Non-Believers who Identify as Catholic, and their effect

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VanitasVanitatum said:
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skyglass:
I know what you mean. I think this is why the phrase “devout Catholic
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That phrase is frequently misused.
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Correct. There’s no “devout” Catholic or “liberal” Catholic or “conservative” Catholic. You’re either Catholic or you’re not.
 
BigBoom said:
Correct. There’s no “devout” Catholic or “liberal” Catholic or “conservative” Catholic. You’re either Catholic or you’re not.
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Adjectives are used to describe specific things in general.
 
Pattylt said:
Do you want a person like Rico to identify himself in public as Catholic or not?
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I think all faithful Catholics would prefer that people like Rico didn’t go around announcing themselves as “Catholic”. They are an embarrassment to those of us trying to actually live a Catholic life.

However, if Rico was baptized Catholic, he is Catholic. He doesn’t somehow lose his Catholicism by not following the rules. So as much as we would like to throw Rico out of the Church, it’s not possible. We’re stuck with him and his sins and his setting a bad example in public. Other than praying for him and, if we’re sufficiently close to him, fraternally correcting him, there’s nothing we can do about it.
 
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BigBoom said:
The church does teach that heretics and schismatics are not members of the church as they have fully separated themselves from it. The church also teaches that in order to be in communion with the church, all doctrines and church teachings must be believed and practiced.
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Assuming these “heretics”, “schismatics”, and those who don’t believe and practice church teaching were baptized as Catholics, then they are Catholics not in communion with the Church to some degree. If their heresy etc is bad enough and public enough, they may be excommunicated. Excommunication is intended to send a strong message to the person that they have erred and need to get right with the Church; it is not intended to throw people out of the Church.

Rico right now is latae sententiae excommunicated because he procured abortions for his wives. So he is an excommunicated Catholic, not a non-Catholic.
 
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That’s what I would assume, too. That’s why I questioned @Jbrady but it seems he really doesn’t care. I would assume faithful Catholics would care even if they can’t change it. No one want their faith shown in such a bad light. Even atheists have to deal with some that state they are atheists and yet make other atheists cringe…it’s just human nature to have feelings about being considered bad or, at least, not representative of your group identity.
 
As the OP noted, we are all sinners. Some sinners are just worse and more public about it than most.

We get in trouble when we start to think of ourselves as “better than” the next guy, rather than directing our efforts towards possibly saving his soul. Rico might very well continue to live a gravely sinful life for decades and then all of a sudden repent on his deathbed and God would rejoice and welcome him. Although he might have to spend time in Purgatory before he can go to Heaven.
 
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Your allegations against orfeo1 are entirely unfair.

We have the ability to judge actions, though not the state of a person’s soul. In this case, Rico is objectively saying one thing and doing another. He doesn’t want the responsibility of being a Catholic, or a father for that matter. Yet he wants to state he’s Catholic. By baptism, he is a Catholic but it would be better if he was honest and called himself a non-believer. Barring any changes, he will fry. We know this because the Bible tells us the truth about hell.

orfeo1 is not playing judge and jury. He is stating only the truth.
 
Only liberal Catholics insist on removing terms like devout, conservative, orthodox. If you are Catholic, ie. really Catholic, these terms are absolutely necessary to defend the faith from people seeking to undermine the Church from within.
 
Lara said:
Only liberal Catholics insist on removing terms like devout, conservative, orthodox. If you are Catholic, ie. really Catholic, these terms are absolutely necessary to defend the faith from people seeking to undermine the Church from within.
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What I mean is you either accept everything the church teaches and are Catholic or you reject one or multiple things the church teaches and are not Catholic.
 
When I was growing up, a kid I was friendly with had a prominent nose. He happened to be 100% Jewish with British/German roots, but he often denied being Jewish and told people he was Italian. He was infatuated with Mafia movies, and sought to be accepted by the fresh-off-the-boat Italian guys I knew. He even adopted their accents and mannerisms. Eventually, several of them got involved in real-life gangland murder and crime, and after a bad run-in with the law, my friend moved on from that infatuation while a few of the Italian kids went on to hard time in prison. In fear for his life, he wisely moved all the way across the country to hide from them.

In actuality, most Italians I knew hated the prejudices and assumptions others imposed on their being Italians. They wanted to be Americans with an Italian heritage. They loved their culture, but despised the criminal element other people associated them with. The glamorized bad guys kind of gave all American Italians (especially in New York) a mostly undeserved bad name.

I don’t care much about getting a bad name myself, whether for being an Italian from New York or for being Catholic. But I do think it’s sadly unfortunate that there are people being dissuaded from entering into our beautiful Holy Mother Church by the impression given by those who proclaim themselves to be Catholic, yet who disavow Her tenets and soil Her reputation. There are MANY people out there who only “know” the bad stuff, and nothing of the true, the pure, the good, and the genuinely Holy Catholic Church. I think it was Fulton Sheen who said there are not 100 people who hate the Catholic Church, but only the Catholic Church they think they know (I’m sure somebody will correct my sloppy quote).
 
