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To: NYer

I didn’t become a Catholic until three and a half years ago. 17 years prior to becoming a Catholic I had become a Christian but did not identify with any particular church. I have been through a lot of different world views in my life including atheism, pantheism, Theosophy, and spiritualism. None of them can hold a candle to the completeness of Catholicism, although all of them were interesting in their own way. I cannot see myself ever leaving the Catholic Church because I would not know where to go.

The world can kiss my Catholic arse.


13 posted on 02/14/2016 4:03:35 PM PST by HerrBlucher (Abortion is murder)
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To: HerrBlucher

Der weld according to “KMA” mohammet doesn’t care whether you are catholic or lutheran.... they don’t even have words for that, fellow infidel.

Obama and the OIC’s “UN” all apart of the same agenda and viewpoint.


15 posted on 02/14/2016 4:23:59 PM PST by himno hero (hadnuff)
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To: HerrBlucher

Your journey sounds like mine.


18 posted on 02/14/2016 4:29:26 PM PST by Catmom (We're all gonna get the punishment only some of us deserve.)
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To: HerrBlucher

Good for you,Herr!Good to see your name again.


19 posted on 02/14/2016 4:36:44 PM PST by georgia peach (georgia peach)
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To: HerrBlucher; Catmom
I have been through a lot of different world views in my life including atheism, pantheism, Theosophy, and spiritualism.

Your journey brought to mind the homily, delivered by (then) Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, in his capacity as Dean of the College of Cardinals, at the mass celebrated before they were sequestered in conclave to elect the next pope. April 18, 2005.

Reflecting on Ephesians 4:14, he said:

How many winds of doctrine have we known in recent decades, how many ideological currents, how many ways of thinking. The small boat of the thought of many Christians has often been tossed about by these waves - flung from one extreme to another: from Marxism to liberalism, even to libertinism; from collectivism to radical individualism; from atheism to a vague religious mysticism; from agnosticism to syncretism and so forth. Every day new sects spring up, and what St Paul says about human deception and the trickery that strives to entice people into error (cf. Eph 4: 14) comes true.

Today, having a clear faith based on the Creed of the Church is often labeled as fundamentalism. Whereas relativism, that is, letting oneself be "tossed here and there, carried about by every wind of doctrine", seems the only attitude that can cope with modern times. We are building a dictatorship of relativism that does not recognize anything as definitive and whose ultimate goal consists solely of one's own ego and desires.

We, however, have a different goal: the Son of God, the true man. He is the measure of true humanism. An "adult" faith is not a faith that follows the trends of fashion and the latest novelty; a mature adult faith is deeply rooted in friendship with Christ. It is this friendship that opens us up to all that is good and gives us a criterion by which to distinguish the true from the false, and deceipt from truth.

We must develop this adult faith; we must guide the flock of Christ to this faith. And it is this faith - only faith - that creates unity and is fulfilled in love.

You can read the homily, in its entirety HERE.

Pope Benedict XVI is a brillian theologian. One can draw so much inspiration from his writings, including his homilies.

21 posted on 02/14/2016 4:45:03 PM PST by NYer (Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy them. Mt 6:19)
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To: HerrBlucher
. None of them can hold a candle to the completeness of Catholicism,

Actually, as a former weekly RC, i can attest that few can t hold a candle to her level of deformation of the NT church.

Which church, as manifested in Scripture,

1. Was not based upon the premise of ensured perpetual magisterial infallibility of office as per Rome, which has presumed to infallibly declare that she is and will perpetually be infallible whenever she speaks in accordance with her infallibly defined (scope and subject-based) formula, which renders her declaration that she is infallible, to be infallible, as well as all else she accordingly declares.

2. Never promised or taught ensured perpetual magisterial infallibility was essential for preservation of truth, including writings to be discerned and established as Scripture, and for assurance of faith, and that historical descent as the stewards of Scripture means that such possessed ensured infallibility.

3. Never was a church that manifested the Lord's supper as being the central means of grace, around which all else revolved, it being “the source and summit of the Christian faith” in which “the work of our redemption is accomplished,” by which one received spiritual life in themselves by consuming human flesh, so that without which eating one cannot have eternal life (as per RC literalism, of Jn. 6:53,54). In contrast to believing the gospel by which one is regenerated, (Acts 10:43-47; 15:7-9; Eph. 1:13) and desiring the milk (1Pt. 2:2) and then the “strong meat” (Heb. 5:12-14) of the word of God, being “nourished” (1Tim. 4:6) by hearing the word of God and letting it dwell in them, (Col. 3:16) by which word (Scriptures) man is to live by, (Mt. 4:4) as Christ lived by the Father, (Jn. 6:57) doing His will being His “meat.” (Jn. 4:34) And with the Lord's supper, which is only manifestly described once in the life of the church, focusing on the church being the body of Christ in showing the Lord sacrificial death by that communal meal.

