Questions from an Ex-Catholic

[ExCatholicGuy]

Pagan Rome waged war on unarmed Christians for hundreds of years, killed them by the thousands, and yet was unable to exterminate them–and ultimately converted to Christianity. The world’s greatest superpower being thwarted by the hand of God… is that what you call “thin”?

That’s a fallacy often seen in apologetics, at least as practiced on this forum: confusing proof of belief with proof of truth. The fact that many people fervently believe something, even to the point of being willing to die for it, does not make it true.

By your reasoning, the spread of Islam and Mormonism, sometimes in the face of severe persecution, would be evidence of the truth of those faiths.

 

[Cat_Herder]

That’s a fallacy often seen in apologetics, at least as practiced on this forum: confusing proof of belief with proof of truth. The fact that many people fervently believe something, even to the point of being willing to die for it, does not make it true.

By your reasoning, the spread of Islam and Mormonism, sometimes in the face of severe persecution, would be evidence of the truth of those faiths.

The Muslims and Mormons used force. The Christians did not and beat the Romans anyway. That’s the point, and it’s not a belief, it’s an empirically verifiable fact.

 

[ExCatholicGuy]

The Muslims and Mormons used force. The Christians did not and beat the Romans anyway. That’s the point, and it’s not a belief, it’s an empirically verifiable fact.

My point is simply that proof of belief does not equate to proof of truth. History only proves that many people came to believe that Christianity is the truth - it does not prove that Christianity is the truth.

And to your point: many people did convert to Islam and Mormonism voluntarily.

 

[PRmerger]

I don’t even know whether Jesus was the son of God, and if he was, whether he really did and said the things which the Church claims, and whether he meant them in the way the Church interprets them. The evidence is thin.

I find it curious that non-believers hold such a high standard for evidence for proofs for Christianity, yet such a low standard of evidence for other things.

For example, no non-believer ever posits, “Did Augustus Caesar really exist?” Yet the evidence for his existence is abysmal compared to the evidence for Christ.

Edit: I understand that the argument, as you present it, ECG, is not whether Christ existed, but whether he said the things the Church says he did.

But my argument still stands: why so high a demand for proof for religious things as opposed to other things, which you accept simply on faith?

 

[Cat_Herder]

My point is simply that proof of belief does not equate to proof of truth. History only proves that many people came to believe that Christianity is the truth - it does not prove that Christianity is the truth.

And to your point: many people did convert to Islam and Mormonism voluntarily.

I am giving you objective evidence that Christianity is true: Pagan Rome lost against pacifist Christians who were martyred by the thousands.

There is no comparable event in any other religion. You cannot say “well every religion has voluntary conversions” and use that to explain away this event because no other religion has won a revolutionary war in which only the bad guys were fighting.

Put down the red herrings.

 

[ExCatholicGuy]

I find it curious that non-believers hold such a high standard for evidence for proofs for Christianity, yet such a low standard of evidence for other things.

For example, no non-believer ever posits, “Did Augustus Caesar really exist?” Yet the evidence for his existence is abysmal compared to the evidence for Christ.

Of course the standard is lower. Augustus Caesar is not alleged to be the son of God, to have performed miracles or risen from the dead.

 

[Cat_Herder]

Of course the standard is lower. Augustus Caesar is not alleged to be the son of God, to have performed miracles or risen from the dead.

Augustus Caesar certainly believed he was the son of a god and that he could perform miracles. In pagan Rome the emperors were considered gods and part of the pantheon along with the likes of Zeus and company. If you didnt worship Caesar then Caesar’s legions would throw you to the lions. Therefore everybody believed the Caesars were immortal miraculous gods–except us Christians, who got killed en masse as a result.

… Have you actually studied history?

 

[PRmerger]

Of course the standard is lower. Augustus Caesar is not alleged to be the son of God, to have performed miracles or risen from the dead.

Really? Do you hold the same demand for proof for the pilot who flies your family on, say, American Airlines?

Or do you just accept on faith that he’s actually a licensed pilot?

