Posted on 02/10/2011 7:57:12 AM PST by Christian Engineer Mass
Jesus said that the truth will set us free. (John 8:32) However, He did not say that the truth would necessarily be easy to accept. It was painful for me to learn the information that I am about to share with you, but it was also liberating and it led to a closer relationship with God.
As a faithful Catholic, and later as a nun, I practiced Mary worship for many years without realizing it. The prayers and practices were so familiar. They were taught to me by good people, sincere people that I trusted. I prayed rosaries and wore a scapular and engaged in other “devotions” which I honestly thought were good and pleasing to God. Because of my lack of knowledge of the Bible and of Church history, I honestly had no idea that I was actually worshipping Mary.
If modern Catholic teachings and doctrines about Mary are true, then they will not be contrary to Scripture, the writings of the Early Fathers, or the decrees of past popes. For a devout Catholic to question these issues and put them to the test can be painful. It certainly was for me. However, it would be far more painful to have God correct us when we face Him on Judgment Day.
LETTING THE CATHOLIC CHURCH SPEAK FOR ITSELF
I believe in letting people speak for themselves. Therefore my primary sources about Catholic doctrines and history come from the Catholic Church.
First and foremost is the official Catechism of the Catholic Church which was written for the purpose of summarizing the essential and basic teachings of the Roman Catholic Church. It was approved by Pope John Paul II in 1992 and the English translation was released in 1994.
(Excerpt) Read more at parkviewgospelhall.com ...
Off topic, I wonder if the writers at the old TV show "Bewitched" were thinking of Samuel when they named Samantha's mother ENDORa?
The only example we have of someone who had died talking to someone who is alive is at the transfiguration, and Moses wasn’t sleeping.
***Plus you have books like the Shepherd and the Didache.****
The Shepherd was ditched because it said you were allowed ONE SIN after being baptized. It is found in the Alexandrian codex.
You can find these tales in THE LOST BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. they were never lost and were not put in the Bible for a very good reason.
The Didache was more of an instruction book. It would still carry more weight than the Shepherd.
That is only true of some of the Western Fathers like Augustine. But Ambrose's Greek was excellent, and Jerome knew Greek as well.
The early Church Fathers (e.g. Irenaeus) wrote in Greek. And the Eastern Fathers all wrote in Greek as well: Chrysostom, Basil, etc.
We have many many writings that illustrate how these folks interpreted certain key passages.
Yes of course. That's because we are far removed from the original audience and we have to infer a meaning from historical data. That wasn't the case in the first centuries A.D.
And I strongly reject the argument that we can't trust the Fathers because "They are flawed men." What are you? What am I? If they are flawed, we are flawed even more. And if we have a reliable guide in the Holy Ghost, were they not reliably guided as well?
The other one that has received significant support is 1 Enoch. What is your thoughts on that one?
When did this change? When I was married in 2001, I had to get a dispensation to marry my non Catholic fiance. It was a painless procedure, paperwork filled out by the DRE/Marriage Coordinator at our parish. But it did actually have to happen. I am unaware of that changing in the last 10 years.
I over stated my point, and admitted as much later in the thread.
It is EXTREMELY easy for Catholics to marry non-Catholics, in my area.
totally agree that it is a painless procedure.
I was raised baptist but converted to Catholicism. my dad is a non practicing catholic. I could name a few beliefs and practices of pentacostals and Baptists I don’t agree with. each demonination has it’s traditions. the reason we have denominations is because not everyone agrees with each one. I for one am not into speaking in tongues nor do I belive in dispensationalism. nor do I belive in the rapture.
In fact, you can have a valid CATHOLIC wedding if a Priest simply attends, and does not perform the service.
Provided the proper dispensations are gained, it is actually even possible for a marriage conducted by a Protestant minister, with no Catholic priest in attendance to be valid. That said, the Catholic Church's preference would be for the wedding to be officiated by a Catholic Priest in a Catholic church.
Nothing changed. A dispensation is still necessary.
So, my wife got back from Chicago last night and I asked her about what catholic chants she did, and if there was anything about Mary dying a virgin. She immediately started with her ‘...full of grace, blessed be the fruit of thy womb...” stuff and got to the end and said, no. And then she keeps mumbling until she says “...ever virgin...”, and stops and says, “Oh yeah, I guess that was in there.”
It is what I suspected. When kids are brought up from birth exposed to and doing a chant, the words lose their meaning. They are just sounds. She never really gave serious thought to what “ever virgin” actually meant.
