Why Should I Become A Catholic.

[LOCO]

WHY I AM A CATHOLIC

By G. K. Chesterton - Anglican convert to Catholicism (Page 1 of 3)

The difficulty of explaining “why I am a Catholic” is that there are ten thousand reasons all amounting to one reason: that Catholicism is true. I could fill all my space with separate sentences each beginning with the words, “It is the only thing that . . .” As, for instance, (1) It is the only thing that really prevents a sin from being a secret. (2) It is the only thing in which the superior cannot be superior; in the sense of supercilious. (3) It is the only thing that frees a man from the degrading slavery of being a child of his age. (4) It is the only thing that talks as if it were the truth; as if it were a real messenger refusing to tamper with a real message. (5) It is the only type of Christianity that really contains every type of man; even the respectable man. (6) It is the only large attempt to change the world from the inside; working through wills and not laws; and so on.

Or I might treat the matter personally and describe my own conversion; but I happen to have a strong feeling that this method makes the business look much smaller than it really is. Numbers of much better men have been sincerely converted to much worse religions. I would much prefer to attempt to say here of the Catholic Church precisely the things that cannot be said even of its very respectable rivals. In short, I would say chiefly of the Catholic Church that it is catholic. I would rather try to suggest that it is not only larger than me, but larger than anything in the world; that it is indeed larger than the world. But since in this short space I can only take a section, I will consider it in its capacity of a guardian of the truth.

The other day a well-known writer, otherwise quite well-informed, said that the Catholic Church is always the enemy of new ideas. It probably did not occur to him that his own remark was not exactly in the nature of a new idea. It is one of the notions that Catholics have to be continually refuting, because it is such a very old idea. Indeed, those who complain that Catholicism cannot say anything new, seldom think it necessary to say anything new about Catholicism. As a matter of fact, a real study of history will show it to be curiously contrary to the fact. In so far as the ideas really are ideas, and in so far as any such ideas can be new, Catholics have continually suffered through supporting them when they were really new; when they were much too new to find any other support. The Catholic was not only first in the field but alone in the field; and there was as yet nobody to understand what he had found there.

Thus, for instance, nearly two hundred years before the Declaration of Independence and the French Revolution, in an age devoted to the pride and praise of princes, Cardinal Bellarmine and Suarez the Spaniard laid down lucidly the whole theory of real democracy. But in that age of Divine Right they only produced the impression of being sophistical and sanguinary Jesuits, creeping about with daggers to effect the murder of kings. So, again, the Casuists of the Catholic schools said all that can really be said for the problem plays and problem novels of our own time, two hundred years before they were written. They said that there really are problems of moral conduct; but they had the misfortune to say it two hundred years too soon. In a time of tub-thumping fanaticism and free and easy vituperation, they merely got themselves called liars and shufflers for being psychologists before psychology was the fashion. It would be easy to give any number of other examples down to the present day, and the case of ideas that are still too new to be understood. There are passages in Pope Leo’s Encycliacl on Labor [Also known as Rerum Novarum, released in 1891] which are only now beginning to be used as hints for social movements much newer than socialism. And when Mr. Belloc wrote about the Servile State, he advanced an economic theory so original that hardly anybody has yet realized what it is. A few centuries hence, other people will probably repeat it, and repeat it wrong. And then, if Catholics object, their protest will be easily explained by the well-known fact that Catholics never care for new ideas.

continued

 

[LOCO]

CHESTERTON (Page 2 of 3)

Nevertheless, the man who made that remark about Catholics meant something; and it is only fair to him to understand it rather more clearly than he stated it. What he meant was that, in the modern world, the Catholic Church is in fact the enemy of many influential fashions; most of which still claim to be new, though many of them are beginning to be a little stale. In other words, in so far as he meant that the Church often attacks what the world at any given moment supports, he was perfectly right . The Church does often set herself against the fashion of this world that passes away; and she has experience enough to know how very rapidly it does pass away. But to understand exactly what is involved, it is necessary to take a rather larger view and consider the ultimate nature of the ideas in question, to consider, so to speak, the idea of the idea.

