SHOULD Catholics attend Protestant services?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Anonimous
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
A

Anonimous

Guest
Dear Everyone:
I was listening to Catholic Answers this morning, and the caller asked about attending Protestant services (which often includes protestant communion services). However, the apologist didn’t bring up an imporant issue, which is that Catholics (according to what I was told by a priest) cannot receive communion in a Protestant church or any Non-Catholic service because in doing so we would be denying our public commitment and declaration of Faith in the True Presence in the Blessed Sacrement as Catholics.

At first, I did not understand this, but after giving it some thought I realized how true this is. I then went to confession for having received communion at my grandmother’s Methodist church because I was trying to please my grandmother and make her happy. This was a very co-dependent act on my part. My grandmother is very anti-Catholic, so to appease her I thought I could be “eccumenical” and receive their communion. The scary thing is that, as I was walking down the isle in the Methodist church, I had a feeling it was wrong and that I was denying my Faith, but I forced myself to ignore those feelings. After I confessed this sin to a priest, he was very firm but loving and told me that I can’t deny my Faith just to make my grandmother happy.

So I guess I have more of a COMMENT rather than a QUESTION.

My comment is that my experience with Protestants is that it IS HUMANLY POSSIBLE for Catholics and Protestants to be friends and share their views on religion. HOWEVER, when it comes to Catholics attending Protestant worship services or Protestant bible studies…this is usually a temptation for both Protestants and Catholics to “CONVERT” the other… I have had to avoid such situations because I have learned that my presence at such services is an IMPLICIT denial of my Faith (in their eyes) because the Protestants believe that I am there “obviously” because I am UNSATISFIED with the rigidity of Catholic Tradition.

Therefore, to meet privately ONE-on-ONE with a Protestant CAN BE an opportunity to share and explain the Catholic Faith and learn more about where exactly Protestants stand in their objections to the Church. However, in a group setting where one Catholic is completely out-numbered by Protestants, this clearly is a “Sharks and Minows” approach to apologetics, and Catholics can end up with a lot of spiritual pride in believing that they will CONVERT all these protestants. ALSO, it is tempting our Protestant brothers and sisters to SAVE US from the Roman Catholic Church. In a nut-shell, it is more prudent and charitable NOT to tempt ourselves and our SEPERATED BRETHREN, and not to take RISKS with being indoctrinated by Protestant theologians and apoligists… remember many many many Catholics have been YANKED out of the CHURCH in this manner… and remember, just as we have “Catholic Answers” and Catholic Apologists, so also do Protestants have their strategies and answers lined up and ready to go (and they clearly out-number Catholics). So please do NOT be discourage, but rather BE PRUDENT and don’t put yourself in a situation that will jeopordize your FAITH or tempt your SPIRITUAL PRIDE… (I am clearly speaking from experience in both regards, so do not take this as passing judgment but rather a PUBLIC confession of sorts in order that others may hopefully learn from my mistakes)…
 
When I was a kid we were still taught that you couldn’t even walk into a Protestant church for anything other than a wedding or a funeral without committing a mortal sin. (I believe this was false even back then but the nuns were told to teach, when in doubt, it’s sin, and when in doubt then, it’s mortal. So basically no distinction was made for the young being catechised between forgetting to genuflect before you entered the pew and committing murder.)

If the church ever taught that it is illegitimate to worship with the Protestants as long as it is a demonination that holds a diminished and incomplete view of the faith instead of a contradictory one, I hope it does not do so now. For instance, I was the organist for various Protestant churches for a number of years. It was part of my living. I did it for the money, but I was not disrespectful of their worship and participated without ever feeling a contradiction of conscience. I never felt this was something I needed to confess.

But these were mainstream denominations, all Trinitarian, all observant of the Christian calendar, all espousing doctrine which is at least consistent with Catholicism if not embracing everything. If it had been the Jehovah’s Witnesses or the Seventh Day Adventists or some such EDIT sect, it would have been a different story. And needless to say, I still always went to Mass on Sunday. I never let these services substitute for that.
 
I dont know the exact Vatican teaching on this but I will not enter a Protestant ‘place of worship’, I will not pray with them, and I will will not attend their ‘services’. My own personal opinion is that something like that would legitamize their heresy and weaken Catholic truth. If we as the Catholic church have a supernatural religion with sanctifying grace why do we even need to go something like that? That in itself is a slap in the face to the perfect nature of Christ and HIS Chruch.
 
