Should I became a protestant?

adolfo123 · Mar 5, 2009

I am catholic and I believe the catholic teachings, but my heart will not change and is not of Christ… I am thinking of trying out a protestant faith in the hope I will see a change. WHAT SHOULD I DO???

tobinatorstark · Mar 5, 2009

pray, pray, pray, pray, pray, pray, pray

Mystic_Warrior · Mar 5, 2009

To me, it’s kind of like a married couple who is having problems in their marriage and decides to have a baby together, thinking that the child will bring them closer together and magically “fix” whatever problems they have. It usually doesn’t solve anything.

You have access to the sacraments and Jesus Christ Himself. You can’t get much closer than that. Recognize where you are spiritually. If you have sin, confess it. If you want to change your heart, ask God to change it for you - to cleanse you, as King David did.

You must believe that your heart can change or you are led to despair, with no hope in God. You can change. Ask God to help you. I recommend picking up a great little book called, “Practice the Presence of God” by Brother Lawrence. I know that it strengthened my relationship with God.

Peace…

MW

Nita · Mar 5, 2009

Could you clarify a little on what it is in your heart that will not change?

Nita

curtishouse29 · Mar 5, 2009

Church shopping will not change your heart. The only thing that will do would be to get you more confused about doctrine. You just need to look within yourself. Give yourself time every day for prayer and pray to God to help you to grow in your faith.

MarcoPolo · Mar 5, 2009

If you believe the Church’s teachings but have not the “feelings” in your heart, then you can still be a great Christian…you are likely a child of conviction, not one of emotion.

My advice, continue to learn the depth of Catholicism…it is sooo rich in Christ’s truth.

If you are confident you understand Catholic teaching (and I mean confident) by all means, study other religions, for they will help you understand your own.

jmcrae · Mar 5, 2009

What would Protestantism give you that you don’t already have? If you want to have an emotional experience, try joining a Charismatic Catholic group - that way, you won’t lose your mind, in quest of your heart.

Charlemagne_II · Mar 5, 2009

The only way you could even begin to consider a Protestant faith would be if you had ceased to worship the Real Presence. You will find your soul mighty empty if you can’t find the Eucharist in those other churches.

If you have ceased to believe in the Eucharist, you are no longer Catholic anyway.

savedsinner · Mar 6, 2009

Get a spiritual director.

Devare · Mar 6, 2009

There’s really only one faith (which is Christ), however, there’s nothing at all to “protestantism,” I’ll sum it up for you in a big nutshell by one of the biggest “protestants:”

So, all protestants believe is salvation by faith [believing Christ paid for your sins]. That’s it… nothing more, nothing less.

Christy_Beth · Mar 6, 2009

I’m a convert from protestantism. I can tell you one major problem with it. They don’t have Christ!! Christ if found in the sacrament, and protestants don’t have that.

WAYNE_LEYDS · Mar 6, 2009

you believe in the Church. but you say your heart is not of Christ…its like saying you go to mcdonalds because you know they make the best burgers but you never eat the burgers.infact maybe you take your own food!!

why wont your heart change?and you cant believe inthe church if you dont have Christ in your heart!

1st find yourself. then look for Christ.i think you are like a boat drifting in the ocean.
what is in your heart?what are you carrying with you?
LET GO AND LET GOD!!

promethius · Mar 6, 2009

James tells us faith without works is dead. If you need to find your heart, it is not in the protestant teachings, but in the streets. I would suggest you work with your parish to feed and clothe the poor. Get involved with the community. When you see the good that you do and the Glory it brings to God, that should give you a good jumpstart.

Second, Eucharistic adoration, stations of the cross, chaplet of the Divine Mercy, and Masses for annointing of the sick could all be answers to your issue.

The time when you are losing heart is not the time to fold and walk away, it’s the time for you to be proactive in your faith: to reach out and embrace more. Perhaps God’s letting you feel your distance is a call to you to come closer to the fullness of the church…

cazayoux · Mar 6, 2009

Exactly the problem with some of our non-Catholic Christian brothers … the effort to OVER simplify.
By saying ‘nothing more’ is to ignore all that Christ actually told us is necessary.
Faith is absolutely necessary, and we should pray to God for faith.
Let’s look at all that Jesus asked for us to DO.

