T
TheRealJuliane
Guest
No, I don’t, which is why I asked. I am not familiar with that word at all.
- Status
T
TheRealJuliane
Guest
Well, there is no such thing as a “Samurai Catholic.”That would be a Samurai Catholic who is not in service to a feudal overlord.
G
Gaber
Guest
“Ronin,” which could, as you suspect, be a play on “Roman,” originally meant a peasant who fled his master’s fields n feudal Japan. Later it came to apply to Samuri who had lost their master one way or another.
So in the first case, as I found at a time of dire need no reasonable explication of a mystical experience from Catholic clerics nor works, I fled the “feilds” of a “fuitile” lord. After a deal of seredipity and resarch, I found a spiritual advisor, you might say, to whom not only Cathoics, even Mother Teresa and her entourage came to seek advice from, but every other denomination, or lack of such, East ans West. But he died some seven years ago, so I am Masterless in that sense as well. Twice ronin, and very happy in the moment with what is. Thanks for asking.
T
Trishie
Guest
May God bless you, Pastor Gary
Lord Jesus, who prayed that we might all be one,
we pray to You for the unity of Christians,
according to Your will, according to Your means.
…
Amen.
P
Petergee
Guest
That’s not what empathy means. It means figuratively getting inside somebody else’s skin and understanding his feelings so well that you feel them yourself. Seeing where somebody is coming from.
P
Petergee
Guest
If you have made it clear that you are no longer a Catholic, the Church accepts this and does not try to claim that you are still a Catholic. Neither should any Catholic try to claim this. It would be very rude of him.
S
Sample
Guest
You’re the first practicing Catholic to acknowledge this. I’ve been told by Catholics that despite my renouncement, because of baptism, I may be considered an excommunicated Catholic, but a Catholic nonetheless. Baptism is juridical and defection does not release one from ecclesiastical law.
What source gives you your opinion?
T
TarkanAttila
Guest
Actually, in a way, they are both right.
You are an apostate. You’ve left the post. You are no longer a Catholic.
BUT if you ever decide to return to the Church, you will not need a baptism because you have already been baptised. Baptism does leave an unchangeable mark on your soul, which can never be erased, and which never can be made again. Once it’s there, it’s there.
All you can do is choose to honour it, or not. If you honour your baptism, you are a Catholic. If you refuse to honour your baptism, you’re not.
See: vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p3s2c1a1.htm#2089
S
Sample
Guest
How do I know if I am cataloged as an apostate? Is there an apostate list?
T
TarkanAttila
Guest
lol, no.Read that passage I gave you. p.2089 says:
If you completely deny Christianity, you are no longer a Catholic. If you ever take up your faith again, you can be again. It’s really that simple. You do not need to fill out any paperwork to officially leave the Catholic Church. We’re not Mormons.
There’s no registration list for membership or non-membership. If you were baptised, confirmed, married, or ordained, that’s kept on the records. But by no means is that a catalogue of who is a Catholic. IIRC, we don’t keep records of individual apostates, heretics, and schismatics.
4
4Squarebaby
Guest
Actually they were and they grew in power and influence under the most powerful warlord of the mid 1500s Oda Nobunaga. When his successor Toyotomi Hideyoshi succeded in unifying Japan in 1587 he moved against the Christians and his successor Tokugawa Ieyasu in 1611 at the end of the civil wars also acted against Christians. But then until Tom Cruise showed upWell, there is no such thing as a “Samurai Catholic.”
there was little active warfare for the Samurai, including the surviving Christians.
S
Sample
Guest
Interesting.
If you were baptised, confirmed, married, or ordained, that’s kept on the records…
I know in Germany, one must declare their religion because each faith-organization gets a tax-percentage based on those records. So if in the USA there is no official record kept for baptized Catholics who are no longer Catholic, is it truthful to say there are a 77.7 million Catholics here?
I know that’s a different question than the original one I asked you, but it seems like a logical progression to ask why records are kept for membership (baptism) but not for non-membership (repudiation/apostasy). I can speculate why this is the case but would rather ask for your opinion.
G
Gaber
Guest
Fascinating. thanks!Actually they were and they grew in power and influence under the most powerful warlord of the mid 1500s Oda Nobunaga. When his successor Toyotomi Hideyoshi succeded in unifying Japan in 1587 he moved against the Christians and his successor Tokugawa Ieyasu in 1611 at the end of the civil wars also acted against Christians. But then until Tom Cruise showed up
P
Petergee
Guest
In most countries, residents are asked in the government Census what their current religion is. Though in many cases answering the questioin is optional. So in liberal democratic countries this gives a pretty good idea of the true figures.
Of course in Marxist- and Moslem- ruled countries many Christians are afraid to reveal their religion so they may lie or not answer the question. Also these governments distort the figures for political reasons, and artificially inflate the proportion of their populations whom they claim to be atheist or Moslem respectively. (Same applies for Buddhism in Burma and possibly Sri Lanka.)
I’m not aware of any government ever inflating its Census figures for the number of Catholics. (Most governments in Catholic-majority countries have teneded to be quite anti-Catholic.)
In the few countries like the USA which neither record religion in the Census nor require residents to register their religion with the government, the published figures are derived from commercial opinion poll companies who interview a representative sample of people which is weghted so that includes a fair cross section, sufficient sample size etc to obtain an accurate estimate.
So in none of the abovce cases does the Church have ANY (name removed by moderator)ut at all into the official or semi-official published figures of how many Catholics there are in each country. In fact the Church derives her own statistics from these government and corporate statistics. The records kept in parish registers have nothing to do with statistics.
