W
wcknight
Guest
I would say you only have to follow 2 rules, love God and love your neighbor.
wc
wc
- Status
S
SusanL
Guest
Yes and like any good, obedient, loving child of God: you follow the teachings of the church.
J
john_ennis
Guest
rep, I think you mischaracterize what Catholics attack when they respond to the popular view of homosexuality.
It is possible to be truly charitable, loving, and forgiving toward homosexuals, and still be passionately indignant at the attack on truth which today’s pro-homosexual agenda is!
Jesus would be loving, perhaps even tender, toward homosexuals and all of us who need his love. But would he hesitate to bellow the name, “Hypocrite!” at those who mislead them, and seek to redefine God’s gift of sexuality to agree with man’s tendency toward self-gratification?
Peace.
John
It is possible to be truly charitable, loving, and forgiving toward homosexuals, and still be passionately indignant at the attack on truth which today’s pro-homosexual agenda is!
Jesus would be loving, perhaps even tender, toward homosexuals and all of us who need his love. But would he hesitate to bellow the name, “Hypocrite!” at those who mislead them, and seek to redefine God’s gift of sexuality to agree with man’s tendency toward self-gratification?
Peace.
John
M
marcadam
Guest
I work in computers, programming specifically, and this reminds me of something a technologist might call “NIH syndrome”-- Not Invented Here. What it refers to is the tendency of usually otherwise gifted individuals to reject solutions upon which they might build, simply because of that solution’s perceived limitations. They believe they can solve that problem better, and besides, “it’ll take just as much time to build my own as to learn how to use that one.”
The difficulties begin to arise because rarely is the problem really that trivial. Instead of relying on the proven, supported solution, the developer ends up spending so much time building and maintaining theirs that they never really get around to solving the business problem they set out to solve.
Hopefully I didn’t lose you all in jargon, but my point is that the exact same is true of theology. The real pain of the Reformation is sentiments such as this: that the 2000 years of development of doctrine and theology and tradition of our Church are seen in entirely negative terms. This gift of orthodoxy that is ever new, deeper than an ocean, with so much for us to learn and discover at least partly so that we don’t have to spend time solving problems that have already been solved is twisted by our own human pride. It’s so huge, complicated, old, outdated, and besides, I can figure it out for myself before I could learn all that.
But you can’t. I’m not saying you’re dumb, that you can’t figure out anything. Maybe you could figure out some things, maybe you have a gift, a joy for theological discernment, theological science, clear rational thought. But reproduce the entire history of theology? The works of Aquinas, Augustine, Avila, &c., &c…? Doubtful.
And really, would that be a fair use of your talents? The Church gives a Collosus whose shoulders we can build upon; why by content to build upon her toes?
And then what happens when you are presented with a true moral dilemma? Will you even have time to make such deliberations? Sure, a life of prayer is a wonderful thing, and may go a long way to guiding you to the Truth, but many prayerful people have been misled. By what authority, against what measure will you judge your Magisterium Of One?
Can you begin to see the freedom and ease you are given if you simply rest in the Church that Christ gave us? It is an ocean, and you can dive to its depths or float, resting upon its surface. Why reject it for the desert?
-Marc
W
wcknight
Guest
Of course, the Church just spells it out with a bit more detail.
N
NotWorthy
Guest
If that’s true, then why the parable about the slaves and the talents?
Why do we need this huge Bible? Why all the lessons? I think there’s more to it than that.
But I’m just
NotWorthy
L
Lillith
Guest
But…when Jesus said this he was really asking us to follow the ten commandments
If you Love God above all you
- Have no other God
- Will not take his name in vain
- Keep the Sabath Holy
- Will honor your parents
- won’t kill them
- won’t commit adultery (fornication)
- won’t steal from them
- won’t lie about them
- won’t wish for someones elses spouse
- Won’t be Jealous and wish for others possesions
A
AlanFromWichita
Guest
Since I like to look at the mystical side of things, I look at the huge Bible and all the lessons more for their transformational nature than as a literal behavioral guide.
