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WilT
Guest
I’m shocked to find out Emily that you’re a Catholic yet you don’t believe that through Jesus’ work of salvation (life,death and resurrection)? It is quite possibly because you as a Catholic don’t read your bible. Without Jesus, you have no life in you! “And so I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail…I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven…” If your seeking Heaven then the Catholic Church is your portal to the kingdom. Nobody else can get you in but Jesus who established our Church. All other religions can make you a better human but it cannot promise you Heaven or the wonderful life thereafter. So if your seeking Heaven then come and follow the path of the Lord. All other paths lead to nothing. If you don’t believe in Christ, God, and the Church then don’t fret!
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EasterJoy
Guest
Just as it is possible for a scientist to do careful and honest research and yet reach an erroneous conclusion when another scientist looks at the same evidence and reaches the correct conclusion, it is possible for someone to hear the Gospel, listen to it in good faith and with a willingness to submit to whatever is true, and yet reach an erroneous religious or moral conclusion. This is called invincible ignorance, and is not something for which a person would be held culpable. God reads hearts, and knows the degree to which we are honest seekers and the degree to which we seek for less noble motives. Obviously, a person of entirely good motives can reach an erroneous conclusion and yet will be imputed by God as having sought him as sincerely as someone who reached a true conclusion.
As for the “heart of the message of Jesus” that you have freed from its “hang-ups,” be very careful about what you mean by that. A logical person would have a hard time arguing that Jesus meant to be nothing more than a moral teacher, for instance. As C.S. Lewis pointed out:
*“I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God. That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.” *― **C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity **
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EasterJoy
Guest
This would seem to be a slightly different situation than invincible ignorance. (I say “seem” partly because I cannot judge hearts and partly because I’m not quite sure what you’re saying.) For instance, if someone has improperly taught you that their manipulations of your emotional connections to them are the demands of moral law, when in fact these are only a way to bend you to comply with their selfish demands, you would not be morally culpable for rejecting moral law because you came to realize you were being manipulated and made the honest mistake of equating all moral law with the manipulation you had suffered. It is possible that this instance of erroneous conscience might not be your fault at all–that is, you might be doing the wrong things, but only because you associate the right things with the directions of someone who had clearly been abusing your trust. If, on the other hand, you were to only mean that you have tried sin and enjoyed indulging your passions according to selfishness of your own and also enjoyed being out from under the thumb of someone you resented in one fell swoop, then that is a quite different reason to reject moral law. In that case, you’d know the difference between the manipulation and the true moral law, and your rejection of what was good would be imputable to you.I’m the opposite in my rejections. I don’t believe, not because I can’t make myself but I simply don’t want to anymore.I used to believe that sacrificing personal happiness for the sake of God’s will was ultimately the rule of the universe.
But when I looked back at my life and what I used to be because I believed that, I only saw what was essentially a bitter douchebag living in denial. Oh but for the Church, my personal desires don’t matter. Only God’s. What am I to do with an institution that believes their version of ‘God’ knows what I want better than I do?
People tell me to completely have utter faith in God.
I used that so I could have zero faith in myself.
That’s why I’m not ashamed to say I’ve stopped believing in some things because I just don’t want to anymore. I am done sacrificing my own personal happiness. I’ve only hurt too many people that way and helped those I should never have.
This is the section of the catechism that explains what I mean:
1790 A human being must always obey the certain judgment of his conscience. If he were deliberately to act against it, he would condemn himself. Yet it can happen that moral conscience remains in ignorance and makes erroneous judgments about acts to be performed or already committed.
1791 This ignorance can often be imputed to personal responsibility. This is the case when a man "takes little trouble to find out what is true and good, or when conscience is by degrees almost blinded through the habit of committing sin."59 In such cases, the person is culpable for the evil he commits.
1792 Ignorance of Christ and his Gospel, bad example given by others, enslavement to one’s passions, assertion of a mistaken notion of autonomy of conscience, rejection of the Church’s authority and her teaching, lack of conversion and of charity: these can be at the source of errors of judgment in moral conduct.