Nine out of ten of what we call new ideas are simply old mistakes. The Catholic Church has for one of her chief duties that of preventing people from making those old mistakes; from making them over and over again forever, as people always do if they are left to themselves. The truth about the Catholic attitude towards heresy, or as some would say, towards liberty, can best be expressed perhaps by the metaphor of a map. The Catholic Church carries a sort of map of the mind which looks like the map of a maze, but which is in fact a guide to the maze. It has been compiled from knowledge which, even considered as human knowledge, is quite without any human parallel.

There is no other case of one continuous intelligent institution that has been thinking about thinking for two thousand years. Its experience naturally covers nearly all experiences; and especially nearly all errors. The result is a map in which all the blind alleys and bad roads are clearly marked, all the ways that have been shown to be worthless by the best of all evidence: the evidence of those who have gone down them.

On this map of the mind the errors are marked as exceptions. The greater part of it consists of playgrounds and happy hunting-fields, where the mind may have as much liberty as it likes; not to mention any number of intellectual battle-fields in which the battle is indefinitely open and undecided. But it does definitely take the responsibility of marking certain roads as leading nowhere or leading to destruction, to a blank wall, or a sheer precipice. By this means, it does prevent men from wasting their time or losing their lives upon paths that have been found futile or disastrous again and again in the past, but which might otherwise entrap travelers again and again in the future. The Church does make herself responsible for warning her people against these; and upon these the real issue of the case depends. She does dogmatically defend humanity from its worst foes, those hoary and horrible and devouring monsters of the old mistakes. Now all these false issues have a way of looking quite fresh, especially to a fresh generation. Their first statement always sounds harmless and plausible. I will give only two examples. It sounds harmless to say, as most modern people have said: “Actions are only wrong if they are bad for society.” Follow it out, and sooner or later you will have the inhumanity of a hive or a heathen city, establishing slavery as the cheapest and most certain means of production, torturing the slaves for evidence because the individual is nothing to the State, declaring that an innocent man must die for the people, as did the murderers of Christ. Then, perhaps, you will go back to Catholic definitions, and find that the Church, while she also says it is our duty to work for society, says other things also which forbid individual injustice. Or again, it sounds quite pious to say, “Our moral conflict should end with a victory of the spiritual over the material.” Follow it out, and you may end in the madness of the Manicheans, saying that a suicide is good because it is a sacrifice, that a sexual perversion is good because it produces no life, that the devil made the sun and moon because they are material. Then you may begin to guess why Catholicism insists that there are evil spirits as well as good; and that materials also may be sacred, as in the Incarnation or the Mass, in the sacrament of marriage or the resurrection of the body.

Now there is no other corporate mind in the world that is thus on the watch to prevent minds from going wrong. The policeman comes too late, when he tries to prevent men from going wrong. The doctor comes too late, for he only comes to lock up a madman, not to advise a sane man on how not to go mad. And all other sects and schools are inadequate for the purpose. This is not because each of them may not contain a truth, but precisely because each of them does contain a truth; and is content to contain a truth. None of the others really pretends to contain the truth. None of the others, that is, really pretends to be looking out in all directions at once.

 

[LOCO]

CHESTERTON (Page 3 of 3)