40.png
A.Pelliccio:
I dont know the exact Vatican teaching on this but I will not enter a Protestant ‘place of worship’, I will not pray with them, and I will will not attend their ‘services’. My own personal opinion is that something like that would legitamize their heresy and weaken Catholic truth. If we as the Catholic church have a supernatural religion with sanctifying grace why do we even need to go something like that? That in itself is a slap in the face to the perfect nature of Christ and HIS Chruch.
Click to expand...
Thank you for not making that personal against me. It should be noted that ecumenical services of various types are officially approved without there being any implication of supporting heresy. (The emphasis is rather upon commonality of belief to the extent it exists, and I believe this was already supported in a document of Vatican II.) However, I respect your decision to err on the side of caution.
 
Now as a convert to the RCC at Christmas time I do go to my parents Christian Reformed Church (Dutch Calvinist) when I go back to Michigan from Northern VA. I also go to a vigil mass one day and go to their service the next. They however do not go up to receive rather communion is passed around like the collection plate - now its take and not give. And thankfully they rarely have communion as it is celebrated only 4 or 7 times a year. Growing up I can only recall receiving communion once as they can only recieve after publicly confessiong the faith or whatever they call it since I did that at age 18. Now I would never recieve at their church.

My parentls will give a car to go to mass, rearrange the dinner plans for the whole family to fit the mass schedule.

The least way to Honor them is to go to their service. They like to parrade me around to see their friends at church who I have known my wholelife and also consider friends,
 
I attend a Baptist church where many of my friends are members all the time. They actually have Communion every Sunday, but I quit taking it almost two years ago when I learned that they consider my baptism invalid (I was baptized at 4-years-old in a Lutheran church). It didn’t feel right to take Communion with a church that considered me unbaptized. I eventually decided to come into the Catholic Church, but since the Baptist church meets on Sunday nights and I have so many friends there, I still attend every now and then. A few of them I feel are ripe for following me into the Catholic Church, if I can just provide some gentle nudging 👍

I totally understand how difficult it is to know whether you should take Communion or not with non-Catholic relatives. My parents are Lutheran and for a while I debated whether or not I would take Communion at their church after I become Catholic. For one, at least they do accept the Real Presence of Christ, and it is the same congregation in which I received the sacrament of Baptism and publicly confirmed my faith. However, ultimately that simple act of receiving Communion is a testimony that you submit to the beliefs of that particular church. We can be ecumenical by attending Protestant churches or praying and volunteering with Protestants, but Communion should be reserved for celebrating true, complete unity. I think if you simply let your relatives know that you cannot take Communion with non-Catholics with a clear conscience, most of them will understand. And if they don’t, pray for them 😉
 
If the only objection to attending Protestant services(funerals or weddings) is avoiding taking communion there then there is not much danger of that(in my experience).In a lifetime of attendence in Assembly of God churches I never saw communion offered at weddinds or funerals.For that matter it was rare if they had communion more often than 4 times a year.They just didn`t seem to put much value on it.After all they thought it was just crackers and grape juice (there they were right !) .So much different than our wonderful Catholic faith where the Sacrament of the Eucharist has real meaning and importance.
 
Unless you are attending a wedding, funeral or some other “special occasion” why would you even want to?

Thats the real question.
 
I guess the question we should ask ourselves is why we want to attend? Since becoming Catholic, I have attended a handful of Protestant services for a variety of reasons (sometimes they were part of a seminar I was attending or at the invitation of a close friend). My thoughts, whenever I have attended, are that their services sing and talk about what we actually get to experience in the Mass. I think a Catholic should be strong in his faith and in his knowledge of his faith if he is ever going to attend anything Protestant. So many Catholics get led out of the Church because they simply don’t know what they believe or why.
 
40.png
LouisvilleCards:
I attend a Baptist church where many of my friends are members all the time. They actually have Communion every Sunday, but I quit taking it almost two years ago when I learned that they consider my baptism invalid (I was baptized at 4-years-old in a Lutheran church).
Click to expand...
What a laugh. A Baptist considers another Christian’s baptism invalid, when the Catholic Church with its strict standards considers all Christian baptisms valid.

While I support your decision, I, who have never encountered such a situation, did take “communion” with my Protestant separated brethren. The reason? They only considered it a ritual commemoration of the the last supper (they didn’t even say what they call “the words of institution” all the time and only did this four times a year in the first place). I can go along with a commemoration of the last supper any time, as long as there is a mutual understanding that there is no such thing in this context as transubstantiation or the real presence.
 
Grace & Peace!
40.png
palmas85:
Unless you are attending a wedding, funeral or some other “special occasion” why would you even want to?