1793 If - on the contrary - the ignorance is invincible, or the moral subject is not responsible for his erroneous judgment, the evil committed by the person cannot be imputed to him. It remains no less an evil, a privation, a disorder. One must therefore work to correct the errors of moral conscience.
1794 A good and pure conscience is enlightened by true faith, for charity proceeds at the same time "from a pure heart and a good conscience and sincere faith."60
The more a correct conscience prevails, the more do persons and groups turn aside from blind choice and try to be guided by objective standards of moral conduct.61
59 & 61–Gaudium et Spes, 16. In the depths of his conscience, man detects a law which he does not impose upon himself, but which holds him to obedience. Always summoning him to love good and avoid evil, the voice of conscience when necessary speaks to his heart: do this, shun that. For man has in his heart a law written by God; to obey it is the very dignity of man; according to it he will be judged.(9) Conscience is the most secret core and sanctuary of a man. There he is alone with God, Whose voice echoes in his depths.(10) In a wonderful manner conscience reveals that law which is fulfilled by love of God and neighbor.(11) In fidelity to conscience, Christians are joined with the rest of men in the search for truth, and for the genuine solution to the numerous problems which arise in the life of individuals from social relationships. Hence the more right conscience holds sway, the more persons and groups turn aside from blind choice and strive to be guided by the objective norms of morality. Conscience frequently errs from invincible ignorance without losing its dignity. The same cannot be said for a man who cares but little for truth and goodness, or for a conscience which by degrees grows practically sightless as a result of habitual sin.
60–1 Tim 5; cf. 8:9; 1 Tim 3; 1 Pet 3:21; Acts 24:16
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Emily2014
Guest
Yes I read the Bible. Peter was not described as a Catholic. Do you not fear that by stating that the Catholic Church is the ONLY portal to Heaven, you could in fact be further alienating those who have already or are considering leaving the Faith. Jesus taught through love. Telling all those who adhere to a different path to salvation that they are banned from Heaven because they do not follow the path you have chosen is unlikely to have a very positive effect! If you find JOY in your Faith and a closer awareness of the love of God in your life, might that not hold a greater appeal.
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Tantum_ergo
Guest
Hmmm. Scattershot arguments based on strawmen (the poster you were addressing did not ‘dismiss’ non Catholics), implying that if the Bible (as if it is the sole authority of the Faith) does not state in 21st century English the exact words “The Catholic Church is God’s only true Church”, so therefore it is not, although again, such an argument is not ever MADE by Catholics. . . and finally, the poster you respond to did NOT ‘insist Catholics are the only people who will be saved’.
You see, if you want to have a decent dialogue, you have to be sure that in lambasting another person (and his/her religion), you are actually talking about the real teachings OF that religion. Otherwise, you’re not doing anybody any good at all.
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Richard_White
Guest
Yes, I DO dismiss the belief systems of other “religions,” because they are all false. Salvation comes only through Jesus. The only way to get to Jesus properly is through the Catholic Church. Thus, outside the Catholic Church there is absolutely no salvation (except the invincibly ignorant- not their fault).
May God bless you and lead you to the Truth!
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Emily2014
Guest
With respect, I think you will find he did!
Why do you take such a patronising attitude towards my post. I was not criticising his right to his opinion - just using it as a probable answer to why people leave the Faith. (o.p)
I think that it is our unfortunate attitude that “only Catholics are right” may have a great deal to do with it.
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Tantum_ergo
Guest
After I wrote my post, I see he did come on and while I think what he said was true so far as it goes, he didn’t go far enough.
Yes, Jesus is the only normative means to Salvation.
However, non-Catholics who are saved will be saved through Jesus (and therefore, through the Catholic Church). They won’t be saved because they were ‘good people’, but because in their lives, they sought Jesus even if they didn’t know Him, even if their own belief taught lies about Him, and they lived for Him.
