Why become a Catholic if you are a Protestant?

MoreCoffee

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If you are a Protestant and have a knowledge of the gospel while holding an active lively faith in God why convert to the Catholic Church?

Here are some reasons that I like.
  • The bible. The bible has more to say than the 66 books commonly received among Protestants says.
  • Antiquity. The Church is older, much older, than the commencement of the Martin Luther's protest against various errors and faults in Catholic practise in the early 16th century.
  • Continuity. The Church of the centuries from the first until the sixteenth and on to the twenty-first is according to the scriptures one church. Couple this with Antiquity and Catholic, Orthodox, and Oriental Orthodox perspectives on the Church have more going for them than Protestant perspectives do.
  • Sacraments. The sacraments are not symbols only nor are they public testimony or private/public remembrance only. Catholics know this and teach it. Catholics point to the same views expressed by Christians in earlier centuries all the way back to the second and first centuries AD.
  • Order. Maintaining order in a large body of believers that spans not just congregations but languages and nations to cover almost every land on Earth is no easy task. The Catholic Church manages it, not flawlessly, not without dissent, yet it remains one church despite all that human frailty and external as well as internal opposition brings.
  • Tradition. What Christians taught and did in the past has a 'vote' in the faith of Catholics. We do not forget the past even when it brings shame but more so when it brings hope and encouragement.
  • The saints. Taken with Tradition the saints offer examples of Christian faith lived in a wide variety of conditions with a wider variety of personality and foibles yet it is Christian faith and it is lived and it gives encouragement to those who take the time to look at how the faith was lived by such diverse people in such diverse conditions.
  • The Faith. The doctrines and practises of Christianity have a longer history than some appear to think. They go back to the time when Jesus walked and talked and taught among men through time to the apostles and on through time to those who followed them until our own time. Taken with antiquity, continuity, and tradition this is a testimony to the enduring presence of God among his people without interruption and without 'restoration of a lost set of truths' to correct an allegedly corrupted church.
  • Truth. Everybody argues for their own views as if they were true but not every argument presented is right and that is why we have so many 'versions' of the 'truth' today. Relativism - the idea that each individual has a 'version of the truth' - is widespread in public and individual thinking but it is not how things are. The truth is singular. It is true and has no versions. Versions of the truth are not the truth even if they contain some truth - be it only a little or be it a great deal - they are not the whole truth. The Catholic Church credibly presents its teaching and practise as "the fullness of truth" and that is really the only kind of truth that there is.
These are not the only reasons that I like but they are the ones I thought about as I typed this post.
 
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Andrew

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I like your new avy MC!
 

Josiah

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double post, sorry. See next post
 
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Josiah

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Why I as a Catholic became a Protestant....



I wrote this several years ago.... perhaps I'll start a thread and expand/explain much more.... but this is sufficient for here. The RCC has lost about 30 Million members just currently just in the USA alone. Some of those have become Protestant, some just unchurched. My Lutheran parish is about 50% former Lutherans (last year, we accepted 12 new members - ALL of them former Catholics). Well, here's what I wrote at CF several years ago when I was asked why I left the RC Denomination..... I'll consider starting a thread on this here.... The wording here is too harsh and emotional, although the points accurate.



Josiah said:

Why I LEFT the RCC:


1. I disagree that Christians are a specific institutional denomination, the RCC as the RCC itself alone so insists for itself alone. The egotistical, divisive, INSTITUTIONAL, self-centered, self-serving, power-grabbing, truth-evading, accountability-denying claims of it itself alone for it itself alone was something I found to be very unbiblical, unreasonable and absurd. I came to believe that Christians are PEOPLE, and so the "assembly, community, gathering, communion" of PEOPLE is also PEOPLE - not a denominational, geopolitical, legal, denomination. I rejected the self-serving ecclesiology of the RCC. I came to embrace the ancient creed: one, holy, catholic communion of believers. And thus all the OBSESSION the RCC has with itself, all the enormous egotistical power-grabbing, lording-it-over-all-as-the-Gentiles-do" of the RCC increasingly revealed to me that the RCC is wrong. In what is the foundation of the RCC, the key point on which it stands or falls. The claims of the RCC here are not only unbiblical and unhistorical - but dangerous and absurd.