4. Never had any pastors titled "priests" as they did not engage in any unique sacrificial function, that of turning bread into human flesh and dispensing it to the people, or even dispensing bread as their primary ordained function, versus preaching the word. (2Tim. 4:2)

5. Never differentiated between bishops and elders, and with grand titles ("Most Reverend Eminence," “Very Reverend,” “Most Illustrious and Most Reverend Lord,” “His Eminence Cardinal,” “The Most Reverend the Archbishop,” etc.) or made themselves distinct by their ostentatious pompous garb. (Matthew 23:5-7) Or were all to be formally called “father” as that would require them to be spiritual fathers to all (Mt. 23:8-10 is a form of hyperbole, reproving the love of titles such as Catholicism examples, and “thinking of men above that which is written, and instead the Lord emphasizes the One Father of all who are born of the Spirit, whom He Himself worked to glorify).

6. Never required clerical celibacy as the norm, (1Tim. 3:17) which presumes all such have that gift, (1Cor. 7:7) or otherwise manifested that celibacy was the norm among apostles and pastors, or had vowed to be so. (1Cor. 9:4; Titus 1:5,6)

7. Never taught that Peter was the "rock" of Mt. 16:18 upon which the church is built, interpreting Mt. 16:18, rather than upon the rock of the faith confessed by Peter, thus Christ Himself. (For in contrast to Peter, that the LORD Jesus is the Rock (“petra”) or "stone" (“lithos,” and which denotes a large rock in Mk. 16:4) upon which the church is built is one of the most abundantly confirmed doctrines in the Bible (petra: Rm. 9:33; 1Cor. 10:4; 1Pet. 2:8; cf. Lk. 6:48; 1Cor. 3:11; lithos: Mat. 21:42; Mk.12:10-11; Lk. 20:17-18; Act. 4:11; Rm. 9:33; Eph. 2:20; cf. Dt. 32:4, Is. 28:16) including by Peter himself. (1Pt. 2:4-8) Rome's current catechism attempts to have Peter himself as the rock as well, but also affirms: “On the rock of this faith confessed by St Peter, Christ build his Church,” (pt. 1, sec. 2, cp. 2, para. 424) which understanding some of the so-called “church fathers” concur with.)

8. Never taught or exampled that all the churches were to look to Peter as the bishop of Rome, as the first of a line of supreme heads reigning over all the churches, and having the last word in questions affecting the whole Church.

9. Never recorded or taught any apostolic successors (like for James: Acts 12:1,2) after Judas who was to maintain the original 12: Rv. 21:14) or elected any apostolic successors by voting, versus casting lots (no politics). (Acts 1:15ff)

10. Never recorded or manifested (not by conjecture) sprinkling or baptism without repentant personal faith, that being the stated requirement for baptism. (Acts 2:38; 8:36-38)

11. Never preached a gospel of salvation which begins with becoming good enough inside (formally justified due to infused interior charity), via sprinkling (RC "baptism") in recognition of proxy faith, and which thus usually ends with becoming good enough again to enter Heaven via suffering in purgatory, commencing at death.

12. Never supported or made laws that restricted personal reading of Scripture by laity (contrary to Chrysostom), if able and available, sometimes even outlawing it when it was.

13. Never used the sword of men to deal with its theological dissenters.

14. Never taught that the deity Muslims worship (who is not as an "unknown god") is the same as theirs.

15. Never had a separate class of believers called “saints.”

16. Never prayed to anyone in Heaven but the Lord, or were instructed to (i.e. "our Mother who art in Heaven") who were able to hear and respond to virtually unlimited prayers addressed to them (a uniquely Divine attribute in Scripture).

17. Never recorded a women who never sinned, and was a perpetual virgin despite being married (contrary to the normal description of marriage, as in leaving and sexually cleaving) and who would be bodily assumed to Heaven and exalted (officially or with implicit sanction) as

an almost almighty demigoddess to whom "Jesus owes His Precious Blood" to,

whose [Mary] merits we are saved by,

who "had to suffer, as He did, all the consequences of sin,"

and was bodily assumed into Heaven, which is a fact (unsubstantiated in Scripture or even early Tradition) because the Roman church says it is, and "was elevated to a certain affinity with the Heavenly Father,"

and whose power now "is all but unlimited,"

for indeed she "seems to have the same power as God,"

"surpassing in power all the angels and saints in Heaven,"

so that "the Holy Spirit acts only by the Most Blessed Virgin, his Spouse."

and that “sometimes salvation is quicker if we remember Mary's name then if we invoked the name of the Lord Jesus,"

for indeed saints have "but one advocate," and that is Mary, who "alone art truly loving and solicitous for our salvation,"

Moreover, "there is no grace which Mary cannot dispose of as her own, which is not given to her for this purpose,"

and who has "authority over the angels and the blessed in heaven,"

including "assigning to saints the thrones made vacant by the apostate angels,"

whom the good angels "unceasingly call out to," greeting her "countless times each day with 'Hail, Mary,' while prostrating themselves before her, begging her as a favour to honour them with one of her requests,"

and who (obviously) cannot "be honored to excess,"

and who is (obviously) the glory of Catholic people, whose "honor and dignity surpass the whole of creation." Sources and more.

45 posted on 02/14/2016 9:12:02 PM PST by daniel1212 ( Turn to the Lord Jesus as a damned and destitute sinner+ trust Him to save you, then follow Him!)
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