Jesus spoke in parables for several reasons, I believe. One was to help shake us from our inbred and nurtured limited attitudes and ways of thinking about rules. It takes a lot of “hammering” to hammer out the old thinking and gently allow the Spirit to renew us. Jesus had to “deprogram” us, as it were, to shake us from our man-made ways of looking at things and bring us to a higher level of understanding.
Plus different parts of the Bible reach different people. Maybe one parable isn’t really needed for a person who already has that particular virtue in abundance compared to someone who has trouble with it. Note that most of the miracles involve a twist or punch line, where we find out that the real answer is more than just what was on the books as interpreted by experts.
There are at least four levels of intimacy with which one can become with the Bible, ranging from the literal, through the moral and allegorical, and eventually to transforming Union and Divine Union. It is fascinating to know what the Bible says literally but its first and most important use, IMO, is its affect at calling hearts to make themselves available to the Holy Spirit to be conformed so that the laws are written on our hearts.
Some might say that I’m advocating forming and “individual conscience.” To those, I tend to agree. I think we each need an individual conscience. I just think that getting our hearts right will more than take the place of any amount of intellectual discussion over shades of literal understanding.
It is as if the Church has the job of “reverse engineering” Jesus and His Bible, in a way, to fill in and clarify gaps in understanding. Mystics don’t worry so much about the accuracy of the details of all that stuff, but just take it and use it for transformational purposes. It’s like a person who may be a safe and expert car driver but doesn’t know how the fuel mixture is determined. Arguably one cannot be a totally competent driver without knowing that, but just because somebody has to know that doesn’t mean it needs to be known by any given individual driver.
Alan
G
gusano
Guest
I believe St.Paul was led by the Holy Spirit so much that he quite often “ran against the grain” of Judaism… to the point of irritating them and even inciting riots. (Acts 19:30…23:6,7)
He put no value on his life; Acts 20:24
The language is what The Holy Spirit Prompted him to say.
same as Jesus did in Luke 4:22-29.
I believe that…
I also went on to read the rest of 2 Tim 2: as far as verses; 11,12…
"You can depend on this:
If we have died with him we shall also live with him;
If we hold out to the end we shall also reign with him.
But if we deny him he will deny us.
What does that mean if someone **denies him in the Eucharist **…but is a “good saved christian” otherwise ?
gusano
I
Ignatius
Guest
A servant must do all that his master comands. If we are bondservants of Jesus Christ we must seek out whatever He has commanded and do it. Jesus left us His Church to direct us toward Him and that is just what she is doing.
God Bless.
God Bless.
R
rwoehmke
Guest
This is exactly correct. Love the Lord with your whole heart and soul and your neighbor as yourself. Where the glue gets binding is that for two thousand years and then some the Church has been figuring out just what that entails. Its like saying to have a well running automobile one must service it properly. Turns out that simple demand entails a whole lot of stuff that needs to be detailed and explained.
G
GKasper
Guest
G
gusano
Guest
I like definition 3. in the dictionary.
"A fixed principle that determines conduct; habit; custom…"
and I like Matt.7:24-26
"Anyone who hears my words and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house in silid rock…
Anyone who hears my words and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sandy ground."
Resisting Christ’s “rules” …is **“rebellion.”/b which is as witchcraft.
Read Eph.2:2…about who works among the rebellious
Read Romans 8:2…about the law of the Spirit.
Read Romans 8:5-13 …about the Spirit and the flesh
especially verse :8
gusano**
C
Crazylady
Guest
I probably shouldn’t get involved in this, but I have a little different, smaller, take on it. I think the problem is that the rules too often are given without relating them back to JESUS who gave us the rules and gave us the Church to teach and clarfify them as necessary. We individually, and all teachers, (the clergy, theologians and catechists, especially), need to always evangelize, to bring people to know and love and desire to follow and trust JESUS before or at least along with presenting his rules. A couple of quotes come to mind here: “And I, If I be lifted up, will draw all men to myslef”, and St. Paul, “I determined to only preach Christ, and him crucified”.(paraphrased).
