Posted on 04/17/2015 12:12:16 PM PDT by RnMomof7
I’ve mentioned that Roman Catholicism is so onerous because it puts its hooks in you at various times in your life – from baptism as a child, to “first confession” and “first holy communion”, then Confirmation as an early teen, then marriage, baptism of your own children, etc. It’s a programmatic cycle.
There is another point at which Rome is prominent, and that is at death. As the “Baby Boom” generation continues to age and die, people will continue to be focused on this phase of life, either as people focused on the end of their own lives, or that of their aging parents.
Paul Moses, a journalism professor at Brooklyn College/CUNY”, has written a piece for the Wall Street Journal this morning entitled “A Liberal Catholic and Staying Put”, which puts this in view.
Beginning the article with some comments from the atheistic “Freedom From Religion Foundation”, which urged discontented, liberal-minded Catholics to “Summon your fortitude, and just go”, he rejects this notion with the following comments:
To me, these invitations reflect a shallow view of the Catholic Church that reduces its complex journey to the points where it intersects with the liberal social agenda. Pope Francis’ pastoral approach has shown a more merciful, less judgmental face of the church—one that always existed but needed to be more prominent in the public arena.
After my father died last year, I realized that my instinctive resistance to these “just go” arguments—from the atheists, the secularists, the orthodox, the heterodox or anyone else—runs deep. It began when I observed how impressively the church was there for me in a moment of need (emphasis added).
Early on the morning after he died, I went to my father's parish, St. Peter's in lower Manhattan, to find out what to do to bury him. I found one of the priests in the sacristy after the early Mass. The Rev. Alex Joseph took my hands in his, spoke a beautiful prayer, told me of his own father's death years earlier and added, "Our fathers are always with us." I was much moved.
We decided to have my father's funeral in the Staten Island parish where he had worshiped for 25 years … Bernard L. Moses, who died at 88, had loved Father Madigan’s homilies, and to hear [Father Madigan] speak at the funeral Mass was to understand why. My father had advanced up the ranks of the New York City Housing Authority to director of management. Citing his concern for tenants, Father Madigan used the traditional Catholic term “corporal work of mercy” to describe what my father did. It explained for me, in those difficult moments, why my father, who was well-schooled in Catholic social teachings, had passed up the opportunity for a more pleasant career in academia, or a more lucrative one managing private housing, to work in housing projects instead.
Few of us, I think, live daily on the edge of eternity in the conscious way that the Puritans did, and we lose out as a result. For the extraordinary vivacity, even hilarity (yes, hilarity; you will find it in the sources), with which the Puritans lived stemmed directly, I believe, from the unflinching, matter-of-fact realism with which they prepared themselves for death, so as always to be found, as it were, packed up and ready to go (emphasis added). Reckoning with death brought appreciation of each day’s continued life, and the knowledge that God would eventually decide, without consulting them, when their work on earth was done brought energy for the work itself while they were still being given time to get on with it (pg 14).
See this article/thread for more information:
Incredible skeletal remains of 'Catholic saints' dug up, still dripping in gems and jewellery:
Thousands of skeletons were dug up from Roman catacombs in the 16th century and installed in towns around Germany, Austria and Switzerland on the orders of the Vatican. They were sent to Catholic churches and religious houses to replace the relics destroyed in the wake of the Protestant Reformation in the 1500s. Mistaken for the remains of early Christian martyrs, the morbid relics, known as the Catacomb Saints, became shrines reminding of the spiritual treasures of the afterlife. They were also symbols of the Catholic Church's newly found strength in previously Protestant areas. Each one was painstakingly decorated in thousands of pounds worth of gold, silver and gems by devoted followers before being displayed in church niches. Some took up to five years to decorate. They were renamed as saints, although none of them qualified for the title under the strict rules of the Catholic church which require saints to have been canonised.
Well, it's a cinch the warm, respectful welcome they get here isn't going to sway them to the conservative position.
I’m not sure I’m getting the driving point of this article. Can you summarize it?
Guess you have not seen the attacks on Protestants, esp, the post about non Catholics not going to heaven.
Yeah, my post was serious. I’m following the main point.
Hmmmm... ok.
I guess I’m on a treadmill. I still go to confession to verbalize and attone for my sins with the hope that God will somehow let my pathetic excuse for a Catholic/Christian into heaven. I haven’t “earned” anything that he hasn’t let or allow me to “earn”. But I’ve done plenty to “unearn” my way to a much lonelier place than heaven. Any goodness in my life is due to him and I can assure you that every sin is mine by choice.
This article is jumbled and I’m trying to figure out if it is slamming the RCC or if it was placed as bait so that others who want to slam the RCC can gather and join in the fun.
I was a fallen catholic who became an agnostic, then born again Christian and finally returned to the Roman Catholic Church because it speaks to my soul and it brings me peace. I don’t get the bashing of the Church or the complaints of one Christian believer against another.
We are all brothers and sisters in Christ. Those that wish to divide us and “prove” that one is “better” than another I feel are just lonely and need affirmation that they’ve made the “right choice”. So before any flame wars start just remember that anything that takes our eyes and hearts away from Christ is a distraction. God sees what’s in your heart and knows your motives and still finds you a lovable creature of his. All of us fall short of perfection. Some like myself fall much shorter but still have faith that through the sacraments of confession and holy communion with the attempt to live in the spirit of Jesus Christ that somehow my misshapen soul will find it’s home in Heaven.
Forget it.
Have you made "friendly" attempts to stop catholics from posting?
Salvation has nothing to do with "sacraments of confession and holy communion with the attempt to live". Salvation is by faith in Christ and His sacrifice alone. No amount of actions on your part have anything to do with salvation. Anything other than faith in Christ alone is relying on man's actions. Put your faith in Him alone and not in what you might be able to do.
No, what?
Christians all over the world are suffering and dying for their faith in Jesus. They are being beheaded, set afire, shot, you name it.
Yeah?
It seems that if people could spend more time praying for them and their situations we'd all be better off. Don't you agree?
Yes, yes I do.
Christians all over the world are suffering and dying for their faith in Jesus. They are being beheaded, set afire, shot, you name it.
Yeah?
It seems that if people could spend more time praying for them and their situations we'd all be better off. Don't you agree?
Yes, yes I do.
And yet Paul, while living in the Roman Empire, which was no friend of Christianity, still found time to correct false doctrine.
Your name is Paul?
you said, “If you truly believe that, you urgently require re-evaluating of which spirit it was that you were born again. How do you know?”
I don’t understand your question.
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