Pope: Half-hearted Catholics aren't really Catholics at all

cns ^ | June 5, 2014 | Cindy Wooden

[NYer]

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Those who insist others pray and believe exactly like they do, those who have alternatives to every church teaching and benefactors who use the church as a cover for business connections may call themselves Catholics, but they have one foot out the door, Pope Francis said.

"Many people say they belong to the church," but in reality have "only one foot inside," the pope said June 5 at the morning Mass in the chapel of his residence.

(CNS/Paul Haring)

"For these people, the church is not home," but is a place they use as a rental property, he said, according to Vatican Radio.

Pope Francis reflected on the day's Gospel reading, John 17:20-26, and Jesus' prayer that there would be unity, not divisions and conflict, among his disciples. There are three groups of people who call themselves Catholic, but are not really, the pope said. Apologizing for making up words, he labeled the three groups: "uniformists," "alternativists" and "businessists."

The first group, he said, believe that everyone in the church should be just like them. "They are rigid! They do not have that freedom the Holy Spirit gives," and they confuse what Jesus preached with their "own doctrine of uniformity."

"Jesus never wanted the church to be so rigid," Pope Francis said. Such people "call themselves Catholics, but their rigid attitude distances them from the church."

The second group, those with alternative teachings and doctrines, "has a partial belonging to the church. These, too, have one foot outside the church," he said. "They rent the church," not recognizing that its teaching is based on the preaching of Jesus and the apostolic tradition.

Members of the third group "call themselves Christians but don't enter into the heart of the church," they use the church "for personal profit," the pope said. "We have all seen them in parish or diocesan communities and religious congregations; they are some of the benefactors of the church."

"They strut around proud of being benefactors, but in the end, under the table, make their deals," he said.

Pope Francis said the church is made up of people with a variety of differences and gifts, and if one wants to belong to it, he or she must be motivated by love and enter with "your whole heart."

Being open to the Spirit, who fosters harmony in diversity, he said, brings "docility," which is "the virtue that saves us" from entering the church half-heartedly.

[Elsie]

No, you were arguing facts which weren't relevant.

Who decides whether they are relevant or not?

Just because a reply is addressed to a certain person; the unknown other readers are always in the back of my mind when I compose my responses.

[Elsie]

It was a response to a direct assertion which was erroneous.

Oh?

Then in my haste to run my opinions across the pages of FR; I missed my error. What was it again?

[Elsie]

You don’t have to be silent to be respectful.

People who are REBUKED seldom like it.

2 Timothy 3:16-17
All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.

[Elsie]

Name one Church dogma that is contradicted by the Bible.

Wrong question:

Name one Church dogma that is NOT FOUND in the Bible; that is needed for Salvation.

[Elsie]

You sound like a Protestant: if it isn't in the Bible; it can't be true, even if it's not contradicted by the Bible.

Conversely, Catholics say: If it isn't in the Bible; it could POSSIBLY be true; so who gives YOU the 'authority' to say it is not to be taught?

[Elsie]

She has employed forgeries to support her claims, and to teach for doctrines traditions of men, while Rome has presumed to infallibly declare she is and will be perpetually infallible whenever she speaks in accordance with her infallibly defined (scope and subject-based) formula, which renders her declaration that she is infallible, to be infallible, as well as all else she accordingly declares.

I do so miss our MORMON FRiends...

---

Where can we find an 'OFFICIAL MORMON' teaching website??

Official sites are sites supported by LDS officials unless said official sites are considered unofficial by said officials.

 

At that point such sites are unofficial unless officially referenced for official purposes by officials who can do so officially.

 

This should not be misconstrued as an indication that official sites can be unofficially recognized as official nor should it be implied that unofficial sites cannot contain official information, but are not officially allowed to be offical despite their official contents due the their unofficialness.

 

Official sites will be official and recognized as official by officials of the LDS unless there is an official reason to mark them as unofficial either temporally or permanently, which would make the official content officially unofficial.

 

This is also not to imply that recognized sites, often used on FR by haters and bigots cannot contain official information, it just means that content, despite its official status, is no longer official and should be consider unofficial despite the same information being official on an official site elsewhere.

 

Even then the officialness my be amended due to the use of the unofficial information which may determine the officialness of anything be it official or unofficial depending on how and where it is used officially or unofficially.

I hope this clear things up for the lurkers out there.

The haters tend to make things complicated and confusing when it is all really quite crystal clear.

--Ejonesie22

[Elsie]

Well, no, the Blessed Virgin's parents...

Is this 'disrespectful'?

Well, no, the blessed virgin's parents...

[Elsie]

Oops!

Ask anything you want...

[Elsie]

Dang!

These fingers (brain) ain't working yet this morning.

I need COFFEE!

[bufferina]

Sadly I,m too, am a fallen Catholic. I tried “Catholics Come Home” but every time I got my foot near the door, the Church came out with some political statement which sent me running away again.