The Church is not merely armed against the heresies of the past or even of the present, but equally against those of the future, that may be the exact opposite of those of the present. Catholicism is not ritualism; it may in the future be fighting some sort of superstitious and idolatrous exaggeration of ritual. Catholicism is not asceticism; it has again and again in the past repressed fanatical and cruel exaggerations of asceticism. Catholicism is not mere mysticism; it is even now defending human reason against the mere mysticism of the Pragmatists. Thus, when the world went Puritan in the seventeenth century, the Church was charged with pushing charity to the point of sophistry, with making everything easy with the laxity of the confessional. Now that the world is not going Puritan but Pagan, it is the Church that is everywhere protesting against a Pagan laxity in dress or manners. It is doing what the Puritans wanted done when it is really wanted. In all probability, all that is best in Protestantism will only survive in Catholicism; and in that sense all Catholics will still be Puritans when all Puritans are Pagans.Thus, for instance, Catholicism, in a sense little understood, stands outside a quarrel like that of Darwinism at Dayton. It stands outside it because it stands all around it, as a house stands all around two incongruous pieces of furniture. It is no sectarian boast to say it is before and after and beyond all these things in all directions. It is impartial in a fight between the Fundamentalist and the theory of the Origin of Species, because it goes back to an origin before that Origin; because it is more fundamental than Fundamentalism. It knows where the Bible came from. It also knows where most of the theories of Evolution go to. It knows there were many other Gospels besides the Four Gospels, and that the others were only eliminated by the authority of the Catholic Church. It knows there are many other evolutionary theories besides the Darwinian theory; and that the latter is quite likely to be eliminated by later science. It does not, in the conventional phrase, accept the conclusions of science, for the simple reason that science has not concluded. To conclude is to shut up; and the man of science is not at all likely to shut up. It does not, in the conventional phrase, believe what the Bible says, for the simple reason that the Bible does not say anything. You cannot put a book in the witness-box and ask it what it really means. The Fundamentalist controversy itself destroys Fundamentalism. The Bible by itself cannot be a basis of agreement when it is a cause of disagreement; it cannot be the common ground of Christians when some take it allegorically and some literally. The Catholic refers it to something that can say something, to the living, consistent, and continuous mind of which I have spoken; the highest mind of man guided by God.

Every moment increases for us the moral necessity for such an immortal mind. We must have something that will hold the four corners of the world still, while we make our social experiments or build our Utopias. For instance, we must have a final agreement, if only on the truism of human brotherhood, that will resist some reaction of human brutality. Nothing is more likely just now than that the corruption of representative government will lead to the rich breaking loose altogether, and trampling on all the traditions of equality with mere pagan pride. We must have the truisms everywhere recognized as true. We must prevent mere reaction and the dreary repetition of the old mistakes. We must make the intellectual world safe for democracy. But in the conditions of modern mental anarchy, neither that nor any other ideal is safe. just as Protestants appealed from priests to the Bible, and did not realize that the Bible also could be questioned, so republicans appealed from kings to the people, and did not realize that the people also could be defied. There is no end to the dissolution of ideas, the destruction of all tests of truth, that has become possible since men abandoned the attempt to keep a central and civilized Truth, to contain all truths and trace out and refute all errors. Since then, each group has taken one truth at a time and spent the time in turning it into a falsehood. We have had nothing but movements; or in other words, monomanias. But the Church is not a movement but a meeting-place; the trysting-place of all the truths in the world.

From Twelve Modern Apostles and Their Creeds (1926)
Reprinted in The Collected Works of G.K. Chesterton, Vol. 3 Ignatius Press 1990

 

[thequeen]

As another post said spend time in the blessed sacrament But i will tell you this The catholic Church was the Church founded by our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ all the other denominations came from out of the reformation and some even began less than 200 years ago so they could not be the church founded by Christ himself Christ founded one Church not alot of different churches or denominationsno he founded one Church One Holy Catholic Apostolic Church That is the best explanation I can give

 

[John_Martin]

(Here is the full text of what I wrote in 2 messages to Mberg, but I believe he discontinued reading before seeing it - the editor limits you to 5000 characters per message, and I am a bit wordy. But I didn’t want my editing to limit the content, so this and the next message say it all…)

Hello Mberg,
By now you have encountered quite a bit of back and forth arguments on doctrinal positions.

As I said before, these will not accomplish anything toward satisfying the desire to know that you have found the one answer to “which is correct?”. You have also encountered some strong emotion (and words) from those like “guanophore”, who can’t understand why his arguments and proofs have no effect, to the point where it seems he is almost ranting at times.

Perhaps a better question to look at would be, “which teaching(s) would Jesus tell us are correct if He were here talking with us?” Then we could do as you wrote and “accept everything at face value” that He says. There we would have an authority we trusted. Why?, because He is the one teacher we do follow and do believe. If we found issue with anything He said, we would not reply to Him: “You are mistaken”; instead we would simply say, “I have an problem understanding You on this teaching; please explain it further so I can understand.” And He would reply back: "To those not following me, I speak in parables, but I will explain it to you - here is what I mean…(explanation). "

But this sets up what I would consider a paradox, and problematic at that: We would need to be with Jesus face to face for this to work, and according to reports, He ascended to heaven a couple thousand years ago.

