The Cradle Catholic experience

[Jennifer132]

For cradle Catholics, how do you learn about your faith? My husband and I are seriously considering converting, and we are reading books and reading through the catechism and eventually will go through RCIA. My husband has a co-worker who is a cradle Catholic and attends Mass regularly. They were chatting and my husband, for whatever reason, mentioned that many Protestants are under the impression that Catholics worship Mary (which we’ve learnt in the Catechism is not true). But this woman immediately replied with an enthusiastic “we do!”. So how does someone get to be middle aged, born in the church, and attending regularly still hold false beliefs about the church? Please note, this is not meant to be a criticism of this person. My question is, how does this happen? Are cradle Catholics educated in childhood about the doctrines of their faith?

 

[Confiteor_Deo]

Many Catholics know little about the Faith because of poor catechesis both from their parents and from the Church. This problem has been quite serious since the Second Vatican Council in the 60’s due to misinterpretation of what the Council taught. Many people taught themselves the Faith once they got older while others were fortunate enough to have been raised in a devout, orthodox Catholic home, parish, or school. Some people may learn what the Church teaches but will deny it and become heretics, but this doesn’t seem to be the case here.

The lady that your husband spoke to was probably using the less common definition of worship which doesn’t mean adoration (which is given solely to God) but mere honor or veneration. That is why the words “we worship thee, O Mary” are in some older prayers.

 

[redbetta]

Many Catholics know little about the Faith because of poor catechesis both from their parents and from the Church. This problem has been quite serious since the Second Vatican Council in the 60’s due to misinterpretation of what the Council taught. Many people taught themselves the Faith once they got older while others were fortunate enough to have been raised in a devout, orthodox Catholic home, parish, or school. Some people may learn what the Church teaches but will deny it and become heretics, but this doesn’t seem to be the case here.

The lady that your husband spoke to was probably using the less common definition of worship which doesn’t mean adoration (which is given solely to God) but mere honor or veneration. That is why the words “we worship thee, O Mary” are in some older prayers.

Let’s not forget poor catechesis in Catholic schools. I graduated from a Catholic high school last year. Our catechesis consisted of feed the poor, don’t be racist, recycle, and buy fair trade. No dogma, practices, or talks on personal sin, just societal sin. Teachers and students both openly talked about being pro-choice and supporting gay marriage. I had to teach myself the faith. My guess is, since man Catholic schools can barely get by, they need to market themselves to non-Catholics as private schools and down play their Catholic identity in order to not scare away costumers. That and sisters do not really teach anymore. We had one religious sister on staff and the rest of the founding order has retired. I often wonder if they know what has become of their school.

 

[Confiteor_Deo]

Let’s not forget poor catechesis in Catholic schools. I graduated from a Catholic high school last year. Our catechesis consisted of feed the poor, don’t be racist, recycle, and buy fair trade. No dogma, practices, or talks on personal sin, just societal sin. Teachers and students both openly talked about being pro-choice and supporting gay marriage. I had to teach myself the faith. My guess is, since man Catholic schools can barely get by, they need to market themselves to non-Catholics as private schools and down play their Catholic identity in order to not scare away costumers. That and sisters do not really teach anymore. We had one religious sister on staff and the rest of the founding order has retired. I often wonder if they know what has become of their school.

Yes, thank you for pointing that out. I have family that went to Catholic school all their life and they barely know anything about the Faith.

 

[fhansen]

For cradle Catholics, how do you learn about your faith? My husband and I are seriously considering converting, and we are reading books and reading through the catechism and eventually will go through RCIA. My husband has a co-worker who is a cradle Catholic and attends Mass regularly. They were chatting and my husband, for whatever reason, mentioned that many Protestants are under the impression that Catholics worship Mary (which we’ve learnt in the Catechism is not true). But this woman immediately replied with an enthusiastic “we do!”. So how does someone get to be middle aged, born in the church, and attending regularly still hold false beliefs about the church? Please note, this is not meant to be a criticism of this person. My question is, how does this happen? Are cradle Catholics educated in childhood about the doctrines of their faith?

There are many uncatechized, or sufficiently catechized, Catholics, unfortunately. And many myths abound, both within the Church and outside of it. There’s a virtual mission field within our Church for further instruction or faith formation, if not evangelization.

 

[Casilda]

For cradle Catholics, how do you learn about your faith? My husband and I are seriously considering converting, and we are reading books and reading through the catechism and eventually will go through RCIA. My husband has a co-worker who is a cradle Catholic and attends Mass regularly. They were chatting and my husband, for whatever reason, mentioned that many Protestants are under the impression that Catholics worship Mary (which we’ve learnt in the Catechism is not true). But this woman immediately replied with an enthusiastic “we do!”. So how does someone get to be middle aged, born in the church, and attending regularly still hold false beliefs about the church? Please note, this is not meant to be a criticism of this person. My question is, how does this happen? Are cradle Catholics educated in childhood about the doctrines of their faith?

