lostwanderingsoul
Well-Known Member
And anyone who follows Jesus can also be assured of paradise.
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What are your thoughts about the Catholic Church?
- Thread starter Spiderman
- Start date
Just wondering if you could share your thoughts about Catholicism, if you have any.
I appreciate their efforts of ecumenism. I am also very ecumenic for what concerns the various brands of Christianity or, more generally, belief in any God.
That was the politically correct response.
In reality, I wish I would have been able to witness guided visit to the Vatican where the guide says to the amazed tourists: here used to live a funny dressed guy who was really believed to be the deputy of God on earth. Flash, flash....
Ciao
- viole
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dianaiad
Well-Known Member
I am grateful to Orthodox Christianity (including the Catholics) for keeping as much of Christianity alive as it did. Did a pretty good job, all in all...in spite of some incredibly bad decisions. Catholics, as people, are as good or as bad as any other group of people, and the true believers tend to be pretty darned good people, frankly.
However, my own beliefs are that as hard as they tried (and they were co-opted by many underhanded people who had agendas more about using the church for THEIR political ends than attempting to figure out how best to adhere to the teachings of Jesus) they did go off the doctrinal rails...a long way off.
So...I'm not a Catholic. I certainly don't think that Catholicism is anywhere near as evil as some have painted it in here, though, nor as good. Catholicism is about the people in it, and people....are like people everywhere else.
However, my own beliefs are that as hard as they tried (and they were co-opted by many underhanded people who had agendas more about using the church for THEIR political ends than attempting to figure out how best to adhere to the teachings of Jesus) they did go off the doctrinal rails...a long way off.
So...I'm not a Catholic. I certainly don't think that Catholicism is anywhere near as evil as some have painted it in here, though, nor as good. Catholicism is about the people in it, and people....are like people everywhere else.
leibowde84
Veteran Member
Well, I guess I should only speak for myself. But, I am not afraid of the pain nearly as much as what happens after that pain. I know what pain is like ... I have no idea what happens after I die.
Or you could choose the path of educating yourself so that you can make an informed decision. I have studied Christianity and Islam and as a result of those studies I dislike them both.
Spiderman
Veteran Member
By all means, talk about and defend your faith on any of my threads.
I would like to start a thread on LDS and other faiths I just don't want to be responsible for another thread where people bash another faith (unless it's mine of course)
leibowde84
Veteran Member
That is a good point. I think my animosity towards the Catholic Church (not Catholics) is greater than my animosity towards Islam (not Muslims). That is because I grew up in the Church, went to Catholic grade school, All-boys Jesuit high school, and studied Christianity extensively ever since. I just don't know much about Islam apart from studying its history and reading the Quran a couple of times.
I don't expect to know that, either.
Unless there is a spiritual NY Times in the hereafter informing me about what happens after my death.
Ciao
- viole
Katzpur
Not your average Mormon
Really? That sort of surprises me. Doesn't seem in character, to be perfectly honest.
leibowde84
Veteran Member
Don't know what to say. It's the truth.
Katzpur
Not your average Mormon
Well, you seem to be too intelligent to be afraid of becoming God's eternal firewood. To me, if there's a God, there's an afterlife, and since I don't believe Him to be a sadistic monster, I believe that the next life will be an improvement over this one. If there isn't a God, well... I guess we don't have to worry.
Unveiled Artist
Veteran Member
Just wondering if you could share your thoughts about Catholicism, if you have any.
Kind of a loaded question.
I have no personal grudges on the Church. Everyone has always been welcome and supportive to my spiritual growth. All the parishes work together on the big stuff and everyone seems to come together as a family unit regardless of what Church I went to. They have good community services and volunteer opportunities that many people Catholic and non-Catholic can use or work in. They started to have Bible study, so that is good. I like that the Church is open pretty much all day (depending on the area). They foster personal devotion time and let you pray without being interrupted.
I have nothing against the doctrine of Catholicism specifically just Christianity itself. I don't believe in human sacrifice. Jesus is not god in my head. We never agreed on the "authority" of scripture.
What the downside about the Church is they only let Catholics take the Eucharist when all Christians are one body and it's a "universal" Church. They are very proactive when it comes to political issues to the point of tearing other people's morals down for sake of their own. It could depend on the parish but that's just watering it down, really. I was a little unnerved given my many of my family are bible belt or baptist folk that Catholics don't have Bibles in their pews. One woman about 45 years old was told she wasn't allowed to read her Bible.
After going to Latin Mass, I experienced the history of the Church in my soul. It was like a weight crushed on me. It was a positive spiritual experience but it conflicted with the nature of the faith-Christianity itself-and emphasis on the sacrifice of christ and his bodily death and not just his resurrection.
It made me seemed like I sined more often than I did before I came to the Church. Which, depending on the person, they may not see it that way but more of a "toning up" one's spiritual health. To me, it did the opposite.
It gave me a conflicted feeling of good and bad that I feel no spiritual faith should never do.
Outside of that, if one finds solace in the core beliefs of the Church, I feel that's the best way to come to Christ. If they are not down with discipline and being part of the body of Christ, this is definitely not the Church to go to.
leibowde84
Veteran Member
I can't say it's logical, but the idea of there being nothing after death scares me to death (no pun intended).
SethZaddik
Active Member
I am happy but not at all surprised that LDS is friendly with Islam. Good stuff.