This is a problem, I think, that goes way back before Vatican II and was the “cause” of much of the rejection of Church teaching when there seemed to be an opening and when culture stopped supporting rules.
This is a problem, I think, that goes way back before Vatican II and was the “cause” of much of the rejection of Church teaching when there seemed to be an opening and when culture stopped supporting rules.
T
toby
Guest
Hi,I see the problem as one of types of faith. Its been said that the longest journey in the world is from the head to the heart. On a personal basis I can confirm that.
For years I made sincere efforts to’make myself better’ - it only worked for a short time. So I found myself in what seemed an endless cycle of failure and guilt. Then at 50 years of age the providence of God meant grace gave me experential faith , instead of intellectual faith
That was more than 30 years ago and all I can say is that I do see that before I was trying to do the impossible by ‘trying to make myself better’ - because I was like a plumber trying to mend a broken tap with a broken spanner.
Now it is a matter,after giving God permission to love me, of learning each day how to hear His guidance - and also learning He never condemns, is always there. always patient, always embracing when the eyes of my heart turn back to Him, after I have taken charge of my life again.
Rules and Regulations are no longer the killers of lives - because anyone touched by God is galvanised into wanting to obey and follow. Someone said at the Last Supper Jesus instituted the Eucharist, showed authority meant having a servant’s heart, and coalesced the Ten Commandments into one by saying a New Commandment I give you -" Love one another as I have loved you."
It is much easier now to see the sacraments as the gift of a loving Father to keep us on the Way with Jesus, and the church as a Resource of God’s love by its Teaching.
Lets pray that the wonder of Vatican II will eventually become a total reality - and our church will becme a dynamic model - one which we ,ordained, religious, and lay, have all helped to shape ,so that every day our lives proclaim Jesus to those we meet, with humility and Joy.
Toby
For years I made sincere efforts to’make myself better’ - it only worked for a short time. So I found myself in what seemed an endless cycle of failure and guilt. Then at 50 years of age the providence of God meant grace gave me experential faith , instead of intellectual faith
That was more than 30 years ago and all I can say is that I do see that before I was trying to do the impossible by ‘trying to make myself better’ - because I was like a plumber trying to mend a broken tap with a broken spanner.
Now it is a matter,after giving God permission to love me, of learning each day how to hear His guidance - and also learning He never condemns, is always there. always patient, always embracing when the eyes of my heart turn back to Him, after I have taken charge of my life again.
Rules and Regulations are no longer the killers of lives - because anyone touched by God is galvanised into wanting to obey and follow. Someone said at the Last Supper Jesus instituted the Eucharist, showed authority meant having a servant’s heart, and coalesced the Ten Commandments into one by saying a New Commandment I give you -" Love one another as I have loved you."
It is much easier now to see the sacraments as the gift of a loving Father to keep us on the Way with Jesus, and the church as a Resource of God’s love by its Teaching.
Lets pray that the wonder of Vatican II will eventually become a total reality - and our church will becme a dynamic model - one which we ,ordained, religious, and lay, have all helped to shape ,so that every day our lives proclaim Jesus to those we meet, with humility and Joy.
Toby
R
reen12
Guest
Dear toby,
I’ve posted over 600 times, and your post above is one of
the most beautiful things I’ve read here on the forums.
May God bless and continue to be with you,
reen12
I’ve posted over 600 times, and your post above is one of
the most beautiful things I’ve read here on the forums.
May God bless and continue to be with you,
reen12
T
toby
Guest
Dear reen12
Your kindness has blown me away. As a young non-catholic used to say to me :- “May God Bless u and your House HEEPS!”
Please accept this for the moment and I will pray to see I can repeat a more lengthy response I have just lost on the computer. Sincerely and with you in Christ
Toby
Your kindness has blown me away. As a young non-catholic used to say to me :- “May God Bless u and your House HEEPS!”
Please accept this for the moment and I will pray to see I can repeat a more lengthy response I have just lost on the computer. Sincerely and with you in Christ
Toby
T
toby
Guest
Dear reen12
I have just read your beautiful message and will answer. What follows is another version of what I wrote earlier. Bless you. Toby Dear reen12
Further to my earlier email I send the following in thanksgiving to you, and all my other brothers and sisters who are also baptised into Jesus.
