The Church is WRONG then

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… said my Dad’s Maronite friend on divorce and remarriage at our bible study (we are all Maronites).

So I asked

“Do you trust the Church then”

He responds “I trust the bible”

So I respond “But it clearly says no divorce and remarriage, so clearly you are not trusting the bible”

So he responds “Every case is different, we have to pray about it and follow the Holy Spirit”. This earned him nods from around the room.

So I tried to counter with, “Yes, but each man is trusting his interpretation of the bible”

To which he replied “No, we trust the Holy Spirit”

To which I followed with “If two men come up with different interpretations, is the Holy Spirit wrong then?”

And he came back with “Everyone has free will, so we are all slightly different”

I believe I tried to address the point of everyone believing different things being contradictory, but the someone else chimed in ‘Well if everyone has pretty similar beliefs and agree on most things, it must be the Holy Spirit guiding them’. That earned him a few nods of agreement.

So I threw in “So where did the bible come from then?”

His response was “Not the Church, the Holy Spirit”

My response was basically ignored, or perhaps too deep for them to understand.

ARGH! Internet apologetics is not the same as real life.

How do you deal with someone who is nominally Catholic, but is protestant in his belief, falling back on “The Holy Spirit will guide us, and if we differ it is because of our free will to disobey Him”.

He also threw in the fact that a female relation of his had her husband just leave one day, and “SURELY she is not supposed to live alone for the rest of her life”.

He also spent twenty minutes warning me about the Catholic Church.

He really stumped me by telling me that we should follow the Holy Spirit, and that differences in belief or the faith follow from our free will to disobey God. Moreover, that every situation in life is different and we have to consider what is best.

And yes, he confesses that he himself is a great sinner and does not follow God perfectly (i.e he is not his own pope)

Help?
 
Magicsilence said:
So I asked
So I respond
So I tried to counter with,
To which I followed
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Oh the insanity! It is amazing what we have to deal with isnt it? You just have to be content with the fact YOU knew better and that you did your best.
My response was basically ignored, or perhaps too deep for them to understand.
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ARGH! Internet apologetics is not the same as real life.
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Even the most basic logic often is too deep for most people to understand because they are not in the right mindset. But then again…are your SURE nobody else heard you during that meeting? It is very likely that your apologetics stand was a powerful testimony to others in the room who sat silent but were in fact hearing something they never heard before.
How do you deal with someone who is nominally Catholic, but is protestant in his belief, falling back on “The Holy Spirit will guide us, and if we differ it is because of our free will to disobey Him”.
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Its tough, you can only do so much. And most importantly you cant let it get to you, it is not a failure on your part.
 
You basically need to treat this person like a Protestant and bring out specific scripture that contradicts his interpretation.

Specifically, I would have called Him on the Holy Spirit leading him to something that is specifically contradicted by scripture. I would not have let him off the hook (hopefully, different dynamics when in a “live” conversation and harder to do), on saying that “every case is different”. Does everyone have their own ten commandments? Where is that in the bible?

Hammer in the point that God would not contradict Himself and we CAN be misled by Satan. If he is not listening, and keeps making assertions that are wrong, sometimes just saying something like.

“You are seriously being misled by Satan and you need to be careful unless you find yourself led straight to hell by the angel of Darkness masquerading as truth.”

Sometimes these emotional responses will hit someone when other things fail.

God bless,
Maria
 
Say it ain’t so, Magic! Say it ain’t so! MARONITES gone cukoo??? Noooooooohhhh!!!
 
Magicsilence said:
… said my Dad’s Maronite friend on divorce and remarriage at our bible study (we are all Maronites).

So I asked

“Do you trust the Church then”

He responds “I trust the bible”

So I respond “But it clearly says no divorce and remarriage, so clearly you are not trusting the bible”

So he responds “Every case is different, we have to pray about it and follow the Holy Spirit”. This earned him nods from around the room.