Thats the real question.
Click to expand...
To know the ways in which people worship, how they believe and how they practice their belief. The fruit of which is understanding, which understanding, if properly cultivated, can in fact lead to compassion and a growing knowledge of the ways in which we of different faith communities agree and disagree. This may then lead to dialogue rather than knee-jerk condemnation or smug superiority.

Under the Mercy,
Mark

Deo Gratias!
 
This is a difficult subject because while it is possible to attend ecumenical services I don’t think that it is moral to attend a strictly protestant service. The reason for this is that we are still bound by the moral axiom that was expressed by the law in the previous code of canon law that forbade what was called “communio in sacris.” We are not allowed to hold communion in the sacred with denominations - meaning protestants and other also other religions. While we can on the one hand say that technically speaking one can attend a service of another religion but we, on the other hand cannot hold communion in the sacred with them. The way this is usually expressed these days is that we can go but we cannot actively participate in the service. However, there are some times that even ones presence will do just that or it will justify their faith in some way to them or it may confuse other Catholics - this is if one is a public person as opposed to a private person. Then one also has to worry about if they are causing a scandal to the faithful by just being at a non catholic service.
 
40.png
jbuck919:
What a laugh. A Baptist considers another Christian’s baptism invalid, when the Catholic Church with its strict standards considers all Christian baptisms valid.

While I support your decision, I, who have never encountered such a situation, did take “communion” with my Protestant separated brethren. The reason? They only considered it a ritual commemoration of the the last supper (they didn’t even say what they call “the words of institution” all the time and only did this four times a year in the first place). I can go along with a commemoration of the last supper any time, as long as there is a mutual understanding that there is no such thing in this context as transubstantiation or the real presence.
Click to expand...
Communion even if symbolic or otherwise is always a sign of unity (communion) either visible or spiritual. Catholics and protestants do not have visible, doctrinal or spiritual unity. Many Baptist churches require new members to be re-Baptized even if they are moving there from another Baptist congregation.
 
Deo Volente:
Grace & Peace!

To know the ways in which people worship, how they believe and how they practice their belief. The fruit of which is understanding, which understanding, if properly cultivated, can in fact lead to compassion and a growing knowledge of the ways in which we of different faith communities agree and disagree. This may then lead to dialogue rather than knee-jerk condemnation or smug superiority.

Under the Mercy,
Mark

Deo Gratias!
Click to expand...
I adhere to the teachings of the Catholic Church, specifically the Church of Rome. I believe that it is the true church and has the fullness of faith that is lacking in the other churches. True they may have some truth in them, may have and can have, not definitely that they do. If you choose to term that smug superiority, so be it. As for me a protestant service sorely lacks any substantive value. I’ve been to them, many of them in fact, of many different sects, years ago, and I sincerely doubt they have changed much. I pity them and if you choose to term that smug superiority and condemnation so be it. As far as dialogue, I know what they believe and it is not the same as what we as Catholics believe. If you choose to term that smug superiority and condemnation then so be it.

I pray that they will return one day to the faith, but I fail to see how attending their services could have any impact on that one way or the other.

As far as ecumenical services go, I attended many of them while in the military, often all that we had. generally they were nothing more than feel good gatherings with a strong pentecostal flavor to them.

If you and others choose to attend these gatherings that is of course your own decision. But please don’t assume or think that because I choose not to compromise my faith, that I am somehow lacking or losing anything.

And if that sounds like smug superiority so be it.
 
Grace & Peace!
40.png
palmas85:
I adhere to the teachings of the Catholic Church, specifically the Church of Rome. I believe that it is the true church and has the fullness of faith that is lacking in the other churches. True they may have some truth in them, may have and can have, not definitely that they do. If you choose to term that smug superiority, so be it.
Click to expand...
Palmas85, I understand that you are faithful to Rome, and I understand what that means. I don’t call that smug superiority. What is questionable to me is not that someone believes what they believe (ultimately, we must all believe that what we believe is true or correct to believe, otherwise why believe it?), but that someone would dismiss out of hand the beliefs or traditions of others, notwithstanding the strength of one’s own convictions.

I attended a Baptist school for many years when I was younger, and I am no great fan of Baptist liturgy. I am, in fact, unconvinced that there is such a thing as liturgy in the Baptist churches, and to be honest, I wish that all churches would return to traditional liturgical worship. But in spite of this and my own personal belief in this regard, I cannot deny that Baptist worship speaks to the souls of many, that through this worship, they have found a relationship with Christ, and that this worship experience has produced (by the Spirit’s grace) men and women of holiness and sanctity. Because it does not appeal to me does not mean that God cannot work through it. And because many have found Christ on it’s account, I cannot look too askance at it. In other words, I cannot deny that people have had an experience of the Risen Lord through Baptist worship–therefore, I cannot deny or dismiss the validity of Baptist worship because to do so would be to denigrate one of the ways by which my Lord chooses to act in the world–and who am I to criticise my Lord in this regard or cast aspersions on the ways through which he appears to his people?