 

[paul_c]

Hello Everyone!

Just a little background about myself… I am a 30 year old female who grew up Catholic. I was a pretty devout Catholic for my childhood and my teenage years, but as I grew older and began to think for myself and question things, I no longer identify myself with the Catholic Church or any one religion for that matter. I have, however, become extremely spiritual in the past three years or so, and have found myself more connected with God than I ever felt while a member of the church. I left the church because I found myself disagreeing with a lot of fundamental issues and teachings of the church, mostly because they did not make much sense to me, and still don’t. I was wondering if you guys could shed some light on some subjects and if we could have an open yet respectful discussion.

Hopefully, 5 days after you posted, its not to late to give answers here.

1. One of the biggest problems I have with Catholicism (as well as other Christian religions) is the concept of Hell. I think a lot of Christians under-estimate the power and wonder of a God who IS unconditional love and I firmly believe that God IS nothing but pure, unconditional love. I feel the church, however, paints quite a different picture. I feel like the church imposes too many human qualities to God, when God is definitely anything but human. I believe within this pure and endless source of unconditional love that is God that no one can and ever will be completely separate from him, nor will he judge anyone. Saying you will go to Hell because you don’t follow him or the church or Jesus or any of other myriad of sins someone could possibly commit doesn’t add up in my book. A truly unconditional God loves you no matter what, even if you don’t ask for forgiveness, don’t believe, or outright reject him.

Look at this a little differently. God is Love, which means he does things for us without expecting anything in return. But he is also just, which means he is fair. And he is considerate, which means he values others. So how is all this manifested in Catholic theology? Well, God makes heaven available to everyone. But there are restrictions. 1) They have to request it through baptism. He does not force heaven on anyone because he values their wishes. 2) those in heaven must do God’s will for them, which is to love. This is justice. You see, in the story of Adam and Eve, it was the same. God loved Adam and Eve everything they wanted with one restriction- they couldn’t eat from the tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil. When they became obedient, he banished them from the garden of eden. This was in direct response for their actions. Do not think for a moment that we won’t be held accountable for our choices and actions. If we chose to do God’s will, we will go to heaven. If we chose to turn away, then our choice will become permanent in Hell. But remember, as long as you live, you can reconcile with God and return to the state of Grace through the sacrament of reconciliation.

1. Why do Catholics/Christians believe that the Bible is free of error and flaw when human beings have written it? It’s also a book that has been translated from ancient languages in a way different time and place than we are in now. Do you ever feel that some parts of it were lost in translation, or even edited or downright tailored to those who had a hidden agenda in the past? I mean, I think it takes a lot more faith in our fellow man to trust everything the Bible says than faith in God.

Catholics believe that the Holy Spirit protected the Bible and the magesterium that compiled and translated it from error. If it wasn’t for the Church and the Bible, how would you know about God. God put these things in place for our benefit.

1. How can religion in general be a valid concept when everyone claims their religion is “the truth”? Isn’t religion also just a manmade concept that people tailor their own beliefs and interpretations around? In the end, aren’t all religions basically acknowledging a higher power? Who is right and who is wrong? Is there even such a thing as right or wrong?

Religion is an understanding of God. And yes, there is such a thing as absolute truth. The Catholic church is the one true faith, others have components of the truth but are not all true. What makes Catholicism more credible than the others. First of all, Christianity is the only religion based entirely on love and as you point out, God is love. Of the Christian faiths, only Catholicism can trace its doctrines and lineage back to Jesus and His Apostles. All Protestant faiths were started by men, who can be readily identified.The Orthodox Faith can trace its lineage back to the Apostles, but they have denied the primacy of Peter. There;s another point here to consider, as well. The Catholic Church can support all of its positions with very well documented, reasoned arguments. Its has had 2000 years to address every conceiveable question because it has been robustly challenged for all those years. And yet it survives and prospers because it is the truth. No single individual can really believe that they are more inspired or more knowledgeable than the Holy Catholic Church, with all of its saints and theologians. When we come to understand that, we start to realize that our response to things that sound wrong must change. Instead of saying, " I don’t agree with that so the church must be wrong", we start saying, " This doesn’t sound right, what am I missing?" And when you approach the questions like this, you are open to learning.

