*****When I got saved, one of the first impulses I had was the NEED to go out and buy a Bible and begin reading it. Nobody told me I had to (I got saved at work, not an altar call where someone told me I ought to do that). I just knew I needed to do it, so I did.****
And why did you feel this need? Did you know what a Bible is? In other words, did you know about God and Jesus and the Bible before you went out to buy one? And if you did, what did you know about it that made you feel you needed to buy one?
And once you did these things, you never once spoke with or studied Scripture with any other human being?
One may like to think one has come to knowledge of Christ and Scripture solely on one’s own, but that could not be further from the truth.
The Holy Spirit impressed it on me. It wasn't because someone told me I needed to.
Did you know what a Bible is?
Not really, having never been exposed to one before.
Yes, but that did not play into the need I felt to go out and buy one.
Based on my upbringing, my first reaction SHOULD HAVE BEEN to make a beeline for the nearest Catholic church. It wasn't.
And once you did these things, you never once spoke with or studied Scripture with any other human being?
I never said that. We were discussing what caused me to feel the need to buy a Bible and anything other than addressing that, what my knowledge about God and Jesus was before that, does not enter into the equation.
If it did, I would have felt the need to buy a Bible BEFORE I got saved, not after.
I read and understood and came to my own conclusions about doctrine. It usually agreed with mainstream Evangelical teaching. And I did ask questions, but that is not what caused me to feel the need to go out and buy a Bible.
Long and short of it is that the Catholic church cannot take any credit for my desire to get a hold of God's word and read and learn of it myself under the guidance of the Holy Spirit.