What do you think Paul meant when he said, ...”provided we all suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him” Rom 8:17.
We Catholics believe that there is a value to suffering when offered up to be shared with Jesus’ suffering. These men are taking it to the extreme, and this is not sanctioned by the Church.
Please, try to understand rather than throw out cheap shots.
Have a blessed Easter.
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As we say here in Texas, "The hit dog always yelps."
I made no reference to the Catholic Church.
My statement was aimed at those who follow (and/or take to extremes) the tenets of any earthly organization (usually calling itself a "church"). The point applies equally as well to extreme glossolalia-addicts, to closed-minded YEC adherents -- or to the Kool-aid drinking followers of Jim Jones.
There is a slippery slope between such overzealousness and truly Satanic behaviour -- and Satan stands ready to push things in his preferred direction. (A good example of this is Islam -- as visualized by its adherents slicing their children's heads with knives and then parading the bloodied tykes through the streets.)
Nothing in Paul's Rom 8:17 implies self-inflicted punishment -- and certainly not self-abuse for public show.
As I said (in shorthand), Christ (not some earthly teaching) is the model for our behavior. (Did He place the crown of thorns on His own Head?)
Next time, "Please, try to understand rather than throw out cheap shots."
Religion and what Jesus did on that cross are sometimes at cross purposes. The scriptures don’t mean we should inflict pain on ourselves to suffer for Jesus...it means that when we are persecuted or killed by those outside of the faith for Him, we should endure it. To do something like this should send warning signals up at how seriously religion and Christianity are often at cross purposes. And yes, there is a difference between religion and knowing Christ personally.
He did the suffering on that cross for our sins. No where in scripture does it say we are to repeat that over and over. And in a way, it’s a mockery of what happened to do so. Christ suffered FAR worse than these people who are up there for a few minutes. Ask them, if they truly want to replicate this, to be flogged until your internal organs are exposed, then to have a crown of thornes pushed down on your forehead, then to be crucified for hours against a rough barked tree with your back already torn to shreds.
And worst of all...tell them to take every sin of every human being ever born upon themselves, and then be separated spiritually from God.
Even then, they won’t be doing a thing...even if they go through all of that.