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minkymurph
Guest
Did the early christians not use a fish as their symbol? Due to the fact that the letters are the same as CHRISTOS, or something. Perhaps someone better versed in Latin than I could enlighten us.
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minkymurph
Guest
Yes that is a good one.
All these notions come from one single notion, I’M RIGHT AND IF YOU DON’T AGREE WITH ME GOD WILL GET YOU.
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losh14
Guest
I had heard (tradition, mind you) that early Christians, during the Diocletian persecution, would trace a half fish in the sand absently with their walk sticks when they met another Christian. If the other Christian filled in the rest of the fish, it meant they could talk freely to one another.
Why so many non-Catholics are opposed to symbolism is beyond me. It’s in our books, it permeates our corporate logos, the clothes we wear, the signs on buildings and highways, even our money. Yet to wear a symbol of Christ’s sacrifice - the single most important event in all of history - or have a picture of a brother or sister in faith, whether carved in stone or painted beautifully on a ceiling - is somehow so unutterably offensive that it creates so much conversation.
Seriously, how often in your conversations with other Christians do they ask about your faith in Christ, or about your prayer life, or about the ways that God has blessed you? Instead, it’s most often:
- the Pope
- Mary and the other Saints
- Statues
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Saintlucy
Guest
Sorry, I meant music!
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Linda_Marie
Guest
I did not mean to be sarcastic and defensive. Looking back over it, I can see how you might take it that way. Please accept my apology.
I like jmcrae’s answer to that.
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Annabelle_Marie
Guest
But yet those same people think nothing of having lots of symbols of their favorite sports team…
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Marc_Anthony
Guest
I think the answer to why this is so is quite obvious. Sports are not controversial. Religion is.But yet those same people think nothing of having lots of symbols of their favorite sports team…
I of course have np problem with people representing their religion however they want to, but the reasoning seems pretty sound to me.
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Ne_OrangeKnight
Guest
Walk into my mother’s house during football season with a Washington Redskins jersey on, and see how long you can keep up that attitude.
Sam, the Neon Orange Knight
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JustaServant
Guest
Ya know what to say to someone that says ‘I don’t believe in symbols/Sacraments’?But yet those same people think nothing of having lots of symbols of their favorite sports team…
Look on thier finger and ask them ‘what is that?’
“Oh, that’s a wedding ring”.
“Really? Isn’t it really just a piece of bent steel (with a precious stone on top if they are female)? It doesn’t really mean anything. It’s just a symbol. Tell ya what, rip it off your finger and throw it at your husband/wife. I’m sure they will say ‘honey, why are you throwing that bent piece of steel (with a precious stone on top) at me?’”
Or…
ask them how they feel about seeing an American flag being burned.
I mean, it’s just a piece of colored clothe.
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Farsight001
Guest
I just heard a couple of new ones yesterday. One was that Catholic laypeople are not allowed to discuss theology - only clergy. The second one was so weird, I’m just going to copy and paste it here:
“they[priests] play mahjong all day when there is nothing else to do except when they nibble at their women servants in the parish, etc, etc.”
“they[priests] play mahjong all day when there is nothing else to do except when they nibble at their women servants in the parish, etc, etc.”
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Janks
Guest
Oh, one day I was over at CARM(I know, I know!) and there was an entire thread devoted to this one guy’s ravings that the Pope is the antichrist and that the early church and church fathers believed this. I think I was in shock for a few moments.
) and there was an entire thread devoted to this one guy’s ravings that the Pope is the antichrist and that the early church and church fathers believed this. I think I was in shock for a few moments.
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Saintlucy
Guest
MAHJONG? Oh, goodness me. I thought they played golf every day.
I think that the couple have been watching “Father Ted” and taking it as truth. However, Frs. Ted, Dougal and Jack had no urge to touch or nibble Mrs Doyle.
I have never heard of any “servant nibbling” in all my 53 years as a Catholic.
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tqualey
Guest
Hi, Janks,
OK, I’ll bite … what is CARM…?
Chances are I am not the only one on the list ignorant of this group.
God bless
OK, I’ll bite … what is CARM…?
Chances are I am not the only one on the list ignorant of this group.God bless
Oh, one day I was over at CARM(I know, I know!
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Annabelle_Marie
Guest
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Ismael
Guest
You are confused.
Kung was denied to teach theology in Catholic universities because his views are clearly anti-catholic.
Well of course you defend ‘poor’ Kung, he would like to water the Church into becoming some semi-protestant faith.
Sincerely I do not understand Kung… he keeps calling himself ‘catholic’ while his beliefs are clearly protestant. At this point he should just formerly become protestant, it would be more honest.