A Jesuit priest was speaking to 1000 of us christians of different stripe - God likes a bag of mixed nuts !!- when he suddenly stopped, looked at us and asked -"How many of you have given God permission to love you. Well, we hadnt even thought of it. Into the silence he spoke these words - “Well, do it now.” - There was a further long silence and then the place blew apart as we were impacted by gods’ love. I mean people were laughing,weeping, hugging, dancing, and singing, praising God. We have a Great God. Amen.
A God who is an existence of infinite, divine,unconditional love, and changeless. A God who gave his only son,the gift of his heart,to die for all mankind past,present,and future.A death that was for each individual,and that won for each person the gifts of Redemption,of Salvation, of Forgiveness- plus Jesus Atoned for our sins and became sin for our sake. 2Cor:5 v 21,NAB- “For our sakes, God made him who did not know sin to be sin, so that in him we might become the very holiness of God.”
No wonder, Paul says,'Rejoice,and again,I say,‘Rejoice.’ and Jesus says in Jn:8 v 36 - “That is why, if the son frees you, you will really be free.” Alleluia!
Because I have always been unsure about Atonement I looked it up in the 1914 Catholic Encylopaedia and now post a summary:-
A SUMMARY OF THE DOCTRINE OF ATONEMENT FROM THE CATHOLIC ENCLYOPAEDIA OF 1914
We cannot stay to examine these new systems in detail. But it may be observed that the truth which they contain is already found in the Catholic theology of the Atonement. That great doctrine has been faintly set forth in figures taken from man’s laws and customs. It is represented as the payment of a price, or a ransom, or as the offering of satisfaction for a debt. But we can never rest in these material figures as though they were literal and adequate. As both Abelard and Bernard remind us, the Atonement is the work of love. It is essentially a sacrifice, the one supreme sacrifice of which the rest were but types and figures. And, as St. Augustine teaches us, the outward rite of Sacrifice is the sacrament, or sacred sign, of the invisible sacrifice of the heart. It was by this inward sacrifice of obedience unto death, by this perfect love with which He laid down his life for His friends, that Christ paid the debt to justice, and taught us by His example, and drew all things to Himself; it was by this that He wrought our Atonement and Reconciliation with God, “making peace through the blood of His Cross”.
Praise God ! I hope you it blessed you too.
However we cant just take these gifts of Calvary off the shelf - we have to have the right inner disposition to be able to receive them.So again the sacraments are so useful.And John Paul II was always urging us to be ‘Docile’ to the Holy Spirit.
Perhaps above all the awesome wonder of Calvary allows us - now - to achieve intimacy, with our father, our Abba, our Daddy. At first it was very hard for me and I was quite scared. My wrong image of God made Him a Ledger Keeper with all my failures noted for the Last Day; and I was scared of my earthly Dad. But slowly I learnt to trust Jesus as He took me to our father. Almighty God wants intimacy with each of His children.
Thank you, Jesus - Praise you, Jesus - We love you, Jesus - Alleluia !!
Gracious Holy Spirit, Spirit of Truth, Spirit of Power, Spirit of Life. Spirit of Fragrance, Spirit of Peace, Spirit of Wisdom, Spirit of Love,move in us,fill us,teach us, to be children of the Most High God ,that through us, He may be glorified over all the Earth. Amen
I have just read your beautiful message and will answer. What follows is another version of what I wrote earlier. Bless you. Toby Dear reen12
Further to my earlier email I send the following in thanksgiving to you, and all my other brothers and sisters who are also baptised into Jesus.
A Jesuit priest was speaking to 1000 of us christians of different stripe - God likes a bag of mixed nuts !!- when he suddenly stopped, looked at us and asked -"How many of you have given God permission to love you. Well, we hadnt even thought of it. Into the silence he spoke these words - “Well, do it now.” - There was a further long silence and then the place blew apart as we were impacted by gods’ love. I mean people were laughing,weeping, hugging, dancing, and singing, praising God. We have a Great God. Amen.
