Why Are You a Catholic?

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I can put it in a sentence: I am Catholic because the Catholic Church holds the fullness of Truth in God’s revelation to man. 😃
 
I’m Catholic because core Church teachings mesh most precisely with what I observe in the world, beginning with the doctrine of Original Sin. I’m Catholic because I’ve come to see that man is lost, as the Church teaches, and that he can’t possibly know anything of value to find himself unless that knowledge were to somehow come from an outside source or revelation, which the Church also teaches. I’m Catholic because the Church teaches that love has the highest value-and that God* is *love-and if she’s wrong there’s not much worth living for anyway-but I’ve come to know for myself that she’s right in this matter, as in others.
 
Love this thread!

I am a Catholic because Jesus didn’t give me a choice. I am a Catholic because I grew weary of searching God where He was not and tired of rejecting Him where He was. I am a Catholic because during Holy Mass, we kneel at the Foot of the Cross with Mary and John. That’s the only place where I want to be.
 
Not only because I’m a Catholic by birth, but because Catholicism is the essence of Truth. The Catholic Church and all its teachings were founded by Jesus Christ Himself. His Church and His Word teaches truths and facts of life. Ever since I started taking my Catholicism seriously, it’s the first time I truly feel alive. Christ validates my otherwise meaningless existence.
 
Because the Holy Catholic Church is the Church that Jesus Christ founded.
 
Charlemagne_II said:
If you had to put your thoughts into a paragraph or a very short essay, what would be the most important reasons you would give for why you are a Catholic rather than a Protestant, a Hindu, a Buddhist, a Muslim, or an Atheist?

I think if we cannot give a succinct answer to that question, we have no real handle on who we are.
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I was raised Catholic and was pretty convicted of it as a kid and even had some pretty powerful prayer experiences. Then I entered college and my faith got challenged. I was humilated and intimidated by not only my lack of knowledge of other faiths, but my lack of knowledge of Catholicism. I didn’t even realize that in ignorance I had sunk into a dualistic mindset about the nature of the body and the soul and that I was filling in my gaps of knowledge with ignorant and inaccurate speculation. I didn’t truly know who God was, and I was tempted by atheism because I began seeing the holes in my concepts of God and was tempted by atheism. However, I realized that proving or disproving God’s existance depends solely on your understanding of God. I didn’t know what to do in the meantime of uncertainty, but found in my heart a dependance on God and decided, fool or not, I’d continue following my faith. Part of this was due to my faith having gotten me through so many hard times in my past.

I’ve since learned a lot more, have a much clearer understanding of what Catholicism teaches. Catholicism seems more intelligent than Protestantism. I simply cannot embrace a pantheist religion or a polytheistic religion. While I do consider many atheists intelligent and I acknowledge that in some debates the believers tend to give the atheist straw man arguments, most atheists still seem to struggle with conceptualizing God. I don’t blame them for this and find that many are intellectually honest and even commendable.

At this point in my life, my trust and faith in God has become imbedded into my life. I admit I may be the fool. There’s a certain wisdom in knowing that the more you know, the more you realize that you actually know nothing. However, my own human limitations should not be reason for me to reject what I hold to be true. At times, life is rough and I realize that if I’m wrong about God’s existance, where my life is going is complete chance and it frightens me. But I would have thought that living a life of submission to the faith through such difficulties would have led me down a much harder and more failing road. God has gotten me through, or I’m the luckiest person in the world.
 
Well, first of all, I am definitely not an atheist because I have found that there really is no way for this world, which contains justice, logic, morality, mathematics, and, most importantly, love, to have been the result of anything but creation by God. I know in my heart that no accidental “big bang” or “evolution” could have created such a vast panorama of beauty (albeit with much ugliness as well) that is the universe. I love, therefore I was created by a personal God, not evolved by impersonal forces driven by “natural selection” and “survival of the fittest”, which can’t coexist with justice and love.

As for why I am specifically a Catholic Christian among many theistic religions, this is mainly due to the fact that the Church has stood the test of time more than any other religion. All that we discover in science actually leads back to Christianity, contrary to what evolutionists (whose science, for the record, is rather flawed; check out Answers In Genesis, for example) would have you believe. There are eyewitnesses in history who have confirmed Jesus’s existence and Resurrection, though atheists refuse to accept this even though they won’t deny other events in history that predate the Resurrection! Christianity seems to be the only religion that truly has the answers for all of our deepest
moral and existential dilemmas. Not to mention it is the only one whose central figure rose from the dead and performed miracles, unlike Buddha, Muhammed (apologies if my spelling is incorrect here), or Confucius. Some may call this audacity on Christianity’s part, but that is a good thing. The truth doesn’t sugarcoat; the truth isn’t convenient; the truth often goes against our fallible understanding of the world. That’s why I choose Christianity.

Lastly, there is the issue of denominations. I am a Catholic simply because the Catholic Church is the ONLY church founded by Jesus Christ himself. That is a historical fact. The Bible may not say “Catholic” but it doesn’t say “Protestant”, “Lutheran”, “Mormon”, or “Fundamentalist” either. The papacy can be traced back to St. Peter. Those who doubt the Catholic Church would benefit from listening to “The One True Faith”, which can be found as a podcast on iTunes. Check it out. Hear the truth.

