My faith is better than your faith

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soma said:
Ecumenicalism is the promotion of unity and cooperation between distinct religious groups and denominations in Christianity and in the larger sense the unity among all religions worldwide. Jesus modeled this by associating with all people and castes.
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I’m puzzled why so many folks are against this. :confused:
 
po18guy said:
Generally, if you come here asking, all is OK. If you come here spouting, you will encounter the CDF (Catholic Defense Forces). And, this is somehow mistreating you? Please, let’s dialog.

Christ’s peace.
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I suppose that makes me a member of the Protestant Defense Forces (PDF), even though I’m a Catholic. 😉
 
Tantum_ergo said:
Pigtown, my non-Catholic Christian friend, you are both right and wrong.

As individuals none of us can fully know the Truth. Only God.

As members however of the Catholic Church, the bride of Christ, and thus “one flesh” with Him, we DO possess the Fullness of Truth. I know you do not accept this, but your nonacceptance does not make Truth ‘false’.

As individuals, any Catholic can be a ‘good’ Catholic or a ‘bad’ Catholic–can choose to follow Church teachings fully, or only in part. That does not make the teaching only as ‘good’ as the individual practicing it though. That virtually ‘all’ of us Catholics fail to live up to Church teaching does not make the teaching ‘wrong’.

Your idea that, if 'none of us can fully know Truth, all of us no matter how we worship are doing what we should" is indifferentism.

Either there is ONE FULL TRUTH or there is NO FULL TRUTH.

If there is one full truth, then either we have one (or more) Churches which possess it, or we have NO church which possesses it.

If there are one or more Churches which possess it, then they must by definition preach not only ‘some’ of the teachings but ‘all’ of the teachings. If one Church teaches that X is authentic truth, and another church teaches that X is not authentic truth, they cannot both be correct. Therefore, unless two–or three-or more Churches teach EXACTLY THE SAME TEACHING–they are not ALL possessed of the fullness of truth.

So if there is one full truth, and we have only ONE Church which teaches all the teachings of that truth, then ALL the other churches must teach at best only PART of the truth.

To claim that any given Church which teaches only PART of the truth is equal to, or as good as, the Church which teaches the FULL Truth, is totally illogical. What is better, PART of a pie or the whole pie? Doing PART of a necessary operation, or the WHOLE operation? Getting PART of a paycheck, or the WHOLE paycheck?
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Just wanted to try and clarify the whole truth thing. We as Catholics do not know it all by any means. But that said we do have access to the WHOLE REVEALED TRUTH which is and has been protected By our Church for over 2 thousand yrs. We can show how the Church started with Christ and has continued unbroken but not perfect since.Mt 16:18 “And so I tell you Peter you are rock and on this rock foundation I will build my church, and not even death will ever be able to overcome it.”
We don’t think all protestants are necessarly wrong,(that is an individual thing) but want to share all the revealed truth so that with the guidance of the Holy Spirit you may have many more blessings.
Tantum you are doing an awesome job keep it up.👍
Bless you all May the peace of the Lord be with you!
Your humble servant, jim
 
mikew262 said:
I’m puzzled why so many folks are against this. :confused:
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It’s why soccer fans fight each other. We are all very clannish. Interactions between Christians should be a high activity.

But what one often sees in these interchanges is just plain low rent, common one-upmanship. Christ asked us to be nice to one another. I guess not everyone got the memo.
 
a_priori said:
It’s why soccer fans fight each other. We are all very clannish. Interactions between Christians should be a high activity.

But what one often sees in these interchanges is just plain low rent, common one-upmanship. Christ asked us to be nice to one another. I guess not everyone got the memo.
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…but He also condemned falsehoods…
 
JimArsenault said:
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Just wanted to try and clarify the whole truth thing. We as Catholics do not know it all by any means. But that said we do have access to the WHOLE REVEALED TRUTH which is and has been protected By our Church for over 2 thousand yrs. We can show how the Church started with Christ and has continued unbroken but not perfect since.Mt 16:18 “And so I tell you Peter you are rock and on this rock foundation I will build my church, and not even death will ever be able to overcome it.”
We don’t think all protestants are necessarly wrong,(that is an individual thing) but want to share all the revealed truth so that with the guidance of the Holy Spirit you may have many more blessings.
Tantum you are doing an awesome job keep it up.👍
Bless you all May the peace of the Lord be with you!
Your humble servant, jim
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There is nothing wrong with sharing the Catholic truth with others, likewise non-Catholics will want to shared their perceived truth with us. The key is to be mutually respectful of one another. If we don’t accept each others truth, then fine, we worship the we want and vice versa. Its really pretty simple. I think God would appreciate that kind of attitude than the alternative.
 
a_priori said:
It’s why soccer fans fight each other. We are all very clannish. Interactions between Christians should be a high activity.

But what one often sees in these interchanges is just plain low rent, common one-upmanship. Christ asked us to be nice to one another. I guess not everyone got the memo.
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I think you nailed it. 👍
 
jay29 said:
…but He also condemned falsehoods…
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And yet, many feel as Catholics, we fit that description. Again, see the topic of the thread.

It is really falsehoods, or just misunderstanding or misinterpretation?
 
mikew262 said:
And yet, many feel as Catholics, we fit that description. Again, see the topic of the thread.

