This may be slightly off topic, but I think the following is an example of error. The caveat is that I saw it on a news documentary show on Fox News. If there is another explanation for it that disproves what I am saying, let me know because I will stand corrected if I inadvertently misrepresented something.
There’s a fundamental difference between the Church teaching error, and a particular priest/bishop, parish, or even diocese accepting error. The Church has sinners in it, and they will sin. There will be people who defy Church teaching, and those who accept or tolerate it. That is why many of the NT letters were written, to bring wayward groups back into line. We have seen it in the past in Christian history with the Arian heresy, when the majority of bishops and Christians accepted Arianism. But the Church and the Pope did not. And eventually this heresy was rejected and fell away. Same with the example you give below, this fascination and tolerance of homosexual sin will not change Church teaching on it, and eventually it will fall away and the truth will remain.
My wife and I are conservative evangelical Christians. I want to attend a more traditional church than the one we currently attend and am considering Catholicism. However, my wife is very anti-Catholic, but she became a little more open to it out of respect to my interest and from what she saw of Pope Francis during his US visit. She likes him a lot, as do I.
Good to hear. Thank you and a thank you to your wife for at least being willing to listen and consider our view.
We sat down a few weeks ago and saw a TV program called *‘Losing Faith In America’ *or something to that effect with Bill Hemmer on Fox News around the same time of Pope’s visit to the US.
The program focused on different Christian denominations and how Christianity is losing adherents in the US. It also spent a significant amount of time on the issue of homosexuality. It focused on a Catholic church in New York City called St Paul the Apostle and a program they have called
outatstpaul.org/.
Yes, Christianity is losing adherents, in all sectors, among all denominations. The current fad of militant autonomy and complete rejection of authority has caused Christians everywhere to believe they can determine truth and set doctrine, which they can’t.
My first thought was that it was an outreach to the LGBT community to help point them to Christ. In other words, “hate the sin but love the sinner” kind of program, which we would welcome and embrace as the proper Christian thing to do.
However, as the program progressed, it became apparent that not only was there a portion of that parish that was openly gay – and I think they said the priest was, too --, but they were proud to be gay and lesbian Catholics and were open about their sexuality and their membership in the Catholic Church, along with taking the sacraments.
I don’t know too much about the group you mentioned or the TV special, but let me just say in general (because I can’t speak specifically about them) that it is scandalous and horrible when supposedly Catholic groups promote open heresy. It promotes error and sin, and causes the weak in faith to lose their faith. As we see with yourself and your wife, it also causes those who would be open to learning about the faith to turn away. It’s absolutely tragic and awful when Catholics sin like that.
That was a ‘fingernails across the chalkboard’ moment for especially my wife, and I was totally caught off-guard by this. I couldn’t defend it. I kept telling her that I didn’t think Catholicism approves of homosexual behavior and that it was an anomaly, but that did more to undo my efforts to portray Catholicism in a positive traditional and conservative light than anything I could think of. She looked at me with one of those, "…and you’re thinking of joining *that kind of church *?
Well first thing, don’t try to defend it in the sense of hiding or ignoring it. Let’s be upfront and honest, the Church has many heretics and apostates in her ranks. And we need good, faithful Christians to join and help us to fight against them. The greatest gift we could give Jesus is to diligently fight against those who wish to destroy or deform His Church, His Bride.
Be assured of this though, the teachings of the Church do not approve of homosexual actions, and never will. They are sinful. And no amount of Catholic groups, priests or even bishops will ever change that.
It kind of put things back to ‘square one’ with her and it came across to me as Catholicism’s toleration of error if not subtle acceptance of a sinful lifestyle. I realize that some mainline Protestant denominations do likewise, but we don’t belong to such a liberal denomination as that. It was big turn-off to us and came across as tolerance of error if the TV program accurately portrayed what was happening correctly.
Toleration of error is nauseating, trust me. It’s tough down here in the trenches, fighting against those who wish to introduce error to the Church. And we need all the help we can get. But remember, Jesus didn’t promise us an easy life, He promised us a cross of our own. This toleration of error and modernism that we are fighting today is our cross. And we’ll keep fighting, and we’ll stay with the Church, because she has the sacraments, especially the Eucharist. We don’t abandon our home to those who wish to destroy it. We fight them and eventually, we WILL repel them and the Church will remain.
:thumbsup: