Posted on 09/06/2009 3:50:15 PM PDT by NYer
And in a big way. A lot of you have seen the great ads produced by a group called Catholics Come Home. The ads, evidently, are working. And spreading.
From the Los Angeles Times:
The Roman Catholic Diocese of Sacramento is home to nearly 1 million Catholics. On a typical Sunday, less than 137,000 can be found in church.Curious to see what all the fuss is about? Check out the videos below. And you can find more at the Catholics Come Home link.
Now, using a strategy straight from the secular playbook, its leaders hope to lure back those who have drifted.
The diocese and nearly a dozen others across the country are preparing to air several thousand prime-time TV commercials in English and Spanish, inviting inactive Catholics to return to their religious roots.
In addition to Sacramento, dioceses in Chicago, Omaha, Providence, R.I., and four other cities will launch the “Catholics Come Home” advertising blitz during Advent, the period before Christmas.
Four more dioceses will follow during Lent next spring. Los Angeles is not among the initial group but could be part of a nationwide campaign slated for December 2010.
"I'm hoping that a significant number of people will give us another look," Sacramento Bishop Jaime Soto said of the campaign. "Many Catholics have a sense of believing but not always a sense of belonging."
The potential audience is huge.
Only about one-quarter of U.S. Catholics say they attend Mass every week, and a majority go to religious services a few times a year or less, according to the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate at Georgetown University, which conducts social science research about the Catholic church.
Researchers there also found that two-thirds of Catholics believe they can be good members of their faith without attending Mass regularly.
Inactive Catholics cite a number of reasons for their absence. Many do not believe that missing Mass is a sin, the center reported. Others say they are too busy with family or work, or, as other analysts point out, are more interested in material happiness than spiritual fulfillment.
"There is a strange pattern of people who aren't practicing but still have beliefs and pick up parts of the faith," said Mark Gray, a research associate with the center. "They may give up meat on Fridays during Lent or attend Ash Wednesday services."
Whatever the Catholic Church officially "does," most Catholics (yourself included) certainly do.
You are conflating non-literal interpretation with a declaration of errors.
So you are saying Genesis is absolutely free of any kind of error whatsoever--historical and scientific as well as "theological?"
You are accepting the twenty generations listed in Genesis 5 and Genesis 11 as literal history, including the lifespans?
BTW, regardless of what Dr. Schroeder may believe, six days and fifteen billion years are not the same thing. If the universe was formed supernaturally over six days, then it cannot have been formed naturally over fifteen billion years.
You Catholics sure do think evolution is important. Why don't you add it to the Creed? It would have kept people like me from making a terrible mistake.
The Catholic Church interprets some portions of the Old Testament in non-literal terms. The days in Genesis, for instance, probably represent individual phases of creation rather than literal 24 hour periods.
You do a lot of crowing about how that somehow means the Catholic Church rejects portions of the Old Testament.
Yet I’m pretty sure you reject ALL of the New Testament.
The irony is creamy and delicious, like a fine mousse au chocolat.
Given your rather pronounced hostility towards Catholics and the Catholic Church, I reject your assessment out of hand.
If the universe was formed supernaturally over fifteen billion years and God in His wisdom chose to refer to the time as six days, then that is what He did.
Yeah, especially the messianic prophecies.
The days in Genesis, for instance, probably represent individual phases of creation rather than literal 24 hour periods.
And we know this because "science" tells us that the formation of the world came about purely naturally, and thus took zillions and zillions of years. Therefore, since Genesis contradicts "science," it doesn't mean what it says. However, if a scientist very logically concludes that the "consecrated host" isn't literally the flesh and blood of J*sus, Catholics have tantrum. Why is it "science" may sit in judgment on Jewish scriptures but not chr*stian ones?
You do a lot of crowing about how that somehow means the Catholic Church rejects portions of the Old Testament.
And it has decided that Darwin and Wellhausen are authoritative on these matters and chosen to follow them.
Yet I’m pretty sure you reject ALL of the New Testament.
The irony is creamy and delicious, like a fine mousse au chocolat.
Not really, since I don't claim to honor the "new testament" as scripture. You claim to recognize Genesis as scripture, yet allow "science" to sit in judgment on it. Yet you refuse to let science sit in judgment on your "new testament!" Seems to me the irony is all on your part.
ZC,
You wrote:
“Pinging your good buddy vladimir998 for when he gets back (he’s no wideawake, but I don’t think he’s as big a fan of Charles Darwin as you are).”
ZC, I’m not a wideawake, but I’m not sure what you think that means. As I have gotten older, and studied more, I came to hold an increasingly more literal view of Genesis 1-11. That doesn’t mean that Petronski and I must be cast as enemies of one another. Not at all. I learned a long time ago, that this issue must - eventually - be definitively defined by the Church before the issue will be commonly understood by Catholics. I might politely argue with Petronski on the issue, but I never go looking for such an argument. Until the issue is definitively defined we’re simply at a full stop.