2. I came to reject the epistemology of "just swallow WHATEVER I'M officially saying because I'M alone saying it." This "just drink the koolaid I'M feeding 'ya and shut up" rubric (CCC 87, etc.). The foundational epistemology of the RCC (and also all "cults" known to me). Over and over and over in Scripture (OT and NT) we are told to beware of false teachings - yet the RCC forbids this. Jesus praised Christians for doing this - yet the RCC condemns that (Rev. 2:2, etc.). I came to embrace that the TRUE TEACHER is likely to come into the light, to welcome the light, to insist on accountability - because TRUTH would matter, not the unmitigated power and lordship of self alone over all. It is the teacher of FALSEHOOD who is likely to hide in the dark, reject the light, insist on building around self huge, thick, divisive walls of egotistical and power grabbing and self serving claims of self for self, insisting that he alone just be given a "pass" on truthfulness and that all just swallow whatever self alone says cuz self alone is saying it and self alone tells all to do that. Now.... I DO agree with a sense of "authority" but Catholicism (and also all the cults) confuse authority with dictatorship. There is a BALANCE between authority and responsibility, a balance the RCC has entirely, wholly, completely, absolutely abandoned - ironcially becoming the very thing it PRETENDS to reject: self appointing self the sole and UNACCOUNTABLE teacher, interpreter, judge, jury - a dictator. Now, what seems interesting to me is that generally, Catholicism is very sound, I have a huge respect for Catholic scholarship, and I think RCC theology is generally excellent. I am profoundly impressed with much of Catholic doctrinal history. So why the RCC retreats into a very unbiblical, unsound, dangerous epistemology puzzles me - but it does.


3. A "Catholic" by Catholic definition is one who just docilicly swallows what the RCC feeds them... BECAUSE it itself alone does. Truth is irrelevant, the only point is the RCC shouting "don't be insubordinate to ME!!!!!!!" That's the whole enchilada. Either you do - and thus you are Catholic, or you don't and thus you aren't. This finally dawned on me. While I largely AGREED with the RCC (I still agree with probably 95% of what it teaches - doctrinally and morally), I agreed with it MORE than the great majority of "Catholics" (I MUST put that in quotation marks!), I was not Catholic at all. What I accepted I did because I viewed it as true and sound - NOT because I was blindly being subordinate. I was what our deacon so powerfully condemned as the "greatest threat to the Catholic Church since Gnosticism" - I was a "Protestant hiding in the Church" as he characterized it, what he regarded as much WORSE than a "Cafeteria Catholic" which he also insisted were by definition not Catholic at all. If one doesn't mindlessly accept the ecclesiology and epistemology of the RCC - and thus SUBMIT to it (right or wrong, good or sound), then one is not a Catholic. Then I'm not Catholic. In MY view, my leaving was a move of integrity, honesty, character: an unwillingness to lie, to give false witness.


I sought a fellowship that embraced humility, accountability, community. That was Christocentric rather than self-centered, that lifted high the Cross rather than the denomination itself. I looked for at least some attempt at BALANCE between authority and responibility, that pointed to an Authority OTHER than self. It was important to ME that the teachings be biblical and historical. I wanted a fellowship that embraced the teachings I felt strongly were TRUE, but didn't insist I accept things I could not so embrace. It was important to ME that worship be liturgical and sacramental. That the fellowship be pro-life, pro-family. I eventually found that in the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod. AT FIRST, I saw it as "Catholic Light" - embracing all I felt dear but none of the reasons why I had to leave the RCC. But in time, I came to embrace the GOSPEL, the Law/Gospel distinction, the "Theology of the Cross" - I became Lutheran, not "Catholic light." Just my journey...... .