I suppose a person that understands the bible and then sees that phrase in something they always said could think to themselves that the phrase “ever virgin” means something other than what the writers intended it to mean. I can imagine being a catholic like she was and then when someone points out that the phrase means Mary was ALWAYS a virgin I might say something like, “That’s ridiculous. I’m sure what is meant is that she will forever be known as the one who, as a virgin, gave birth to our savior. I mean, she was married, and Joseph was told not to have relations with her UNTIL she had given birth, so that is the only explanation that makes sense, right?”
I’ve actually had experiences like that with various organizations of which I was a part. Some obscure phrase they cling to means something different than what I thought it meant.
I’ll bet there are a LOT of devout Catholics that don’t know that the church teaches that Mary is perfect and she died a virgin.
BTW, If the Church really does teach that along with all the baggage I have seen attached to it here, then the church is much more flawed than I originally thought. Although many of its members may be Christian, I’m not sure its teaching is. It does fit in with why my wife left it. With an adult mind she read the Bible with an open mind and found she had to move on. However, because she was raised in it and they were VERY Catholic, she still has a “vestigal” need for the pomp. She misses it, but knows that it is mere reminiscing about her childhood culture, which is meaningless. Heck, I met an ex-Hitler Youth member that reminisced over his Hitler Youth days. But you can’t go back. Nor would you want to.
>>You aren’t doing a very good job of presenting it. <<
My wife was in Chicago yesterday. I queried her this morning on the subject. I clarified in a post a few minutes ago.
>>Then you both reject John 6 and 1 Corinthians 11 based on your own personal interpretation of Scripture.<<
Listen to yourself. That sentence makes no sense. Let me make a slight change: “Then you both reject the Catholic church’s interpretation of John 6 and 1 Corinthians 11 based on your own personal interpretation of Scripture.”
The answer to that is, yes, absolutely.
I wrote about two paragraphs in response to your simple inclusion of those two chapters in the NT but decided it would be easier to just link to a few people with whom I agree. It is not necessary to argue the same thing over and over:
My favorite, but a long read:
http://bible.org/seriespage/corrections-communion-1-cor-1117-34
Also
http://www.auburn.edu/~allenkc/openhse/communion.html
And this is good information which helps explain the challenge both of us are having with each other’s views.
http://www.fact-index.com/e/eu/eucharist.html
>>And I strongly reject the argument that we can’t trust the Fathers because “They are flawed men.” What are you?<<
Not true. You asked me “What am I?” The answer is, “I am the one man that ever lived that is alone responsible for whether or not I come to Jesus as my Lord and Savior.”
Those other flawed men are not. It is up to me. It means I choose. It is the free-will thing. And the ONLY “earthly” authority to which I will appeal is the Bible. I will listen to other men and they often will convince me of where I may have been steering myself in the wrong direction, but it is always because of some scripture I was ignoring or missreading, or ignoring context, etc. But the bottom line is that once “flawed men” have their say, it is fully my responsibility to accept or reject what they say. And only I will suffer the consequences or reap the benefit.
Each man has the God given right and RESPONSIBILITY to choose for himself. And this decision, ultimately, is strictly between me and God. Everyone dies alone.
>>I could name a few beliefs and practices of pentacostals and Baptists I don’t agree with. <<
Tell me about it! :)
I cannot imagine finding a church with which I agree on every little thing, so I make sure we agree on the “bullet doctrines” and mostly agree on the other stuff. Otherwise I’d never find a church.
>>...the reason we have denominations is because not everyone agrees with each one.<<
I’m in the process to moving to rural Kentucky. The sheer quantity of “Babdis” churches there is staggering. And they have prefixes like “first separate”, “second revived separate” before the words “Baptist Church”. Freedom has its price.
>>I for one am not into speaking in tongues<<
That is why I had to finally leave Assembly of God after attending there for 18 years. It was the church I began attending when I first gave my life to Him. But no matter how I read it, that tongues thing just did not match what the bible says about it. The primary example in Acts is clearly talking about people speaking in other earthly languages. But I digress.
Regarding the Rapture, I had a REAL hard time with that. However, here is was a timing thing. They strongly preach “Pre-Trib” and I was in agreement when I was ignorant. After all, they knew more than I did, right? I mean, I could just appeal to their authority. Except the proofs they used were almost (but not quite) as silly as the proofs used to claim Mary died a virgin.
I did become a “mid-Tribulationist” (actually it is “post-trib, pre-wrath”) but this was after studying it myself. Twenty five years later I came across a guy that actually describes my position much better than I can, so I offer it here. And he and I are pretty much in total agreement on this particular issue:
http://watchmanbiblestudy.com/BibleStudies/Definitions/Def_Pretrib.htm
For me, the “rapture” (or whatever you want to call it) is most simply called out in Revelation 7, after the sealing of the 144,000. I find it interesting that the Bible prophesy talks of such a precise number out of israel, talks of armies of 300,000,000 and yet in that verse the number of people is too high to count.