Also the Church is not a democracy and never was: Jesus taught, the apostles/disciples listened, then the Apostles taught and disciples listened, the the bishops, followers of the apostles taught and the faithful listened.
Besides are protestants ‘democratic’? Different views usually result in a scism…
Give me a break! ALL original 'reformers like Calvin and Luther stated in their creeds that the Church was the whore of Babylon and the Pope the ani-Christ.
Luther even draw offensive satirical pictures of the Pope…
Perhaps some anti-catholicism was born out of fear, but most of it it was born as a way to scare protestants against the Church. I think it was a sort of ‘terrorism’, picturing the Church as a horrible monster.
Anti-catholicism in protestants was fairly common in past centuries…
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Returning IT
One whopper I heard was at a protestant WEDDING. The protestant minister started bashing the Chuirch sayint it ‘oppressed’ women in the past and based this accusation (he clearly stated!) on The Da Vinci Code!! :hypno:
I was shocked… I could not understand WHY he would say such thing… and at a wedding (I still was unfamiliar with anti-catholicism).
On the other hand I never heard any Catholic priest bad-mouthing protestants… Catholic priests in their homilies (as my experience goes) talk about the GOSPEL not about protestants…
Sadly 99% of my experiences with protestants resulted into some anti-catholic comment.
PErhaps I am just unlucky… but I really do not understand why thet have to be so mean
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Ismael
Guest
1- It’s IL Papa, the Pope is male.
2- The East had an Emperor as well. The Orthodox churches might not have a Pope but they hdo have a ‘chief’ Patriarc, The Copts have a ‘pope’ (or a title very similar to it).
3- Your conclusion ‘from Emperor to Pope’ makes NO sense. Many Christians were ‘barbarians’ (ie not roman citizens)
4- "and it also could be argued that the Pope never had authority over most of the earlest Christian churches which were in the east. "
And this is a false argument.
Many Catholics were killed in protestant countries. In Holland, where I lived for a while, it was ILLEGAL (at least in the North) to be Catholic and Catholics had to celebrate mass in secret until 1850!
Catholics were proibited to celebrate public services such as processions until the XX century…
Protestant persecution of Catholics is rarely spoken about, but it does not mean it wasn’t there, probably beacaust it is not the Catholic way to recriminate against protestants…
On the other hand Protestants are ever so glad to bash Catholics about every little (or big) thing they did.
So here you accuse all decent Catholics to be ‘fundamentalists’ and the only good catholics for you are the ‘liberal’ ones?
This is another ‘whopper’. You claim that Catholic Dogma ‘makes God small’ or leaves no room for mystery and awe… but this is absolutely not true.
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Loboto-Me
Guest
Actually I think that the Catholic religion is the most mystical there is… TRUE mystisim that is.
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Cosmian
Guest
Let’s be fair to Roy5 who has expressed that anti-Catholicism as well as anti-Protestantism is troubling to him. The conclusions that you are drawing against him probably don’t match his intentions.
Roy5 doesn’t seem to me to have an accusatory tone at all. He seems to be making some observations based on his own unigue perspective. I find it helpful to try to understand another person’s point of view and why they might hold that particular point of view rather than respond defensively. You don’t have to agree with someone in order to understand where they are coming from.
The fact is that religion used wrongly and in the wrong hands can be dangerous. Lies and misunderstandings can not only hurt people’s feelings but can become deadly.
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tqualey
Guest
Hi Roy5,
You have asked some good questions, and I would like to offer some of the answers that makes sense to me. How these will square with anyone else on the list… well… that is what makes a horse race! For brevity, I will just copy your topic sentence although I may use others parts of it in my response. Well… I tried and still wound up having to split this up into two parts! Here is Part 1 of 2
Our work as Christians has not changed much since the beginning - we are to model Christ in the world by our love for one another - even those who do not share our religious beliefs.
So, lets look at these two different thought and see how they really work.
Catholics believe Peter was the first Pope (leader of the Church founded by Christ as identified in Matthew 16) based on the Apostolic Traditions of the Church and Sacred Scripture - one reference given to you. Protestants need to address this using the Scripture and at least the historic records of the Early Church Fathers. A classic example is that the so-called ‘Protestant Bible’ is anctually the abridged form of the Catholic Bible that was approved in about 400AD. Protestants removed books from the Canon - they added nothing in the 16th Century. That by itself should tell you of the rich treasure that was already in existence before men decided to present their own religion.
The leadership arrangement of the 1st Century persecuted Catholic Church whre most Popes were martyrs changed dramatically when Constintine became Emperor. But, would anyone honestly expect that when Christ sent His Apostles to make disciples of all nations and baptize the entire world as recorded as the Great Commission (Matt 28:19) the same structure would be used in the 21st Century? Not to be silly about this, but, would you expect the Pope to get a quil and scroll to send out a note - or, pick up his Blackbrerry? The Church is to be in the world - just not of it! (John 17:11-16)
And, if you want some real carnage, just check out the 30 Years Was - when religion and politics certainly had a chance to mix things up (here is a link: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thirty_Years%27_War. But, who did what to whom way back when is probably not an especially fruitful topic when contrasted with what is it we are doing to each other today?