.
.


I didn't mention here the "issue" with a few of those 2,865 points in the ever changing, ever evolving Catechism of the RCC. SOME were not "deal brakers" for me (the Marian ones, for example) but some where: The two I mention here most of all, the Ecclesiology and Epistemology of the RCC. But I also had issues with Transubstantiation, Purgatory and the Infallible Pope - all dogmas that all Catholics MUST swallow and accept, all unique to itself, all surprisingly new. I also had troubled with the Catholic Church on THE most important teaching of all - salvation. I think the typical Catholic position is SO confusing, SO mixed up, SO entanged, SO much a confusion of Law and Gospel that I think that the vast majority of Catholics have no idea who the actual Savior is (Jesus or self?). I think the OFFICIAL teachings of the RCC on this are often sound, but how it gets expressed is often terrible. "God helps those who help themselves" is what our Catholic teachers taught us. "Jesus opens the gate to heaven but you got to get yourself through it by what you do" that's what we were taught. Actually, it wasn't until I became a Lutheran did I realize the error of popular Catholicism on this, THE most important teaching of all.


That said, there is MUCH in Catholicism I admire. I agree with probably 95% of those 2,865 points in the latest edition of the . I LOVE the worship, the liturgy. I LOVE the bold pro-family, pro-life stance. I LOVE how it boldly and with a lot of guts stands up for biblical morality. I LOVE how Catholicism is often very practical, a lot of emphasis on what we do rather than just on a lot of head stuff. I LOVE that there is a deep sense of being a part of a community (it's the denomination rather than Jesus and His family - but it IS a sense of belonging).



- Josiah



.
 
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Albion

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Take all the good things about Roman Catholicism, remove the inauthentic additions that even she is reversing these days, and you get Anglicanism. Although I generally follow convention and describe myself as a Protestant, it's really reformed Catholicism. That being the case, anyone who has a yearning for the "good" things of Catholicism but of course would not want the Medieval superstitions and so on, would find them in Anglicanism.
 

ImaginaryDay2

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Why I as a Catholic became a Protestant....



I wrote this several years ago.... perhaps I'll start a thread and expand/explain much more.... but this is sufficient for here. The RCC has lost about 30 Million members just currently just in the USA alone. Some of those have become Protestant, some just unchurched. My Lutheran parish is about 50% former Lutherans (last year, we accepted 12 new members - ALL of them former Catholics). Well, here's what I wrote at CF several years ago when I was asked why I left the RC Denomination..... I'll consider starting a thread on this here.... The wording here is too harsh and emotional, although the points accurate.



.


I didn't mention here the "issue" with a few of those 2,865 points in the ever changing, ever evolving Catechism of the RCC. SOME were not "deal brakers" for me (the Marian ones, for example) but some where: The two I mention here most of all, the Ecclesiology and Epistemology of the RCC. But I also had issues with Transubstantiation, Purgatory and the Infallible Pope - all dogmas that all Catholics MUST swallow and accept, all unique to itself, all surprisingly new. I also had troubled with the Catholic Church on THE most important teaching of all - salvation. I think the typical Catholic position is SO confusing, SO mixed up, SO entanged, SO much a confusion of Law and Gospel that I think that the vast majority of Catholics have no idea who the actual Savior is (Jesus or self?). I think the OFFICIAL teachings of the RCC on this are often sound, but how it gets expressed is often terrible. "God helps those who help themselves" is what our Catholic teachers taught us. "Jesus opens the gate to heaven but you got to get yourself through it by what you do" that's what we were taught. Actually, it wasn't until I became a Lutheran did I realize the error of popular Catholicism on this, THE most important teaching of all.