So I tried to counter with, “Yes, but each man is trusting his interpretation of the bible”

To which he replied “No, we trust the Holy Spirit”

To which I followed with “If two men come up with different interpretations, is the Holy Spirit wrong then?”

And he came back with “Everyone has free will, so we are all slightly different”

I believe I tried to address the point of everyone believing different things being contradictory, but the someone else chimed in ‘Well if everyone has pretty similar beliefs and agree on most things, it must be the Holy Spirit guiding them’. That earned him a few nods of agreement.

So I threw in “So where did the bible come from then?”

His response was “Not the Church, the Holy Spirit”

My response was basically ignored, or perhaps too deep for them to understand.

ARGH! Internet apologetics is not the same as real life.

How do you deal with someone who is nominally Catholic, but is protestant in his belief, falling back on “The Holy Spirit will guide us, and if we differ it is because of our free will to disobey Him”.

He also threw in the fact that a female relation of his had her husband just leave one day, and “SURELY she is not supposed to live alone for the rest of her life”.

He also spent twenty minutes warning me about the Catholic Church.

He really stumped me by telling me that we should follow the Holy Spirit, and that differences in belief or the faith follow from our free will to disobey God. Moreover, that every situation in life is different and we have to consider what is best.

And yes, he confesses that he himself is a great sinner and does not follow God perfectly (i.e he is not his own pope)

Help?
Click to expand...
He is of course falling into Moral Relativism. See The Maronite catechism, ***Captivated by Your Teachings ***Pg 300 and 346-347.

Part of the problem is this type of “Bible Study” where we read a passage and then everyone contributes what they think it says. Instead we should read a passage and then listen to what the Church says it says through the Church Fathers, and official commentary.
 
MariaG said:
You basically need to treat this person like a Protestant and bring out specific scripture that contradicts his interpretation.

Specifically, I would have called Him on the Holy Spirit leading him to something that is specifically contradicted by scripture. I would not have let him off the hook (hopefully, different dynamics when in a “live” conversation and harder to do), on saying that “every case is different”. Does everyone have their own ten commandments? Where is that in the bible?

Hammer in the point that God would not contradict Himself and we CAN be misled by Satan. If he is not listening, and keeps making assertions that are wrong, sometimes just saying something like.

“You are seriously being misled by Satan and you need to be careful unless you find yourself led straight to hell by the angel of Darkness masquerading as truth.”

Sometimes these emotional responses will hit someone when other things fail.

God bless,
Maria
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These things are so easy to say on the internet, but in real life it’s much tougher.

The difficulty is he is a friend, and I believe he is sincere.

Peace and God Bless!
 
Br.Rich_SFO said:
He is of course falling into Moral Relativism. See The Maronite catechism, ***Captivated by Your Teachings ***Pg 300 and 346-347.

Part of the problem is this type of “Bible Study” where we read a passage and then everyone contributes what they think it says. Instead we should read a passage and then listen to what the Church says it says through the Church Fathers, and official commentary.
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Yes, your comment about the ‘bible study’ is spot on. We used to have a Maronite-turned-Melkite priest leading it, but he has since been busy, and we continued without him.

I don’t have a Maronite Catechism, but thankyou for the reference. I will try and get hold of one.

Peace and God Bless!
 
I believe there is so much truth in the statement “the devil is in the details” The bible christians who tolerate “looseness” of truth and tolerance of “well as long as we sort of agree on the major stuff” are creating cracks the evil one uses to divide, confuse, create doubt.

Christ never promised the Counselor to lead each of us into our own truth, He promised it singularly to His Holy Church
 
So, well, yeah…we can use our free will to disagree with the Holy Spirit? I guess they prove your point for you 😃 😃
 
Be forewarned of my offtopicness:

What is a Maronite Catholic? I’d hate to start a whole new darn thread on it when I could just get a quick anwer here. I never heard the term before…
 
Laurence_of_PA said:
Be forewarned of my offtopicness:

What is a Maronite Catholic? I’d hate to start a whole new darn thread on it when I could just get a quick anwer here. I never heard the term before…
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The Maronite Catholic Church is a Eastern Catholic Church in full union with the Bishop of Rome. The Maronites never broke off union with Rome when all the other 22 Eastern Catholic Churches did. They went into hiding in the mountians around Lebanon. Hundreds of years later they emerged and took on some Western Christian practices influenced by the Latin Church. They have been urged to return to and continue their Eastern tradition.
 