Parish registers are kept (at the church where the person was baptised) to record whether a person has received the non-repeatable sacraments (baptism, confirmation, ordination) and also Holy Matrimony and religious vows. So that the Church can ensure its internal rules that you can’t receive any other sacrament till you’ve received baptism, you can’t receive marriage if you’ve been married before unless your spouse has died or have taken religious vows or Holy Orders unless you’ve been formally discharged from them, , and you can’t (in the Latin church) receive ordination if you’ve been married and your wife is still alive. There is absolutely no reason to reco9rd in the register whether aor not a person has apostatised or joined another religion or whether he is practising the faith or not. If a person ever seeks another such sacrament the register is there to assist him. If he leaves the Church and never returns, the register is of no consequence to him.
There is no central register at all, the parish registers are entirely independent.
Of course it often happens that registers are lost, damaged or destroyed due to persecution or accidents. Also sometimes people seek other sacraments and they can’t remember where they were baptised. In this case if they can’t find people who are willing to swear a declaration that they witnessed the baptism, the person has to be conditionally baptised (i.e. it has no effect if he was baptised before).
P
Petergee
Guest
It’s true that baptism (and Confirmation and Holy Orders if you’ve received them) puts an indelible mark on your soul so that you never need to repeat them in the event that you ever choose to take up the role they confer again. (If you leave the Church but are still a Christian, you are still “using” your baptism of course.) And every sacrament has spiritual benefits to you for your whole life though you may not be aware of or acknowledge them. But neither Christ nor His Church FORCES you to live out the role that the Sacraments He instituted confer, it’s your free choice whether to do this at any time.
You are not an excommunicated Catholic unless the Church (usually the Pope or a bishop) has formally excommunicated you (this is very rare) because you have done some terrible ongoing public sin which is causing great public scandal, or if you have, knowing beforehand that this is the penalty, done something which automatically excommunicates you, which are drastic things such as physically attacking the pope, desecrating the Holy Eucharist or procuring an abortion. If an excomminicated person leaves the Church, the fact that he had been excommunicated makes no difference, as non-Catholics can’t receive the Sacraments anyway (unless and until he decides to return to the Church, and make a full Confession in the Sacrament of Reconciliation).
And if you have left the Church, why would it bother you in the slightest that you are doing things which are against the Church’s ecclesiastical laws which she makes for the internal governance of the Church and her members?
If I was a former Moslem, it wouldn’t bother me that I drink alcohol which is against the rules of Islam.
And to clarify what I said before, the reason we know that there are 77.7 million Catholics in the the USA is because **people told ** interviewers employed by Gallup and such companies that they consider themselves to be Catholic. It has nothing to do with what the Church considers them to be.
S
Sample
Guest
Petergee,
Oh don’t misunderstand, it’s not a question of bothering me personally, I simply get this question often enough in other forums that I thought I’d ask around here. I wouldn’t presume to know why it would bother other people, but I think it does. Consider that Jews were mightily upset with Mormons when they performed proxy baptisms. I suspect the feeling is along those lines but who really knows?
Thanks for the reply.
K
Kouyate42
Guest
I’m here because although my primary focus is on Islam, Qur’anic studies and Arabic, I believe there is a great deal of truth and beauty in Catholicism and so I am here.
R
robwar
Guest
you list yourself as confused still, why not still take the plunge and join?
P
PumpkinSeed
Guest
To learn more, debate, ect.
People have a thirst for knowledge even if they don’t want to admit it.
And there are muslims on here. I have came across quite a few of them.
People have a thirst for knowledge even if they don’t want to admit it.
And there are muslims on here. I have came across quite a few of them.
T
TheAtheist
Guest
2 Reasons
1.) Occasionally pop my head in to toss a query in or see how your particular religious denomination handles a moral/ethical/philosophical dilemma.
2.) To observe you all.
Catholicism (at least from the outside) is always portrayed as this monolithic giant that needs to be assaulted (or so claim some Protestants, Jews, Atheists, Muslims, etc.).
But for me its a lot more interesting to see where the “stress fractures” occur within your specific tradition. Why for instance a member of Opus Dei would find certain Jesuit viewpoints to be er… “wanting” to put the matter in a polite tone.
Or watching your interactions between the RC members and the EC or Orthodox (as I’m also a member of an Orthodox website, i do pretty much the same there as well).
And the most interesting to watch is on this very forum - when an RC tries to talk/debate a member of a Non-Western religion.
it really exposes a lot of the underlying mechanics beneath your belief systems. Especially when certain concepts/forms that would be taken to be “self-evident” in one culture doesnt have a correlate in another.
1.) Occasionally pop my head in to toss a query in or see how your particular religious denomination handles a moral/ethical/philosophical dilemma.
2.) To observe you all.
Catholicism (at least from the outside) is always portrayed as this monolithic giant that needs to be assaulted (or so claim some Protestants, Jews, Atheists, Muslims, etc.).
But for me its a lot more interesting to see where the “stress fractures” occur within your specific tradition. Why for instance a member of Opus Dei would find certain Jesuit viewpoints to be er… “wanting” to put the matter in a polite tone.
Or watching your interactions between the RC members and the EC or Orthodox (as I’m also a member of an Orthodox website, i do pretty much the same there as well).
And the most interesting to watch is on this very forum - when an RC tries to talk/debate a member of a Non-Western religion.
it really exposes a lot of the underlying mechanics beneath your belief systems. Especially when certain concepts/forms that would be taken to be “self-evident” in one culture doesnt have a correlate in another.
- Status