Your Temples are freaking awesome btw.
They have a supernatural almost ominous (not in a negative fashion) look to them, outstanding structures.
dianaiad
Well-Known Member
Amen and Amen. I can't imagine that God is the sort of Being that is going to make eternal firewood of people simply because they don't know everything...or the right things...or because they didn't win some heavenly lottery and get picked.
Katzpur and I share a belief system, though, and so we tend to have a different view than most about what salvation and the after life actually are.
As for me, I don't have any problem at all with being dead. Not thrilled about the 'dying' process, though. Tried it once (not on purpose!) Didn't succeed, didn't enjoy the experience one little bit. Now I have to do it all over again at least one more time. ick.
dianaiad
Well-Known Member
I understand, and you are right; it's NOT logical. However, it's understandable! It took me a long time to figure out that being scared of there 'being nothing after death' was weird....as if we were going to be around to actually experience that nothing?
I think this fear is a sort of ingrained faith and understanding that yep, there will be something. We just can't wrap our minds around 'non-existence,' can we?
I THINK I finally did, for myself...I'm not afraid of there being 'nothing' after death any more. The idea doesn't bug me at all.
.................which may be rather ironic since I firmly believe that there is not only 'something,' but I have some idea of what it will probably be like.
Maybe.
It surprised me to read your feelings about this too.
I am more like Samuel Clemens. "I was dead for billions of years before my birth, and I was not inconvenienced in the slightest."
But I also totally get the Woodie Allen quote. Being dead doesn't bother me, it's the process of going from alive to dead that I will avoid as long as possible. That don't sound like all that much fun....
Tom
Stalwart
Member
I recognise the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church as the one Church which Jesus Christ founded to bring together His faithful. I recognise that the Catholic Church is the sole depository of objective moral and religious truth. I recognise that without Christ, one cannot be saved - and that without the Church, one cannot have Christ; that one cannot have God for a father who does not have the Church for a mother. I recognise that all outside of Her cannot be saved. I recognise that within the Catholic Church subsists the Body of Christ, and that none outside of her can possibly merit the name 'Christian', because they are in all cases deviant from the faith that Christ granted to Man.
I strongly dislike the person of our Holy Father, Pope Francis, as well as all the post-concilliar popes and the destruction that they have wrought through the propagation of the abominable pastoral changes introduced in the Second Vatican Council. It has led to the decimation of the Church; its priests, its religious, and its laypeople. Those who recognise themselves as Catholic rarely understand the faith. We are in a disastrous state, and only God can possibly set things straight.
That same disaster of the falling away from faith - the "crisis of modernism"; the Church's fourth great crisis - is what has led to the corruption of the visible hierarchy of the Church. Clerical sexual abuse and avaricious corruption is a result of the watering down of the faith. The Church must come to rediscover Her own traditions, and revive them, doing away with the sickness of the post-50s ideology.
Those guilty of such corruption ought to be reprimanded gravely, and those who would abuse their position of trusted authority to take from the young their innocence and purity - not to mention their trust in the Church - ought to suffer in the extreme. That said, the Church is not what you see; the Church is the community of Christians throughout the world, subject to the visible element of shepherds. The corruption within the ecclesiastical body of the contemporary Church (which is thorough, but not complete) has completely no impact upon the fact that the Catholic Church is the one founded by Christ - that Her teachings are His own - and that all outside of Her can never enter unto salvation.
There is no such thing as a Christian who exists outside of the Catholic Church, and there is absolutely no salvation outside of the Church. Ergo, you are not a Christian, and if you were to die, you would never be saved, by virtue of existing outside of the Church.
I strongly dislike the person of our Holy Father, Pope Francis, as well as all the post-concilliar popes and the destruction that they have wrought through the propagation of the abominable pastoral changes introduced in the Second Vatican Council. It has led to the decimation of the Church; its priests, its religious, and its laypeople. Those who recognise themselves as Catholic rarely understand the faith. We are in a disastrous state, and only God can possibly set things straight.
That same disaster of the falling away from faith - the "crisis of modernism"; the Church's fourth great crisis - is what has led to the corruption of the visible hierarchy of the Church. Clerical sexual abuse and avaricious corruption is a result of the watering down of the faith. The Church must come to rediscover Her own traditions, and revive them, doing away with the sickness of the post-50s ideology.
Those guilty of such corruption ought to be reprimanded gravely, and those who would abuse their position of trusted authority to take from the young their innocence and purity - not to mention their trust in the Church - ought to suffer in the extreme. That said, the Church is not what you see; the Church is the community of Christians throughout the world, subject to the visible element of shepherds. The corruption within the ecclesiastical body of the contemporary Church (which is thorough, but not complete) has completely no impact upon the fact that the Catholic Church is the one founded by Christ - that Her teachings are His own - and that all outside of Her can never enter unto salvation.
There is no such thing as a Christian who exists outside of the Catholic Church, and there is absolutely no salvation outside of the Church. Ergo, you are not a Christian, and if you were to die, you would never be saved, by virtue of existing outside of the Church.
Katzpur
Not your average Mormon
Well, fortunately for people like me, it's God who gets to decide and not the Catholic Church.
As one of my all-time favorite Catholics, Mother Teresa once said, "For you see, in the end, it is between you and God. It never was between you and them anyway."