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WHY ARE OUR CATHOLIC LAITY SO ILLITERATE WHEN IT COMES TO THE CATHOLIC FAITH
Southern Orders ^ | May 31, 2013 | Fr. Allan J. McDonald

Posted on 05/31/2013 2:44:05 PM PDT by NYer

WHY ARE OUR CATHOLIC LAITY SO ILLITERATE WHEN IT COMES TO THE CATHOLIC FAITH--BLAME THE TEXT BOOKS, BLAME THE TEACHING METHODS AND BLAME THE PARENTS, BUT BLAME THE BISHOPS, PRIESTS AND CATECHISTS TOO, BLAME EVERYONE INCLUDING SATAN, EXCEPT NO ONE TEACHES ABOUT HIM ANYMORE OTHER THAN POPE FRANCIS, DON'T BLAME HIM!

Do our Catholic children and most adults know what these images teach?

All of us know one of the elephants in the room of the Catholic Church. Our religious education programs are not handing on the essence of our Catholic Faith, our parents are befuddled about their role in handing on the faith and the materials we use are vapid or if good do not make an impression on young minds. We are afraid of asking for memorization and thus most don't remember anything they've learned about God and Church other than some niceties and feel good emotions.

I teach each class of our grades 1-6 (we don't have 7th or 8th) each Thursday, rotating classes from week to week. For the last two years I have used Baltimore Catechism #1 as my text book. It is wonderful to use with children and it is so simple yet has so much content. If Catholics, all Catholics, simply studied Baltimore Catechism #1, we would have very knowledgeable Catholics.

These past two years I've used Baltimore Catechism #2 with our adult religious program which we call Coffee and Conversation following our 9:30 AM Sunday Mass, which coincides with our CCD program which we call PREP (Parish Religious Education Program).

This #2 book has more content and is for middle school, but upper elementary school children must have been more capable of more serious content back when this book was formulated and used through the mid 1960's because it is a great book to use with adults and not childish at all. We all use this same book as a supplemental book for the RCIA because it is so clear, nobly simple and chocked full of content!

Yes, there are some adjustments that need to be made to some chapters, but not that many, in light of Vatican II and the new emphasis we have on certain aspects of Church that are not present in the Baltimore Catechism. But these are really minor.

What is more important though is that when the Baltimore Catechism was used through the mid 1960's it was basically the only book that was used for children in elementary and junior high school. It was used across the board in the USA thus uniting all Catholics in learning the same content. There was not, in other words, a cottage industry of competing publishing houses selling new books and different content each year.

The same thing has occurred with liturgical music, a cottage industry of big bucks has developed around the sale of new hymnals, missalettes and new music put on the open market for parishes to purchase. It is a money making scheme.

Why do our bishop allow this to happen in both liturgical music and parish catechesis? The business of selling stuff to parishes and making mega bucks off of it is a scandal that has not be addressed.

In the meantime, our liturgies suffer and become fragmented because every parish uses a different resource for liturgical music and the same is true of religious formation, everyone uses something different of differing quality or no quality at all.

Isn't it time to wake up and move forward with tried and true practices that were tossed out in favor of a consumerist's approach to our faith that has weakened our liturgies, our parishes and our individual Catholics?


TOPICS: Apologetics; Catholic; Ministry/Outreach; Religion & Culture
KEYWORDS: catechism; catholic; catholicsects; ignorantprotestants; papalpromotion; traditionalcatholic
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To: JCBreckenridge
"Your argument is from silence. You have no direct evidence that Mary sinned."

I have no direct evidence she menstruated, went to the bathroom, drank water or ate her fruits and vegetables either. Your posts have devolved into meaningless chatter.

581 posted on 06/01/2013 7:25:32 AM PDT by BipolarBob (I have sexdaily. Oops, I meant dyslexia.)
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To: JCBreckenridge
What if Jesus kept her from sinning?

And what if Mary when she was reincarnated fought dragons with Harry Potter??? What if???

582 posted on 06/01/2013 7:26:04 AM PDT by Iscool
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To: JCBreckenridge
What if Jesus kept her from sinning?

And what if Mary when she was reincarnated fought dragons with Harry Potter??? What if???

583 posted on 06/01/2013 7:26:45 AM PDT by Iscool
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To: RPTMS
"Only surreal to Southern Baptards."

LOL. At least I haven't lost my sense of humor. I'll take the Bible over your Church traditions any day of the week.

584 posted on 06/01/2013 7:28:21 AM PDT by BipolarBob (I have sexdaily. Oops, I meant dyslexia.)
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To: JCBreckenridge
If Jesus didn’t need Mary to be sinless, then how did he get a sinless human nature.

Jesus did not get a sinless human nature...Read the bible, will ya...

Jesus died...Original sin was on him like it was everyone else...Jesus was tempted and overcame the temptations...