That said, there is MUCH in Catholicism I admire. I agree with probably 95% of those 2,865 points in the latest edition of the . I LOVE the worship, the liturgy. I LOVE the bold pro-family, pro-life stance. I LOVE how it boldly and with a lot of guts stands up for biblical morality. I LOVE how Catholicism is often very practical, a lot of emphasis on what we do rather than just on a lot of head stuff. I LOVE that there is a deep sense of being a part of a community (it's the denomination rather than Jesus and His family - but it IS a sense of belonging).



- Josiah

Frankly, Josiah, as someone who personally has friends and family who are Catholic that don't resemble anything like the "vast majority of Catholics (who) have no idea who the actual Savior is", I find this quite offensive.
 
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MoreCoffee

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I had to make a correction in the first post in this thread. I forgot to type the y in every. The corrected text says
  • Order. Maintaining order in a large body of believers that spans not just congregations but languages and nations to cover almost every land on Earth is no easy task. The Catholic Church manages it, not flawlessly, not without dissent, yet it remains one church despite all that human frailty and external as well as internal opposition brings.

I read the replies thus far.

Strip away superstitions - normally culturally bound and geographically bound - and what do you have? A church without the things that the one stripping away the alleged superstitions wants to remove. But what if the alleged superstitions remain, would that be a good reason to leave the church and create a new one that better suits?
 

Josiah

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Frankly, Josiah, as someone who personally has friends and family who are Catholic that don't resemble anything like the "vast majority of Catholics (who) have no idea who the actual Savior is", I find this quite offensive.

I'm sharing my experience - as one whose family is Catholic and whose friends include a high percentage of Catholics. MY experience is that the overwhelming majority of Catholics are synergists and Pelagians..... after all, I was taught by Catholic teachers that "Jesus opened the gate to heaven but it's up to you to get through them." "Jesus made salvation POSSIBLE but you have to achieve it by what you do." "God helps those who help themselves." What I learned in the Catholic Church (and I thought correct until I left that denomination) is that Jesus is the Possibility-Maker but He's not the SAVIOR in the sense that He does the saving. Catholics, obviously, speak constantly of Jesus as the Savior but what is typically meant is not that Jesus does the saving but that Jesus makes salvation possible - but those in heaven very likely achieved it (perhaps only in Purgatory).

Because Jesus is often not seen as the SAVIOR (the one who saves), the emphasis I got every Sunday is the HELP we get so that we can get ourselves through those pearly gates. HELP. "God HELPS those who help themselves" not "God SAVES the helpless." I was taught that we have many helps - The intercessions of the currently RCC approved list of Saints, the intercessions of the Queen of Heaven, the EXACTLY 7 Sacraments that the individual RC Denomination owns and doles out, the "Treasury of Merits" that the individual RC Denomination can credit to us.... occassionally the Holy Spirit is added to this list but usually only in conjunction with some of the above. The Saints, The Holy Virgin, the RCC Sacraments, the RCC itself - these give us the HELP we need to save ourselves. No one can walk through those Pearly Gates on their own, they need help so that THEY can do it. Jesus - I found - doesn't save anyone and doesn't even play much of a role in salvation: He made it POSSIBLE to be saved but He never saved anyone - we do that for ourselves (albeit with gobs of HELP - the vast majority of that help coming from the RCC, claimed the RCC). This was SO drilled into me from birth that I just accepted it. It wasn't until I was worshipping in the Lutheran church that I learned that actually Jesus saves. I didn't leave the RCC for this reason (because I didn't know it was wrong) but it is one thing that keeps me Protestant.