I am an older cradle, I was taught a pre-first Holy Communion Catechism by Franciscan nuns prior to V2. I add that because that kept me a faithful Christian. Sadly my parents left the church shortly after and I didn’t finish growing up in the church but was raised by Catholics. (I have since come to think of this as a blessing. For the church has gone through some upheaval and decay and I am just learning about it.)I did spend a lifetime in Protestant churches learning the Bible. I finally spent years studying the ancient faith as expressed by Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholics. Not being able to convert to either, I am an Eastern Catholic now. It is where the faith that I studied seems to be truly practiced. I, too, encountered Catholic parishes full of people and even the priests who not only didn’t know their faith but could not share it.

 

[SuscipeMeDomine]

I think there are many different ways to be Catholic.

People here tend to take an intellectual approach to the faith. Many discussions include citations to the Catechism, Church fathers, encyclicals, etc. And people often look down on those who are less educated. This short thread already has several mentions of poor catechesis.

There’s another approach. I want to call it a more emotional approach though there may be a better term. They may not be able to define transubstantiation, but they know that when they receive communion at Mass, they are receiving Jesus, pure and simple. They may not know what canon law says about marriage, but they’d be devastated if their son or daughter got married at City Hall. Catholicism has permeated their lives in a way that will never leave them.

As someone passionate about adult faith formation, I definitely think it would be beneficial if people continued learning about their faith throughout their lives. But along with that I think it would also be beneficial if they performed service activities and developed their prayer lives. Ideally there’s a balance among all these areas.

 

[Padres1969]

For cradle Catholics, how do you learn about your faith? My husband and I are seriously considering converting, and we are reading books and reading through the catechism and eventually will go through RCIA. My husband has a co-worker who is a cradle Catholic and attends Mass regularly. They were chatting and my husband, for whatever reason, mentioned that many Protestants are under the impression that Catholics worship Mary (which we’ve learnt in the Catechism is not true). But this woman immediately replied with an enthusiastic “we do!”. So how does someone get to be middle aged, born in the church, and attending regularly still hold false beliefs about the church? Please note, this is not meant to be a criticism of this person. My question is, how does this happen? Are cradle Catholics educated in childhood about the doctrines of their faith?

Same way many native born Americans would utterly fail a US Citizenship test. Lack of need to or desire to learn all they can about what they’re already a member of.

I mean I know first hand what you’re talking about. My coworker who is in her mid-40’s, was a Cradle Catholic who left for the LDS church in her early 30’s, and then a non-denom Christian church after that. But just today she was asking me why Catholics worship statues and images in RC churches.

 

[Padres1969]

Let’s not forget poor catechesis in Catholic schools. I graduated from a Catholic high school last year. Our catechesis consisted of feed the poor, don’t be racist, recycle, and buy fair trade. No dogma, practices, or talks on personal sin, just societal sin. Teachers and students both openly talked about being pro-choice and supporting gay marriage. I had to teach myself the faith. My guess is, since man Catholic schools can barely get by, they need to market themselves to non-Catholics as private schools and down play their Catholic identity in order to not scare away costumers. That and sisters do not really teach anymore. We had one religious sister on staff and the rest of the founding order has retired. I often wonder if they know what has become of their school.

I can vouch for this one. After 13 years of Catholic primary and secondary education they hadn’t taught me much about Catholic dogma and the like. I didn’t even learn the word magisterium until I looked into the RCC deeper myself during Catholic university. And even then my knowledge gained during college was mostly self searching, not institutional.

 

[styrgwillidar]

I’m a cradle Catholic and the elementary school I attended and CCD program was solid on the faith and taught the doctrine correctly.

However, when I got older I had trouble remembering some of the apologetics arguments and supporting scripture for many of the doctrines.

So, I started reading a lot of apologetics works by authors like Hahn and Madrid.
“Catholicism and Fundamentalism”
“What Catholics Really Believe”
“Surprised by Truth”

An exceptional book for understanding the faith in the earliest years of the Church is “Faith of the Early Fathers”, edited and translated by Jurgens.

 

[Lormar]

I am an older cradle, I was taught a pre-first Holy Communion Catechism by Franciscan nuns prior to V2. I add that because that kept me a faithful Christian. …

My earliest religious training was from Dominican nuns before VII, so my experience was similar to your own

 

[JimR-OCDS]

I’m a cradle Catholic, born in 1951.

I went to Catholic School with nuns and the Baltimore Catechism, which we had to memorize.

The nuns taught us greatly about going to Mass, the Sacraments and especially about the saints.

