Posted on 07/15/2005 11:29:25 AM PDT by nypokerface
JACKSON, Miss. - A Christian adoption agency that receives money from Choose Life license plate fees said it does not place children with Roman Catholic couples because their religion conflicts with the agency's "Statement of Faith."
Bethany Christian Services stated the policy in a letter to a Jackson couple this month, and another Mississippi couple said they were rejected for the same reason last year.
"It has been our understanding that Catholicism does not agree with our Statement of Faith," Bethany director Karen Stewart wrote. "Our practice to not accept applications from Catholics was an effort to be good stewards of an adoptive applicant's time, money and emotional energy."
Sandy and Robert Steadman, who learned of Bethany's decision in a July 8 letter, said their priest told them the faith statement did not conflict with Catholic teaching.
Loria Williams of nearby Ridgeland said she and her husband, Wes, had a similar experience when they started to pursue an adoption in September 2004.
"I can't believe an agency that's nationwide would act like this," Loria Williams said. "There was an agency who was Christian based but wasn't willing to help people across the board."
The agency is based in Grand Rapids, Mich., and has offices in 30 states, including three in Mississippi. Its Web site does not refer to any specific branch of Christianity.
Stewart told the Jackson Clarion-Ledger that the board will review its policy, but she didn't specify which aspects will be addressed.
The Web site says all Bethany staff and adoptive applicants personally agree with the faith statement, which describes belief in the Christian Church and the Scripture.
"As the Savior, Jesus takes away the sins of the world," the statement says in part. "Jesus is the one in whom we are called to put our hope, our only hope for forgiveness of sin and for reconciliation with God and with one another."
Sandy Steadman said she was hurt and disappointed that Bethany received funds from the Choose Life car license plates. "I know of a lot of Catholics who get those tags," she said.
She added: "If it's OK to accept our money, it should be OK to open your home to us as a family."
Bethany is one of 24 adoption and pregnancy counseling centers in Mississippi that receives money from the sale of Choose Life tags, a special plate that motorists can obtain with an extra fee.
Of $244,000 generated by the sale of the tags in 2004, Bethany received $7,053, said Geraldine Gray, treasurer of Choose Life Mississippi, which distributes the money.
"It is troubling to me if they are discriminating based on only the Catholics," Gray said.
Fallen away catholic with an ax to grind, I knew it, LOL.
That explains everything.
I'm sure they would be too. My intended reference to Luther was regarding his role in the Protestant Reformation.
Actually, a Southern Baptist.
She had grown up Independent Fundamentalist Baptist. She was asked to leave the congregation because she fell in love with and married a Lutheran. That was 25 years ago. Then she joined the Southern Baptist congregation.
Catholic theologians have traditionally held that "all have sinned" does apply to the Blessed Virgin. Cornelius a Lapide notes:
"The Blessed Virgin sinned in Adam, and incurred this necessity of contracting original sin; but original sin itself she did not contract in herself in fact, nor had it; for she was anticipated by the grace of God, which excluded all sin from her, in the first moment of her conception."
"All died, namely, in Adam, for in him all contracted the necessity of sin and death, even the Deipara; so that both herself and man altogether needed Christ as a Redeemer and His death. Therefore the Blessed Virgin sinned and died in Adam, but in her own person she contracted not sin and the death of the soul, for she was anticipated by God and God's grace."
blah blah... whatever makes you feel better
Hmmm . . . I have to say that seems out of character for the SBC.
No, this is a well-worn lie, but a lie none the less.
Petros, like lithos, means stone or rock.
Hmmm
For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same? And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others? do not even the publicans so?
Unlike some FR "Christians" you have indeed followed the teaching of the master.
A few years ago my niece wanted to join Youth For Christ at her high school. Most of the members belonged to the biggest congregation in town, they discouraged her participation quite loudly, with her being a Catholic and all. This was out side of Houston in 2000.
No doubt it took a former priest to set up all the additional rules those folks live under.
There's much more to it than that.
While I'm not surprised, it surely must have been a source of pain for your niece.
A few years back, I got a rare invite to a neighborhood coffee which really seemed to be about getting converts to some Baptist church once I got there. I felt kind of tricked when all was said and done. It got a little awkward when a Christian Science lady piped up about babies' being born innocent of sin. I said something and wish I'd kept my mouth shut. I don't know which end is up any more when it comes to religion.
The group that Menno headed were a group of German Anabaptists.
These German Anabaptists had some ideas which were related to those of the Czech Hussites, who had in their own turn adopted some ideas of the Italian Waldenses.
The Waldenses had taken some of their own teachings from the French Cathars. The Cathars were related to the Bogomili sect of Bulgaria, whose ideas had apparently spread by the flight of Bogomili from the Bosphorus to the seaports of southern France.
The Bogomili seem to have been an offshoot of the Manichaeans.
There was no apostolic link, let alone a direct person-to-person apostolic link as the Roman Catholic Church can document - but a link threading through a number of heretical movements back to a non-Christian religion.
There was no institutional link or direct heritage between any of these groups (i.e. I am not saying that Mennonites are really Manichaeans), but a similarity in a few doctrines and in religious customs.
And the ancient Romans are not around anymore to describe what their beliefs were, so instead we rely on historians.
Non-Catholic historians sympathetic to the Cathars have independently come to the conclusion that the Cathars were radically different from Christianity.
All sources agree that the Cathars held the doctrines of the perfecti and the consolamentum - doctrines completely alien to any form of Christianity, and their abbreviation of Scripture is well-attested.
The Grimaldis were an obscure family in Genoa, Italy at the time of the destruction of the Cathars in France in 1229.
If you want to blame the destruction of teh cathars on any family you can primarily blame the Counts of Toulouse for promoting the cult and the Capetians for putting an end to it.
No, many born agains, as you call us so reverently, do NOT think alike. I don't know anyone who hates like this man does nor do I know a lot of people who are 'obsessed with catholics. We are concerned that catholics and protestants know the truth about how to be saved, etc. You get a very few who have a distorted view of Christ and His teachings, but most born-agains are loving, compassionate and caring about others. Do I sense a little bias on your part?
The Catholics were the first Christian church, the one Christ started, so for these so called Christians to exclude Catholics is probably a good sign that they are pagan still.
Probably humanism followers who believe they are mainstream Christians.
As long as they accept Christ as their Lord and Savior, there is still hope for them though. :-)
The prayers of the faithful are OUR prayers, not the elders, not the catholic saints, but US. How things get twisted about by folks, catholic or protestant.
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