Now, friend, as I posted, while this is POPULAR Catholicism, what we consistently learned from our pastor, our deacon, our teachers - from First Communion Classes, etc. - the OFFICIAL position of Catholicism is nearly impossible to determine. IMO, friend, there is no topic on which the RCC is more unclear and seems more confused. I suspect nearly EVERY possible thought on this can be found in Catholicism (even double predestination, usually associated with John Calvin, actually can be found in official RCC declarations, too - LONG before Calvin came up with it). You can find the Lutheran position loud and clear in Catholicism! But you can also find EVERY OTHER position, too. Law and Gospel are entirely intertwined, blended, mixed-up, confused.... justification and sanctification are often intertwined, blended, mixed up, confused.... the result is that justification is usually presented as progressive, synergistic, Pelagian. "God HELPS those who help THEMSELVES." "Jesus opened the gate to heaven but you got to get YOURSELF through them" as the verbatim, exact things we were taught..... The OFFICIAL position may be 0K (I think it's impossible to determine, but even the Lutheran position can be found in Catholicism), but POPULAR Catholicism leaves Catholic insecure and confused and often holding that IF they ever make it to heaven, it will ultimately because they adequately tapped all the HELP that the RC Denomination offers them and got themselves there. TRUE, they couldn't have done it unless Jesus made it POSSIBLE and unless they were offered lotsa HELP but they got there because of what THEY achieved. Semi Pelaganism at least, certainly synergism if a fairly moderate form.


Now, since you are still reading this (!!), I think where you at times see that Catholics don't swallow their own pitch is when it comes to funerals. I've been to several Catholic funerals. They get REAL Lutheran at funerals. The last one I went to, well, the message could have been preached word-for-word by any Lutherans (I don't at all dismiss the possibility that he was reading a Lutheran sermon!), he was in fact proclaiming a couple of things for which Luther was excommunicated by the RCC! Does the Gospel exist in the RCC? YOU BET. It's found in the Liturgy, it's found in hymns (many are Protestant these days), and it often comes out in sermons and teachings. It's just that it's BURIED and blended and confused with a lot of synergistic Pelagianism - giving an extremely confusing message. Again, I know of NO teaching in all of Catholicism where the RCC is less clear.


Since you are still reading this (!!!!) about half of the members of my Lutheran parish are former Catholics (ALL 12 of the converts we had last year were former Catholics!). We often discuss this.... and I'd say 90% affirm that they were taught EXACTLY as I was. What I'm sharing with you is what virtually all the former Catholic members of my church have experienced and said. Of course, that was Luther's experience, too (and he was excommunicated for saying Jesus saves us). I'm far from unique....


Thanks for reading this, ImaginaryDay2


A blessed Lenten season to you....


- Josiah



.
 
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MoreCoffee

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MY experience is that the overwhelming majority of Catholics are synergists and Pelagians..... after all, I was taught by Catholic teachers that "Jesus opened the gate to heaven but it's up to you to get through them." "Jesus made salvation POSSIBLE but you have to achieve it by what you do." "God helps those who help themselves." What I learned in the Catholic Church (and I thought correct until I left that denomination) is that Jesus is the Possibility-Maker but He's not the SAVIOR in the sense that He does the saving.

Looks like a lot of heresy. Pity that the experience was so bad. Of course that stuff is not Catholic teaching.
 

Josiah

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Pity that the experience was so bad.

Yes....

I think if we took a bit of a survey among the ex-Catholics here, we'd find it is a common one.... Indeed, about half of the members of my Lutheran parish are former Catholics (our president completed Catholic seminary). And we've had this discussion OFTEN, what I was taught seems to be that of the other ex-RCC'er I know. And yes, I agree with you, it's not EXACTLY the official RCC spin.... THAT, in my opinion, is impossible to determine - but one can find the Lutheran position among a plethora of other views all entangled together. But the popular line seems to be pretty much the same.

You might want to read post #8 that I wrote to ImaginaryDay2


A blessed Lenten season ...


- Josiah
 

MoreCoffee

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I think if we took a bit of a survey ...

Everybody ought to know that surveys do not define truth.
  • Truth. Everybody argues for their own views as if they were true but not every argument presented is right and that is why we have so many 'versions' of the 'truth' today. Relativism - the idea that each individual has a 'version of the truth' - is widespread in public and individual thinking but it is not how things are. The truth is singular. It is true and has no versions. Versions of the truth are not the truth even if they contain some truth - be it only a little or be it a great deal - they are not the whole truth. The Catholic Church credibly presents its teaching and practise as "the fullness of truth" and that is really the only kind of truth that there is.
 
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Josiah

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Everybody ought to know that surveys do not define truth.

Actually, surveys can be an effective way of determining what people think/believe.

The point I made is what Catholics perhaps typically think/believe - not what is true.
 

ImaginaryDay2

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It may be a common experience, but I dare say that the sample would be a bit skewed. There may be some Catholics who also would hedge on Catholic doctrine/dogma - admittedly be uncomfortable and not swallow everything hook, line, and sinker - yet would look askance at being termed anything but Catholic.
 

MoreCoffee

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Actually, surveys can be an effective way of determining what people think/believe.

Everybody has an opinion but not all opinions are of equal value because some are not true while other are true.

Why become a Catholic if you are a Protestant?
  • Truth. Everybody argues for their own views as if they were true but not every argument presented is right and that is why we have so many 'versions' of the 'truth' today. Relativism - the idea that each individual has a 'version of the truth' - is widespread in public and individual thinking but it is not how things are. The truth is singular. It is true and has no versions. Versions of the truth are not the truth even if they contain some truth - be it only a little or be it a great deal - they are not the whole truth. The Catholic Church credibly presents its teaching and practise as "the fullness of truth" and that is really the only kind of truth that there is.
 

Josiah

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Josiah said:
Actually, surveys can be an effective way of determining what people think/believe.

The point I made is what Catholics perhaps typically think/believe - not what is true.



.


Everybody has an opinion but not all opinions are of equal value because some are not true while other are true.

You are evading the point.....


The Catholic Church credibly presents its teaching and practise as "the fullness of truth" and that is really the only kind of truth that there is.


Friend, just because a person or institution says "what I say is true" thereby does not mean it's true. But yes, you are WELL conveying the mindset of which I wrote. And yes, I know, it is drilled into Catholics from birth (been there, done that).


Let's move on....



- Josiah



.
 
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MennoSota

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I have no idea why anyone would join the Roman church, but my guess is that they are either ignorant of the Bible or they are joining for a selfish reason (i.e. they want to marry someone who is Roman).
 

MoreCoffee

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You are evading the point.....
A survey - real or (as in your post) imagined - is not a point it is an aggregation of opinions with no significant value for deciding what is true and what is not. In brief your post did not have a point to make it offered only an opinion.
  • Truth. Everybody argues for their own views as if they were true but not every argument presented is right and that is why we have so many 'versions' of the 'truth' today. Relativism - the idea that each individual has a 'version of the truth' - is widespread in public and individual thinking but it is not how things are. The truth is singular. It is true and has no versions. Versions of the truth are not the truth even if they contain some truth - be it only a little or be it a great deal - they are not the whole truth. The Catholic Church credibly presents its teaching and practise as "the fullness of truth" and that is really the only kind of truth that there is.
So does the LDS. Friend, just because a person or institution says "what I say is true" thereby does not mean it's true. But yes, you are WELL conveying the mindset of which I wrote. And yes, I know, it is drilled into Catholics from birth (been there, done that).
LDS claims about ancient Israeli settlement in North America are not only incredible they are completely absurd so when you say "so does the LDS" you're talking nonsense and I suspect that you know it is nonsense.

Let's move on....

I'd love to stick with the thread's topic and not move on to something as absurd as your claim about 'Mormons' (LDS).