Have faith (Rom 3:28, John 3:16, 1 John 4:15)
forgive the sins of others (Matt 6:14-15)
care for one’s family (1 Tim 5:8)
feed the hungry, clothe the naked, visit the sick and imprisoned (Matt 25:31-46)
keep the Commandments (Matt 19:17 and 1 John 2:3-4)
love my brother (1 John 2:10)
deny ourselves and pick up our cross daily (Luke 9:23)
do the will of the Father (Matt 7:21)
eat the flesh and drink the blood of the Son of Man (John 6:51-58)
give a return for the talents the Master has given us (Matt 25:14-30)
be baptized (John 3:3-5, 1 Ptr 3:20-21)
confess our sins (1 John 1:9)

Belief is an **action **word, a verb.

In doing all that Jesus asked of us, we WILL see our faith increase and our unbelief melt away. DOING what Jesus asks stokes the fire that he put in us.

michel

runandsew · Mar 6, 2009

It sounds to me like you know about Christ, but you don’t know Christ.
God created us to know, love and serve him in this world so that we might spend eternity with him in the next.
We know God by spending time with him. In prayer, reading scripture, Mass, adoration ect.
We love God by loving others.
We serve God by giving him our time.
Do you put God first when planning your day, or do you fit God into your day.
You have to put God first.
I would recommend that you listen to a mp3 by Father Larry Richards called “The Truth”
You can download it free if you register at his site.
Here is the link: The Reason for our hope

Tell me, what do you hope to get out of the Protestant church that you can’t find in the Catholic church?
Community, fellowship, better sermons?
Are you looking for an emotional lift?

Before you make any decisions, I think you should listen to “The Truth” by Father Larry Richards, and then decide what you want to do.

Crimson_Seraph · Mar 6, 2009

Whether or not you should convert to Protestantism is between you and God mate, I won’t tell you that if you do you’ll automatically become closer to God. There are a great many who call themselves Protestants who struggle with exactly the things you do probably. That is why I tell people that I’m not in a religion really, I’m in a relationship with Christ. I have to pray all the time that the Lord will sanctify me and keep refilling me with his Holy Spirit. I pray “Lord, give me Chastity” and try to meditate on the good things of God.

If you have the desire in your heart to live a holy and righteous life, God WILL give you the strength to do it. Whether or not you stay Catholic is up to you, but I would strongly suggest that you seek a deeper more personal relationship with Christ and with his Spirit.

Corius · Mar 6, 2009

Your question is the kind that permits many interpretations. Let me assure you that I as a Protestant would never presume to give you an answer no matter how the question is interpreted. Let me assure you that I firmly believe that God in Christ and through the Holy Spirit is still active among us and in us whatever label we may wear. The Roman Catholic Church and all of the many other Christian churches and groupings are all part of the CHURCH of which Jesus Christ is Lord’; we are all people of God who have through God’s great love been reconciled to Him, Through Christ and in Christ we are a new creation. Whatever our position in life, whatever name we wear, we have been called as the people of God to be ministers one to another and to give account of our faith and hope.

Consider this: it matters not by what name you are called, the charter of your salvation, the hope you have in this world, is the same for Roman Catholics as it is for Protestants and all others. No one owns an exclusive franchise to declare the Gospel of God as we have it in Jesus Christ. Each of us is free to speak out for the Good News. That is the protesting (speaking for) we can all do. For myself I say that I will stay where I am and try as I am given the power to brighten the corner wherever I am.

COPLAND_3 · Mar 6, 2009

I was a Baptist before I converted to Catholicism, so I understand both sides of the isle. Any change for such reasons would be emotional, not based on facts and substance, which might feel good for a time, but once the honey moon is over you no longer are running on emotions and you end up in worse shape than before.

I would listen to some of these wonderful suggestions on here on how to break through to reach that change of heart that you desire. It’s all right here in our Catholic Faith. You don’t need to try an imitation of the real thing to get fulfilled, we have all of Jesus that can be gotten, and no other group outside of the Catholic Church can give you all of Christ.

Trishie · Mar 6, 2009

Adolfo, I just wanted to hug you for being so urgent and desperate, and for wanting to find SOME way of getting closer to God…but it isn’t in leaving the Catholic Church!!!

