Troubling comments

[seetiger33]

I havnt been here in a while however. I Read post after post and its as if Im not of the Catholic faith I have no chance whatsoever to be used by God almighty.I believe Christ is my Lord and Savior. I believe in the trinity. God the Father, The Son , and Holy Spirit are ONE. I beleive in the death ,buriel and Resurrection of Christ. I have asked Christ to rule my life and asked for forgiveness and as all of us I am a sinner. Forgive my mispellings for you grammer pros out there.So what more is it that I have to do . NOTHING.Now yes I need to study to show myself approved, Yes I have to walk the walk.Yes I need to ask forgieness of my sin when I fall . But I dont believe I have to practice Catholic beliefs to go to heaven. So before you try to tear me down. Because no i dont understand everything you do. But I can only go by what I see and read.

 

[PaulDupre]

No one, including the Catholic Church, believes you have to be Catholic to go to heaven. However, the Catholic Church is the church established by Jesus to bring salvation and grace to this world. You would do well to seriously investigate its claims. You may find your true home, as I and so many others here have.

Grace to you,
Paul

 

[seetiger33]

Ok If you dont believe I have to be a Catholic to go to heaven then why persist to explore your claims? Isnt going to heaven and worshiping our creator and his sons death and resurrection the whole reason why you do what you do?

 

[PaulDupre]

If it is true, as we claim, that the Catholic Church is the one true Church established by Jesus in 33 AD, that the Catholic bishops are the successors of the apostles, and that His Church teaches His doctrines without error and is “the pillar and bulwark of the truth” as the bible teaches, why would you not want to be a part of it?

All you need to do is investigate the doctrines and history of the Catholic Church, and I am sure you will see that you need to be a Catholic. The Catholic Answers website is a good place to start, especially the section called “The Fathers Know Best”. This is a compilation of the writings (arranged by topic) by those men who sat at the feet of the apostles and learned from them, then became the leaders of the Church in the first few centuries after the resurrection of Christ. They wrote about what the early Church believed and how they worshipped. If you read them, you will find out that they were Catholics. You will also discover that the doctrines they taught 2000 years ago are the same doctrines we still teach today.

Grace to you,
Paul

 

[Roman_Catholic_1]

I believe Christ is my Lord and Savior. I believe in the trinity. God the Father, The Son , and Holy Spirit are ONE. I beleive in the death ,buriel and Resurrection of Christ. I have asked Christ to rule my life and asked for forgiveness and as all of us I am a sinner.

The next reasonable step then would be to join His church.

 

[seetiger33]

Ok im already part of Gods family right?? Ive accepted Christ as my Lord and Savior .Well since The Catholic Church is his Church I guess we all better become Jews since that is Gods people? My point is Christ died for EVERYONE ON THE FACE OF THE EARTH. To even say well yea your going to heaven . Now since you arnt a Catholic youll never know the truth. Thank you but I already know the truth. Sounds like its a ritual not worship.

 

[exoflare]

seetiger33,

You asked whether you “need to be Catholic” to get to Heaven. There’s no simple way to tell you whether not being a Catholic is a sin or not; only God knows in everybody’s case for sure, and here’s why… A sin only qualifies as such when the person who committed it is aware that it is wrong. Once you are made aware of God’s will for you, there’s no excuse not to follow it. Those who deliberately choose to remain ignorant or stubborn are also sinning, because they put their own comfort over the chance to serve God that they are aware was given to them.

 

[exoflare]

seetiger33:

Ok im already part of Gods family right?? Ive accepted Christ as my Lord and Savior .Well since The Catholic Church is his Church I guess we all better become Jews since that is Gods people? My point is Christ died for EVERYONE ON THE FACE OF THE EARTH. To even say well yea your going to heaven . Now since you arnt a Catholic youll never know the truth. Thank you but I already know the truth. Sounds like its a ritual not worship.

The next time you feel like this, take a deep breath and slowly count to 10 before you start typing.

 

[puzzleannie]

seetiger33:

Ok If you dont believe I have to be a Catholic to go to heaven then why persist to explore your claims? Isnt going to heaven and worshiping our creator and his sons death and resurrection the whole reason why you do what you do?

the whole reason we do what we do is in obedience to the clear command of Jesus Christ
If you love me, you will keep my commandments.
on the night before he died he changed bread and wine into his body and blood, gave it do his disciples to eat, and commanded them to do the same thing in remembrance of him and of the sacrifice he was about to make
Unless a man be born again of water and the holy spirit he shall not have eternal life.
Unless you eat my body and drink my blood you shall not have life within you. My body is true food and my blood is true drink.

when he said these things almost all his enthusiastic followers, including most of the 5000 who had just feasted on the bread and fish he provided miraculously, turned away from him because his claim seemed outlandish, bizarre and even blaspehmous. A few loyal ones remained, including the 12 apostles headed by Peter, of whom he inquired: aren’t you going to leave me as well? Peter replied, speaking for the entire group: To whom Lord would we go? You have the words of everlasting life.