I became a Catholic - being neither ignorant of holy scripture nor seeking to marry a "Roman" (as one unimaginative post suggests are the only reasons anybody who was a Protestant would become a Catholic). Here are some of the reasons I had.
  • The bible. The bible has more to say than the 66 books commonly received among Protestants says. There are 73 books that constitute the canonical holy scriptures.
  • Antiquity. The Church is older, much older, than the commencement of the Martin Luther's protest against various errors and faults in Catholic practise in the early 16th century.
  • Continuity. The Church of the centuries from the first until the sixteenth and on to the twenty-first is according to the scriptures one church. Couple this with Antiquity and Catholic, Orthodox, and Oriental Orthodox perspectives on the Church have more going for them than Protestant perspectives do.
  • Sacraments. The sacraments are not symbols only nor are they public testimony or private/public remembrance only. Catholics know this and teach it. Catholics point to the same views expressed by Christians in earlier centuries all the way back to the second and first centuries AD.
  • Order. Maintaining order in a large body of believers that spans not just congregations but languages and nations to cover almost every land on Earth is no easy task. The Catholic Church manages it, not flawlessly, not without dissent, yet it remains one church despite all that human frailty and external as well as internal opposition brings.
  • Tradition. What Christians taught and did in the past has a 'vote' in the faith of Catholics. We do not forget the past even when it brings shame but more so when it brings hope and encouragement.
  • The saints. Taken with Tradition the saints offer examples of Christian faith lived in a wide variety of conditions with a wider variety of personality and foibles yet it is Christian faith and it is lived and it gives encouragement to those who take the time to look at how the faith was lived by such diverse people in such diverse conditions.
  • The Faith. The doctrines and practises of Christianity have a longer history than some appear to think. They go back to the time when Jesus walked and talked and taught among men through time to the apostles and on through time to those who followed them until our own time. Taken with antiquity, continuity, and tradition this is a testimony to the enduring presence of God among his people without interruption and without 'restoration of a lost set of truths' to correct an allegedly corrupted church.
  • Truth. Everybody argues for their own views as if they were true but not every argument presented is right and that is why we have so many 'versions' of the 'truth' today. Relativism - the idea that each individual has a 'version of the truth' - is widespread in public and individual thinking but it is not how things are. The truth is singular. It is true and has no versions. Versions of the truth are not the truth even if they contain some truth - be it only a little or be it a great deal - they are not the whole truth. The Catholic Church credibly presents its teaching and practise as "the fullness of truth" and that is really the only kind of truth that there is.
 

Josiah

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A survey is not a point it is an aggregation of opinions

Exactly. Which why you are being evasive. My point was what Catholic people think and what Catholic people regard as what they were taught. Again, yet again, still one more time, I never said this is how to determine theological truth, I said it would be a way to determine what a group of people think and regard as what those people were told.



when you say "so does the LDS" you're talking nonsense and I suspect that you know it is nonsense.


As you noted, the Roman Catholic denomination CLAIMS that when IT ITSELF exclusively teaches (officially and dogmatically anyway), it IS the Truth, indeed when IT ITSELF EXCLUSIVELY so speaks, Jesus Himself is teaching. IT ITSELF claims that for IT ITSELF. You suggested therefore what IT teaches is true. Well, that makes you a good Catholic.

Frankly, I find self claiming that self alone is infallible, the Voice of Jesus, True and thus unaccountable - while EVERY OTHER teacher is potentially wrong (and IS wrong where they disagree with SELF) and every OTHER is fully accountable is, well, just circular and a pretty obvious ploy to circumvent Truth and responsibility. It's not impressive. Or convincing. But of course, it flows from an ego bigger than Jupiter and a self-deification (each will shout, "Well GOD says that - so I can too!") Yup, it's one of the two major problems I had with the RCC and you are confirming it wonderfully.




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MoreCoffee

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My point was what Catholic people think ...

That's an opinion. You think that is what Catholic people think. There are over a billion Catholic people. You do not know what those billion people think. You're just opining and that is not worth much in a discussion.
Frankly, I find ...

Another opinion.

Something with substance might be better.
 

