Rapture: Catholic yes or no?

[weddy]

every time I’ve read the BIBLE I keep seeing a theme that even the “just” or “rightous” children of ISREAL going through extremely hard times.

if the chosen people of GOD go through suffrages, then I don’t see how we would be “RAPTURED” prior to any tribulations or trials, until after the final judgement on this earth

 

[Hildebrand]

AsStAnselmPrays:

Actually, I believe that the Catholic Church teaches the opposite – the bad guys will be taken away, leaving the good to live with Christ during the Millenium.

I am pretty sure the Catholic Church does not accept the Milleniumism Theology of Protestants about the “1000 years of peace” after the Second Coming.

 

[MGEISING]

Hildebrand:

I am pretty sure the Catholic Church does not accept the Milleniumism Theology of Protestants about the “1000 years of peace” after the Second Coming.

You would be correct.

 

[MGEISING]

Elzee:

Go to www.bcs.com (bible christian society) and order (for free) John Martignoni’s cd on The Rapture. It is excellent and it explains the Catholic teaching on this subject very well and compares it to the numerous rapture variations taught by different churches.

JOHN IS AWESOME! I LOVE HIM.

 

[Genesis315]

Wormwood:

Wow Genesis315, I can’t believe I finally got one “right” from the get go

As the old saying goes, every dog has his day

 

[Genesis315]

Wormwood:

Wow Genesis315, I can’t believe I finally got one “right” from the get go…

As the old saying goes, every dog has his day

 

[javelin]

Wormwood:

javelin:

How could anyone

consider Revelation “suspect”?!?Easily…have you ever read that thing? I almost thought this first line was sarcastic before I read the rest of your post.

javelin:

It doesn’t really matter *who *

the human author was since it is Inspired by God HimselfAlso suspect. And that fact that he was crazy certainly doesn’t help it’s validity…so “who” does matter at least a little bit.

javelin:

It can be no more suspect than the Gospel of Matthew or Acts

Which could coincidentally be considered suspect also. At least Matt had the benefit of knowing things first hand and his teachings were consistant with writings outside of his own.

I guess I should have been clearer: “Anyone who accepts the Bible as the Word of God cannot consider Revelation ‘suspect’.” I made the assumption that since we’re talking about a protestant doctrine we can assume they accept Revelation as inspired.

Apparently you don’t, since you question even Matthew and Acts.

My apologies for assuming too much.

Wormwood:

Because others were saying, for example, that it appears in thesselonians…and other statements that indicated that one side was misinformed.

Well I can now…I won’t have to add you guys to “the list” just yet

Well, let’s look at Thessalonians to see what Gottle of Geer was referring to:
1 Thessalonians 4:16-17:

16 For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: 17 Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.
This passage depicts exactly what the Catholic Church professes about the Second Coming. Note the “voice of the archangel, the trump[et] of God”. Several passages regarding the Second Coming describe an unmistakable sound “like a trumpet” that precedes, or announces, the Lord’s coming. Hardly secret. Then living Christians are “caught up” to essentially greet the Lord as He arrives in Glory. Catholic teaching is that the Final Judgement takes place very shortly after the events described here.

Notice that although believers in the secret rapture doctrine often use this passage as their primary “proof text”, this passage never even mentions the great Tribulation, such that it in no way “proves” that Christians will be raptured* before* the Tribulation.

So, the primary difference in the Catholic doctrine and those who hold the secret rapture doctrine is the timing of the event. Secret rapture proponents believe it will be before the Tribulation (a la Left Behind); the Catholic Church believes it will come after the Tribulation, just prior to the Lord’s Second Coming.

Hope this clarifies.

Peace,
javelin

P.S. I don’t think Gottle of Geer believes in the secret rapture doctrine. I think he was just trying to point out that "

There is no contradiction between the Love of Christ for all men, and the severity and fearsomeness of His Judgements; because they are always holy and righteous, which His Love is."

 

[Wormwood]

Genesis315

As the old saying goes, every dog has his day

ok Mr. Funnyman all of the sudden. You’ll rue this day!!!

I guess I should have been clearer: “Anyone who accepts the Bible as the Word of God cannot consider Revelation ‘suspect’.”

Indeed you should have.

I made the assumption that since we’re talking about a protestant doctrine we can assume they accept Revelation as inspired.

Apparently you don’t, since you question even Matthew and Acts.

Perhaps they do. And yes I question Matt and Acts…i question everything …it is my curse. None of the gospels are ver batum so putting a large amount of faith into every little wording seems like a waste. I think the central message is there, but I don’t think that they are word for word. If you explained the gospel of John to me 3 times without a bible handy, you would not have the exact same wording everytime but the meaning is there. See what I mean?

My apologies for assuming too much

Yes well, see that it doesn’t happen again

So, the primary difference in the Catholic doctrine and those who hold the secret rapture doctrine is the timing of the event. Secret rapture proponents believe it will be before the Tribulation (a la Left Behind); the Catholic Church believes it will come after the Tribulation, just prior to the Lord’s Second Coming.

Ok thanks. one last thing…if Christ opens the seven seals or whatever, wouldn’t that mean that you guys WOULD be gone by the tribulations, as christ would have to be resurrected to do that?

 

[Genesis315]

Wormwood:

Ok thanks. one last thing…if Christ opens the seven seals or whatever, wouldn’t that mean that you guys WOULD be gone by the tribulations, as christ would have to be resurrected to do that?

I don’t see what you mean by “Christ would have to be resurrected?” He is resurrected already.

Like I said before, there’s no official interpretationof Revelation besides that the Millenium is now. If you look in chapter 20, we see there is where Satan is bound and the Church age begins (marked probably with the conversion of Pagan Rome). Satan being bound is what has allowed the Gospel to spread and Truth to be learned, it doesn’t mean there will be no evil. Then we see that right before the end, Satan is loosed and there is a final battle. Our time now is either Satan is still bound or he is being loosed (if you ask me, I’d say it’s the beginning of the latter, but who knows).

I personally think the beast and all that has alread happened in Pagain Rome during those 300 sum-odd years of oppression especially under Nero and the other guy (starts with a D ).

I think the end times trials will be more of a trial of faith than anything.

I stick to what the Church says in the Catechism concerning the end times:

vatican.va/archive/catechism/p1s2c2a7.htm

Specifically this part:

The Church’s ultimate trial

**675 **Before Christ’s second coming the Church must pass through a final trial that will shake the faith of many believers.573 The persecution that accompanies her pilgrimage on earth574 will unveil the “mystery of iniquity” in the form of a religious deception offering men an apparent solution to their problems at the price of apostasy from the truth. The supreme religious deception is that of the Antichrist, a pseudo-messianism by which man glorifies himself in place of God and of his Messiah come in the flesh.575

**676 **The Antichrist’s deception already begins to take shape in the world every time the claim is made to realize within history that messianic hope which can only be realized beyond history through the eschatological judgment. The Church has rejected even modified forms of this falsification of the kingdom to come under the name of millenarianism,576 especially the “intrinsically perverse” political form of a secular messianism.577

**677 **The Church will enter the glory of the kingdom only through this final Passover, when she will follow her Lord in his death and Resurrection.578 The kingdom will be fulfilled, then, not by a historic triumph of the Church through a progressive ascendancy, but only by God’s victory over the final unleashing of evil, which will cause his Bride to come down from heaven.579 God’s triumph over the revolt of evil will take the form of the Last Judgment after the final cosmic upheaval of this passing world.580

 

[Semper_Fi_1]

The rapture is heretical and was born out of evangelical protestantism. It basically states that we are better than Jesus Christ Himself who had to suffer and who commanded us to carry our own cross with Him. It is a gimmick ‘born again’ Christians use in order to try and ‘save’ people. The Catholic Church believes that there will be a second coming and that we will know neither the time nor the hour, but we do not believe that we will be raptured up pre-tribulation and not have to suffer during the great tribulation. There is no Scriptural basis for the rapture.

 

[BibleReader]

Wormwood:

I recently learned that the idea of rapture (or the good people leaving the earth before the trials and tribulations) wasn’t created until the renaissonce ( i don’t know about that spelling it’s late ). So do Catholics believe in this, and if so why? Are there verses to back this claim?

For Catholics, rapture is not a miraculous pre-End Time, pre-Tribulation event, but a somewhat minor event to occur on the Last Day. It is indirectly referred to in the Apostle’s Creed – “and from thence He will come to judge the living and the dead.” The saved among the living will be taken up to the sky, never experiencing death.

As far as I know, no post-rapture tribulation period is discussed in Scripture.

 

[Elzee]

I like one point in particular that John Martignoni makes on his cd…if all the believers are raptured up, and the unbelievers are left on earth to supposedly suffer and hopefully come to their senses about Jesus, who is going to TEACH these people about God and Jesus? All the believers will be gone!!!

