What is a false religion according to Catholicism?

[ebonykawai]

Easy and short: Every non-Catholic religion is false.

Strange. The Catholic Church doesn’t say that.

 

[SteveVH]

On this whole “fullness of truth” business… I think a lot of that debate is boiling down to semantics. One poster says “The Catholic Church acknowledges the truths taught by some religions without acknowledging that the religion itself is true.” Another poster comes in and says “No! It’s all false!”

The religion itself may be false insofar as it is not true revelation, but it may contain elements of truth. For instance, with the simplest example:

Is Judaism a false religion?

-It is false insofar as Jews do not recognize the truth that Jesus is the Son of God who takes away the sins of the world, etc etc.
-It contains elements of truth in that they recognize the Old Testament to be scripture, and they recognize all of our prophets up to Jesus.
-CCC 1096: “Better knowledge of the Jewish people’s faith and religious life as professed and lived even now can help our better understanding of certain aspects of Christian liturgy.”

A less simple one:

Is Zoroastrianism a false religion?

-It is false insofar as they do not acknowledge any of our scriptures, have their own set of scriptures that we do not recognize as divine revelation, etc etc
-It contains elements of truth in recognizing the very real existence of evil.

In any event, I see no reason to not acknowledge that many religions have some things right, but fall short. Some fall further short than others. I don’t think it’s helpful to get caught up in the language of the “half-truth” and “full truth” of a religion. Doing so means that Catholics would have to disagree that 2+2=4, just because Pagans invented basic arithmetic.

The Church recognizes the truth in every religion. But the best lie is the one that contians a majority of truth. Any truth that exists in any religion is already found in the Catholic Church simply because Christ is the fullness of revelation and Truth. It is not a matter of refusing to recognize truth in other religions, it is a matter of determining where that religion ultimately leads one’s soul.

 

[GenesiusofRome]

Any religion that makes it’s own doctrine not based on the bible or the commandments is a false religion.

Any religion that was created from any prophet which speaks of doctrine against the Bible or the Catholic Church is a false religion (Mormonism, Islam)

Practically, every religion that is not in communion with the Catholic Church

 

[Lucky7]

Strange. The Catholic Church doesn’t say that.

Actually, by saying that all other religions are partially true, it does in fact say that all of them are false (at least to some degree, right?).

You just don’t hear the Church using the word false about other religions. Again, the Church now uses different words so as not to be inflammatory. This is good on some levels, but IMHO causes much confusion and helps lead others(including other Catholics) to believe that any religion is OK.

 

[Kam_Fanaian]

Hello again dear friends

Apologies for being absent over the weekend to continue this discussion. My weekends are intensely occupied with community development and spiritual empowerment projects.

I do wish to eventually focus in on why the Catholic community would deem the Baha’i Faith a false religion, and explore that a little further, however for now, if I may, I will try and address some further exploration of some of the posts written above…

…please be aware however that I do have the Baha’i Faith in mind when I am posting, so when I am addressing matters of faith, I am talking about the Baha’i concept of faith, and not a Mormon interpretation, or scientology, or raelian, or Moony, or Rastafarian. I do hope to eventually also distinguish the similarities between the Baha’i Faith and Catholicism, and how they both differ so vastly to the belief systems I just listed above.

Hopefully, that way we can begin to trust each other as two communities and work TOGETHER towards a noble goal, the unification of mankind

God bless, and hopefully this will become a positive thread

Kam

 

[IbnFiktur]

The Church recognizes the truth in every religion. But the best lie is the one that contians a majority of truth. Any truth that exists in any religion is already found in the Catholic Church simply because Christ is the fullness of revelation and Truth. It is not a matter of refusing to recognize truth in other religions, it is a matter of determining where that religion ultimately leads one’s soul.

Unless I am seriously misunderstanding you, I do not believe we disagree. I was mostly referring to the poster Suraya’s manner of representing the church’s stance on the issue, which appeared to me neither wholly accurate nor charitable.