That actually puts more of a burden on us as Catholics to both preach Christ (by living our own lives truly for Him) so that we can help others to know Him truly (and not the ‘false Christ’ that, to give an example, a Muslim or Jew thinks he is), and to also make sure that we give correct information.
Certainly, a person hearing, “The only way to salvation is to be Catholic, you aren’t, to hell with you” is probably not going to want to BE Catholic. I totally agree with you there.
The problem is that we are such a ‘tetchy’, thin-skinned, egotistical bunch in this modern world, that we ‘take offense’ at things which are not, in themselves, offensive.
A person who hears, “Jesus is the Way to Heaven (normally), and He wants all people to be saved. He gave us the Catholic Church as the (normative) helper to bring all to salvation, and all will be saved through it, even if they are not baptized, practicing members of it, because it has all Truth. Thus all who seek Truth, even if they only have certain elements of it, are in fact searching for Christ through His Church, and God in His mercy will save them through His Church”. . . might be a LITTLE more inclined to at least not think Catholics are total jerks, but they’re still going to be miffed because it is an unfortunate truth that if any person or group does not have ‘all’ Truth, then what they have that is not Truth is ‘NOT’ Truth. You simply can’t get around it. And again (naturally), people don’t like to hear that what they sincerely believe is true, isn’t.
Now, the only way a Catholic could possibly make headway is to not teach the truth about Catholicism.
A Catholic who came on and said, "Well, all religions have some truth in them, so they’re all leading to Heaven, and what really matters is being a good person. . ’ would be lauded as not just ‘kind’, but ‘truthful’. “Finally”, say the non-Catholics, "A Catholic who understands that we’re all the same. There is no ‘One True Church’. There is no need to follow the same teachings, because what works for YOU doesn’t work for ME. There is no need to worry about hell, because no ‘reasonable person’ wants eternal torture, and surely with the exception of mass murderers, there is no person out there who doesn’t deserve heaven. No need for silly rituals, or demand for ‘absolutes’. This is a Catholic we’ll listen to. . .’
But the problem is, this Catholic isn’t giving Catholic teachings.
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EasterJoy
Guest
Fortunate or not, though, it is integral to the Catholic faith that there is a known and extremely important deposit of truth has been revealed by God, a deposit of truth given to the Church to spread and to guard from being twisted, falsified, or diluted, a deposit of truth by which human souls are to be saved by accepting it and taking it to heart. This is the normal means by which souls are intended to come to know, love, and serve God.
It is not true that the Church teaches that everyone has to obviously accept this prior to death in order to repent from their sins and ultimately enter eternal life. I used to think this, but the Church allows that a person of good faith might fail to accept the faith because of an invincible ignorance which, while incorrect as to fact, is not something God will hold against them, because God can read hearts and know who did not have the grace to accept the truths that they were offered to know. (This is in contrast to those, whether formally inside the Church or outside of it, who refuse to accept the faith because doing so would require them to give up some form of self-idolization that they aren’t even willing to* try *to throw off.)
Ecumenism doesn’t require anyone to say, “Hey, maybe you are right and we are wrong.” Ecumenism says, “Hey, maybe you are doing the best that you can, and maybe you are even doing better with the limited amount you accept than those who accept more in the letter and yet in the end do less in action and conversion of heart.” From those to whom much has been given, much will be required. Some of the first will be last, and some of the last will be first…whatever else has been revealed about the Final Judgment, one thing that is certain is that there will be surprises for those who think they have it all figured out. The Church does teach this.
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WilT
Guest
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WilT
Guest
Scattershot arguments…exactly the word I was looking for in Emilies response.
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WilT
Guest
At the very end only Jesus Christ, the Word made Flesh the Only begotten Son of God knows each and everyone’s heart and will bring to God his beloved children. The Catholic Church whom holds the Truth to God is the quickest path to Salvation. Because it preserves the Word of God and it’s teachings.
