Posted on 12/05/2011 8:58:43 AM PST by Salvation
Gary Zimak is the founder of Following The Truth Ministries (http://www.followingthetruth.com), a lay apostolate created to assist Catholics in learning more about their Faith. He is a regular guest on EWTN Radios Son Rise Morning Show, Ave Maria Radios Catholic Connection with Teresa Tomeo and appears frequently on several other Catholic radio programs. In addition to writing for CatholicLane. Mr. Zimak hosts a daily program on BlogTalkRadio and posts frequently on his blog, Facebook and Twitter. He is a member of Catholics United For The Faith and the Knights of Columbus and resides in New Jersey.
I appreciate all of you for NOT “watering down” Catholicism on FR. People always need to know the truth.
Blessings in this second week of Advent.
Fluffy theology, you say?
While Catholics believe the Bible is inspired by the Holy Spirit and that it is true, one cannot take individual biblical quotes or passages and say each one is literally true, Pope Benedict XVI said........In his message, the Pope said clearer explanations about the Catholic position on the divine inspiration and truth of the Bible were important because some people seem to treat the Scriptures simply as literature, while others believe that each line was dictated by the Holy Spirit and is literally true. Neither position is Catholic, the Pope said.
-- from the thread How to Read the Bible as a Catholic
...while fewer believers know much about the Bible, one-third of Americans continue to believe that it is literally true, something organizers of the Synod on the Word of God called a dangerous form of fundamentalism that is winning more and more adherents even among Catholics. Such literalism, the synods preparatory document said, demands an unshakable adherence to rigid doctrinal points of view and imposes, as the only source of teaching for Christian life and salvation, a reading of the Bible which rejects all questioning and any kind of critical research....
-- from the thread A Literate Church: The state of Catholic Bible study today
Not much has changed with human nature in 2000 years, has it?Our task is to TRY.
Fluffy theology, you say?
Is the following Biblical Quote true: "Then Jesus said to them: "Amen, amen, I say unto you: unless you eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood, you shall not have life in you. He that eats my flesh and drinks my blood has everlasting life, and I will raise him up in the last day. For my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed. He that eats my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him. As the living Father has sent me and I live by the Father: so he that eats me, the same also shall live by me. "
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Thank you for the ping, Salvation. Blessings to you also.
Like the myth of the bodily assumption of Mary and that she is now the queen of heaven?
Although I vehemently disagree with you that your examples prove your point, I do agree that watered down theology has lost us at least as many Catholics as authoritarianism. All that Kumbaya handholding crap turns people off and appeals to a lukewarm faith. People are going to go looking for the Truth.
“Then Jesus said to them: “Amen, amen, I say unto you: unless you eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood, you shall not have life in you. He that eats my flesh and drinks my blood has everlasting life, and I will raise him up in the last day. For my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed. He that eats my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him. As the living Father has sent me and I live by the Father: so he that eats me, the same also shall live by me. “
Communion, and this happens at every Catholic mass.
What was my point?
Good piece. Thanks for the ping.
I have often wondered just how many fallen away Catholics left because the truth was watered down so much.
AMEN!
good post. I’ve been unhappy with my Church since the seventies for pandering to the squishy mainstream. Most American parishes embraced lousy pop music, hand holding and creepy liturgical dancing. This, I believe, sends more Catholics away than some poorly-defined dissatisfaction with “old” dogma. The only hope for the Church is a return to Truth, modern “correctness” be damned. There are over 1,000 Protestant denominations, world-wide they total about equal the RCC... so if anyone has a problem with the hard line taken by the RCC, let them go join one of them. See ya, hate t’be ya!
I know many recent converts, and I also know MANY drifting Catholics and from what I see, historical SOLID unchanging morality is the attraction, not the deterrent... of my Church. Protestant-style Catholic parishes that embrace “modernity and reaching out” are the problem and not the solution.
Myth?
Tell me, please, where is her body buried then?
It has never been found.
It would seem that these new translations are bringing them back.
While Catholics believe the Bible is inspired by the Holy Spirit and that it is true, one cannot take individual biblical quotes or passages and say each one is literally true, Pope Benedict XVI said....
Why do we see more and more techniques of the Left here among those claiming to be conservative? Taking a quote, tearing it from context, and then using the damaged remainder for shock value and to imply horrible errors is definitely not something real conservatives would do. But, it is very popular among liberals.
It is also, and perhaps ironically, precisely the kind of thing the Holy Father was decrying in the comments from which you quoted. Just as you take one phrase and insist it is a literal truth all to itself, regardless of any original context, he warns against unwisely ripping one sentence or passage from scripture and trying to use it apart from anything which surrounds it. It is incorrect both intellectually and theologically.
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