“I’m just trying to understand the argument here .....”
It’s obvious, these “goddess folk” are all about “the I, the me, the we and the us”. No doctrine is sacred. No tradition is below their contempt. I would expect that Catholics, Protestants and all people of faith would be united in opposition to such nonsense. Certainly, while I may not agree with doctrine of other denominations I would be supportive of our Christian brothers and sisters in opposing attacks on the things that they hold dear by a group of secular humanist wackjobs parading as mainline Lutherans. It’s the right thing to do.
As for the foodfight, I don’t worry about such things anymore. I used to be THE defender of the Faith until it became apparent to me that the folks with whom I constantly seemed to be defending the Faith from wanted little or nothing to do with my apologia. There are many Evangelicals out there with whom we can stand shoulder to shoulder with, sharing the things that we have in common regarding our faith in Christ. It’s just that they’ll go unnoticed because they simply don’t get all bent out of shape over the Blessed Mother, the Saints or the “one Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church.”
Often, pride is at the core of such discussions, in which matters of faith are turned into “gotchas” and “scoring points”. At times, when I spoke out in defense of the Universal Church it had more to do with me proving something to myself than it had to do with sharing my faith with others, in retrospect I was at fault.
On the other side, a good many of the folk who sought to undermine my spiritual journey were simply using the format of discussion to shore up their own wayward arguments; more than a few would be revealed as bitter ex-Catholics with an ax to grind or a chip on the shoulder. It seems like I could only ever be drawn out into ferry little, blood pressure raising exchanges with such people. I don’t bother anymore.
Is it good to engage? Sure. When open hearts and minds are speaking truth with love, at other times one might feel that they were responding to some providential calling, possibly to be “the messenger” for others. If it's right, you’ll know when this is.
Peace.
Times have changed. We are a far graver problem than pagans pretending to be Christians. WE are so terrible a problem that we MUST be mocked, and no attempt to understand what we truly think must be made because it's like we're infectious. Roosevelt allied with Stalin to stop Hitler. This chunk of our FR separated brethren would, in the same situation, blame Stalin on Hitler and ally with Hitler to wipe out Stalin. They think we are the focus of evil in the modern world.
Often, pride is at the core of such discussions, in which matters of faith are turned into “gotchas” and “scoring points”. At times, when I spoke out in defense of the Universal Church it had more to do with me proving something to myself than it had to do with sharing my faith with others, in retrospect I was at fault.
Yep! that's the tragedy. They force the conversation there. They cannot suppress their disdain and disgust for us, and feel morally obliged to repeat, over and over again, repetitiously, and possibly even redundantly, that trusting God's promise to the Church could be hazardous to our Spiritual health. The use of mocking terms is a bonus.
Peace.
They are not interested in peace. We are an evil so great that we simply must be repudiated at every opportunity, and others warned against it.
Of course, all in a spirit of brotherhood ....