But while it is problematic, that is where your answer lies, in being face to face with him, transcending the 2000 year chasm of time. That was for me the answer - legitamate participation in being united to Him, because ‘He is where I truly am from’. If I am not face to face with Him and His Words, then I only know doctrines and teachings about Him by other people who want me agree with their interpretations about Him.

Things like historical criticism, as good as it may be in defining the writings of J, Q, & P, or showing that the writer to the Romans was probably not the same writer to Timothy, would have no impact with Jesus here face to face - He could tell me “believe all you read in Romans and in the letters to Timothy; here is what they mean for you… (explanation).” etc. Even reading Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Paul, Peter - all of these have no authority without being face to face with Jesus and He tells me, “Listen to them; I will vouch for what they wrote, for what you read”. These writings are not scripture unless He says they are Scripture for me. And the same with the Catechism.

Imagine for a moment that you are face to face with Jesus, and he says to you, Mberg, “Tell people you have seen me and ask them to be a disciple with you - I was anointed as your King when I was baptized, I baptized you to make you a member of my Kingdom, now you make them a disciple too by baptizing them and teaching them what I said to you. And here is my Spirit (breathes on you), so that you will tell them what I want them to hear.”

Okay, so you go out and start telling people that “the Kingdom is here, would you like to be a part of it? I can grant you citizenship.” Should they believe you? Your reply, “Well, yes, I was with Jesus”. Yes, you were. The Holy Spirit is real, and some will hear while others will not; some will “see Jesus” when they see you; others will not. Some will say as the Ethiopian in Acts, “Here is water; what is to prevent you from baptizing me here and now; I want to be part of His Kingdom with you”. That person will hear Jesus face to face in every word you speak, and see him in you as you pour water over him in baptism.

Now, do you want that Ethiopian to grant this citizenship to others he meets as he travels southward home? Will you vouch for what he does, just as Jesus will vouch for you? Do you believe Jesus will stand behind the Ethiopians words to people just as He does standing behind your words? Right there is the Historical Continuity, the legitimate continuity, with the contact with Jesus. It is not about the “correct doctrine”; it is about receiving from a legitimate giver. If my “teacher” is the legitimate “heir” of the teaching, then I am hearing Jesus face to face, and either accepting Him or rejecting Him, because I have accepted or rejected one whom He has sent. If I take your word for it and you baptize me, then I see myself as your ‘little’ brother, your fellow citizen, and I see Jesus as my King and also as my Brother. And every word you say to me has my heart burning with joy. You are not simply a ‘witness’ to Jesus, you are ‘evidence’ of Jesus, and now I am also that same ‘evidence’. I have legitimate historical continuity and participation back to Jesus through you. Am I mistaken?

(continued in next message - John Martin)

 

[John_Martin]

(conclusion)
“guanophore” expects you to believe either logical arguments or well known scholarly arguments, but does not claim “I have seen Jesus face to face and here is what he says”.

The Catholic Church, however, does use that statement (knowing Jesus face to face) when it maintains that its being is centered on faithfully inheriting and passing on what it has received, down through the centuries, from those who were at Jesus side hearing Him. Doctrinal arguments for the Church were not for convincing people to be Catholic. Doctrinal arguments and doctrinal decisions were for “self-control” in making sure they did not say things that were untrue (to limit how our logical reasoning embellishes everything we ponder when we talk to people). If you were baptized, the reality is that you were baptized by someone that He has sent - real water on you by a real person in an historical continuity to Peter, Paul, James, John, Andrew, etc. to Jesus. “He made and baptized more disciples than the Baptist, though Jesus himself did not baptize, rather his disciples did that for him).”

One final thought; if I have face to face contact with Jesus, it really does not matter if I have all the explanations and doctrines correct in my brain at this moment - my union and presence with him is not bound to those, but to the fact that he embraces my presence with Him through the people he sent to me. He will “reveal all things to me” in time, if the Holy Spirit really is real (and it is).