 

[Kam_Fanaian]

In order for this dialogue to go in any direction, we may need to ascertain a recurring theme in a lot of posts in this thread, namely, TRUTH…

So, what is truth?

…and how can you discern, as an individual, what is falsehood?

Kam

 

[IbnFiktur]

In order for this dialogue to go in any direction, we may need to ascertain a recurring theme in a lot of posts in this thread, namely, TRUTH…

So, what is truth?

…and how can you discern, as an individual, what is falsehood?

Kam

My personal opinion…

Truth is God, the unmoved mover, the first cause.

There are many “ways of knowing,” as one of my old professors referred to them. There is reason, which was the chosen tool of St. Thomas Aquinas and many other thinkers. My personal favorite is St. Augustine, who combined logic and reason with sincere introspection and evaluation of the human condition by means of the one human he could truly know… Himself. This is a brief but generally accurate representation of my own ongoing quest for Truth.

 

[Kam_Fanaian]

Strange. The Catholic Church doesn’t say that.

I am finding that there seems to be a lot of Catholics who make their own authoritative interpretations of what the meaning of their Faith is.

May I suggest to all Catholics on this forum to familiarise themselves on the official Catholic stance on any given subject they wish to contribute towards, BEFORE they post what seems to be an “official stance” of Catholicism on the said subject.

It brings the Faith, albeit negligebly, into disrepute…as adherents of a Faith, it is the individuals responsibility to post responsibly, with purity of motive and heart…represent the Spirit of your FAITH, not the essence of your “ego”

Please understand, this is being said lovingly and with courtesy as something to be aware of for the betterment of the world (yes, I did say, the world )

God bless
Kam

 

[InJesusItrust]

Truth is such that any other claim in some sense contradicts it. By the logical law of non-contradiction we can deduce that there is at most one truth.

We can discern falsehood by looking at the evidence and deductive reasoning. We may also be lucky enough to experience the reality of the truth.

Only one of these claims can be true: reincarnation and resurrection. Any belief system that tries to rationalize the existence of both is illogical. Same with many other set of mutually exclusive claims in religion.

 

[Kam_Fanaian]

My personal opinion…

Truth is God, the unmoved mover, the first cause.

There are many “ways of knowing,” as one of my old professors referred to them. There is reason, which was the chosen tool of St. Thomas Aquinas and many other thinkers. My personal favorite is St. Augustine, who combined logic and reason with sincere introspection and evaluation of the human condition by means of the one human he could truly know… Himself. This is a brief but generally accurate representation of my own ongoing quest for Truth.

FANTASTIC my friend

I am united with you in thought on this matter

Others must contribute to this question also, to bring richness and depth to the concept of “What is Truth”

So, IbnFiktur, with myself and yourself agreeing that Truth is God, by what rational and reasonable means, can you ascertain if something or someone is a human (made flesh) representative of God or not?

God bless

Kam

 

[IbnFiktur]

FANTASTIC my friend

I am united with you in thought on this matter

Others must contribute to this question also, to bring richness and depth to the concept of “What is Truth”

So, IbnFiktur, with myself and yourself agreeing that Truth is God, by what rational and reasonable means, can you ascertain if something or someone is a human (made flesh) representative of God or not?

God bless

Kam

I’m sure that differs from person to person. As for myself, a born Catholic, I was brought up with such teachings and have spent significant portions of my young life meditating internally upon these claims, examining my own human nature, and being an avid student of history. In these ways, and others (surely this brief treatment does not do my faith justice), I have placed my faith in the Catholic Church. I do not presume to know precisely how God passes his truth to others, since much of this process for me was intensely personal.

 

[Kam_Fanaian]

Truth is such that any other claim in some sense contradicts it. By the logical law of non-contradiction we can deduce that there is at most one truth.

We can discern falsehood by looking at the evidence and deductive reasoning. We may also be lucky enough to experience the reality of the truth.