It is really falsehoods, or just misunderstanding or misinterpretation?
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The five solas and OSAS are heresies. The Council of Trent was PERFECT in response to the “reformation”
 
kalt said:
Yep, that’s a world of difference. 🙂

Some Cathollics believe that Catholics do everything better. Hah!

Catholics have a lot to learn from some other Xian denom’s.
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I have learned alot…and our goals are the same…our paths are different…not better…different. 👍
 
mikew262 said:
On another thread which was recently closed down, a lot of the discussion indirectly centered around the “My faith is better than your faith” concept. In other words, some Catholics were saying and/or insinuatiing our faith is the true faith and the whole truth and your Protestant faith is lacking and thus imperfect. Likewise some Protestants were saying the Catholic faith encouraged idol worship and spread a false gospel.

IMO, these types of attitudes do nothing but fuel the divisiveness between the various Christian denominations and Catholicism and accomplish nothing positive. Instead of trying to find fault, why not rejoice in the what they most all have in common.
  • Christ is the Son of God
  • Trinity
  • Christ died for our sins
  • The Resurrection
Most Christian groups all believe the above things. While we may worship God differently to some respect, most all agree on the basics. Does God really care that we worship differently, as long as we are sincere in that worship?

This may have been discussed enough already on the other thread, but I invite anyone’s comments. However, lets try to keep a charitable tone.
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Yes, God does care. That is why Jesus told the Samaritan woman how God desired to be worshipped. He made it clear that the ideas the Samaritans had were not consistent with what He had in mind.

Christians do not even agree on what the ‘essentials’ are! I bet we cannot even agree on what it means to “worship Him in Spirit and in Truth”!
 
This topic has motivated me to get an account so that I can give my two cents on the “One True Faith” situation.

To all protestants out there, let me ask you this question: Why do your churches continually change their stances and opinions about issues such as contraception and abortion “with the times”?

Tink about this: in the bible, two statements come to mind, the statement about God stating: “I am Truth, and do not change”, and “You are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church and the gates of Hell will not prevail against it.”

If the reason for these changes is “new or relevant morality” or something, then you are insinuating that God may change in his laws. Saying that God can change is not Biblical. I for one would not want to worship a God who isn’t a Being with perfect consistency. Would you?

If the reason for these changes is to adjust with the social norm, then that to is in error. As is apparent throughout the Earth, darkness has creeped into the times. Changing to adjust with the times is simply allowing the darkness to influence you, which would mean that the “gates of Hell” have scored a win over you.

The Catholic Church stands today as the only church with near-perfect consistency to both Christ’s teachings and the beliefs of the early fathers of the church. It has consistently tought the same message for nearly 2000 years. While clarifications and revisions have been made, these were primarilly used to discredit heresy and apostasy. The protestant churches have proved through their own actions that they are not the “One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic” church which is the one fully True Church of Christ. The changes they made are simpy condemning.

Spoken in Truth and Love:
Gloria en Excelses Deio!
God Bless.🙂
 
mikew262 said:
Why can’t all Christians just accept that while all may worship God a little differently, our ultimate goal is the same; to get to Heaven? A little more mutual respect might go a long way. This actually should go for all the world religions.
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Some people do not have a goal to get to heaven.

Furthermore, Jesus was very specific about how this could best be done, and from our perspective, departure from what He revealed would be placing ourselves at risk of not attaining.
 
mikew262 said:
I agree with you. A lot of it relies on faith, and unfortunately not everybody’s faith is identical.
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I think you just answered your own OP here. According to Apostolic Teaching, The faith of Christ is identical all over the world. therefore, if some people’s is not identical, then they have departed from what Christ taught.
 
mikew262 said:
This may be true, but who says Catholicism necessarily has it right? Catholics have faith that it is, but so do Baptists, Methodists, etc. with their brand of worship. Nobody knows for sure. One just has to follow where they feel the Holy Spirit leading them. Many ex-Catholics have said they felt dead spiritually while a member of the CC, but found God in another… The same has been said in reverse by ex-Protestants who converted to the CC. Who is to say Christ doesn’t reach out to people in different ways?
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mikew, Catholocism is not a ‘brand of worship’ but Christ’s revelaiton of Himself to mankind. Yes, we can know for sure, because God has revealed it to us. If you wish to reject that for yourself, it is your perogative, and if you wish to believe that these other man-made “brands of worship” that appeared 1500 years later, that is also your perogative. It is possible for every man to reject God’s revelation and “do what he thinks is right in his own eyes”.

I was one of those Catholics who felt spiritually dead before I left. I found that God was not missing, it was I that had wandered. God reaches out to people whereever they are, and leads each one to Himself. It is for this reason we know that we are all to be in unity, because He has One Body, and we are all to be united in it, and in Him. To the extent we are not, we fall short of His plan for us.
 
mikew262 said:
Good for you if that’s what you believe. However, a Baptist, an Anglican, etc. would answer the same way if the question was posed to them about their denomination.

Get the point I’m trying to make?
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Relativism. It is “Pilates Point”. What is truth?

With the answer that we cannot really know what it is!

Is that the company you wish to keep?
 
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