You said “And in the end that’s where it stands with Protestants who hate the Catholic Church. They insist on calling it “Roman Catholic” because they think that some how works against the Church.”
I use the term ‘Roman Catholic’ or just ‘Roman’ frequently. I don’t mean it to be pejorative in any manner, but as a protestant I too consider myself part of the catholic church; just not the Catholic church.
It is equally if not more offensive to me to have the Catholic Church feel it has exclusive rights to the term ‘catholic’.
There is only one church. That is the body of Christ in the world. It is therefore the catholic church. Exclusive or primary possession of either of those terms ‘catholic’ or ‘church’ should be recognized as the true offensive use of verbage; not the addition of qualifiers to make certain the group being spoken about is uniquely identified.
will wallace
You wrote:
“It is equally if not more offensive to me to have the Catholic Church feel it has exclusive rights to the term ‘catholic’.”
That is irrelevant. The very concept of truth dictates that you cannot have opposing organizations all truthfully claiming to be universals. That is logically impossible.
“There is only one church. That is the body of Christ in the world. It is therefore the catholic church. Exclusive or primary possession of either of those terms ‘catholic’ or ‘church’ should be recognized as the true offensive use of verbage; not the addition of qualifiers to make certain the group being spoken about is uniquely identified.”
There is only one Church, and it is not your sect. You belong to a sect invented sometime after 1500. You, therefore, cannot be Catholic and cannot hold a faith that could possibly be called “catholic” because it belongs to nothing but a particular sect founded in the last few centuries with a new gospel, no history beyond 1500, and no mandate from Christ Himself. Do my words offend you? The truth often does offend people.
I agree with what you said!