Josiah

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The opinion of the RCC itself for it itself alone is that self exclusively is (officially, in formal doctrine) INFALLIBLE, that whatever SELF says IS the definition of "truth", that when SELF speaks ergo Jesus is speaking, that SELF alone is infallible and thus unaccountable, that all are to just docilicly swallow whole whatever self alone says cuz self is saying it - that is the OPINION of self for self. I find it circular, evasive and unconvincing. The very thing they demand we do (CCC 87 for example) is the exact opposite of what Jesus tells us to do in Revelation 2:2. And of course, each will note about ABSURD the claim is for ANY other but that it is absolutely appropriate for it itself exclusively because God says it for Himself (revealing how incredibly egotistical these denominations that claim this for self are and perhaps how much they sense they must sheild self from what they do to all others - regard as responsible and accountable).


But friend, you are beautifully and quite dramatically proving my point (see my point below on epistemology).



Josiah said:


1. The Dogma of the Church.

While the RCC retains a faint sense of the Church of Christ - the one, holy, catholic community of all believers - in truth, this is ENTIRELY buried by the dogmatic insistence of it itself that it itself IS the Church (at least in fullness). There is an OBSESSION with it itself by it itself - as a geopolitical, economic, earthly, institutional/denominational entity with the HQ in Rome. This whole dogma gets very radical. The RCC even speaks of itself as JESUS on earth. When IT speaks, Jesus Himself is speaking. When you are an official, registered member of the denomination, you are "one with Jesus." I found this really very, very extreme focus on self and the claims of self for self to be quite unbiblical, unhistorical and frankly troubling... but all of Catholicism hinges on this: in a real sense, Catholicism stands or falls on this series of claims of it itself for it itself - and it is often central to its message. At times, I felt as if the RCC talked about itself more than God ("Catholic" this, "Catholic" that) and promoted itself more than Christ. While I have nothing against denominations per se... and regard the RCC as one of the best denominations.... I found its claims not only unacceptable but divisive, unbiblical and troubling. With SO much good in Catholicism, it seemed at times to get lost in the obsession with the denomination.


2. Epistemology.


The Catholic Catechism #87 says this, "Mindful of Christ's words to his apostles, 'He who hears you hears me," the faithful receive with docility the teachings and directives that their [Catholic] pastors give them in different forms." Understand, this is the cornerstone of Catholicism. This is the reason for the Doctrine of the Church that it has... the reason for all the claims that when IT (alone) speaks ergo Jesus is, the reason for the INFALLIBILITY of their Pope, and the reason for their enormous repudiation of Sola Scriptura. There is a radical rejection of accountability of itself and a bold demand that all just swallow whatever is said, "with docility." This is DRILLED into CAtholics from birth. See CCC 85, 95... this is the cornerstone of the denomination. In part, I think this is simply a mindset of the middle ages but it is SO stressed. Yes, one my ask QUESTIONS but not hold the RCC accountable. And the issue is never "because it's TRUE but because the RCC teaches it." I found this troubling.... And I found this obsession with power and submission odd. The RCC is clearly correct about SO much.... and all it's teachings are VERY well thought out (even where I disagree), I have a LOT of respect for Catholic scholarship. So WHY this extreme need to evade all accountability? BTW, many think Luther was excommunicated NOT because he said Jesus is the Savior (as the RCC claimed) but because he said the individual RC Denomination could err, thus undermining this point. I had to ask myself: Do I just swallow whole - with docility - WHATEVER the RCC says BECAUSE it says it? No, I don't. Thus, I'm not Catholic (my Deacon shouted) - or at least not faithful (as CCC 87, etc., etc., etc., etc. says). I share this from the "Handbook of the Catholic Church" page 137, "When someone asks where the Catholic finds the substance of his belief, the answer is this: From the living teaching Authority. This Authority consists of the Pope and the bishops under him at the time." Nothing about Jesus or God or Scripture or even Tradition.... and lest one confuse this with the Church, nope - this is a denomination. I had trouble with that. And I had to ask, am I therefore a Catholic? The answer seemed clear... and I needed to have the honesty, the integrity, the character to not lie just because I loved my parish and my family.



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