Posted on 06/26/2015 10:18:59 AM PDT by Morgana
My grandmother celebrates 100 years of being a Catholic. She will most likely be a Catholic till her last breath as all my other grandparents were. Me? I’m a mere forty-year cradle Catholic. I own that it hasn’t been easy to remain a faithful daughter of the Church, particularly during my turbulent twenties. There was a period I disagreed with, questioned, and criticized Holy Mother Church. There were times I watched people I love abandon their baptismal promises. Still, I remained true to my heritage.
Why? Why am I still Catholic? It’s for the same reasons why people disagree, question, criticize and leave the Church:
1. The Eucharist. A mystery or a symbol to some, but the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Our Lord in the host is clear as the Catechism 1376 puts it, “because Christ our Redeemer said that it was truly his body that he was offering under the species of bread.” I am more than happy to remain in the Church where Jesus is really and truly present, and where I can be united to Him in receiving Communion.
2. Blessed Virgin Mary. The Church exalts the Mother of God as the perfect apostle and bestows dignity to womanhood. Since Mary was “preserved free from all stain of original sin” (Catechism 966), she is the role model for every Christian. The scripture on the wedding feast at Cana illustrates that she is a powerful intercessor to our prayers and that devotion to her is the fastest, surest way to unity with Christ as she encourages us: “do whatever [Jesus] tells you.” Our Lady is, to me, all that and a mother who cares about my everyday concerns, with the end goal of the sanctifying my soul. “Don’t be afraid of loving Mary too much,” St. Maximilian Kolbe said. “You can’t possibly love her more than Jesus does.”
3. The saints. By the rigorous process of canonization, the Catholic Church venerates the saints as humans who blazed the path on how to live the Christian life and who “provide us with examples on holiness.” The saints also obtain favors for us as they “do not cease to intercede with the Father for us, as the proffer the merits which they acquired on earth.” (Catechism 956). Just like any good friend, saints inspire and pray for me. The journey of my spiritual life is easier with their assistance.
4. Penance and Reconciliation. Undoubtedly, the Church houses both saints and sinners. Knowing our fallen nature, which tempts us to sin and often characterizes us as Pharisees, Christ established the Sacrament of Reconciliation as a means for contrite sinners to obtain absolution for our sins. Jesus told St. Faustina “When you approach the confessional…I myself am waiting there for you. I am only hidden in the priest.” Never have I heard more powerful words than the merciful ones voiced at the Sacrament of Reconcilation: “I absolve you from your sins, may God give you pardon and peace.”
5. Purgatory. Purgatory is the place where all who die in God’s grace and friendship but are still imperfectly purified undergo purification after death so as the achieve holiness necessary to enter the joy of heaven. (Catechism 1030). Purgatory as a manifestation of God’s mercy gives me hope that even if I can’t overcome my faults during my life on earth, I still have an opportunity to be sanctified by God’s justice so that I can one day enjoy the beatific vision.
6. Suffering. Suffering is inevitable in our lives because of man’s free will. The Catholic Church makes sense of suffering when it teaches that suffering can be untied with Christ’s passion in atonement for sins. According to St. John Paul II, suffering also increases our capacity for selfless love and hones the virtue of humility. Since scripture says that carrying my cross is necessary to share in Christ’s redemption, the Church not only explains suffering’s purpose but also offers me graces from the Sacraments to endure sacrifice.
7. Magisterium. Jesus Christ established the Catholic Church as the “pillar and bulwark of the truth” to sift through the muddled moral issues that confounds our modern age (and every age) so that she can provide clear guidelines on right versus wrong. “To the Church belongs the right always and everywhere to announce moral principles.” (Catechism 2032) In every moral issue it has addressed, the Church has illustrated wisdom that only comes from the Holy Spirit. I rely on this wisdom to guard my soul from evil and to direct me on the path to eternal life as much as I rely on the promise of Jesus that “the gates of hell shall never prevail against [the Church].”
I could go on and on. The truth in the Catechism and experience of millions of Catholics over two thousand years are inexhaustible. I don't know how far back my Catholic roots go. But I hope I am not the branch that withers and rots off a steadfast family tree and I pray that I leave Catholicism as a fruitful legacy to my children, and generations after them.
Catechism 2030: “It is in the Church, in communion with all the baptized that the Christian fulfills his vocation.”
Anyone who believes that is NOT part of the body of Christ. That teaching is another gospel and anyone who teaches it is considered accursed by God.
“I believe you have already been told that the grace you are touting is not God’s Grace...”
All grace is His.
1 Peter 5:10: And the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast.
“...God of all grace”
ALL grace.
“You might want to study up on the Bema Seat of Christ IN HEAVEN.”
You might want to study up on everything.
And again, what you describe in purgatory is not Grace.
