lol. Good luck, Bryan. You're going need those wheels for all the back-pedaling you'll be doing.
Posted on 03/31/2011 11:41:49 PM PDT by GonzoII
Dear friends,
I know this may come as a shock to many of you; I am in shock in a way my self. I have spent the past 23 years living my life for Christ always wanting to serve Him and know His truth.
I have been a member of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church for almost 10 years as I was so inspired by the liturgy and reverence I found there. I have also been in a constant journey for God’s truth, studying His Word as well as church history. After many, many years of resisting a calling that I tried to suppress I have finally felt the peace of God with my decision to join the Catholic Church.
I know that many of you will be confused, even concerned for me. I know that you will have many questions and even be tempted to try and dissuade me from this decision. While I will most certainly talk to you about what God is doing here, I will not be entering into any debates about this right now.
I want to let you know this is not made lightly; I fought against this for years. There are several things that led me to search and finally choose to go back to the Church. I will share a few things in brief here and would love to sit down in person some time with you if you want to peacefully discuss them in more detail.
Church authority: There are simply thousands and thousands of denominations and every time someone disagrees with another teaching of their church they simply start a new one. The Catholic Church has had it’s teaching since the beginning of the Church in the scriptures. There is no way God can be happy with thousands of denominations or so-called non-denominational churches. It seems that when people disagree on doctrine it often results in another break off church. The fact is that current Christian teaching can differ so much between two churches that it really constitutes different religions and different Gods. There must be one established truth that God gave us, one that has remained from the time of Christ.
Pro-life and Contraception: There is only one church that has been consistent from the time of Christ to today on the teaching of pro—life and contraception. Before 1930 there was never a single Christian church in history to accept any form of contraception and today there is only one that absolutely has kept this Christian teaching and truth.
Communion or the Eucharist: I have always believed that communion was more that just a symbol and in looking back at early church teaching it is crystal clear that this was taught from day one. St Ignatius of Antioch a student of John the Apostle taught on this and clarified it well.
These are just a few of the things that drew me back into the Catholic Church; however there is so much more. I was baptized Catholic as a child so the process is not as complicated for me. I will be starting RCIA classes and working towards confirmation.
I am asking my friends to pray for my family’s journey and me as I truly seek to be closer to Christ. My relationship with Christ is the most important thing in my life and I hope my friends will stand by me, as I grow closer to Him.
As for the work of Stand True; it will remain focused on educating, activating and equipping young to stand up for life and Christ. We have always been an organization that reaches out to and works with all Christians and we will remain true to that.
For Christ I stand, Bryan Kemper
bryankemper@standtrue.com
http://www.bryankemper.com
http://www.facebook.com/iambryankemper
http://www.twitter.com/bryankemper
Thank you. I opted for non-denominational because it stays truer to the Bible than any Religion. While the Bible only mentions "Christian a few times, it serves the purpose of definition for those who understand/believe that Christ is the Savior.
While I do not believe in religions, I do not condemn them because they do help many discover Christ, but there are over 33,000 sects of Christianity and no two have all the same beliefs - it takes scholarly theologians to "explain" the nuances. If it was supposed to take that kind of brain power to be saved, then the Bible is relegated to kindling. The information in the Bible is sufficient to explain the path to Heaven and does not require any more. All else is for personal satisfaction and does little to assist "the man on the street" to find Christ in his heart.
God Bless
The process really isn’t that long or that difficult. As a matter of fact, placed in its proper perspective, the process itself is a growth in grace and the joy that accompanies that. I balked for some time at entering a 6 year formation process for the permanent diaconate. I am now completing the fourth year and am finding that the process is more important than the end except maybe for the graces that will accompany ordination. As a matter of fact, I sometimes start to wonder if I will miss this after ordination. In a similar way, RCIA can be viewed as a process that brings all its own rewards regardless of its end.
6 years?! Yes, it takes commitment to join and even more to complete.
Welcome home brother.
You are in my prayers.
hmm... well, as long as you believe in Jesus Christ as Lord, God & Savior, true God from true God, begotten not made, of one being with the Father, who with the Father and Son is our One God, that’s good enough for this Catholic to hold you as a Christian brother
Jesus IS Lord and Savior and He did step down to earth to cement our personal relationship with God as the Old Testament prophets said would happen. His loving sacrifice makes worthy sainst of those who accept Him into their hearts and He forgives our wickedness and recognizes our sins no more. God IS good and faithful.
I am your brother in Christ and hold no animosity for any Christian religion because I also recognize that the Catholic Church has done more to bring sinners to Christ than any other religion. I would posit that if it were not for the Catholic Church, non-denomiational churches, such as I associate with, would not be the same purveyors of His Word as is laid out in the Bible. I am a believer that when Jesus told us to "resist not evil", He was telling us not to worry ourselves with the ways of the world, and that His purpose for telling us was the same as when God would tell those He had plans for that He would be their rearguard - our job is to carry His Word and He will handle what the Evil One sows because He is the only One with the power to do so.
Have a Blessed day!
FR needs a ‘Like’ button.
And if you can’t do 15 minutes, do ten. If you can’t do ten, do five. God is in the business of growing mustard seeds — and how much time does it take to say,”Lord, I give you my heart for your home.”