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EasterJoy
Guest
The question is whether or not there are opportunities for leading souls astray in the Church herself that could be addressed, things that obscure the truth that saves. Sure, we hope we’d see the truth in a poor package, but that is not the way our human nature works. There is no reason to add discouragements that do not have to be there.
Letter 2, The Screwtape Letters
MY DEAR WORMWOOD,
I note with grave displeasure that your patient has become a Christian. Do not indulge the hope that you will escape the usual penalties; indeed, in your better moments, I trust you would hardly even wish to do so. In the meantime we must make the best of the situation.
There is no need to despair; hundreds of these adult converts have been reclaimed after a I brief sojourn in the Enemy’s camp and are now with us. All the habits of the patient, both mental and bodily, are still in our favour.
**One of our great allies at present is the Church itself. Do not misunderstand me. I do not mean the Church as we see her spread but through all time and space and rooted in eternity, terrible as an army with banners. That, I confess, is a spectacle which makes I our boldest tempters uneasy. But fortunately it is quite invisible to these humans. All your patient sees is the half-finished, sham Gothic erection on the new building estate. When he goes inside, he sees the local grocer with rather in oily expression on his face bustling up to offer him one shiny little book containing a liturgy which neither of them understands, and one shabby little book containing corrupt texts of a number of religious lyrics, mostly bad, and in very small print. When he gets to his pew and looks round him he sees just that selection of his neighbours whom he has hitherto avoided. You want to lean pretty heavily on those neighbours. **Make his mind flit to and fro between an expression like “the body of Christ” and the actual faces in the next pew. It matters very little, of course, what kind of people that next pew really contains. You may know one of them to be a great warrior on the Enemy’s side. No matter. Your patient, thanks to Our Father below, is a fool. Provided that any of those neighbours sing out of tune, or have boots that squeak, or double chins, or odd clothes, the patient will quite easily believe that their religion must therefore be somehow ridiculous. At his present stage, you see, he has an idea of “Christians” in his mind which he supposes to be spiritual but which, in fact, is largely pictorial. His mind is full of togas and sandals and armour and bare legs and the mere fact that the other people in church wear modern clothes is a real-though of course an unconscious-difficulty to him. Never let it come to the surface; never let him ask what he expected them to look like. Keep everything hazy in his mind now, and you will have all eternity wherein to amuse yourself by producing in him the peculiar kind of clarity which Hell affords.
Work hard, then, on the disappointment or anticlimax which is certainly coming to the patient during his first few weeks as a churchman. The Enemy allows this disappointment to occur on the threshold of every human endeavour. It occurs when the boy who has been enchanted in the nursery by Stories from the Odyssey buckles down to really learning Greek. It occurs when lovers have got married and begin the real task of learning to live together. In every department of life it marks the transition from dreaming aspiration to laborious doing. The Enemy takes this risk because He has a curious fantasy of making all these disgusting little human vermin into what He calls His “free” lovers and servants-“sons” is the word He uses, with His inveterate love of degrading the whole spiritual world by unnatural liaisons with the two-legged animals. Desiring their freedom, He therefore refuses to carry them, by their mere affections and habits, to any of the goals which He sets before them: He leaves them to “do it on their own”. And there lies our opportunity. But also, remember, there lies our danger. If once they get through this initial dryness successfully, they become much less dependent on emotion and therefore much harder to tempt.
I have been writing hitherto on the assumption that the people in the next pew afford no rational ground for disappointment. Of course if they do-if the patient knows that the woman with the absurd hat is a fanatical bridge-player or the man with squeaky boots a miser and an extortioner-then your task is so much the easier. All you then have to do is to keep out of his mind the question “If I, being what I am, can consider that I am in some sense a Christian, why should the different vices of those people in the next pew prove that their religion is mere hypocrisy and convention?” You may ask whether it is possible to keep such an obvious thought from occurring even to a human mind. It is, Wormwood, it is! Handle him properly and it simply won’t come into his head. He has not been anything like long enough with the Enemy to have any real humility yet. What he says, even on his knees, about his own sinfulness is all parrot talk. At bottom, he still believes he has run up a very favourable credit-balance in the Enemy’s ledger by allowing himself to be converted, and thinks that he is showing great humility and condescension in going to church with these “smug”, commonplace neighbours at all. Keep him in that state of mind as long as you can.