I kind of hope you will give up the back and forth with “guanophore” because I see it as futility, but instead look to the question of how do I find myself in legitimate participation in salvation history, being a human who is 2000 years distant from Jesus and the words written about him by those who saw him face to face. Knowing you are face to face with Jesus as one of his own is the “pearl of great price”. Certain doctrines and knowledge are that pearl to “guanophore”, but it is actually the Kingdom itself that is the pearl, and the literal participation in that Kingdom. This true pearl can be seen as priceless by all and anyone, no matter what level of intelligence or logical acumen. “I am a member of the Kingdom established by Jesus” does not require lengthy proofs, it just means I believed you were telling the truth when you baptized me.

John Martin

 

[saved4sure]

No one is saved until they are saved, that is until they die and face their judgment and God tells them they are saved.

One can be in a state of justification and then turn away from God and lose that justification and then one can return to God and be restored to the justified state again, but as far as salvation nothing is decided until God decides after we die.

God of course knows what will happen but we cannot know and should never presume.

“…but he who has persevered to the end will be saved.” Matt 10:22, 24:13

So we’ll never know until after we die and face God? It seems that the uncertainty we all have about earthly matters carries over into spiritual matters also?

 

[ESMDHokie77]

So we’ll never know until after we die and face God? It seems that the uncertainty we all have about earthly matters carries over into spiritual matters also?

Why else would we have to work out our salvation with fear and trembling?

 

[saved4sure]

Why else would we have to work out our salvation with fear and trembling?

So our works are what saves us? I thought it was the sacrifice of Jesus Christ at calvery.

 

[ESMDHokie77]

So our works are what saves us? I thought it was the sacrifice of Jesus Christ at calvery.

We must cooperate with God’s Grace. What Jesus did for us means nothing if we reject it, and don’t follow His teachings and do as He commanded us.

 

[josephback]

So we’ll never know until after we die and face God? It seems that the uncertainty we all have about earthly matters carries over into spiritual matters also?

We can’t know the final outcome but we can know the Way as proclaimed by the Church and follow it.

As to what Jesus did at Calvary I would encourage you to look into the Catholic teaching of infused righteousness. What Jesus did justifies us but it’s not a one time thing, we still sin and have some free will. It’s a relationship, a real relationship!! That’s all I’ll say for now…

 

[saved4sure]

We can’t know the final outcome but we can know the Way as proclaimed by the Church and follow it.

As to what Jesus did at Calvary I would encourage you to look into the Catholic teaching of infused righteousness. What Jesus did justifies us but it’s not a one time thing, we still sin and have some free will. It’s a relationship, a real relationship!! That’s all I’ll say for now…

I appreciate your help but I’ll stick with The Bible. See that’s the Word of God.

 

[Stepson]

Things that stop me:

Indulgences - I have been told that the practices come from the treasure of merit. I see in the bible where it does talk about rewards being given in heaven for certain acts. But how can we give indulgences to the dead?

Mariology - I know that Catholics do not worship or pray to Mary. I know that they are only asking her to pray for them. However, I live in California in which there is a HUGH portion of a population does worship her. They call her a co-redeemer. Some even claim that she redeems women. I even read this on this very forum. I drive down a main street and I see fortune tellers with a picture of the Virgin Mary on the front. They claim she gives them power to see the future. I know you do not judge an entire Church by some. However, I don’t see the Church taking a very proactive attempt to stop it; to preach against it from the pulpit. And that bothers me. It may seem silly and superficial, but it is what bother me about this.

Venial vs. Mortal Sins - Someone told me that he could live a righteous life; full of good works, but that he could die with a mortal sin on his heart and would be cast into hell.

Teaching on Contraceptives - I could list pros and cons, but here I see a teaching in which the majority of Catholics do not follow. I understand that the Eastern Orthodoxy does not teach this as well.

Things that attract me:

The Origin of the Church - It is the first Church.

Liturgy and the Traditions of the Church - It humbles me to think I am walking in the footsteps of countless generations. It’s awe inspiring to think that this is what the first Christians were doing.

Sacramental Rites - Worshiping God with all your senses is very good for the soul.

Catholic Education System - Enough said here.