 

[paul_c]

I guess I just feel that a lot of things in the church are too black and white with no room for discussion, debate, question, or opinion. I feel like I don’t belong because I don’t agree with or believe everything the church teaches and I take a lot of the Bible with a grain of salt. This is why I can no longer call myself a Catholic, despite the fact that I still believe in God and the teachings of Jesus. If there is one thing I miss about the church it was the sense of community. Because my beliefs span across many different philosophies and religions, I feel like an outcast at times with no one to really talk or discuss with.

The Church was commissioned to teach the truth by Jesus and it can not vary from what it has been taught. Truth is not defined by opinions or by democratic vote. Truth is eternal. Have you ever considered this: Why do you think you are right and the church is wrong? Do you have more inspiration than the Apostles and the Saints? do you have more knowledge than that of all the gifted theologians that have graced the church? Could you go head to head with Pope Benedict and prove him wrong? I ask this to make the point that we all have to trust someone to teach us about God and morality. And who possibly has more credibility than the Catholic Church

 

[paul_c]

Free will is not quite absolute, there. They may disbelieve or outright reject God, but not want to accept the consequences of their actions. If their free will were absolute, then they could choose to be free from the consequences of their action.

So the free will argument seems to say, “you are free to do as you choose, but you are not free to escape from the consequences of your actions.”

And who determines what the consequences of your actions are? Not you, but the nature of reality (again, the dream of any wrongdoer is wrongdoing without consequences, which isn’t going to fly). But who defines the nature of reality? Not you, but God.

If God is truly omnipotent, then we are back with the dilemma of whether it would have been more merciful to have created less severe consequences for rejecting him.

In our penal system, for example, we’ve abolished cruel and unusual punishment and, in some cases, the death penalty. We’ve alleviated the consequences for those who have chosen criminal behavior. Some are even jealous of the amenities of our prisons

It still remains a paradox, then, why an omnipotent God could not have made the consequences of rejecting Him less severe and less permanent.

God could certainly have made the consequences of rejecting Him less severe and less permanent. And he could have made the law of gravity only apply when its convenient as well. But he didn’t. We know so little about the infinite knowledge that God possesses that its rather ridiculous to try to second guess God’s morality. What we can do is to try to understand why things are the way they are. So why would God allow people to make decisions that are bad for them? Perhaps it is because God respects our autonomy? Isn’t that true love? People who want to live without God are given their wish. Is that unfair? People who can only love themselves are separated from those that love others. Again, is this unfair?

Another limitation of freedom is that there is no free will in hell. Change, growth, and repentance are no longer possible. One cannot pray for those in hell – they are beyond the reach of prayers. If God respected the freedom of all of his creatures – out of love – then there would always be (it seems) the freedom to repent and to turn back towards him. If one wanted – i.e., freely chose to ask – for help in doing that (e.g., “I find it difficult to love God, but I would like help in doing so”), then it would seem that help would always be available. After all, eternity is an awfully long time

We can’t really appreciate how it is to live “out of time” like we will after we die. Nor do we understand the true dynamics of hell. And Even on earth, there are decisions that can not be reversed, no matter how much we would like to. You see, we are afforded the right to make meaningful decisions. After all, what would be the worth of a life in which no decision we made was ever final or meaningful. It is a sign of utmost respect that God allows us to make decisions in our life that are for keeps.

Someone like Hitler spent 50-something years on earth, and at least 30 of them propagating acts of great cruelty.

How long would it take to repent, or to learn from such grievous transgressions? The equivalent of one-hundred years, perhaps? One-thousand? One million? Ten million? One billion? Eternity, within the context of 30 or so years of temporality, creates the paradox of why change is never possible.