However, my greatest influence had to be my grandmother, who had a deep faith.

I left the Catholic Church and was an agnostic between the age of 16 and 26.

I had the flawed judgement about the Church which I wouldn’t get over until Jesus Christ came into my life and gave me the gift of faith.

I then returned to the Church and had to learn the deeper meaning of everything I was taught growing up.

Prayer and reading were the paths Jesus led me on.

Jim

 

[carefullytread]

I am (was?) a cradle Catholic and I can attest that I learned very little about the actual Church teachings growing up. I was never taught about, say, mortal sin and the importance of being in a state of grace to receive the Eucharist. I think I went to confession twice when I was a child, once for first Confession that we all did before our first Communion and my mother took me one other time when I was older.

My CCD classes were definitely about the feel good aspects of the faith and making art around the familiar stories from the OT like Noah and the Ark.

And my parents (or at least my father) were some of the strictest Catholics at our parish! We went to Mass every week and all the Holy Days, prayed every time before we ate, etc. But the Catechesis didn’t happen.

I made it half way through my Confirmation classes before I dropped out and I can say they weren’t any better. After many years as a lapsed Catholic, I felt the desire to come back to the Church and I launched myself into studying it. Was I ever in for a surprise! I really didn’t know what being a Catholic was about.

Examining the faith, I realized that I didn’t accept it, but this time for entirely different reasons than when I left originally. I really didn’t know what Catholicism was and I can’t imagine that most of the kids in my CCD classes knew either!

 

[boomerang]

So how does someone get to be middle aged, born in the church, and attending regularly still hold false beliefs about the church? Please note, this is not meant to be a criticism of this person. My question is, how does this happen? Are cradle Catholics educated in childhood about the doctrines of their faith?

That phenomenon is not confined to Catholics. I am friends with a 75 year old devout Lutheran woman, a regular church-goer, who did not know that Jesus is the incarnation of the Father. She doesn’t believe in the Trinity, and thinks they are three entirely separate beings.

 

[Crusaderbear]

Yep, CCD wasn’t very helpful, I left the church after college and I was in the Navy, more from convienience than any disagreement with what I knew of the faith, now I’m back and have learned more from this forum than I knew before! Good luck with your journey into the faith!

 

[Vic_Taltrees_UK]

The lady who says “We do worship Mary!” may have been wittily ironic in accurately observing her fellows!

My grandparents became Catholics 100 years ago this year and though I didn’t know them, I get the impression they had very little catechesis and likewise our parents and us.

It takes probably unusual proactiveness and inventiveness and continual begging God so that you will have a chance of strengthening and informing your faith lifelong. It is most valuably done in peer groups with reinforcement from experienced peers as well as the better-informed clergy.

 

[Minion_w_a_drum]

About 15 years ago my son’s first communion instruction included a grand total of classes, one of which was logistics for the event- you will sit in this pew, this is how you walk ETC… No reconciliation, for that matter there was really no anything. I pressed the deacon about it (we had no priest at the time) and he said “well you never stop learning about the Eucharist and we feel that we give the children what they can handle” or some such malarkey. We ended up switching parishes, an act I detest, but thought I had to do something for my other kids… Imagine trying to teach a 7 year old the concept of the Eucharist in basically 2 sessions. And then they wonder why no one comes to Mass anymore…
Don’t get me on catholic marriage prep… it is a flat out disgrace.

 

[Peter_J]

The lady who says “We do worship Mary!” may have been wittily ironic in accurately observing her fellows!

That’s possible, but if that’s how she meant it then I think she ought to have added a charitable qualifier, e.g. “but only very rarely, and it’s usually an innocent misunderstanding”.

 

[Padres1969]

About 15 years ago my son’s first communion instruction included a grand total of classes, one of which was logistics for the event- you will sit in this pew, this is how you walk ETC… No reconciliation, for that matter there was really no anything. I pressed the deacon about it (we had no priest at the time) and he said “well you never stop learning about the Eucharist and we feel that we give the children what they can handle” or some such malarkey. We ended up switching parishes, an act I detest, but thought I had to do something for my other kids… Imagine trying to teach a 7 year old the concept of the Eucharist in basically 2 sessions. And then they wonder why no one comes to Mass anymore…
Don’t get me on catholic marriage prep… it is a flat out disgrace.

The thought process is probably that some instruction is better than no instruction at all (the implication being if instruction involved too many classes or too much effort, most people these days just wouldn’t bother at all). And then they definitely wouldn’t be coming to mass on Sunday.

That said there’s some merit to the idea that if they make it harder, at least those that stick with it will fully understand their faith and in theory might be more dedicated to actually practicing and living their lives as Catholics are supposed to according to Catholic teaching.

 

[ConfusedLucy]

There is a bit of a low expectations culture sometimes