Catholic Charities - Same as above.

 

[zz912]

I appreciate your help but I’ll stick with The Bible. See that’s the Word of God.

You only know that because the Catholic Church (through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit) declared what books constituted Sacred Scripture. So whether you realize it or not, you accept the authority of the Catholic Church.

 

[zz912]

Things that stop me:

Indulgences - I have been told that the practices come from the treasure of merit. I see in the bible where it does talk about rewards being given in heaven for certain acts. But how can we give indulgences to the dead?

Mariology - I know that Catholics do not worship or pray to Mary. I know that they are only asking her to pray for them. However, I live in California in which there is a HUGH portion of a population does worship her. They call her a co-redeemer. Some even claim that she redeems women. I even read this on this very forum. I drive down a main street and I see fortune tellers with a picture of the Virgin Mary on the front. They claim she gives them power to see the future. I know you do not judge an entire Church by some. However, I don’t see the Church taking a very proactive attempt to stop it; to preach against it from the pulpit. And that bothers me. It may seem silly and superficial, but it is what bother me about this.

Venial vs. Mortal Sins - Someone told me that he could live a righteous life; full of good works, but that he could die with a mortal sin on his heart and would be cast into hell.

Teaching on Contraceptives - I could list pros and cons, but here I see a teaching in which the majority of Catholics do not follow. I understand that the Eastern Orthodoxy does not teach this as well.

Things that attract me:

The Origin of the Church - It is the first Church.

Liturgy and the Traditions of the Church - It humbles me to think I am walking in the footsteps of countless generations. It’s awe inspiring to think that this is what the first Christians were doing.

Sacramental Rites - Worshiping God with all your senses is very good for the soul.

Catholic Education System - Enough said here.

Catholic Charities - Same as above.

Indulgences - The Bible shows how our prayers can benefit or save those who commit venial sins. St Paul also talks about perfecting what is lacking in the suffering of Jesus. We also are never separated from our brothers and sisters in Christ. We are surrounded by a cloud of witnesses.

Mary - of course some abuse or go overboard with their veneration of Mary. And you are right about pastors needing to confront these issues more directly. Many people in the Church are crying out for priests to be more forceful in proclaiming the Faith. The tide is slowly turning with the aging of the baby boomers and new crops of more faithful priests. To note as well, those fortune tellers don’t listen to the Church, so I don’t know how much they would listen to an individual priest. But the education of Catholics for the last 60 years has been woefully awful. All that said, it doesn’t change the Truth of the Catholic Faith.

Mortal Sin - I think you don’t realize the enormity of mortal sin. Mortal sin is a direct and obstinate refusal to do the will of God and intentionally sever your relationship/covenant with God. Why should God allow you to violate the New Covenant and remove yourself from the life of Christ, and not let you suffer the result of those actions?

Contraceptives - they have allowed women to become little more than glorified sex toys in today’s culture. And some cause abortions (the pill, IUD’s, etc). Babies have become an unnaceptable outcome of sex, and as such, abortions are used to this end. (Over 50% of all abortions are done on those who were using contraceptives.)

I hope you will consider all this and pray to undertsand why the Church teaches these Truths. You would make a great Catholic and we need more like you.

 

[LOCO]

I appreciate your help but I’ll stick with The Bible. See that’s the Word of God.

No, you are quite wrong, Jesus is the Word of God. The 'living, breathing’ Word of God. Your primary focus should be on cultivating your relationship with him, not an inanimate object. The Bible is the ‘word of God’ (small letters), it is and will always be subservient to Our Lord.

Sacred Scripture is important but it is not something with which you can form an intimate relationship.

Jesus never wrote anything down. He left us a Church. This Church in the early years interpreted and taught the Scriptures orally.

The CC then compiled the first Bible. Before the introduction of the printing press in the C15, Bibles took 2 years to handwrite which was painstakingly done by monks and nuns. No wonder there was one Bible shared between several parishes, and it was chained to the pulpit.

The congregation did not ‘self-intepret’ until quite recently (a manmade tradition). The Bible has no inspired table of contents, it contains numerous separate books and letters containing true stories, fables, parables and prophecies which were never meant to be interpreted by individuals to suit their own beliefs.

