I’d say it’s a very fundamental part of the Christian Faith. And **Christianity can’t be reduced to a lowest common denominator **anyways.

However, in the situation you describe, my reservations fall - for someone who is not acquainted by Christianity at all, we have to start somewhere. I’d say the best starting point is the Resurrection, others might say the Incarnation (kind of makes the chronology easier, I guess).

Edit: And before I was done writing, we have (including mine) four different answers from four different people 🙂 . That is the beauty of Catholicism in a nutshell.
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Trust - is the lowest common denominator

see my post above
 
That we are called to be a perfect example of God’s love to each other.
 
celtspirit said:
Trust - is the lowest common denominator

see my post above
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Actually I would have to disagree with this.

Scripture tells us that it is Love (Agape) that is the “lowest common denominator” - See Mt 22:36-40, 1 Corinthians 13:1-13 and 1 John 4:7-8

I see no comparable Scriptural references to trust.

Not trying to be argumentative…Just sayin’

Peace
James
 
Rin said:
Trust is not unique to Christianity and can hence not be used to denote a Christian.
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Again I say

“There is no honour among thieves”

evil people do not trust anyone, even each other.

Christians trust in God, they trust each other.
 
celtspirit said:
“There is no honour among thieves”
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Forgive my ignorance but would you provide the chapter and verse for this?

I submit that the reason there is no honor among thieves is because there is no Agape among thieves.
Trust stems from Love - from Agape.

Please know that I’m not trying to downplay the importance of trust…

Peace
James
 
I think the most fundamental thing is how we obtain forgiveness of sins, then the command, “go and sin no more” so understanding what things are sins.

I imagine I’d do something like this:
  1. Who is God, All-Powerful, Holy, Creator of everything
  2. Who is man: creature, ought to rightly obey God,
  3. Man’s sin and disobedience
  4. God’s solution: incarnation, crucifixion, resurrection.
I think that while we live in a society that thinks they understand Christianity they often don’t understand the most key element: that we are sinners and that we need forgiveness of sins. Most people don’t even understand why Jesus needed to die
 
JRKH said:
Forgive my ignorance but would you provide the chapter and verse for this?

I submit that the reason there is no honor among thieves is because there is no Agape among thieves.
Trust stems from Love - from Agape.

Please know that I’m not trying to downplay the importance of trust…

Peace
James
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TRUST ME …

Im right:D
 
celtspirit said:
Again I say

“There is no honour among thieves”

evil people do not trust anyone, even each other.

Christians trust in God, they trust each other.
Click to expand...
So you’re saying that non-Christians by definition are evil and can’t exhibit trust (given that you disagree with my statement about trust not being unique to Christianity)?

I’m sorry, but you’ll have to provide a very good source for me to even consider to consider such an extraordinary claim.
 
Maybe this is a (very interesting!) question without no fundamentally right-or-wrong answer (they all seem good to me), but I’ve always felt that surely the Incarnation has to be the fundamental truth of Christianity.

Were He not the Son of God, then His death have been perhaps moving, but I guess meaningless (and almost certainly we’d not know anything about it today) - everything that Christ is, really, seems to follow from the Word becoming flesh. His coming into the world as a man, provided the basis for everything He did, for us, in it, and in His departing from it.

Just my pennyworth…

Ellie
 
Murmurs said:
Maybe this is a (very interesting!) question without no fundamentally right-or-wrong answer (they all seem good to me), but I’ve always felt that surely the Incarnation has to be the fundamental truth of Christianity.

Were He not the Son of God, then His death have been perhaps moving, but I guess meaningless (and almost certainly we’d not know anything about it today) - everything that Christ is, really, seems to follow from the Word becoming flesh. His coming into the world as a man, provided the basis for everything He did, for us, in it, and in His departing from it.

Just my pennyworth…

Ellie
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👍👍

The problem with a question or thought like the thread title is that there are so many things intertwined. It really is hard to choose a single thing.
Of course the OP then placed the question a bit different in the body of the opening post…
If you met someone who had lived in isolation from any Christian influence their whole life, what would be the first thing you would say to them about the faith? What would be the key Catholic truths you would discuss with them?
This is why I chose Agape as being the first concept to cover as the first things to cover with this person who had been so completely isolated. Every thing else, including the incarnation flows from Agape.

As a corollary to this - I think it important to really get to know this person first. Only by discovering their background, their character, their fundamental beliefs can we know how best to approach them with the faith - and what (from the several options) might be the best thing to bring up first.

Peace
James
 
rin said:
so you’re saying that non-christians by definition are evil and can’t exhibit trust (given that you disagree with my statement about trust not being unique to christianity)?

I’m sorry, but you’ll have to provide a very good source for me to even consider to consider such an extraordinary claim.
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trust me Im not wrong.
 
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