A God who is an existence of infinite, divine,unconditional love, and changeless. A God who gave his only son,the gift of his heart,to die for all mankind past,present,and future.A death that was for each individual,and that won for each person the gifts of Redemption,of Salvation, of Forgiveness- plus Jesus Atoned for our sins and became sin for our sake. 2Cor:5 v 21,NAB- “For our sakes, God made him who did not know sin to be sin, so that in him we might become the very holiness of God.”
No wonder, Paul says,'Rejoice,and again,I say,‘Rejoice.’ and Jesus says in Jn:8 v 36 - “That is why, if the son frees you, you will really be free.” Alleluia!
Because I have always been unsure about Atonement I looked it up in the 1914 Catholic Encylopaedia and now post a summary:-
A SUMMARY OF THE DOCTRINE OF ATONEMENT FROM THE CATHOLIC ENCLYOPAEDIA OF 1914
We cannot stay to examine these new systems in detail. But it may be observed that the truth which they contain is already found in the Catholic theology of the Atonement. That great doctrine has been faintly set forth in figures taken from man’s laws and customs. It is represented as the payment of a price, or a ransom, or as the offering of satisfaction for a debt. But we can never rest in these material figures as though they were literal and adequate. As both Abelard and Bernard remind us, the Atonement is the work of love. It is essentially a sacrifice, the one supreme sacrifice of which the rest were but types and figures. And, as St. Augustine teaches us, the outward rite of Sacrifice is the sacrament, or sacred sign, of the invisible sacrifice of the heart. It was by this inward sacrifice of obedience unto death, by this perfect love with which He laid down his life for His friends, that Christ paid the debt to justice, and taught us by His example, and drew all things to Himself; it was by this that He wrought our Atonement and Reconciliation with God, “making peace through the blood of His Cross”.
Praise God ! I hope you it blessed you too.
However we cant just take these gifts of Calvary off the shelf - we have to have the right inner disposition to be able to receive them.So again the sacraments are so useful.And John Paul II was always urging us to be ‘Docile’ to the Holy Spirit.
Perhaps above all the awesome wonder of Calvary allows us - now - to achieve intimacy, with our father, our Abba, our Daddy. At first it was very hard for me and I was quite scared. My wrong image of God made Him a Ledger Keeper with all my failures noted for the Last Day; and I was scared of my earthly Dad. But slowly I learnt to trust Jesus as He took me to our father. Almighty God wants intimacy with each of His children.
Thank you, Jesus - Praise you, Jesus - We love you, Jesus - Alleluia !!
Gracious Holy Spirit, Spirit of Truth, Spirit of Power, Spirit of Life. Spirit of Fragrance, Spirit of Peace, Spirit of Wisdom, Spirit of Love,move in us,fill us,teach us, to be children of the Most High God ,that through us, He may be glorified over all the Earth. Amen
P
pipoluojo
Guest
A million rules would be nothing to a soul willing to obey. Only one rule would appear a million to a soul that is not willing to obey. That is why we are taught the significance of the virtue of obedience as the mother of the virtue of humility.
It is possible for Jesus to treat homosexuals just the way he treated the Pharisees. He would love them but hate their fault which is intolerable because it goes against God’s will for man as scripture clearly shows.
I don’t know what you would call me: I always tell those I love that they are wrong whenever they go wrong; it may be seventy times a day. I am learning to tell them they are right too whenever they are.
I sometimes feel things would not have gone this bad with the world if everyone had the spirit of nudging his neighbour whenever he spotted him doing something wrong. That would be charity proper.
It is possible for Jesus to treat homosexuals just the way he treated the Pharisees. He would love them but hate their fault which is intolerable because it goes against God’s will for man as scripture clearly shows.
I don’t know what you would call me: I always tell those I love that they are wrong whenever they go wrong; it may be seventy times a day. I am learning to tell them they are right too whenever they are.
I sometimes feel things would not have gone this bad with the world if everyone had the spirit of nudging his neighbour whenever he spotted him doing something wrong. That would be charity proper.
- Status