That is actually pretty good news. :)
This verse is used often to posit what at first glance is a rebuke of His mother by Jesus. I admit that upon considering a return to the church, it troubled me and was somewhat an obstacle to my return.
I weighed it against what I knew as a Catholic and read and prayed over it many times and have come to understand what Jesus is saying here. I see it now as what a current popular phrase calls a “teachable moment.”
Jesus does not rebuke his mother. Instead, He holds her up as an example for us. What does He say?
“For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven, the same is my brother, my sister and my mother.”
Do we agree that Mary in her consent to bear Jesus has in fact done the will of God?
Luke 1:38 Then Mary said, ‘Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.’
Jesus is saying that we are His brother, his sister, his mother when we do what Mary did, hear the Word of God and and accept His will in our lives.
What is our next encounter with Mary in the Bible? When she visits Elizabeth and from that visit we have her beautiful Magnificat.
My soul doth magnify the Lord.
And my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour.
Because he hath regarded the humility of his handmaid;
for behold from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed.
Because he that is mighty,
hath done great things to me;
and holy is his name.
And his mercy is from generation unto generations,
to them that fear him.
He hath shewed might in his arm:
he hath scattered the proud in the conceit of their heart.
He hath put down the mighty from their seat,
and hath exalted the humble.
He hath filled the hungry with good things;
and the rich he hath sent empty away.
He hath received Israel his servant,
being mindful of his mercy:
As he spoke to our fathers,
to Abraham and to his seed for ever.
This has also been called the Canticle or Song or Prayer of Mary. But, read it. Could it not also be our prayer? Mary was after all the first of the disciples of Jesus. Is it wrong to wish for ourselves to be the same as Mary? To be full of His grace? To be a bearer of Jesus? To be blessed to be called by Him and to rejoice in Him?
Do you believe that Jesus loves Mary in the way a son loves his mother? If so, why? The Bible never tells us once that Jesus loved Mary. Why? And what are we to make of that?
All Catholic doctrine regarding Mary serves two purposes.
First and foremost, everything believed and taught about Mary has a direct correlation to WHO and WHAT is Jesus.
Second, everything believed and taught about Mary is serves as an example to us of the perfect disciple.
We hear God’s word, we ponder it and we accept His will in our lives. We stay united to Jesus in all things, especially in sorrow and troubled times. Mary was there, from the beginning and stayed to witness what must have been the most horrific thing a mother will ever witness.
If we follow her example, we too will have a share of the graces and glories given her by her Son.
“upon considering a return to the church, it troubled me and was somewhat an obstacle to my return”
But that is not really logically consistent with what the Catholic Church teaches.
I don’t see that passage as Jesus rebuking his mother and brothers, but rather Jesus is saying that they are no more important than anyone else. And in fact, his followers are more important to Him.
But what should it matter if Jesus were rebuking them? If your view of Mary is that she is not raised up any higher than any other believer in Jesus? Jesus did rebuke Simon Peter.
I think you were quite right in your concern, because you recognised that the Catholic Church raises Mary up significantly higher than believers in Jesus, and virtually to deity status (there is a group of Catholics who want her named co-redeemer).
Because unless they do raise her up so, there was no reason for your concern, *however* you chose to interpret that passage. But your gut gave you concern, because in fact, they do, do that.
And there are many ultra-religious people who call themselves Catholics (maybe you think they are in error), who have little statues of Mary, and make the statues face the brown ground, so they can “send rain”, as one poster related. In Mexico they combine the image of Jesus and Mary with the images of Sun worship. It’s all intensely related (particularly in some cultures) to pagan beliefs. And yes, maybe such people are considered in error by good Catholics, who I know exist. But those people are in no way rebuked by the church. The church allows these things to go on, which are clearly in error, because they have made the judgement that they will allow pagan worship in, so they can grow the church.
I believe that God elevated Mary when He chose her to bear His Son.
From the song, “Gentle Woman”
You were chosen, by the Father
You were chosen, for the Son.
You were chosen, o’er all others.
And for women, the shining one.
I also believe that we are imperfect, all of us. In our lives AND in our worship.
I also believe that everything belongs to God and what is imperfect, Christ makes perfect to the glory of God.
And, because I believe what I have stated above, I believe that God knows the hearts of all men and will be merciful in His judgment of those who love Him and seek Him however imperfectly.
I need to add that it was not my gut that gave me concern regarding Mary, it was my head. Once my head understood what my heart was telling me, I found a peace, returned to the Church and happily reside there to this day.
All glory and praise be to God, for He has found me and brought me home.
Please do not play word games with Christianity.
Your premise is that Catholics pray to Mary as to God.
Not true. Go to the sources such as Catholic Encyclopedie or the Catechism.
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