Under the Mercy,
Mark

Deo Gratias!
 
40.png
mosher:
This is a difficult subject because while it is possible to attend ecumenical services I don’t think that it is moral to attend a strictly protestant service. The reason for this is that we are still bound by the moral axiom that was expressed by the law in the previous code of canon law that forbade what was called “communio in sacris.” … The way this is usually expressed these days is that we can go but we cannot actively participate in the service. However, there are some times that even ones presence will do just that or it will justify their faith in some way to them or it may confuse other Catholics - this is if one is a public person as opposed to a private person. Then one also has to worry about if they are causing a scandal to the faithful by just being at a non catholic service.
Click to expand...
I agree Mosher But I also don’t think you HAVE to be a PUBLIC person to give SCANDAL. So thank you for bringing up a TOPIC that is oft forgotten…scandal. This is something that anyone can give by implying that their Faith in the Church is not absolute. The whole basis for Protestantism is rejection of the authority of ROME and the SACRAMENTS. Catholics should never give credence or presence to this… However, the Church’s role on ECCUMENISM is different that everyone running off to start their own little eccumenical movement… IF CATHOLICS are going to be involved in Eccumenism…then they should do their homework first by reading all the documents that Church as issued on this subject…
 
I would never be tempted to convert especially after growing up in that environment. Do I see myself attending a protestant service in the future? Only if the Pope called/showed up at my door/sent me a personal letter and asked me to (in other words, no). 😉
 
Ave Maria!

I will go to a funeral or wedding (not receiving any ‘communion’ of course) when it is proper to do so. I do not go to ecumenical events or to the protestant churches otherwise.

My divorced sister is talking marriage to a divorced man. She left the church years ago but sometimes comes to Mass–and communion although I showed her that she is not to do that but she says she can do what she wants–. I have already spoken to my one brother who is an orthodox Catholic and we both know we could not attend her ‘marriage’ in a protestant church. So I would not go to a wedding if it was a Catholic marrying outside of the Church.
 
40.png
palmas85:
Unless you are attending a wedding, funeral or some other “special occasion” why would you even want to?

Thats the real question.
Click to expand...
For me, it’s about being with my family on certain special occasions. It was hard for me to join the Catholic Church, even after I KNEW it was Christ’s Church, because it meant giving up something that had been an important part of my childhood. My parents are devout Methodists and we were at church at least once every week, usually 2 or 3 times. And, growing up in a small town, church was one of two places that community was (the other being school). Now, I don’t go often, but this year my husband and I spent Christmas at my parents (they live in another state) and I went to a Christmas eve music service. I would NEVER go to a Protestant service instead of mass (I did once, and felt incredibly guilty and promptly got myself to confession). I would also NEVER recieve communion in a Protestant church. To do so is to blaspheme the Lord . . . He commanded that we eat His flesh and drink His blood, not that we commemorate His death with a purely symbolic meal. But, within the context of my family, attending Protestant services is a little different. My parents won’t try to convert me back. They occasionally ask me questions about the Church, and in fact, my mother defending the Catholic Church to her bible study a month or two ago. But they taught their children to think on their own and now their stuck! 🙂 I would be hesitant to attend a Protestant service otherwise . . . it is easy to be tempted into questioning things we already know and going in ways that God doesn’t want us to.
 
This topic actually makes me wonder what people in my own Church must have thought when they found out I was going to a Catholic Mass every Sunday with no intention of becoming Catholic.

I will most likely attend an Anglican church with my family from time to time, just to be with them on special occasions like other posters have said. It’s the Church I was baptized in, and right now it would be REALLY difficult for me to just give that up. One of the reasons I had such a hard time even deciding to become Catholic was because my religious affiliation wasn’t just a label, it was part of my identity (I don’t know if others see their faith in this way as well). At this point, I’m not ready to say I won’t go to an Anglican church again. I wouldn’t go regularly, but I would go with my family for special occasions.

That being said, I would NEVER attend a Protestant service in place of Mass, and while I think ecumenical services and worsihipping with others does have it’s place, I can’t really say I’ve felt the desire to go to a Protestant service (outside of the Anglican/Episcopal group, for the reasons listed above).
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top