Your affectionate uncle
SCREWTAPE
Letter 2, The Screwtape Letters
MY DEAR WORMWOOD,
I note with grave displeasure that your patient has become a Christian. Do not indulge the hope that you will escape the usual penalties; indeed, in your better moments, I trust you would hardly even wish to do so. In the meantime we must make the best of the situation.
There is no need to despair; hundreds of these adult converts have been reclaimed after a I brief sojourn in the Enemy’s camp and are now with us. All the habits of the patient, both mental and bodily, are still in our favour.
**One of our great allies at present is the Church itself. Do not misunderstand me. I do not mean the Church as we see her spread but through all time and space and rooted in eternity, terrible as an army with banners. That, I confess, is a spectacle which makes I our boldest tempters uneasy. But fortunately it is quite invisible to these humans. All your patient sees is the half-finished, sham Gothic erection on the new building estate. When he goes inside, he sees the local grocer with rather in oily expression on his face bustling up to offer him one shiny little book containing a liturgy which neither of them understands, and one shabby little book containing corrupt texts of a number of religious lyrics, mostly bad, and in very small print. When he gets to his pew and looks round him he sees just that selection of his neighbours whom he has hitherto avoided. You want to lean pretty heavily on those neighbours. **Make his mind flit to and fro between an expression like “the body of Christ” and the actual faces in the next pew. It matters very little, of course, what kind of people that next pew really contains. You may know one of them to be a great warrior on the Enemy’s side. No matter. Your patient, thanks to Our Father below, is a fool. Provided that any of those neighbours sing out of tune, or have boots that squeak, or double chins, or odd clothes, the patient will quite easily believe that their religion must therefore be somehow ridiculous. At his present stage, you see, he has an idea of “Christians” in his mind which he supposes to be spiritual but which, in fact, is largely pictorial. His mind is full of togas and sandals and armour and bare legs and the mere fact that the other people in church wear modern clothes is a real-though of course an unconscious-difficulty to him. Never let it come to the surface; never let him ask what he expected them to look like. Keep everything hazy in his mind now, and you will have all eternity wherein to amuse yourself by producing in him the peculiar kind of clarity which Hell affords.
Work hard, then, on the disappointment or anticlimax which is certainly coming to the patient during his first few weeks as a churchman. The Enemy allows this disappointment to occur on the threshold of every human endeavour. It occurs when the boy who has been enchanted in the nursery by Stories from the Odyssey buckles down to really learning Greek. It occurs when lovers have got married and begin the real task of learning to live together. In every department of life it marks the transition from dreaming aspiration to laborious doing. The Enemy takes this risk because He has a curious fantasy of making all these disgusting little human vermin into what He calls His “free” lovers and servants-“sons” is the word He uses, with His inveterate love of degrading the whole spiritual world by unnatural liaisons with the two-legged animals. Desiring their freedom, He therefore refuses to carry them, by their mere affections and habits, to any of the goals which He sets before them: He leaves them to “do it on their own”. And there lies our opportunity. But also, remember, there lies our danger. If once they get through this initial dryness successfully, they become much less dependent on emotion and therefore much harder to tempt.
I have been writing hitherto on the assumption that the people in the next pew afford no rational ground for disappointment. Of course if they do-if the patient knows that the woman with the absurd hat is a fanatical bridge-player or the man with squeaky boots a miser and an extortioner-then your task is so much the easier. All you then have to do is to keep out of his mind the question “If I, being what I am, can consider that I am in some sense a Christian, why should the different vices of those people in the next pew prove that their religion is mere hypocrisy and convention?” You may ask whether it is possible to keep such an obvious thought from occurring even to a human mind. It is, Wormwood, it is! Handle him properly and it simply won’t come into his head. He has not been anything like long enough with the Enemy to have any real humility yet. What he says, even on his knees, about his own sinfulness is all parrot talk. At bottom, he still believes he has run up a very favourable credit-balance in the Enemy’s ledger by allowing himself to be converted, and thinks that he is showing great humility and condescension in going to church with these “smug”, commonplace neighbours at all. Keep him in that state of mind as long as you can.
