Posted on 11/24/2013 10:16:03 AM PST by Salvation
Our Knights of Columbus do pancake breakfasts. And then about once a quarter they do a biscuits and gravy breakfast.
Also do spaghetti dinner fundraisers for our youth or other special projects.
God’s grace is pre-eminent in the Catholic Church. You will come back some day, I’m sure.
Thanks — real stories.
Former Catholics?!?
I’ve been told may times, right here on RF, that there is no such thing. Once a Roman Catholic always a Roman Catholic.
Which is it?
If I ever feel a hankering for worshipping inanimate objects, giving up my assurance of salvation, and trusting in my obedience to vain ritual and musty old Popes, I’ll let you know.
There is no worshipping of inanimate objects in the Catholic Church. You are mistaking honor for worship.
Do you honor you mother and your father, or do you worship them?
Did you read any of the stories? They realized they were missing something. They were always Catholics.
You may be confused by the presence of statues in Catholic churches. Don't be. They are merely images of loved ones, like the photographs in your wallet.
If you have mis-read the commandment against idolatry then this seems a good time to correct your mistake. We are allowed to make images. We are not allowed to worship them.
But I know that some FReepers read the Bible and aren’t in the habit of using reductio ad absurdum to correct their mistakes.
For their benefit: if any FReeper actually believes that the simple act of making images is blasphemy then they should - as an act of Christian witness - spend the rest of their lives downvoting cat videos on Youtube.
I came back after a personal encounter with Christ. That was enough for me. I wanted everything He had to offer me - and that included His Church. Thankfully He preserved me from the heresies of Protestantism even though I live in a Protestant country.
**downvoting cat videos on Youtube. **
LOl! I hate all those cat videos I get.
“You may be confused by the presence of statues in Catholic churches. Don’t be. They are merely images of loved ones, like the photographs in your wallet”
You forget that I was a Catholic, so this spin doesn’t work on me. I don’t kneel before images of my loved ones, nor do I offer prayers, incense and devotion to them. That’s for God alone, and no one else. Nor does any human spirit have the ability to be present with every believer in the world simultaneously, since these would be divine abilities, and therefore they would be gods.
“Thankfully He preserved me from the heresies of Protestantism even though I live in a Protestant country.”
Now I understand why Catholics vote overwhelmingly for Democrats. It’s hostility for a Protestant country LOL.
You are so mistaken.
You don't pray for your loved ones?
You don't ask your loved ones for things?
Which - BTW - is what prayer is. "I pray thee" just means "Please".
There's some debased modern notion that prayer means worship: however it does not. Prayer is only worship when it is directed to God.
And as for the incense: Revelations makes it plain that the prayers of the Saints are closely identified with incense:
And the smoke of the incense, which came with the prayers of the saints, ascended up before God out of the angel's hand.
It is perfectly natural to burn incense whenever we pray to Saints: we are identifying and magnifying their prayers as holy before God.
Nor does any human spirit have the ability to be present with every believer in the world simultaneously, since these would be divine abilities, and therefore they would be gods.
This last misconception should be easy to clear up: although it edges onto profoundly mysterious concepts.
The Saints (and Angels) in Heaven are outside of time and space. They are in eternity. They don't use this mortal and (literally) temporary stuff we call 'time' any more.
Getting late here.
Saints may not be bound by time but it looks like I am. Goodnight to all, and God Bless.
“You don’t show devotion to your loved ones?
You don’t pray for your loved ones?
You don’t ask your loved ones for things?”
I don’t show religious devotion to my loved ones.
I do not pray to my loved ones.
I do not ask pictures of my loved ones for things.
“There’s some debased modern notion that prayer means worship: however it does not. Prayer is only worship when it is directed to God”
Nonsensical, since if prayer is only worship when it is directed to God, then the only difference is who you are praying to which turns it from worship to non-worship.
But if you are depending on Mary, for example, to save you from the wrath of Christ, it is worship, whether you like it or not. From the Secret of the Rosary, endorsed by your Popes:
“One day the King fell seriously ill and when he was given up for dead he found himself, in a vision, before the judgement seat of Our Lord. Many devils were there accusing him of all the sins he had committed and Our Lord as Sovereign Judge was just about to condemn him to hell when Our Lady appeared to intercede for him. She called for a pair of scales and had his sins placed in one of the balances whereas she put the rosary that he had always worn on the other scale, together with all the Rosaries that had been said because of his example. It was found that the Rosaries weighed more than his sins.
Looking at him with great kindness Our Lady said: “As a reward for this little honor that you paid me in wearing my Rosary, I have obtained a great grace for you from my Son. Your life will be spared for a few more years. See that you spend these years wisely, and do penance.”
When the King regained consciousness he cried out: “Blessed be the Rosary of the Most Holy Virgin Mary, by which I have been delivered from eternal damnation!”
After he had recovered his health he spent the rest of his life in spreading devotion to the Holy Rosary and said it faithfully every day.