At the time the Affordable Care Act passed (I think the Church was for its passage, but now they say they really didn’t want the “religious freedom restrictions” that came with it) I was fighting against it. I had a family member with leukemia.

I couldn’t go to Mass, shake hands, sing praises — and think — these people are against what I am FOR.

Now it is the redistribution statements of Pope Francis. And that the Church seems to be all for illegal aliens being granted amnesty. Look at how they are rushing our borders.....this will dramatically change America. I believe the Church wants this for America. I don’t.

But I am getting older. I would like religion in my life. It gave me comfort too when I was young.

So...I hope I can go back before I get much older. I am in my sixties.

If not, I hope God sees that maybe the Church did leave me.
Buff

[Elsie]

But I am getting older. I would like religion in my life. It gave me comfort too when I was young.

So...I hope I can go back before I get much older. I am in my sixties.

'Religion' leaves an empty feeling in the soul.

Get Jesus; and you never hunger or thirst again.

[Dick Vomer]

Communist infiltrated the Roman Catholic church. The communist want to destroy and corrupt every stabilizing force in the free world. Only then can they come in and stabilize society and control our lives.

[Trapped Behind Enemy Lines]

The idea that Mary was ALWAYS a virgin. Last I checked she was married to Joseph and that Jesus had brothers and sisters specifically mentioned in the Bible. And the yarn that Mary herself was conceived of an Immaculate conception. Where is that mentioned in the Bible? Who makes this stuff up? And of course we know there is nothing in the Bible which mandates celibacy as a prerequisite for service in the priesthood.

[Trapped Behind Enemy Lines]

If you want to call me an apostate, a heretic, a Protestant...fine....I don’t care. Report me to the authorities and have me ex-communicated. Not all of us are drones marching in lockstep. Some of us do actually read the Bible and study history. The Church is NOT ALWAYS right. It has made mistakes.

[Legatus]

I’m late to this thread so you may have answered already but why do you call yourself a Catholic if you don’t believe what the Catholic Church teaches? Why not find a community that believes what you believe?

[Trapped Behind Enemy Lines]

There are over a billion Catholics in the world today. It would be ludicrous to suggest that we should all think exactly the same way. It is not wrong to question Church teachings especially when they do not conform to what is written the Bible.

I suppose I could join the Mormon Church——that might make you happy. Or I could join the Episcopalian Church, or Jehovah’s Witness, or The Quakers, etc.... No doubt I would find some issues with some of those churches as well.

Sorry to annoy you, but I’m sticking with my Catholic Church where I serve as a volunteer (Eucharistic Minister) and a member of the Knights of Columbus.

[Legatus]

Sorry to annoy you, but I’m sticking with my Catholic Church

You mistake my curiosity for annoyance. My wife and I are converts to Catholicism so we both abandoned the faith traditions we had been raised in to become Catholic because we believe what the Catholic Church teaches is true.

I disagree with the hierarchy on many matters of prudential judgement but I can't imagine hanging around if I decided the Church had blown it on a doctrinal issue. I don't want to put you in the category of Nancy Pelosi but I'm just as confused by her as I am now by you... what is it that holds you to a Faith you clearly don't fully believe?

[Trapped Behind Enemy Lines]

I too probably agree with my Church on about 95% of issues. I love my Church have no intention of ever leaving it. I must say I am profoundly disappointed in many of the economic pronouncements I hear these days from our new Pope. But I am glad that he recently said the Church’s policy on clerical celibacy is not etched in stone and is subject to change.

[Legatus]

Clerical celibacy has always been a discipline and not a doctrine, although I think it would be a nightmare if the Latin Church allowed married men in great numbers to become priests. Clerical celibacy was one of the things that attracted me to Catholicism because I’m a PK (Preacher’s Kid) and saw too many of my peers lives wrecked because their fathers were busy working for the church (as they should have been) and not raising their families (as they also should have been).

But 95% agreement... you don’t believe in the Immaculate Conception (I think), the perpetual virginity of Mary... do you believe in the Assumption? (What do you do on August 15th, compromise your beliefs and go to Mass anyhow?) You appear to believe that the Bible is the supreme authority in matters of faith, where does that put holy Tradition? How about auricular Confession? Male only ministerial priesthood, the ministerial priesthood period? How do you get to an “orthodox” belief in the Trinity, the 7 Sacraments (especially what the Church teaches about the Eucharist), contraception and Purgatory from the Bible alone? etc, etc, and on and on. To me it all hangs together or it all falls apart.

I’m not running a quiz here to test your orthodoxy, but I am trying to understand how you make it work while being intellectually honest with yourself (which I presume you are).

[cothrige]

Who decides whether they are relevant or not?

Oh come on. It was irrelevant to what I was saying, and I said so. You are free to infer whatever you want, but if you quote me and ping me I am equally free to respond pointing out it is irrelevant. How would I have less freedom to consider the "unknown reader" in pointing this out than you were in saying it? Or, how about looking at it this way, who decides who gets to decide whether they are relevant or not?