Self-interpretation has led to chaos, confusion and further division. Whose interpretation is right? If I don’t agree with your interpretation, I’m packing up my bongos and starting up my own church!!! So who is the Holy Spirit guiding?.. all of them… I don’t think so.

The Holy Spirit is ** NEVER the author of division, chaos and confusion**.

 

[saved4sure]

No, you are quite wrong, Jesus is the Word of God. The 'living, breathing’ Word of God. Your primary focus should be on cultivating your relationship with him, not an inanimate object. The Bible is the ‘word of God’ (small letters), it is and will always be subservient to Our Lord.

Sacred Scripture is important but it is not something with which you can form an intimate relationship.

Jesus never wrote anything down. He left us a Church. This Church in the early years interpreted and taught the Scriptures orally.

The CC then compiled the first Bible. Before the introduction of the printing press in the C15, Bibles took 2 years to handwrite which was painstakingly done by monks and nuns. No wonder there was one Bible shared between several parishes, and it was chained to the pulpit.

The congregation did not ‘self-intepret’ until quite recently (a manmade tradition). The Bible has no inspired table of contents, it contains numerous separate books and letters containing true stories, fables, parables and prophecies which were never meant to be interpreted by individuals to suit their own beliefs.

Self-interpretation has led to chaos, confusion and further division. Whose interpretation is right? If I don’t agree with your interpretation, I’m packing up my bongos and starting up my own church!!! So who is the Holy Spirit guiding?.. all of them… I don’t think so.

The Holy Spirit is ** NEVER** the author of division, chaos and confusion.

Well it’s not the rcc, that’s for sure! When I was catholic, it used to be a mortal sin if you ate meat on Friday. Directly to hell, no passing go, finished! NOW, it’s not. Wow, sure glad that I didn’t die before your rcc changed the rules. Your church’s teachings are a joke! They change like the wind. They cannot be counted on. If I was to take the time, I would list all of the changes in beliefs they have instigated as well as all of the socalled saints they have desainted. But my time is worth more than that.

 

[josephback]

I appreciate your help but I’ll stick with The Bible. See that’s the Word of God.

It is the Word of God But my question is, does the Bible interpret itself What sources do you ALREADY RELY UPON to help yourself understand the Bible? What favorite theologians or pastors? Or maybe its your own intellect?

Stick with the Bible sure. But make yourself humble about it and allow the very Catholic Church who canonized that Bible the opportunity to help explain it to you It can open up vast riches in your life:thumbsup:

 

[TheWhoFreak]

Well it’s not the rcc, that’s for sure! When I was catholic, it used to be a mortal sin if you ate meat on Friday. Directly to hell, no passing go, finished! NOW, it’s not. Wow, sure glad that I didn’t die before your rcc changed the rules. Your church’s teachings are a joke! They change like the wind. They cannot be counted on. If I was to take the time, I would list all of the changes in beliefs they have instigated as well as all of the socalled saints they have desainted. But my time is worth more than that.

Eating meat on fridays during Lent is still a mortal sin, BUT, In order for a sin to mortal, three conditions must be met: 1) The person committing the sin must know that it is a mortal sin. 2) The person must commit the sin with full consent. 3) the person must intentionally commit the sin. In other words, you have to know the sin is a mortal sin, committing the sin must be completely your choice, and you have to commit the sin on purpose. This being so, the only Catholics who ate meat on a friday during Lent and mortally sinned in doing so are those who knew eating the meat was a mortal sin, who ate meat of their own free choice, and deliberately ate the meat knowing it was a mortal sin.
Another thing. Although mortal sin removes sanctifying grace from our souls, it can be restored by going to confession and confessing the mortal sin.

Your church’s teachings are a joke! They change like the wind

Could you point out some doctrines please?

 

[agent_grey]

I sugest you abondon religion and faith entirely. All these from Christian fundi this to Catholic that to the muslim menace are nothing more than lies.

The best part. The icing on the cake so to speak is all you need to do simply read scripture to know that it is not from a Holy God.

Look to your conscience. You will find I speak as a beakon of light in the darkest place.