People who love the Blessed Virgin out to follow the example of King Alphonsus and that of the saints whom I have mentioned so that they too may win other souls for the Confraternity of the Holy Rosary. They will then receive great graces on earth and eternal life later on. “They that explain me shall have life everlasting life.” [1] Ecclus. 24:31”
Another story on how saying rosaries can earn you salvation:
“Later on, when she was at prayer she fell into ecstasy and had a vision of her soul appearing before the Supreme Judge. Saint Michael put all her penances and to her prayers on one side of the scale and all her sins and imperfections on the other. The tray of her good works were greatly outweighed by that of her sins and imperfections.
Filled with alarm, she cried out for mercy, imploring the help of the Blessed Virgin, her gracious advocate, who took the one and only Rosary she had said for her penance and dropped it on the tray of her good works. This one Rosary was so heavy that it weighed more than all her sins as well as her good works. Our Lady then reproved her for having refused to follow the counsel of her servant Dominic and for not saying the Rosary every day.
As soon as she came to herself she rushed and threw herself at the feet of Saint Dominic and told him all that had happened, begged his forgiveness and promised to say the Rosary faithfully every day. By this means she rose to Christian perfection and finally to the glory of everlasting life.”
http://www.rosary-center.org/secret.htm
Popes on the “sure and most efficacious means” for help from heaven:
“We constantly seek for help from Heaven - the sole means of effecting anything - that our labours and our care may obtain their wished for object. We deem that there could be no surer and more efficacious means to this end than by religion and piety to obtain the favour of the great Virgin Mary, the Mother of God, the guardian of our peace and the minister to us of heavenly grace, who is placed on the highest summit of power and glory in Heaven, in order that she may bestow the help of her patronage on men who through so many labours and dangers are striving to reach that eternal city. Now that the anniversary, therefore, of manifold and exceedingly great favours obtained by a Christian people through the devotion of the Rosary is at hand, We desire that that same devotion should be offered by the whole Catholic world with the greatest earnestness to the Blessed Virgin, that by her intercession her Divine Son may be appeased and softened in the evils which afflict us. And therefore We determined, Venerable Brethren, to despatch to you these letters in order that, informed of Our designs, your authority and zeal might excite the piety of your people to conform themselves to them.” (ENCYCLICAL OF POPE LEO XIII ON DEVOTION OF THE ROSARY)
http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/leo_xiii/encyclicals/documents/hf_l-xiii_enc_01091883_supremi-apostolatus-officio_en.html
A decree to perform them:
“We decree and order that in the whole Catholic world, during this year, the devotion of the Rosary shall be solemnly celebrated by special and splendid services. From the first day of next October, therefore, until the second day of the November following, in every parish and, if the ecclesiastical authority deem it opportune and of use, in every chapel dedicated to the Blessed Virgin - let five decades of the Rosary be recited with the addition of the Litany of Loreto.” (SUPREMI APOSTOLATUS OFFICIO, ENCYCLICAL OF POPE LEO XIII ON DEVOTION OF THE ROSARY)
The importance of the Rosary to a Pope:
“With these words, dear brothers and sisters, I set the first year of my Pontificate within the daily rhythm of the Rosary. Today, as I begin the twenty-fifth year of my service as the Successor of Peter, I wish to do the same. How many graces have I received in these years from the Blessed Virgin through the Rosary: Magnificat anima mea Dominum! I wish to lift up my thanks to the Lord in the words of his Most Holy Mother, under whose protection I have placed my Petrine ministry: Totus Tuus!” (ROSARIUM VIRGINIS MARIAE OF THE SUPREME PONTIFF JOHN PAUL II)
These are all pretty good reasons not to pray the Rosary at all:
Rom 11:6 And if by grace, then is it no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then is it no more grace: otherwise work is no more work.
Eph 2:8-9 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: (9) Not of works, lest any man should boast.
“The Saints (and Angels) in Heaven are outside of time and space. They are in eternity. They don’t use this mortal and (literally) temporary stuff we call ‘time’ any more.”
If that were true, why was it necessary for the angel Gabriel to travel from heaven (moving in space and time) to meet with Daniel, and why was he unable to meet with Daniel due to having to deal with other issues for about 3 weeks? (Daniel 9).
If Gabriel is outside of time and space, then presumably Gabriel can be anywhere at once, and need not even travel anywhere. He could be everywhere at the same time.
Furthermore, even if heaven has no time, we are in time, and therefore what we say or do must either be experienced in time, as the Papists pretend, or else must be transmitted to heaven, and in such a way that the vast trove of information does not explode their minds.
I left the church because of their allowing priests to molest children. When you know someone it happened to and see that their lives are destroyed, it is really hard to be okay with the church until they make it stop.
There has been a little talk here and there, but there have been new cases all over the US. Is that what God wants them to do? Hide child molesters and move them around to unsuspecting churches? I think the answer is no....
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