Is it the teaching of the Catholic church that if anyone truly repents of his sins sacramentally, no matter how grievous the sin, even up to their last breath, then God will forgive their sins and allow them to enter heaven. As Jesus said, God is more happy over 1 repentant sinner than over 100 righteous people who had no need to repent. That is the fullness of his mercy. But if we don’t partake of this chance during life, we have lost the opportunity. And by the way, we believe that we can’t judge anyone, even Hitler, because we don’t know what happened at the end of his life. We simply can’t read men’s hearts like God can.

Perhaps I can also give you a little background in the Catholic teaching on Purgatory. You see, you need to die in the state of grace to go to heaven. You get in the state of grace through baptism. You fall from the state of grace through sin. You can regain the state of grace after sin through the sacrament of reconciliation. If you die in the state of grace but still have the tendency to sin, you will not enter heaven directly but will be purged of that tendency first in Purgatory, since no sin can ever be found in heaven. So your question about how long it takes to be purged of a radical tendency to sin is an open question. Perhaps it happens in an instance, perhaps it takes much longer, we have no way to know. But before any of that is possible, you have to desire to be cleansed and act on it (thus the sacrament of reconciliation). This is a matter of God respecting our individual will.

As one person I know put it, “it is itself a paradox that temporal decisions have eternal consequences.” Again, we make the decisions – but it is God that has decided that the consequences, are the consequences.

If we let our criminals on earth sentence themselves…well Just so, some absolutely brazen individual would tell God, “I want all of the pleasures of heaven, without loving you.” And an omnipotent God would say, “sorry – not possible.”

Its not a paradox to me. God sees what we do not and he judges based on far more knowledge than we have. But you’ve started touching upon the truth in this last paragraph. If God really wants a heaven where everyone loves everyone else, there is no room for compromise.

 

[pismopal]

That’s a fallacy often seen in apologetics, at least as practiced on this forum: confusing proof of belief with proof of truth. The fact that many people fervently believe something, even to the point of being willing to die for it, does not make it true.

By your reasoning, the spread of Islam and Mormonism, sometimes in the face of severe persecution, would be evidence of the truth of those faiths.

With proof of truth there would be no need for “Faith” and without faith ,the connection between the Church and God disappears ,it seems to me. I have always loved what Bishop Sheen once said…" A lie is a lie if everyone believes it and the truth is the truth if no one believes it."

 

[Cat_Herder]

With proof of truth there would be no need for “Faith”

Catholicism is 100% empirically provable. Actually, the Catholic Church invented empiricism, which much like Brother Ocham’s Razor, has now been stolen and used against her by modernism in the typical Judas fashion.

So although we have absolute proof of the truth, that does not dispense with the need for faith. Faith doesn’t mean assuming things are true, it means fidelity in the sense that spouses are called to be faithful for one another. From CCC 1814:

Faith is the theological virtue by which we believe in God and believe all that he has said and revealed to us, and that Holy Church proposes for our belief, because he is truth itself. By faith “man freely commits his entire self to God.” For this reason the believer seeks to know and do God’s will. “The righteous shall live by faith.” Living faith “work through charity.”

Thus, I can believe that someone is my spouse. But unless I actually give myself completely to this person, I am not being faithful to my spouse. Faith is more than a set of intellectual propositions, it is a total gift of the self to God.

 

[Eric_Hyom]

free_thinker;

. What I haven’t seen is much love for our fellow man,

We are not very good at this, but Just a thought of what the greatest commandments would have meant to Jesus when he spent his time on Earth…

Jesus loves God the Father with his heart, soul mind and strength.
Jesus loves each and every one of his neighbours as he loves himself.

Could Jesus love us more than he loves himself?

Search for a greatest meaning to this question to find God.

Blessings

Eric

 

[ExCatholicGuy]

I am giving you objective evidence that Christianity is true: Pagan Rome lost against pacifist Christians who were martyred by the thousands.

There is no comparable event in any other religion. You cannot say “well every religion has voluntary conversions” and use that to explain away this event because no other religion has won a revolutionary war in which only the bad guys were fighting.

Put down the red herrings.

