St. Francis, there are a LOT of issues with what you write. First of all, if you want to quote Jesus, great, but he never said “go to mass every Sunday.”
I just today heard a talk in which this was explained, so I will get back to you in the next couple of days with that–it was explained much better than I could do.
What he did give us was the concept that we should love God, and love our neighbor as ourselves. I see a lot more condemnation of people on this board for things like missing mass than I do for failing to love our neighbors.
Hopefully the explanation above will cover this as well.
Also, since when does failure to keep His commandments equal failure to love Him? Maybe I’m weak. Maybe I’m confused about my obligations. Maybe I’m 80 years old and my joints ache and I can’t make mass.
Well, a Catholic should not be confused about the obligation to attend Mass, bit if there was some ignorance of this and it was not the Catholic’s fault, then his culpability in the objective sin of missing Mass would be reduced accordingly.
Anyone who is *unable *to go to Mass has the obligation lifted. Now, this happened to me at a time before I returned to the Church, bit was attending Sunday services at a little Protestant place down the road from my house. I wanted to go every Sunday, bit i had a baby with asthma who got hit hard by every respiratory thing that got near him. So I would go on one Sunday, be home with a baby just becoming sick the next week, a sick baby the following week, and a baby just recovering the third week. The fourth week I would go and the cycle would start again.
But taking care of a sick baby meant I couldn’t go, and the obligation (had I been Catholic) was therefore lifted.
An elderly person who cannot get to Mass, someone who is sick, etc, the obligation is lifted.
OTOH, I have seen people in Mass who are there with their handicapped children; I have seen 2 men bent over almost double by a back problem; people who drive 3 hours round-trip (in the Bible Belt); people in their 90s; so it’s not like every little thing should keep someone at home.
It must be tough for some posters, having to make those judgments about who is and isn’t a practicing catholic. Those ivory towers sure must be nice to live in.
What posters generally do is to explain what the Church teaches. I wouldn’t say to someone who posted on CAF, “You are not a practicing Catholic.” I would, however, gently (hopefully) challenge them about what they are doing.
If someone comes here and says, “We want to buy a boat so we can goof off on it during the summer, so we are using contraception,” yes, that person would have what the Church teaches explained to them, and they would be challenged to consider their priorities.
However, many times people ask general questions about Catholic practice, or we speak in general terms about these issues.
All this is a part of loving our neighbor, because when we see people taking a path which generally leads to an unpleasant eternity, we want to instruct them and warn them: two of the Spiritual Acts of Mercy. We must at times judge *actions, *but not people.
I usually go on Fri at least. Maybe even Tue. and or Thur. but it’s very early in the morning. So transportation on Sun is still unavailable to me.