This might provide a little different perspective:
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Not living my faith, but I still know it's the correct one Catholic Living
Much as the title says. I don’t go to Mass anymore or receive the Sacraments. Lost my mom and my closest sister over the past couple of years, and have since moved in with a gal who loves me very much and who I love very much back. I fully accept that I’m wrong for living outside the faith, but I do feel loved, valued, taken care of, important and capable in my life right now. I still pray, especially for my mom and my sister. I certainly don’t hate the Church, and I still feel like it teaches a…
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I’ve never met a Catholic that agrees with the Church on everything, or who follows every teaching perfectly, or who does everything a “good Catholic” is supposed to do every time. And many Catholics struggle with faith and unbelief.

In short, I am not going to sit in judgment as to who is and isn’t Catholic. The Church certainly has the authority to do that (I do not) - but notably the Church does not exercise that authority (except in exceedingly rare circumstances). I am fine with that; and I’ll follow that lead.
 
This doesn’t just apply to things like religion and heritage. Anything that one can join or even just an idea that one can be for is susceptible to people saying I believe in a percentage of it. One issue is that the tenets of any group can usually be broken down in those that are required, those that are commonly held, usually held, etc. Rico in the given example likely covers the gamut. This leads to another issue. A person can believe that no one group has it all right, but that one group may be closest to accurate.

There are a lot of reasons why one may say they are part of a group and not be strongly in line with it. Some of these don’t even relate to Catholicism. One quick example: The founder of MADD (Mothers Against Drunk Driving) founded the group to stop people from drinking and driving. It’s had to fathom it now, but there was a time when judges would sometimes give people convicted of it of light sentences because they were drunk. Later on the tenets of the group shifted from strengthening the laws, but to limit drinking itself. She later left the organization because of this change, but she will always be associated with it.

One item that’s popped up in this thread is a bit confusing. It seems odd to scold someone for calling themselves a Catholic for not believing in a majority of what it teaches, yet the Church itself calls that same person a Catholic knowing full well what he believes. I personally feel if one has a title imposed on them they should be allowed to use it.
 
Mike_from_NJ said:
It seems odd to scold someone for calling themselves a Catholic for not believing in a majority of what it teaches, yet the Church itself calls that same person a Catholic knowing full well what he believes.
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People who have made this argument about someone not being a Catholic despite being baptized often cite to older Church documents that say that in addition to being baptized, the person needs to agree to the full Profession of Faith in order to be Catholic. Many of these people who call themselves Catholic but don’t act it were baptized as infants, so they never made the full Profession of Faith that adult converts who are getting baptized into the Church do.

There is some support for their position in that cases exist of a baby being baptized but then brought up in another faith by parents who never intended to raise him Catholic. One example of this from a few decades ago would be Protestant parents rushing their baby to a Catholic hospital because it was closest or the best at dealing with emergency baby care. If the parents were Christian and baby had not been baptized yet and was in danger of death, then the nurses, depending on what era we were in, might have baptized the baby, with or without asking permission of its parents. In any event, if baby recovered then parents generally took baby home and raised it in whatever religious tradition they were planning to follow, usually Protestant denomination. At no time did the parents or the baby consent to or plan on being raised Catholic.
 
Jbrady said:
Who granted you that faculty? Why would you take it upon yourself to decide who is Catholic or not? And on what basis beyond your own personal beliefs and interpretations?
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What if you knew someone who claimed to be a vegan believer in animal-rights at the same time as he was eating a rare sirloin, wearing a fur-lined leather jacket and preparing to go on a hunting trip? Would you express the same outrage at someone who made the obvious observation that such a person is not a vegan animal-rights adherent at all?

It’s called the faculty of reason, and the basis for the conclusion is the testimony of the alleged vegan. Or Catholic. There’s no mystery to it, and it should be obvious that someone who rejects Catholic teaching has abandoned Catholicism and cut himself off from the Church.
 
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BornInMarch said:
Some people continue to call themselves catholic because they were raised that way, because the rest of their family is, or because it’s most common in their community.

While it’s not a good reason to stay in the Church, it can still lead them to the holy spirit and back into faith.
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Or maybe because they were baptized into the Catholic faith. And a Catholic baptism leaves an indelible mark on the soul of the person, so once one is baptized Catholic, they’ll remain Catholic for all of eternity.

What the OP describes I simply call non-practicing Catholics and others might call them fallen-away Catholics, but they’re still Catholics nevertheless.
 
neophyte said:
It’s called the faculty of reason, and the basis for the conclusion is the testimony of the alleged vegan. Or Catholic. There’s no mystery to it, and it should be obvious that someone who rejects Catholic teaching has abandoned Catholicism and cut himself off from the Church.
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Even with “reason”, it is simply not the OP’s job, or right, or “duty”, to personally declare who is a “real Catholic”, and who is not. That is egregiously presumptous. Your “vegan” analogy is irrelevant.
 
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