Rock cut tombs in Petra
Ancient burial ground in Kurdistan
Posted on 04/17/2015 12:12:16 PM PDT by RnMomof7
I’ve mentioned that Roman Catholicism is so onerous because it puts its hooks in you at various times in your life – from baptism as a child, to “first confession” and “first holy communion”, then Confirmation as an early teen, then marriage, baptism of your own children, etc. It’s a programmatic cycle.
There is another point at which Rome is prominent, and that is at death. As the “Baby Boom” generation continues to age and die, people will continue to be focused on this phase of life, either as people focused on the end of their own lives, or that of their aging parents.
Paul Moses, a journalism professor at Brooklyn College/CUNY”, has written a piece for the Wall Street Journal this morning entitled “A Liberal Catholic and Staying Put”, which puts this in view.
Beginning the article with some comments from the atheistic “Freedom From Religion Foundation”, which urged discontented, liberal-minded Catholics to “Summon your fortitude, and just go”, he rejects this notion with the following comments:
To me, these invitations reflect a shallow view of the Catholic Church that reduces its complex journey to the points where it intersects with the liberal social agenda. Pope Francis’ pastoral approach has shown a more merciful, less judgmental face of the church—one that always existed but needed to be more prominent in the public arena.
After my father died last year, I realized that my instinctive resistance to these “just go” arguments—from the atheists, the secularists, the orthodox, the heterodox or anyone else—runs deep. It began when I observed how impressively the church was there for me in a moment of need (emphasis added).
Early on the morning after he died, I went to my father's parish, St. Peter's in lower Manhattan, to find out what to do to bury him. I found one of the priests in the sacristy after the early Mass. The Rev. Alex Joseph took my hands in his, spoke a beautiful prayer, told me of his own father's death years earlier and added, "Our fathers are always with us." I was much moved.
We decided to have my father's funeral in the Staten Island parish where he had worshiped for 25 years … Bernard L. Moses, who died at 88, had loved Father Madigan’s homilies, and to hear [Father Madigan] speak at the funeral Mass was to understand why. My father had advanced up the ranks of the New York City Housing Authority to director of management. Citing his concern for tenants, Father Madigan used the traditional Catholic term “corporal work of mercy” to describe what my father did. It explained for me, in those difficult moments, why my father, who was well-schooled in Catholic social teachings, had passed up the opportunity for a more pleasant career in academia, or a more lucrative one managing private housing, to work in housing projects instead.
Few of us, I think, live daily on the edge of eternity in the conscious way that the Puritans did, and we lose out as a result. For the extraordinary vivacity, even hilarity (yes, hilarity; you will find it in the sources), with which the Puritans lived stemmed directly, I believe, from the unflinching, matter-of-fact realism with which they prepared themselves for death, so as always to be found, as it were, packed up and ready to go (emphasis added). Reckoning with death brought appreciation of each day’s continued life, and the knowledge that God would eventually decide, without consulting them, when their work on earth was done brought energy for the work itself while they were still being given time to get on with it (pg 14).
Rock cut tombs in Petra
Ancient burial ground in Kurdistan
But being in “union” with Christ or “communion” with, as you’ve stated, is not the Gospel message which determines an individuals spiritual condition before and after death...and ultimately where they will spend eternity.
In John 19:30 Jesus said, “It is finished!” And bowing His head, He gave up ‘His spirit’.....
So we see again the body without the spirit is dead....do we agree?
There is no debate regarding that our sin brings forth death...just as it’s written.
You wrote....”Then faith dies apart from works is dead, and works in this context is understood faith rooted in the other theological virtues’ of Hope and Love.”
You know really... that sounds pretty twisted, like a Pretzel....Never the less let me say... how can it be at all possible that our ‘faith dies’ when in fact our faith rests entirely on the person Jesus Christ...He cannot deny himself.
caw:
As who were the first to bury there dead, maybe it was the Neanderthals. I only stated the pagans around the time of Christ and going back to probably 1000 BC burned and cremated. Cleary the Jews of Christ time respected his Dead body as they anointed it and clothed it with an appropriate burial cloth. I am aware that burial grounds go way back, but among the Pagan Romans and Greeks, burning and cremation were the more popular methods.
Sheesh....am really trying to get on a footing of agreement here while you’re attempting to teach history...so let’s get this settled if you don’t mind.
A Yes or no is sufficient....Do we agree that the body without the Spirit is dead?
caww:
I really quite frankly don’t know where you are going with this. Yes, when a person dies, the soul and spirit leave the body. If that is what you mean, then ok.
As for my views of James, no not twisted at all, it just seems like a pretzel to you because it does not fit your Protestant soteriology. Entirely consistent with Catholic Doctrine. Your faith dies when you destroy it by works or acts that don’t flow from faith [not works of the Jewish ceremonial law here], but acts that go against hope and love.
And to die in communion with Christ is just a Catholic way of expressing what is pointed to in Romans 6:4-8 and 2 Timothy 2:11, those who die with Christ [in communion with him] will rise with him.
Faith is not just a theological assent to who Christ is, that is part of it, but by dead faith one has made shipwreck of it by there actions. Again, this debate is slowly moving into a Soteriology debate, which has been debated here ad nauseam.
caww:
The Person [Body and Soul] without Christ will be dead in eternity, thus it is not spiritually alive [is alive with God’s Grace]. But it that context, the Soul is also dead in a sense. So, only through God’s Grace can the human person have immortality, and be resurrected, but the entire Human Person [Soul and Spirit and Body] will be resurrected. Those who die rejecting Christ will also have their bodies reunited with their souls, but experience eternal torment in Hell.