I have a friend, a convert to the Catholic faith, who takes Genesis 1-11 literally as I do. He is, however, making the mistake of saying that the Church defined the issue when I know it hasn’t. He is in a leadership position in a local parish (no, he’s not an ordained man) and may eventually turn people off with his insistance on this issue. It’s a pity all around.
I like seeing posters such as yourself post often and in close order.
That's when the true heart shows itself.
However, if a scientist very logically concludes that the "consecrated host" isn't literally the flesh and blood of Jesus, Catholics have tantrum.
When was that? Got a link?
1)The entire purpose of fifteen billion years is to give the universe time to form naturally, without any Divine "interference." Notice no one ever allegorizes the six days to six centuries or six seconds? It's always the exact amount of time it would take for the universe to form "naturally."
2)I guess J*sus didn't really turn the bread and wine into his flesh and blood but just put it that way.
That's an amazingly meaningless statement, since I am not a fan of Charles Darwin, not even a small one.
Why, because he gave attributing error to G-d a bad name?
Vlad is more literal than you. Let's put it that way.
That would be absurd, since science--a gift from God--strongly suggests it was billions of years.
I guess Jesus didn't really turn the bread and wine into his flesh and blood but just put it that way.
You guess wrong. Then again, you reject the New Testament, so why would you guess right?
Did "attributing error to God" (as you define it) ever have a good name?
Yes, that's how long it would have taken if the universe had formed naturally and had always functioned exactly as it does now. But why should you believe this?
I guess Jesus didn't really turn the bread and wine into his flesh and blood but just put it that way.
You guess wrong. Then again, you reject the New Testament, so why would you guess right?
Science (a gift from G-d) strongly suggests that stuff like that just doesn't happen. If the laws of nature are so absolute that they governed the formation of the universe, they certainly govern how it functions.
Then again, you reject the New Testament in toto.
I understand your point. Maybe I shouldn’t care what former Roman Catholics do; however, as someone that does care about Christianity in general, what one denomination does often affects more than that denomination. Whether we like it or not, we are in the same boat. I also know that the Roman Catholic Church, because of its size, it often the target of all those that hate Christianity.
Science (a gift from God) strongly suggests that stuff like that just doesn't happen.
Then again, you reject the New Testament in toto.
Exactly. If I accepted the "new testament," I'd accept all of it, not just the parts that don't offend "science." I'd have no quarrel with you if you'd disavow Genesis as scripture, but you attribute it to G-d and then insist it is full of historical and scientific errors.
BTW, your hypocrisy and inconsistency as to when you will listen to "science" and when you will not is what led that crazy guy in Minnesota to do what he did.
“And I will point out yet again that, from a Sola Scriptura basis, the evidence of sola Scriptura is non-existent. “
Not true. However, if you ignore the verses that show it, then you can claim anything.
PSS-Referring to the Catechism-””Catechism 841:
The Church’s relationship with the Muslims. “The plan of salvation also includes those who acknowledge the Creator, in the first place amongst whom are the Muslims; these profess to hold the faith of Abraham, and together with us they adore the one, merciful God, mankind’s judge on the last day.”
Tell me how this does not say that Muslims who simply acknowledge the Creator will be saved.””
This only has to do with the ignorant who accept a merciful God and who love unconditionally,not the radical muslims who reject Christ.You’re not reading the entire section of the Catechism.
Like this part....
848 “Although in ways known to himself God can lead those who, through no fault of their own, are ignorant of the Gospel, to that faith without which it is impossible to please him, the Church still has the obligation and also the sacred right to evangelize all men.”
God is merciful! He does not condemn people to life without Him in Hell because they didn’t hear the Bible being read to them. According to this “logic”, every Old Testament figure is in hell. Every person in the Western Hemisphere up until 1500 is in hell. Every person in lower Africa and Asia is in hell until missionaries went there, in some cases, into the 1800’s. The Holy Spirit blows where HE wills, not where PSS says He blows. The Holy Spirit has written His law on everyone’s heart. The Gospel preached makes this law come more alive for us. But when a person loves, He has Christ abiding within him.
I have a question for you now ,Dear Brother?
I recently read an article about a 14 year old muslim girl who was sold into prostitution because her mother owed a loan of about $100.00.
The 14 year old girl said she did not want to be a prostitute but she said she loves her mother regardless of what happened to her and does not want her mother to be punished.
Are you going to say the young girl deserves hell because she is a muslim even if she has never heard about Christ?
Zero. Zed. Nada. Zilch. The Empty Set.
So it is about money?
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