Only one of these claims can be true: reincarnation and resurrection. Any belief system that tries to rationalize the existence of both is illogical. Same with many other set of mutually exclusive claims in religion.

Thankyou my friend

May I ask you to go deeper? How do you know what is truth? How do you know which one is true, reincarnation or resurrection? Why choose one over the other?

God bless you!

Kam

 

[IbnFiktur]

I would be happy to go into more depth after some sleep goodnight!

EDIT- though I do believe that this may be a slight derailment from the original topic of what is a false religion according to te Catholic Church.

 

[InJesusItrust]

I personally had a mystical experience of the crucifixion. So if it is indeed the most important event in history, everything that does not place Jesus’ passion as the center is just false.

One question to ask is who was Jesus, man or God? peterkreeft.com/topics/christ-divinity.htm/

Logic already tells you, but unless the heart is open logic cannot penetrate it.

If He is God you have to take His claims very seriously: like His claim that unless believed who He was they would die in sin, or how he was the only way to God.

 

[Adonia]

Thankyou my friend

May I ask you to go deeper? How do you know what is truth? How do you know which one is true, reincarnation or resurrection? Why choose one over the other?

God bless you!

Kam

Wow, reincarnation or resurrection, what a great question. The spirit comes and goes from the earth and back again to learn things, or the spirit is resurrected to eternal life in heaven after one journey as taught by orthodoxy.

In our present state and the natural blinders that surround us I don’t think anyone can really know which is true or not. We base what we believe on faith, on what we have in the teachings we have received. I think it’s that simple.

And you my friend, a convert to the faith? And from which other faith system - if any?

 

[Kam_Fanaian]

I personally had a mystical experience of the crucifixion. So if it is indeed the most important event in history, everything that does not place Jesus’ passion as the center is just false.

One question to ask is who was Jesus, man or God? peterkreeft.com/topics/christ-divinity.htm/

Logic already tells you, but unless the heart is open logic cannot penetrate it.

If He is God you have to take His claims very seriously: like His claim that unless believed who He was they would die in sin, or how he was the only way to God.

Absolutely agree with you there, my friend. Anyone who denies the Divinity of Jesus Christ is speaking falsehood…

So when you say “anyone who does not place Jesus’ passion as the center is just false.”, are you talking about Jesus as a physical body, or Jesus as the name, or the Divinity of Jesus which is an eternal Entity beyond the full comprehension of mere mortals like you and I?

Kam

 

[Kam_Fanaian]

I would be happy to go into more depth after some sleep goodnight!

EDIT- though I do believe that this may be a slight derailment from the original topic of what is a false religion according to te Catholic Church.

Sleep well, my brother/sister (I assume brother with the username “Ibn”)

My God be with you and protect your loved ones

Kam

 

[InJesusItrust]

The passion of Jesus, Him voluntarily being tortured and killed so that those covered by His blood can escape from an eternal Hell. Just as the Angel of death passed over the Jews in Egypt, the blood of God’s Lamb gives freedom from death. Why would God kill Himself not to save us from Hell?

If we believe in that, reincarnation is contradictory or renders Jesus’ sacrifice stupid…

 

[Kam_Fanaian]

I personally had a mystical experience of the crucifixion. So if it is indeed the most important event in history, everything that does not place Jesus’ passion as the center is just false.

That’s all well and good, my friend. Would you then deny the dreams and visions of millions of other people who may have experienced Buddha, Muhammad, Baha’u’llah in a similar vein?

If He is God you have to take His claims very seriously: like His claim that unless believed who He was they would die in sin, or how he was the only way to God.

So, this part relates to Jesus “claiming” that He was the only way to God. Maybe this answers the question, for you, as to why you recognize Jesus as the truth. And I agree with you.

However, would you deny the other Divine Personages who have provided Revelation which has claimed similar “exclusivity” to God?

I guess what I am saying is, why ONLY Jesus?

Kam