Oh, but you have nothing to do with those dead liberal mainline Churches do you? No no--your church has conveniently separated from them once, twice, three, four times over.
How nice it must be! Just carve out a tiny little niche of self-selected Christianity, built only of people who chose this particular theology, this particular pastor, and this particular worship style, and that's YOUR church, right? That Methodist guy on the street who can't be bothered on Sundays anymore--he has nothing to do with you. But the Catholic who votes for Pelosi and is contracepting--he is still mine, right?
Heck, if I could self-select my own Church from the most committed, the most devout, I could leave your puny little evangelical commitment in the dust:
http://benedictinesofmary.org/content/monastic-schedule
See that schedule? That's a DAILY schedule. Do you remember, from your Catholic days, what all those terms mean...if you were ever taught? Matins/Lauds, Prime, Terce, Sext, None, Vespers, Compline--every single one of those terms involves communal prayer and singing the Psalms. Every day starting at 5 AM. These ladies don't have families except each other, don't have jobs except whatever tasks they are assigned in the monastery. Their whole life is prayer. Individually and communally, orally and mentally.
But I *can't* self-select from the most devout. It's not MY church. It's Christ's Church. The Christ who prayed that "we might all be one" and who promised that the weeds would grow among the wheat. So yes, I'm a member of Christ's Church, and so is the Pelosi voter, and so is the poor soul who self-excommunicates and damns himself with the mortal sin of heresy--and may we all be saved from the fire come the harvest.
The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is exactly what you once taught it was. We've always believed it, still believe it, and will always believe it. And you are doing yourself no favors by absenting yourself from it.
Wrong.
As with virtually every Catholic I have ever met, there's a misunderstanding of what the church truly is.
The church is the body of Christ, comprised of all born again believers throughout the church age.
It's an organism, not an organization.I haven't met one believe who is born again who adheres to denominationalism and insists that their local assembly at which they worship is the OTC, and that membership in it is required for salvation.
And yet, historically, and even still in the present, that is exactly what the Roman Catholic church teaches. And some Catholics still adheres to that. That anyone not Roman Catholic is not saved.,P> Salvation is through Jesus Christ alone and it is the faith in Him and the spiritual regeneration that one experiences from that that is the unifying factor amongst followers of Christ. Denominational labels mean nothing as long as the church teaches the Bible and not add-ons.
Nor should you:
Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? for ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you, And will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty. (2 Corinthians 6:14-18)
How nice it must be! Just carve out a tiny little niche of self-selected Christianity, built only of people who chose this particular theology, this particular pastor, and this particular worship style, and that's YOUR church, right?
No, such "only of people" elitism is Roman and cultic, while evangelical types can visit multitudes of churches which hold to commonly held fundamental truth which the modern evangelical movement originally arose to defend, against the liberal revisionism, including that which Rome has taught and teaches right in sanctioned notes of her own NAB Bible.
That Methodist guy on the street who can't be bothered on Sundays anymore--he has nothing to do with you. But the Catholic who votes for Pelosi and is contracepting--he is still mine, right?
That Methodist who does not sanctify the Lord's day and sanctions sodomite ministers etc., has no part with Christ, thus why should and how can I in spiritual fellowship?
But the Catholic who votes for Pelosi and is contracepting--he is still mine, right?
She is indeed, since you remain in and must follow a church that counts and treats such as members in life and death, which RCs tell us we are to submit to her, and not follow our contrary interpretations.
And as V2 evidences , Rome interprets herself, and what one does and effects testifies to what they really believe. (Ja. 2:18; Mt. 7:20)
Surely you are not engaging in dissent based upon your own interpretation in protesting against what Rome manifests as her interpretation of herself would you? So if Teddy K is given an apostolic blessing and honored with and in a church funeral, which even Chavez and Mayor Menino most recently received, then how can you not treat other like RCs as members?
Heck, if I could self-select my own Church from the most committed, the most devout, I could leave your puny little evangelical commitment in the dust:
This much is true,
For to him that is joined to all the living there is hope: for a living dog is better than a dead lion. (Ecclesiastes 9:4)
See that schedule? That's a DAILY schedule
To which only a minute % of RCs attend, so these are the Real RCs? Let alone the unScriptural nature of the Mass.
It's not MY church. It's Christ's Church.
That is a mere assertion, but in reality it is abundantly manifest to be a severe deformation of the NT church .
The Christ who prayed that "we might all be one" and who promised that the weeds would grow among the wheat. So yes, I'm a member of Christ's Church, and so is the Pelosi voter, and so is the poor soul who self-excommunicates and damns himself with the mortal sin of heresy
At least you admit the apostate nature of your idea of a church, as in reality the one true church is the body of Christ which only consists of those who are born again of the Spirit of Christ who places them into it. (1Cor. 12:13)
Who also mandates,
"not to keep company, if any man that is called a brother be a fornicator [includes supporting such], or covetous, or an idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner; with such an one no not to eat." (1 Corinthians 5:11)
The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is exactly what you once taught it was. We've always believed it, still believe it, and will always believe it.
Another bare and fallacious assertion, as in reality, rather than being the "source and summit of the Christian life," in which "redemption is accomplished," by its separate class of priests offering Christ as atonement as he did upon the Cross, and by which believers obtain spiritual life in themselves,
instead, the Lord's supper is only manifestly described once in the life of the church with any detail, in which the church is the body of Christ which shows, declares, His death by taking part in the communal meal (ideally not just a wafer) in an unselfish manner, showing caring love for those whom Christ bought with His sinless shed blood, in mindfulness of that act. (1Cor. 11:17-34 )
Moreover, there simply is no separate sacerdotal class of believers distinctively titled "priests" in the NT, as the Holy Spirit never uses that distinctive word for "priest" for pastors.
Nor NT pastors ever shown dispensing food as part of their primary ordained duty, much less human flesh and blood, as instead their ordained duty was that of prayer, preaching the word. (cf. Acts 6:4)
Nor is spiritual life ever obtained by literally consuming anything physical: and in fact the metaphorical view is the only one which is consistent with the rest of the writings of John, and the rest of Scripture, and the use of figurative eating and drinking.
And in which even potable water is called the blood of men, and thus is poured out as an offering to the Lord as is done with blood in Leviticus. And people are called "bread for Israel," while land "eats" them, and enemies come to eat David, and the word of God is also eaten, etc. (2 Samuel 23:15-17; Num. 13:32; 14:9; Jer. 15:16 ; Ps. 27:2; Ezek. 3:1; Rev. 10:8-9)