The punished innocent?

[Cure]

I’m looking into the Catholic religion to see if it is right for me. One gentlemen I’ve been speaking with has told me that because my birth is not the result of my parents FIRST marriages that according to Chatholic belief…I am a illlegitiamate child. Thus I am being punished by GOD for being illegitimate.

If this is true…then this makes GOD seem very cruel and unfair. To make me suffer for something that is in no way even remotely my fault. Why does GOD hold me at fault for something I had to control over? It was not my choice to be born into this situation.

 

[tee_eff_em]

I’m looking into the Catholic religion to see if it is right for me. One gentlemen I’ve been speaking with has told me that because my birth is not the result of my parents FIRST marriages that according to Chatholic belief…I am a illlegitiamate child. Thus I am being punished by GOD for being illegitimate.

Leaving aside the question of legitimacy except to note that the issue is not nearly so clear cut as outlined above:

In what way do you (or your gentleman) believe you are being punished by GOD? What do you (or your gentleman) believe to be the effect(s) of the legitmacy of your birth?

tee

 

[Claire_from_DE]

The Catholic church doesn’t consider you illegitimate. You were born within a legal marriage. Even if your parents’ marriage isn’t what the church would call ‘valid’, any children from it are still legitimate since it is a legal marriage. God isn’t punishing you or calling you illegitimate. This doesn’t affect whether you can become Catholic.

Even children born to an unmarried woman can be baptized Catholic and wouldn’t be considered second class Catholics.

The gentleman you spoke to was mistaken.

 

[VociMike]

God doesn’t care whether you are “illegitimate” (however that might be defined), and neither does the Catholic Church. It is simply a non-issue, and I can’t imagine why that person even brought up the subject.

BTW, I took a look at your profile and I’d like to offer you a thought. Don’t choose a faith because it “feels right”. Choose a faith because it is true, to the best of your ability to discern. Then, once you have found the truth, work to conform your mind and your heart to that truth, and then it will feel right, because you have conformed yourself to the truth.

Of course, we Catholics here are convinced that the Catholic faith is the true faith revealed in its fullness by God, and protected from error by God.

 

[jmcrae]

I’m looking into the Catholic religion to see if it is right for me. One gentlemen I’ve been speaking with has told me that because my birth is not the result of my parents FIRST marriages that according to Chatholic belief…I am a illlegitiamate child.

The concept of “child legitimacy” has to do with inheritance from the biological father; it has absolutely nothing to do with one’s status in the Church. There are plenty of priests and religious around today who were born to single mothers. A father can “legitimize” his extra-marital offspring simply by including them in his last will and testament. (He can also disown any of his children, simply by taking their names out of his last will and testament.)

Thus I am being punished by GOD for being illegitimate.

In what way are you being punished by God? (Is this something you noticed happening beforehand, or did you only start to notice it when the “gentleman” mentioned it to you?)

In any case, it seems as though the “gentleman” has no idea what he is talking about.

 

[Texas_Roofer]

…

The gentleman you spoke to was mistaken.

that said it all