You know what I used to think when I had cavies, guineapigs. My last two were Tessie and Pia, and lived 7 and 8 years respectively. I’m very loving with people…but also happen to be very fond of creatures. And I took the greatest care of them. Would you believe I bathed and blow dried them each week. They’d be outside during the day, and in the evening I’d put them in large cane basket in a corner of the kitchen, with freshly torn up newspaper under them and a soft cloth over that. And they’d sit there, noses sniffing for vegetable off-cuts, and waiting for when we’d watch a bit of TV and they’d perch on the shoulder snuggling into my neck and singing in their own way…of course they learned to signal when they needed to relieve themselves or that wouldn’t have worked!

I noticed with my guineapigs that with the affection and care they received, they changed in little ways from the simple animal instincts. If I’d not given them a hug in their recent menory, I could put their favourite treats down and they wouldn’t touch them, untill I’d scooped them up and given them a hug, then they’d dive enthusiastically into consuming the parsley or whatever I’d previously put in their box. What guineapigs, not touched by human care would have hesitated! I saw that I could never have given them away, never wanted to, nor could they have been let go in the wild…in fact, when young, Pia escaped from the outside cage, and I didn’t find her in my lush garden close to bushland, until two weeks had passed and I saw a flsh of brown fur and set about capturing her. When I picked her up, she nipped my chin as if to communicate, “How dare you do that to me, how dare you lose me!” She never bit me again in her eight years.

A month before she began to weaken with age, the little creature began making the sounds of respiratory distress that her sister had shown a year before and I feared she had contracted the illness. This went on for a couple of weeks. As soon as I picked her up, the sounds stopped. “I think she’s faking it”, my husband said. She was…because I began carrying her around in a little shoulder bag as I did housework and whatever…I never liked my animals to die alone. I entertained her by making little repetitive sounds to her, which she made back. She made no attempt to sound ill again. She knew perhaps she was dying. Late one evening as I hugged her she went theough the death agaony. She seemed lifeless then. Crying myself, I made those little repetitive sounds to her a few times, thinking she couldn’t hear me. You know, she made those sounds back several times though she seemed otherwise dead.

Why have I told you this story? Two reasons…one to shake you out of sheer distress by
distracting you.
The other, because I learned several things from my cavies when we had them…one was, I would be moved to tears by their unequivocal and total devotion, because I’d say to God, "I should love and adore You at least as wholeheartedly as they do me…
And…these little creatures because of human love became more than they were, more than little animals that are very good prey in South America. **They’re animals. They’re limited by their nature. **They have fur and stubby little legs and jelly-bean poohs.

Be patient with yourself Adolfo, because you’re human, you’re limited, and you can try all you want but you can’t change some things…but God can enrich your life, not through your running away from His greatest gifts to you because you haven’t quite worked out how to undo the ribbons around His gifts to you. You are so much more than any animals because you are made in God’s image and likeness. And He will lead you to grow spiritually and humanly as He has promised, if you will trust Him and have patience.

Trishie · Mar 6, 2009

I don’t know if of use to you, but will post some prayers from the ‘conversion’ division of my journal. Let what I’ve writeen tel you…others have struggled with their lack of conversion, and I wouldn’t myself have tired to find so many ways at different times to reach out for God’s conversion of my heart if I were wounded by my imprefection and my desire, like you, for close relationship with God.

Wisdom of true conversion

Dear God, I know that Your love can free me from the self-imposed need to force my inclination and emotions into a pattern of love and virtue. Give me grace to strive faithfully, while trusting my efforts into Your care, allowing You to love me and to love others through me.

I do not seek to be ‘virtuous’ or ‘exemplary’. I seek to be to be Your living tabernacle. Let me not be ‘candle’, but part of Your light that dispels all darkness.

Let me not be ‘wise’, but absorbed into Your wisdom and truth. Let me not be ‘peaceful’ or ‘trusting’, but resting faithfully in Your peace and joy.

Let me not be ‘productive of good works’, rather, let me be responsive to every facet of Your love for me and for others, as vehicle of Your goodness for them.

I ask this true conversion of You, for “At night my soul longs for You and my spirit in me seeks for You.” [Isaiah 26:9]

Should I became a protestant?

adolfo123

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tobinatorstark

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Mystic_Warrior

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Nita

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curtishouse29

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MarcoPolo

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jmcrae

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Charlemagne_II

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savedsinner

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Devare

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Christy_Beth

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WAYNE_LEYDS

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promethius

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cazayoux

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runandsew

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Crimson_Seraph

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Corius

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COPLAND_3

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Trishie

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Trishie

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