MariaG said:
***You basically need to treat this person like a Protestant and bring out specific scripture that contradicts his interpretation. ***

Yes, exactly!! You should prepare ahead of time, pull out scripture and catechism.

Remember love is patient and persistent.

Rome was not built in a day … so don’t expect to change their minds in 10 minutes.

I pray God will bless you in this future endeavor.👍
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We normally think of apolgetics as us defending the faith to protestants. Sadly, the most critical task in apologetics needs to be defending the faith to fellow Catholics. It seems when things get down to laws regarding marriage and sexuality, far too many Catholics then assume they know better than the church. If we Catholics could just get all of ourselves on the same page, everything else would fall into place so much easier 😦

LT
 
ltravis said:
We normally think of apolgetics as us defending the faith to protestants. Sadly, the most critical task in apologetics needs to be defending the faith to fellow Catholics. It seems when things get down to laws regarding marriage and sexuality, far too many Catholics then assume they know better than the church. If we Catholics could just get all of ourselves on the same page, everything else would fall into place so much easier 😦

LT
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Sad…but all too true…
 
Magicsilence said:
These things are so easy to say on the internet, but in real life it’s much tougher.

The difficulty is he is a friend, and I believe he is sincere.

Peace and God Bless!
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Yes, it is VERY difficult to do in real life with friends.

But the good thing with these kind of people, is that you are using scripture (rather than early church fathers) and usually it taken much better. Frequently, (usually?) is friends part “agreeing to disagree”.

Anyway, whenever you know you are going to be talking to this person, make sure to pray alot beforehand:thumbsup:

God Bless,
Maria
 
This man probably has a personal bias against the church most likely stemming from past experiences or events…
 
MariaG said:
Yes, it is VERY difficult to do in real life with friends.

But the good thing with these kind of people, is that you are using scripture (rather than early church fathers) and usually it taken much better. Frequently, (usually?) is friends part “agreeing to disagree”.

Anyway, whenever you know you are going to be talking to this person, make sure to pray alot beforehand:thumbsup:
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If your husband leaves you, it is very easy to persuade yourself the the Holy Spirit wouldn’t want you to remain alone for the rest of your life.
That’s why we need the Church as well as individual conscience.
 
Magicsilence said:
Even our resident Maronite priest has become Melkite!!

I think we are a dying breed 😃
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I have fallen into relativeism my self and it probably shows here sometimes and am trying to get my free will connected to God’s will.

It is sad to hear about your priest is it time for you to move maybe this is the Holy Spirit talking or nudging you?

You can keep practicing on us 🙂 You are brave and God Bless YOU.

Some Catholics in my parish say stuff that doesn’t sound right sometimes so I have to go to the CCC and even my own family that are some Catholic don’t do the traditional stuff anymore
some are coming my way, that which they may have just forgotten, which dah is the way of the Church. There will always be issues as I am finding out in my parish.

But this is still my church family and whoever I end up spending the most time with ie most likely at mass and after breakfast etc. bible study choir adoration etc. then this is my family my mother, the blessed Virgin Mary and bros and is in these group are really my spiritual family and real to me not relative to me:p If I am not believing what they believe then I could stumble on the words, that of the the people like you are talking about and otherwise I will be lead away again and my intruder alert goes wha wha wha when I feel a wrong coming from someone.

I can’t have that happen again but then on the threads all I have to do is push a button but on real people I have to argue or walk out of the room or maybe not see them so much like once a month or less.

Dessert**

" Be Jesus … share Jesus "
Blessed Mother Teresa**
 
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