He commanded us to evangelize and baptize all nations.
He commanded us to ask forgiveness from from God and from each other for our sins before offering sacrifice to God.
He commanded the apostles to bind and loose, to forgive sin, to estabish a Church and give it order.
He commanded Peter to be the head of this Church and lead the others.
He warned us we will be judged in the end on how we treat our fellow human beings, on our good works in their behalf, done for love of the Lord himself.
he commanded us to hold on to our unity, to preserve it at all costs.

 

[joshua_b]

seetiger33:

I havnt been here in a while however. I Read post after post and its as if Im not of the Catholic faith I have no chance whatsoever to be used by God almighty.I believe Christ is my Lord and Savior. I believe in the trinity. God the Father, The Son , and Holy Spirit are ONE. I beleive in the death ,buriel and Resurrection of Christ. I have asked Christ to rule my life and asked for forgiveness and as all of us I am a sinner. Forgive my mispellings for you grammer pros out there.So what more is it that I have to do . NOTHING.Now yes I need to study to show myself approved, Yes I have to walk the walk.Yes I need to ask forgieness of my sin when I fall . But I dont believe I have to practice Catholic beliefs to go to heaven. So before you try to tear me down. Because no i dont understand everything you do. But I can only go by what I see and read.

Lets back up just a bit here. The Catholic Church does not claim to know the state of ANYONES soul…nowhere in any Church teaching will you find the statement that it is impossible for non-Catholics to go to heaven.

 

[joshua_b]

With that being said, let’s just examine what our opinion of the Church is as Catholics. We believe the Catholic Church to be the church Jesus founded here on earth. If you are a Christian (and I am not claiming you are not) then Catholics would hold that you should want to do the will of Christ, and we further believe that the will of Christ is to be a member of the church that he established, which has the FULLNESS of Truth, and the FULL means to salvation. We believe that God can (and does) save anyone as He sees appropriate, but that the ordinary means of Salvation He gave the world are found in the Catholic Church (the Church founded by Jesus himself). The belief that Christ established a visible unified Church is found in Scripture, in Apostolic Tradition (that is the unchanged faith and teachings of the Apostles as handed down to their successors the Bishops), and in historical record. The Catholic position on this is that if you are willing to accept the Truth that Jesus established a Church here on earth, then it is your obligation to find that Church and become a member of it.

 

[BryPGuy89]

seetiger33:

I havnt been here in a while however. I Read post after post and its as if Im not of the Catholic faith I have no chance whatsoever to be used by God almighty.I believe Christ is my Lord and Savior. I believe in the trinity. God the Father, The Son , and Holy Spirit are ONE. I beleive in the death ,buriel and Resurrection of Christ. I have asked Christ to rule my life and asked for forgiveness and as all of us I am a sinner. Forgive my mispellings for you grammer pros out there.So what more is it that I have to do . NOTHING.Now yes I need to study to show myself approved, Yes I have to walk the walk.Yes I need to ask forgieness of my sin when I fall . But I dont believe I have to practice Catholic beliefs to go to heaven. So before you try to tear me down. Because no i dont understand everything you do. But I can only go by what I see and read.

You need to read the Bible. It says it pretty clearly that the Catholic Church is the best way to Heaven and salvatioin.

 

[TamaraS]

seetiger33:

Ok If you dont believe I have to be a Catholic to go to heaven then why persist to explore your claims? Isnt going to heaven and worshiping our creator and his sons death and resurrection the whole reason why you do what you do?