CONTINUED…
You have asked some good questions, and I would like to offer some of the answers that makes sense to me. How these will square with anyone else on the list… well… that is what makes a horse race! For brevity, I will just copy your topic sentence although I may use others parts of it in my response. Well… I tried and still wound up having to split this up into two parts!
Here is Part 1 of 2God tells us to bear one another’s burdens - there really is no room for expressing hatred in the Name of Christ!
Our work as Christians has not changed much since the beginning - we are to model Christ in the world by our love for one another - even those who do not share our religious beliefs.You may not have notice this, but, there is a dramatic change of focus within this sentence. Something along the line of, “My car is blue and my Aunt Sue makes great cakes!” would have caught your attention, too…
So, lets look at these two different thought and see how they really work.Catholics believe Peter was the first Pope (leader of the Church founded by Christ as identified in Matthew 16) based on the Apostolic Traditions of the Church and Sacred Scripture - one reference given to you. Protestants need to address this using the Scripture and at least the historic records of the Early Church Fathers. A classic example is that the so-called ‘Protestant Bible’ is anctually the abridged form of the Catholic Bible that was approved in about 400AD. Protestants removed books from the Canon - they added nothing in the 16th Century. That by itself should tell you of the rich treasure that was already in existence before men decided to present their own religion.
The leadership arrangement of the 1st Century persecuted Catholic Church whre most Popes were martyrs changed dramatically when Constintine became Emperor. But, would anyone honestly expect that when Christ sent His Apostles to make disciples of all nations and baptize the entire world as recorded as the Great Commission (Matt 28:19) the same structure would be used in the 21st Century? Not to be silly about this, but, would you expect the Pope to get a quil and scroll to send out a note - or, pick up his Blackbrerry? The Church is to be in the world - just not of it! (John 17:11-16)
I am not sure that any of us should be in the demeaning bussiness!
And, if you want some real carnage, just check out the 30 Years Was - when religion and politics certainly had a chance to mix things up (here is a link: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thirty_Years%27_War. But, who did what to whom way back when is probably not an especially fruitful topic when contrasted with what is it we are doing to each other today?CONTINUED…
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tqualey
Guest
Hi Roy5,
Here is Part 2 of 2
Hope this helps.
God bless
Here is Part 2 of 2
I think one of the things one must be careful about is taking gossip or rumor as fact. Mega churches appear to be more of a US ‘development’ - in that you have a gigantic structure built essentially on the clay-feet of one man who holds a bible in his hand, dramatically screams that we are saved because we proclaim Christ is our Lord and Savior and then bills the individuals of his congregation 10% based on their latest IRS return. (Those churches and pastors are high maintenance items!) But, look at Christ is you want a model. He came to save us from sin - and He established His Church first on Peter (Matt 16) then died and rose from the grave (Matt 27) and then sent His Holy Spirit on Pentecost (Acts 2) At no point does it say, He made a mistake, came back and revoked the powers given to Peter and his successor and gave it to Martin or John or any other 16th Century individual.
Just because a definition of a particular mystery is given does not take away the very nature of a mystery. Try as we might, we can not understand it! The definition ‘sets limits’ so that our human minds do not confuse one Truth for another (e.g., the Immaculate Conception and the Incarnation). And, you know, the Chruch Fathers are named such - not because they had scientific instruments and made (or didn’t make) scientific discoveries. These men are so honored by this title is that they worked with the Holy Spirit during the days of the Infant Church and helped spread the Word, clarify doctrine and vivibly support and honor the Pope as the Vicar of Christ on earth. These men were closest to the scene of Christ’s being on earth and helped guide the development of doctrine. Here is a link you will find interesting: newadvent.org/cathen/06001a.htm
If we judge God’s actions by our human standards, aren’t we try to sit in judgment of God? We quickly forget that God’s ways are not our ways (Isaiah 55:8) Statements like, “That’s not fair!” aimed at God are classic - and are motivated by our First Parents desire to be “like God”. Well, Roy5, we are required to obey God’s Will - He is not requried to obey ours. That may sound silly, but, look at the argument you are making. The very existence of Evil is a mystery! Here is God Who is All Good - allowing this creepy Devil to come around and tempt us - when all God has to do is stop thinking of the Devil and the Devil is totally out of existence! No one can answer the mystery of Evil - accept God does allow it, never causes it.
Hope this helps.
God bless
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