Your affectionate uncle
SCREWTAPE
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Emily2014
Guest
I would be grateful if you could explain why, because I disagree with you, my questions and opinions are dismissed as “Scattershot arguments!” It seems to be a common C.A.F trait to label others- e.g “Cafeteria Catholics” etc.
Reverting to the o.p - do you not feel that your reaction to my posts typifies some of the aspects of Catholicism which cause people to leave the Faith?
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Lost_Wanderer
Guest
The thing is the only person who manipulated myself was ultimately me. Others just followed suit. But the fact remains. It was me. It was me who saw myself as a conflicted being that needed to put himself down for fear of desire. Even without the manipulator, the law remains unchanged. It didn’t twist nor bend anything. There are just some laws and some teachings I can no longer bear to follow because it’s just not what I want.
I know I’m a selfish, sexually depraved, and all-around go-getting bastard. My patience is thin and I grow sick of guilt.
But guess what? I’m all the better for it!
The saints can look down on me all they will or pray with grievous tears, I’m done seeing myself as their object. Because frankly, that had always been my choice. Changing the way I viewed myself had really made such a difference in my life. Any moment when I feel otherwise is really just my old doubts, my old beliefs, banging at the door and crying to be let in… just so they could ruin my life again.
I say, nope. Nada. Forget it! I’m not doing this anymore! Feel free to slip in a few feel-good notes under the door but I’ll keep it locked until I finally get something better.
It certainly does for me.
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Emily2014
Guest
You sound so sad and bitter. Please, please stop castigating yourself. Our Blessed Lord would not judge you in this way. As a Catholic body, we have failed you and I’m so very sorry. God be with you along your future path and I pray that His love will ease your pain.I know I’m a selfish, sexually depraved, and all-around go-getting bastard. My patience is thin and I grow sick of guilt.
But guess what? I’m all the better for it!
The saints can look down on me all they will or pray with grievous tears, I’m done seeing myself as their object. Because frankly, that had always been my choice. Changing the way I viewed myself had really made such a difference in my life. Any moment when I feel otherwise is really just my old doubts, my old beliefs, banging at the door and crying to be let in… just so they could ruin my life again.
I say, nope. Nada. Forget it! I’m not doing this anymore! Feel free to slip in a few feel-good notes under the door but I’ll keep it locked until I finally get something better.
:hug1:
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Lost_Wanderer
Guest
I actually thank you for the apology.
But really do I sound that sad? I’m actually quite chipper. 
The words I used are really just labels that most Catholics on these boards would cast upon me if they could finally see everything that goes inside my head. My sense of sexual restraint are remarkably relaxed now compared to before. Same goes for my thoughts on materialism and greed. And yet, the only condemnation I get is in places like CAF. Neither friends nor family ever fault me anymore for ‘chasing my whims.’
Of course, I can and do use more positive vocabulary when describing my new take on life. I just don’t use them here because so many posters would just see it as sugarcoating.
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alexandratm
Guest
Yes, this. I’ve tried to politely point this out a few times, but it’s brushed off.
Where’s the love for others that Jesus proclaimed? Where is the charity that St. Therese of Lisieux wrote so wisely about?
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Emily2014
Guest
Please don’t give up on all of us because you have been treated without consideration or respect. Many posters are challenging - as I know to my cost, but others share your views.
We are all equal in the eyes of Our Blessed Lord and if we hang onto His unstintingly love for us, we can’t go far wrong. Pope Francis certainly seems on the right track!
God bless you.
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