585 posted on 06/01/2013 7:31:57 AM PDT by Iscool
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To: BipolarBob; Natural Law
The Catholic Church did many terrible things in the name of God. Jesus did not authorize it. They (the manmade institutions) did it on their own.

The Church is Christ's bride (Ephesians 5:29) and has "no spot, wrinkle or blemish" (Ephesians 5:27). Christ also stated that the gates of Hell will not prevail against His Church (Matthew 16:18). Individual clergy may commit sins, even popes commit sins because in the Church there are both "weeds and wheat" (Matthew 13:30).

586 posted on 06/01/2013 7:33:09 AM PDT by NYer ( "Run from places of sin as from the plague."--St John Climacus)
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To: JCBreckenridge
If Jesus didn’t need Mary to be sinless, then how did he get a sinless human nature.

Jesus did not get a sinless human nature...Read the bible, will ya...

Jesus died...Original sin was on him like it was everyone else...Jesus was tempted and overcame the temptations...Jesus would have died of old age just as Adam did had he not been murdered...

587 posted on 06/01/2013 7:33:55 AM PDT by Iscool
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To: BipolarBob
I'll take sacred scripture (all of it, even the parts that Luther cut out) and sacred tradition and the magisterium.
588 posted on 06/01/2013 7:34:07 AM PDT by RPTMS
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To: Iscool

“Jesus did not get a sinless human nature...Read the bible, will ya...

Jesus died...Original sin was on him like it was everyone else...Jesus was tempted and overcame the temptations...”

Yes, he did get a sinless human nature. Otherwise he could not serve as the substitutionary sacrifice. He was as Adam was before the fall.


589 posted on 06/01/2013 7:34:33 AM PDT by JCBreckenridge (Texas is a state of mind - Steinbeck)
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To: MeganC
I’m Catholic and your post made me LOL because it’s so true. I finally read the entire New Testament as an adult because I was taking a college course on the history of the Bible. I never read a page of it during all my years in Catechism class.

Other than my Lutheran husband, I may be the only one in my large Catholic family who has read it.

590 posted on 06/01/2013 7:36:49 AM PDT by CaptainK (...please make it stop. Shake a can of pennies at it.)
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To: JCBreckenridge

You’re going to need to cite chapter and verse on that, and please identify the translation you’re utilizing. It sounds as if you’re denying Jesus was fully human (and neither was Mary by inference), while simultaneously insisting that he was. Humans are subject to temptation to sin. Jesus was subject to temptation to sin, but did not.


591 posted on 06/01/2013 7:37:06 AM PDT by RegulatorCountry
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To: Iscool

Temptation itself isn’t a consequence of original sin. Otherwise Adam and Eve wouldn’t have been tempted by the serpent, since they were created without original sin.


592 posted on 06/01/2013 7:39:49 AM PDT by RPTMS
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To: RegulatorCountry

The belief is that Mary was preserved from sin (by the grace of Christ) because it was appropriate. Not because it was required.


593 posted on 06/01/2013 7:40:39 AM PDT by rmichaelj
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To: Natural Law

If she was prevented from making a sinful choice, she was compelled.


594 posted on 06/01/2013 7:41:21 AM PDT by RegulatorCountry
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To: NYer
"The Church is Christ's bride (Ephesians 5:29) and has "no spot, wrinkle or blemish" (Ephesians 5:27)."

Thanks for proving that the Catholic Church never was nor never will be The Church that is Christs bride. Thank you very much for that.

595 posted on 06/01/2013 7:45:42 AM PDT by BipolarBob (I have sexdaily. Oops, I meant dyslexia.)
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To: metmom
Well and truly said, dear sister in Christ!
596 posted on 06/01/2013 7:46:41 AM PDT by Alamo-Girl
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To: NYer

I have heard from time to time from friends who do teach CCD is that often the parents would drop the kids off and they are still, a few of them in pj pants. In other words, they put the unfair burden on the teachers.


597 posted on 06/01/2013 7:48:29 AM PDT by Biggirl ("Jesus talked to us as individuals"-Jim Vicevich/Thanks JimV!)
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To: RegulatorCountry

Hebrews 2:14-18

Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might break the power of him who holds the power of death—that is, the devil— 15 and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death. For surely it is not angels he helps, but Abraham’s descendants. For this reason he had to be made like them,fully human in every way, in order that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God, and that he might make atonement for the sins of the people


598 posted on 06/01/2013 7:48:49 AM PDT by JCBreckenridge (Texas is a state of mind - Steinbeck)
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To: rmichaelj

This whole elaborate doctrine begs the question of just why the sacrifice of Imanuel, God with us, Jesus Christ, was required for the salvation of humankind and in turn the world, if individuals could be made appropriately sinless without such a sacrifice, for this reason or any reason at all.


599 posted on 06/01/2013 7:49:25 AM PDT by RegulatorCountry
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To: JCBreckenridge

Death entered the world via what means, JCBreckenridge?


600 posted on 06/01/2013 7:50:29 AM PDT by RegulatorCountry
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