For some of us, it isn’t just about the minimum of what we need in order to attain Heaven when we die. I’m not just content with the minimum requirements, if Christ has offered us more while we are still here, then I want it all.
Whenever any Christians come together to pray or worship God, Jesus is present spiritually. But if I can not only be joined with him spiritually, but also physically, then I desire all that he has to offer. You can not only find Jesus present in the Catholic Church in a spiritual sense, but also Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity- the Eucharist. It is at the very heart of the Catholic Church.
-Tamara

 

[carol_marie]

I have to agree with TamaraS. Seetiger, I could’ve written your post three years ago - I was a born again Christian - walking the walk, loving my Lord, just like you. But then I started to look at the Catholic Church and I realized that it truly WAS the orginal Church that Christ established. Then I read in John Chapter 6 that the bread & the wine is actually his body & blood - literally. Only my church told me it was only a symbol… wrong! So I got to thinking… what else is my church wrong about? And I prayed & I prayed & I prayed. Not my will be done Lord - but Yours. And God said, “Come home.” It’s not about “Will I get to Heaven?” It’s about someday standing in front of my Lord and being able to say, “You called me and I listened.”

Pray about it… and then go where He leads you.

Blessings,
CM

 

[johntkd]

BryPGuy89:

You need to read the Bible. It says it pretty clearly that the Catholic Church is the best way to Heaven and salvatioin.

Well that really depends on which version of the bible you read,
I posed this question to our priest last night,just from the numbers i gave him he knew the subject matter when i explained the problem he dug into his collection of Bibles and we found that Mathew 19-9
is defined at least 5 different ways,the best way to see the difference even though we found differences in other “Catholic” bibles is to look at a new american version Catholic bible less than 10 yrs old and look at a King James version.
what got me on this was the fact the Orthodox church uses a verse almost exactly as the one in the KJ version, where the Catholic bible has eliminated about 15 words of the same verse.
John

 

[PaulDupre]

Matthew 19:9 is rendered by all of the recent translations to exclude the phrase “and whoever marries her who is divorced commits adultery”. The footnotes of the New Living Translation (definitely a Protestant bible) says that this last part of the verse does not appear in the earliest manuscripts, and therefore is considered to be a later addition.

 

[BryPGuy89]

johntkd:

Well that really depends on which version of the bible you read,
I posed this question to our priest last night,just from the numbers i gave him he knew the subject matter when i explained the problem he dug into his collection of Bibles and we found that Mathew 19-9
is defined at least 5 different ways,the best way to see the difference even though we found differences in other “Catholic” bibles is to look at a new american version Catholic bible less than 10 yrs old and look at a King James version.
what got me on this was the fact the Orthodox church uses a verse almost exactly as the one in the KJ version, where the Catholic bible has eliminated about 15 words of the same verse.

                             John

Interesting, but my overall point was basically all that the thread creator said is addressed in the Bible, the Church is the world authority on spirituality, all she does is of the Bible and divinely guided.

 

[Della]

seetiger33:

Ok If you dont believe I have to be a Catholic to go to heaven then why persist to explore your claims? Isnt going to heaven and worshiping our creator and his sons death and resurrection the whole reason why you do what you do?

The reason the Church says that non-Catholic Christians are Christians, such as you, is because of your trinitarian baptism–when you, probably as a baby, were baptized in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.

I’ll let that soak in a minute.

Okay. Let’s go on.

You see, the first step on the road to salvation is baptism, not a “personal acceptance of Christ,” as you have been taught. What happened to you is what happens to a lot of people who have a conversion experience. You, as a baptized person, having received the grace of God through your baptism, responded to the Holy Spirit’s call within your heart to live your life for Christ. In Catholicism we have a sacrament for that, it’s called confirmation.

Spiritual awakenings, such has you’ve had, are fine things, but they aren’t the source of our salvation. The grace of God is. The sacraments of the Catholic Church actually do impart grace to us, so they are the true helps to salvation that Jesus wanted us to have–since he is the one who established them in the first place.

Well, that’s enough for now. It isn’t easy to have to see everything from a totally different perspective, I know. I was once in your situation too and knew nothing about the Catholic Church. So, ask any questions you have and we will do our best to get the answers for you.

 

[Eden]

I just wanted to mention that what some Christians call a “born again” experience is similar to what Catholics call a “deeper conversion”. I don’t think many “born again” Christians are aware of this.

 

[Della]

Eden:

I just wanted to mention that what some Christians call a “born again” experience is similar to what Catholics call a “deeper conversion”. I don’t think many “born again” Christians are aware of this.

Right. I’ve said it before, but most of the “conversions” seen by Billy Graham, et al, are really “deeper conversion” or “spiritually awakenings” not conversions from being pagans or hedonists to Christianity. Most of these people weren’t dancing naked in the moonlight and worshiping idols–they were merely Christians asleep at the wheel who needed to be awakened to a deeper commitment to Christ, which they had promised to have at their confirmations.