How can you prove that the triumph of Christianity was due to God’s intervention, any more than any other historical event - good or evil - was due to God’s intervention? You simply can’t prove causation in this case.

 

[paul_c]

How can you prove that the triumph of Christianity was due to God’s intervention, any more than any other historical event - good or evil - was due to God’s intervention? You simply can’t prove causation in this case.

Perhaps, but have you heard the story of Our Lady of Gaudalupe? In that case, the direct intervention of Mary led directly to the conversion of Mexico. And as lasting testimony to its truthfulness, Juan Diego’s tilma still exists for all to see.

And perhaps you have heard the story of Bernadette Soubirous, the 14 year old visionary of Lourdes. She was poor, sickly, uneducated and a child, yet she her witness to the apparitions of Mary led to the conversion of millions and to dozens of medically unanswerable miracles that are still occurring today, 154 years later. And did you know that Bernadette’s body remains incorrupt 130 years after her death in the convent of Nevers, a silent testimony to the truthfulness of the events?

And perhaps you have heard of Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta, the child visionaries of Fatima. God used them to turn aside the athiestic govenment of Portugal and 70,000 people witnesses the miracle of the sun on October 13, 1917. Oh, and by the way, Jacinta’s body is also incorrupt.

And perhaps you know that it was largely due to the appeal of John Paul II that the Soviet Union crumbled without a shot being fired.

But perhaps you haven’t heard of these things and that’s why you continue in your unbelief. The truth is out there for those willing to look for it…

 

[pismopal]

How can you prove that the triumph of Christianity was due to God’s intervention, any more than any other historical event - good or evil - was due to God’s intervention? You simply can’t prove causation in this case.

In a court of law, the prosecution presents EVIDENCE that is intended to prove it’s case. The prosecution cannot present PROOF without the ability to recreate the event in the presence of the jury in real time. The jury must be swayed and convinced by a preponderance of evidence in order to agree with the case presented. I, as part of the jury presented with evidence that people actually witnessed the events surrounding the formation of the Christian faith, believe that a witness who is willing to die before recanting their testimony, are the strongest form of evidence that their testimony is true. It is impossible to force someone to accept evidence as proof…regardless of the compelling nature of the evidence. As Christians, we believe we have a case. Have you examined the evidence?

 

[pismopal]

We can prove Bibical events in the same way that we can prove that Napoleon invaded Russia.

 

[Cat_Herder]

How can you prove that the triumph of Christianity was due to God’s intervention, any more than any other historical event - good or evil - was due to God’s intervention? You simply can’t prove causation in this case.

Because it is impossible.

Let’s say I am investigating a murder in a small town. The murder occurred in a bank vault and the victim is a security officer who had gone into the vault and locked it–although not before forgetting to reset the security DVR, so there’s no video. The vault was forced open. Well, that narrows the list of suspects considerably. I only have to investigate people who can bench press a ginormous number or those who have access to industrial strength machinery. But you, defense attorney, say that I can never prove that your client, Mr. Laid-Off ExOlympian (who used to work in a steel factory), did it because I don’t have any observers that actually saw him break in. Too bad–he is guilty because anybody in that jury box can deduce that of everyone in that town, only one guy has the manner, means and motive.

 

[mab23]

That’s a fallacy often seen in apologetics, at least as practiced on this forum: confusing proof of belief with proof of truth. The fact that many people fervently believe something, even to the point of being willing to die for it, does not make it true.

By your reasoning, the spread of Islam and Mormonism, sometimes in the face of severe persecution, would be evidence of the truth of those faiths.

My point is simply that proof of belief does not equate to proof of truth. History only proves that many people came to believe that Christianity is the truth - it does not prove that Christianity is the truth.

And to your point: many people did convert to Islam and Mormonism voluntarily.

You can play the game of proofs all day long

what it comes down to is which has the most evidence supporting it - Christianity by far has the most historical, archaeological and even scientific evidence supporting it

once you find that Christianity has the most evidence behind it - you see that Catholicism has the most evidence (historically, archaeologically and scientifically) behind it than all the other Christianities