“Anyone who believes that is NOT part of the body of Christ. That teaching is another gospel and anyone who teaches it is considered accursed by God.”
Jesus is full of grace and truth: John 1:14.
From His fullness we receive grace upon grace: John 1:16.
Grace and truth came through Jesus: John 1:17.
Jesus came through Mary. Luke 2:7.
Jesus is the source of grace: again, John 1:14.
The source of grace passed through Mary into this world: again Luke 2:7.
You can make up anything you want. Every person who has ever died drank water therefore drinking water causes death.
“And again, what you describe in purgatory is not Grace.”
And, again, it is.
http://www.ncregister.com/daily-news/the-joyful-pains-of-purgatory
Lutherans are just Catholics that trust the bible more.
They’re still way off of what the Bible plainly says.
No one that seeks the eucharist will find Yehova’s rest.
No One!
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“Lutherans are just Catholics that trust the bible more.”
Lutherans are Protestants. Period. Everything I said was true. You can try to worm out of it somehow but it won’t work.
“They’re still way off of what the Bible plainly says.”
Again, your opinion is not important. You were wrong.
“No one that seeks the eucharist will find Yehova’s rest.”
Again, your opinion has been demonstrated to be not in accord with the facts. You have been shown repeatedly to be wrong - on things that are not even matters of interpretation - so you can’t possibly be taken seriously on anything.
“No One!”
Except those who do.
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Not one willing seeker of Lucifer’s false messiah (the messiah in the eucharist) will find Yehova’s rest.
Not one worshiper of Ishtar/Mary, or keeper of the 40 days of Tammuz will find his rest.
Yeshua taught to feed his sheep, not build gilded cathedrals.
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“Not one willing seeker of Lucifer’s false messiah (the messiah in the eucharist) will find Yehova’s rest.”
That sort of statement just makes the person saying it look desperate and ignorant.
“Not one worshiper of Ishtar/Mary, or keeper of the 40 days of Tammuz will find his rest.”
Except none of us worship Mary and Lent has nothing to do with “Tammuz” as everyone of any intelligence knows. I guess there are some people stupid enough to still believe some sort of Hislopian nonsense but you would think that died long ago after the Ralph Woodrow revelations about his own stupidity. http://www.amazon.com/Babylon-Connection-Ralph-Woodrow/dp/0916938174/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1435879959&sr=1-4&refinements=p_27%3ARalph+Woodrow
“Yeshua taught to feed his sheep, not build gilded cathedrals.”
We’ve been doing both for many, many centuries, while most anti-Catholics do neither or little of either one.
When I was a Catholic, I remember there was allegedly a place called Limbo. I don't remember what qualified anyone to go there, but was it willed out of existence? What happened to all those who were in Limbo, if it was decided the place no longer existed?
Anyway, I don't believe in Purgatory. I don't do sacraments. I don't do good works to get saved, or stay saved. I do good works BECAUSE I am saved. I don't pray to the holy saints (necromancy) and besides that, how does anyone even know for sure these "saints" are even in Heaven? Many of them might be in Hell. I don't believe Mary was sinless. I believe she gave birth to a ton of kids, New Testament writers James and Jude being two of them. There might be other things I don't do. These are just some of them. Does that make me a basher? 😀😂😂😎😆
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Everything about the RCC is sungod worship, and everyone but the catholics seem to understand that. (everyone of any intelligence anyway)
The timing of the RCC events being on the traditional ancient pagan days is more than a coincidence.
Who could possibly be fooled by it?
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Limbo is Caribbean catholic Santeria.
It is where someone whose spirit has been stolen must dwell until their spirit is recovered.
Just more paganism.
Mark, did you ever believe, as a Catholic, that you would be paying for the sins you didn’t get absolved by the church, by spending time in Purgatory?
It is where someone whose spirit has been stolen must dwell until their spirit is recovered.
I can't remember even hearing the word, since 1970, when my mom said she thought my dad would go to Limbo. Actually, this is pretty laughable. I wonder how one gets their spirit stolen, and then recovered?
It wasn’t very popular to say that unbaptized babies didn’t go to heaven or never even had the chance to, so limbo has been essentially dropped.
Well, first of all, when there is a false doctrine, like Purgatory, each priest might give a slightly different version, but essentially, I believe that is about what we were told by the priests. Now me personally? I didn't really think Purgatory would apply to me, only other people, simply because I was a VERY sinful catholic, and I thought I would go straight to Hell at death, not Purgatory. I think Heaven will be filled with horrible sinners. Sinners who were so awful, they realized it, and fled to the Savior for forgiveness. Make sense?
Yes, Brother, it is the essence of The Gospel Good News. So of course it makes sense.
In the Caribbean, that kind of stuff is just normal.
Nobody ever questions what is possible; they just believe what the ‘priest’ tells them, and pay him the fee for the info.
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