There you have it. My reasoning for my faith in a nutshell.

Edit: Split into paragraphs, even though I was supposed to sum it up in one.
 
I am Catholic instead of a Hindu because I firmly believe that the Catholic Church is the actual intention of what the early Church was. I am Catholic because the faith has an interesting way of combining mystagogy, faith, reason, and tradition. The Catholic church is very rich in tradition, beliefs, and history in ways that many other denominations and faiths are not. I am Catholic because I believe in Sacraments, or “physical signs,” I am drawn to the global nature of the Church, and the Magisterium works in concert with Sacred Scripture and Sacred Tradition.

I was drawn to the Catholic Church for many years before deciding to finally take the plunge.
 
In the past 5 or so years, I have increasingly became spiritual, and searched longingly for a religion to “complete” my spirituality. At first, I was reluctant to become Catholic - and I knew I was baptized as Anglican when I was 11mths, I was reluctant because to be honest, I didn’t know better! I saw it as a strict religion and saw it not me. I tried looking at becoming Hindu, as I was attracted to the culture of India and the myths…but I never got replies to my emails. However, I stumbled across the Archangels, and then paganism, and developed a pagan belief with Christian ideas (One God, with Angels and Saints etc). This felt comfortable and I was happy.

Until, I moved interstate and out of home for the first time. I found the Catholic Cathedral in my new city and visited…and I suddenly felt at home. I walked around and found the Ladye Chapel, and I sat there in front of it…and I knew I had too, somehow become Catholic. Almost one year later, at St. Mary of the Cross’ canonisation, I got my answer, the week before I was reconsidering putting up pros and cons…and yeah…St. Mary told me I should become Catholic, I felt a connection with her. I HAD to become one this year to be at next year’s Easter’s Vigil…and now I have been accepted into RCIA in my new parish. I am so happy!

My journey is almost complete!
 
I am a Catholic for the following reasons:

The Catholic faith can be historically traced back to Jesus and the apotles.

The Catholic Church is the same Church Jesus establieshed.

The pillar and foundation of truth according to the Bible (1 Tim 3:15) is the Church.

The Church and its doctrinal teachings are like Jesus, they don’t change. For example, what was sin 2,000 years ago is still sin today.

What the vast majority of early Christians believed and practiced is still believed and practiced today within the Catholic Church, ie, confession of sin, eucharist, the other sacraments.

There is a constancy and consistency within the Catholic Church that no other Christian community can lay claim to.

Take the reverse of the above positions and you have the reasons why I choose not to worship God as a Protestant.

God Bless, george miller.
 
I came back to the Catholic Church after several years during college and beyond, away from the Church where I was born a “cradle Catholic.” It was during those years apart that I felt a great loss. I didn’t understand, at first, that I was missing something so very important in my life. If it wasn’t for the help of God, Himself, I know I couldn’t have returned on my own. When I started to study looking for answers to questions about the universe and our place in it, I read various books. But it was after reading the 4 gospels, one after the other, I fell in love with Jesus. He showed me the Way, the Truth, and the Life. He gave Himself to me on a cross and in a piece of bread. His Sacred Heart and Divine Mercy won me over to the Catholicism. Besides He gave me His Mother Mary and the saints. He is the true Light that has come into the world.
 
4Horsemen said:
I came back to the Catholic Church after several years during college and beyond, away from the Church where I was born a “cradle Catholic.” It was during those years apart that I felt a great loss. I didn’t understand, at first, that I was missing something so very important in my life. If it wasn’t for the help of God, Himself, I know I couldn’t have returned on my own. When I started to study looking for answers to questions about the universe and our place in it, I read various books. But it was after reading the 4 gospels, one after the other, I fell in love with Jesus. He showed me the Way, the Truth, and the Life. He gave Himself to me on a cross and in a piece of bread. His Sacred Heart and Divine Mercy won me over to the Catholicism. Besides He gave me His Mother Mary and the saints. He is the true Light that has come into the world.
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Well put.
 
So why am I Catholic.

I was born and raised in the church. It is what I knew and what I understood from early on. I was introduced to other churches as a teenager and eventually found myself at a crossroad. I could leave the church, or stay. But I had to make a decision. There were simply too many people in my life pushing hard for an answer to the same question this thread starts with.

In retrospect, I was being pushed very hard by people from different protestant religions that perceived me to be a weak Catholic and wanted me in their own church.

This eventually led me to study of each chruch I came upon. As well as a deep study of my own Catholic faith.

In every single church I came across, I found some kind of logical inconsistency.
There was always something (usually many things) that I simply could not agree with and upon research could show false.
Every that is, except one.
I have stayed in the Catholic church. It is the only one that has held up against the my own research and study. It is the only one that I can pull any given teaching, examine it, and say “yes, that makes sense.”
 
*God doesn’t make mistakes. He created the Catholic Church and handed it over to Peter and the Apostles - the Church is both divine and human.

The Catholic Church nourishes us in a way that is essential to our happiness and salvation.

The Catholic Church is a thorn in the side of anyone who prefers and opts for an “easy” life. Actually this is an illusion.

I love being Catholic

Cinette:)*
 
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