I guess they could all get bibles and teach themselves, but then they’d have a thousand different interpretations of what the truth is, and how will they know which truth is correct without an authority on earth. Wow - .sounds a lot like the problem I think non-Catholics have in our current time!!! I just now thought of that!!!

 

[javelin]

Wormwood:

Ok thanks. one last thing…if Christ opens the seven seals or whatever, wouldn’t that mean that you guys WOULD be gone by the tribulations, as christ would have to be resurrected to do that?

Hmmm, when I searched this thread for “false dichotomy” I found nothing…

But I will once this is posted

To answer your question above – no. First of all, the Catholic Church doesn’t believe in using a word-for-word literal interpretation of Sacred Scripture. Certain writings (including apocryphal writings) can be purely symbolic. So Jesus would not need to come again to pysically open seven seals, which would mean we would not need to be gone already.

Actually, the common interpretation of Revelation starts with John witnessing heavenly events. What he sees and records are not happening on Earth, but in Heaven. A popular theory among Catholics is that since John received his vision on “the Lord’s Day”, what he is describing in portions of his vision is the heavenly celebration of the Eucharist (“I saw a Lamb standing, as though it had been slain”)

Since Christ is raised and reigning at the Father’s right hand, His presence in the vision does not require that He had already come back to earth in the Second Coming.

Peace,
javelin

 

[Daniel_Marsh]

aloha.net/~mikesch/antichrist.htm

Hi WW, according to the above Seventh Day Adventist link. Jesit priests invented futurism or the rapture theory.

 

[Liberian]

weddy:

every time I’ve read the BIBLE I keep seeing a theme that even the “just” or “rightous” children of ISREAL going through extremely hard times.

if the chosen people of GOD go through suffrages, then I don’t see how we would be “RAPTURED” prior to any tribulations or trials, until after the final judgement on this earth

I learned as I was studying a little Church history that God’s record for delivering His people from persecution is abysmal. While the event that is called “the Rapture” is indeed recorded in the Bible (the Catholic Church calls it “the Parousia”), the idea of a “pre-Tribulation Rapture” is largely a case of collective wishful thinking.

• Liberian

 

[epr1993]

aloha.net/~mikesch/antichrist.htm

Hi WW, according to the above Seventh Day Adventist link. Jesit priests invented futurism or the rapture theory.

I couldn’t access the link because I’m at work. There is a 16th century Jesuit priest from Spain who believed that Catholics who frequently received Communion would be caught up into the clouds 45-days before the Second Coming of Christ. He wrote under a pen name and his teaching was condemned by the Church.

 

[scylla]

Since you wanted a yes or no.

No

Not at all like the Left Behind kinda idea. John Martignoni explains it pretty clearly. Last day.

God Bless
Scylla

 

[kim_wilson]

Doesn’t the pope get left behind in those Left Behind books?

 

[Fidelis]

kim wilson:

Doesn’t the pope get left behind in those Left Behind books?

Actually, in one of the first ones, he gets “raptured” – but only after embracing Protestant teaching.

 

[Etisoppa]

Again my question:

The Church’s ultimate trial

The Catechism says this:

Quote:

675 Before Christ’s second coming the Church must pass through a final trial that will shake the faith of many believers. The persecution that accompanies her pilgrimage on earth will unveil the “mystery of iniquity” in the form of a religious deception offering men an apparent solution to their problems at the price of apostasy from the truth. The supreme religious deception is that of the Antichrist, a pseudo-messianism by which man glorifies himself in place of God and of his Messiah come in the flesh.

**My Question 1 **So what is the Church doing using the US Government’s neurological mind assault technologies and glorifying themselves as to being God’s stand-in, who was previously the only that could do as was done unto Samuel?

“Hey!” they say, “ I can now do what only God could do before. I have infiltrated the domain of God.”

This they say to themselves as the do these deeds and more. And worst yet, feel no sense of walking on hallowed, sacred grounds as they invade the mind of individuals, a domain and activity that hence to before belonged only to God.

One does not have to be a believer to appreciate some of the deep human wisdom of the ancients. They knew this would eventually happen! Man would eventually acquire such powers. And they tried to warn us how to deal with it.

For if dealt with as predicted:” a form of a religious deception”, then surely that must be the end of times. How true on so many levels.

Question 2 Is the Catechism clear as to the Church’s role in this “deception”? Is the Church destined to play a willing part in this deception? How convenient if so.

But no matter. I just stand against this invasion unto hallowed ground, for moral reasons which are fortunately translatable into legal reasons Fortunate, since we are of societies that have made these moral translations into laws and Constitutions.