Luke 15, my friend. The whole chapter; let us look at the concluding verse:
32: But now we must celebrate and rejoice, because your brother was dead and has come to life again; he was lost and has been found.’”
Scripture and history convinced me that many claims of Rome are false. The yoke of Marian dogma, Papal claims, purgatory, etc... were not placed on the early church. The Most important thing, however is if a Church preaches the True Saving Gospel. John 3:16.
Acts 16:30 “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” 31 They replied, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved. God sent His Son, to die in the place of sinners (taking our punishment) to give us the free gift of eternal life though Faith in His Son and His work on the Cross and Resurrection. After true regeneration has taken place through belief, the Christian WANTS to obey in thanks, Love and obedience for the savior, The Lover of their souls!
Certainly, there are many Roman Catholics who are truly regenerated and Love the Lord, but it is in spite of Roman churches teaching.
It depends on the situation BUT if the reason is that you believe in its Theology because it is the TRUTH then lowering the bar is not that important.
That being said my parish priest allowed my wife to baptize her mom who was gravely sick in another state.
Let’s be clear and precise. From our POV, if you are validly baptized you have already joined the Catholic Church. This is just a matter of gathering your strength to take (and endure) another step further into Christ.
I have been a helper in RCIA for several years now. Some who enter the class come in burning brightly. What they need is for the embers to be re-arranged, for the draft to be adjusted. The fire it there, but to get the best burn, some changes need to be made.
Others come in, and I see no spark there at all. I deduce one only because they keep coming back. For them it’s a matter of blowing on the flames hard enough to make things glow but not so hard that the flame is extinguished.
Some come in and leap from height to height, never looking back; their feet like hind’s feet they dance secure in the high places. Others plod in, and continue to plod. And some seem to fall away almost instantly.
Two things seem to apply. First: we are talking about a body with members. The call to enter further in essentially involves the members, even those who have the effrontery to disagree with me or the blindness to fail to perceive my splendid and tender spirituality or my intellectual brilliance. (I know that’s hard to believe ...)
To love the Lord is to love his body. It’s hard to imagine loving a body without spending some time with it, bumping up against it.
Second, to will, to choose is not done once, but all along. I choose today, right now, to give this verbosity and all my live to IHS. RCIA and all the monkey-business gives you a dojo, a practice floor, a place to train in willing to join, in choosing to be a member.
One reason the prince has to hack through the thorns to get to sleeping beauty is so that HE may learn how much he loves her. We hope to be of some service as the ‘habit’ of the virtue in faith grows.
The difference is that in this case, when the prince kisses the princess, we also, the thorns, have learned more about how much we love her.
I'm sorry, but by that statement, the conclusion is automatically that the "Church of Rome" is "darkness." That couldn't be further from the truth.
I left Protestantism for Catholicism, you went the other way. It seems to be a two way street. The fact of traffic provides little help in discerning which way we should go. And we already knew that people are going both ways
You’re the one who brought it up. Not me.
It was THE CHURCH (PRIESTS of the Catholic Church) that carried out that inquisition and burned, killed and drove the Huguenots (Protestants) out of France - NOT the French kings. My Maupin ancestors were driven from France to Holland to England, from can to can’t by the RCC. - The RCC has blood on its hands, in the name of Christ. - Does not compute. - As for your comment; asinine. - I do pray for all.
What?
What did I bring up?
Did you think my post was a criticism of you? You did see, I hope, that bkaycee was the primary addressee, didn't you? So HAD I been criticizing anyone it would have been he, not you.
But I wasn't criticizing anybody. The OP was a kind of a testimony or something concerning conversion. bkaycee posted His testimony. Since I thinka lot about what arguments can and can't accomplish, I was offering the conjecture that testimonies of this kind don't have much useful to them unless they include propositions which can be argued. -- neither the OP not bkaycee's post, while they are both interesting, and I am happy to read them, move the ball downfield one way or another as far as I can tell.
So what is it that I brought up and why does it matter?
Does anybody dispute this?
Lacking dispute, though there might be some disagreement about details, isn't the next question, "What can REASONABLY be concluded from that fact?"
We do not dispute that there have been atrocities done in the name of the Church. We just do not see the relevance. We are not surprised. The first Pope (as we think of him) denied Jesus.
So what do you make of all this? I have ancestors on both sides of most conflicts and injustices in the History of the west. what difference doe or should that make?
Does anybody dispute this?
Lacking dispute, though there might be some disagreement about details, isn't the next question, "What can REASONABLY be concluded from that fact?"
We do not dispute that there have been atrocities done in the name of the Church. We just do not see the relevance. We are not surprised. The first Pope (as we think of him) denied Jesus.
So what do you make of all this? I have ancestors on both sides of most conflicts and injustices in the History of the west. what difference does or should that make?
lol. We’ve seen these “conversion” stories before.
And often they’re from phantoms. Make-up names and made-up conversions.
Who cares? Scripture is true and any move toward Rome is a move away from God’s word.
lol. Good luck, Bryan. You're going need those wheels for all the back-pedaling you'll be doing.
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