So perhaps we actually do agree, but we use different terminology.
You asked me if I believed in the Resurrection of the dead...
I responded yes,..but then that would depend on which resurrection and what that means to you. That perhaps best we begin with agreeing what dead is defined as.
I said for me ..just as it's defined...”The body without the Spirit is dead”. (James26)
I asked if we could agree on that and a simple yes or no would have cleared that right up...
BTW I noted you sent another post I haven't read yet so I'll proceed to that now before I reply further....and please...you do well not to compartmentalize me into a specific faith or denomination of which I have not shared.
I am a Christian ...Jesus is my Savior, Lord, Father, God and coming King...I am forgiven by His finished/completed work on the cross and thru His Resurrection Life everlasting with Him.... By His Spirit given me, and His Word, I have the assurance of eternal life with Him and the fellowship of other believers in the Body of Christ. That should be more than sufficient for conversation regarding the faith.
....”The Person without Christ will be dead in eternity”....
The Person without Christ will endure for eternity but in what condition we can only refer to a likeness of when the Rich man went to Hell and suffering does see to have a bodily form, with it’s senses, as he sees and tastes, is thirsty and well ‘aware’ there is a separation between where he is suffering and the poor man being comforted...and that distinction. We also know he had a memory by asking that someone warn his family members of the place he was.
No matter how you read that selection he is aware of the past, his condition of suffering, and the separation and distinctions between himself and what he saw but could not go there and be among...ever.
So I believe quite possible they have life, and perhaps even possible the body they had here on earth...corrupted etc. At any rate they will have ‘no relief’ from sorrow and suffering and aloneness...and this by their own choosing.
Praise the Eternal God and Savior he found us!...and we said Yes to His great and awesome salvation promise!
In contrast, millions of Christians quietly give their “widows mite” to run thousands of hospitals in third world hell holes to cure the sick. In the past, many of us who worked in these hospitals were Europeans or Yanks, but now many of these are staffed by locals. Quite a few are run by Catholics, although we had SDA and Anglicans and UCC and Lutheran run hospitals too.
I am too old to work, but my relatives work here in the rural Philippines even though they could earn a lot more in the US.
as for Catholics being “rigid”...uh, is this what you read or is it what you observed? How can we be both evil hedonistic pagans and rigid obedient rule followers.
As far as the rigid thing goes. It was a comment you made in post 86. I really didn't know what you meant by it then. I don't know what you mean by it now. I will just have to leave it to your imagination to figure it out. Same goes with the hedonistic thing. I can't answer that either, being as I never said anything about hedonism. If someone else did, then you will have to ask them. I guess in the end, we will all have to wait till Gabriel blows his horn, to see who goes where and why they go there. I am perfectly willing to let God decide when old Gabe gets to do that. I hope we all make it.
Death is a consequence to ANY sin and ALLmsin.
Scripture makes no distinctions of sin, like original, venial, mortal, like the Catholic church does. Those distinctions are man-made constructs to try to diminsh the seriousness and consequence of sin.
I can't believe Catholics go there. If you want to use the Old Testament how about this.
Deuteronomy 4:2 Ye shall not add unto the word which I command you, neither shall ye diminish ought from it, that ye may keep the commandments of the LORD your God which I command you.
Creating the veneration of bones and relics from a verse that gives absolutely no background or reference to a command by God is very dangerous. It is however prevalent in paganism. Babylonians, Egyptians, and Buddhists all venerated the dead long before Catholics incorporated the practice. It certainly didn't originate nor was it taught by Christ and the apostles.
>>As Saint Jerome wrote<<
I doubt I have to elaborate on how many errors Jerome's translation includes compared to the original Hebrew and Greek.
They only quote their “church fathers” when convenient to the present day beliefs.
That's idolatry. Surely you didn't think the pagan idols were the gods themselves did you? They also represented the gods they serve. God told us in Deuteronomy 12 not to do what the heathen do. Yet the Catholic Church readily admits that they incorporate pagan worship practices.
No, its idolatry to an iconoclastic with puritan stripes, particularly the American Fundamentalist Protestant stripe. If was not to Saint Polycarp, Saint Augustine, Saint Jerome, Saint Cyril of Jerusalem, no orthodox Church Father nor was it to the 2nd Council of Nicea in 787, which predated Calvin and Zwingli by almost 800 years.
Of course I don’t think pagan idols were God. That is the context of making a graven image and bowing down to it as if it were God. The Invisible reality that I am referring to is God, the realities, if would thus be CHrist, the Holy Spirit, etc. So an Icon with a Dove is a visible symbol of an invisible reality, that reality being the Holy Spirit. One worships the Holy Spirit, one venerates the Icon that symbolizes the Holy Spirit.
CynicalBear:
You have a problem with Saint Jerome’s translation, that is your prerogative. I will take his translation over your views of his translation every day the rest of my life.
Again, the Bones of the Prophet Elisha were not an Idol, they were real flesh and bone, the images forbidden to be worshipped does not forbid the use of all images, as I can go through a whole litany of OT passages were God commanded the making of an image/icon. Take the Ark of the Covenant to start, the Bronze Serpent that Moses used, etc.
No use going on any further.
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