A Battered Faith

[Budge]

The Vatican does not hold a monopoly on Christiandom.

Connie is a soon be ex-Catholic I suppose. I will pray she finds a good church. My church is an incredible blessing to my life. I have grown in my relationship with Christ. I have leanred what true Christian fellowship is and been extremely blessed. Everytime I go to church I learn something new about God from His Word.

[quote]I am an alien in the neo-modern, mega-Catholic Church; lost in austere, cavernous, unruly monstrosities, where I may no longer worship, venerate and reflect, but now must raucously "assemble" in the din of an irreverent "gathering space."[/quote]

I agree with her. Catholic churches are far too large (problem for those mega churches of Protestant persuasion too for true community to blossom) The neo-modernism truly is a problem. I know when I came back after 13 years in UU, they had become more like the UUs in every way. The Catholic Church has become very secularized with modern values, collusion with the world.

[quote]And now, my church has become a bastion of hypocrisy, mired for two nightmarish years in a monumental, devastating, unending sex abuse scandal. When our saintly, beloved pope speaks, the world snickers, his moral authority undermined, his own house in disarray. And, in his twilight, this great man must bear the burdensome reality that he let this one get by him; his 25-year legacy of holiness stained by the worst scandal in modern church history. Our church transformed into a war zone; our battlefield littered with wounded souls; our priesthood offered up on a platter for sexual predators to devour.[/quote]

Just stepping up instead of pointing fingers would have worked wonders. The institution has become its own enemy where beauracracy over Christian love has been allowed to fester.

The Catholic Church is too big for its own good. Too behemoth. Too disconnected from itself.

[quote]Worldly, arrogant bishops fiddled while Rome burned. Confident they were above the law, they artfully dodged prosecutors, abdicated societal obligations, lived in palatial mansions, vacationed in seaside villas, drove fancy cars and wasted untold millions of our hard-earned dollars on lawyers, hush-money, country-club treatment centers and grotesque, monster churches and cathedrals. Our children, teachers, schools and poor urban parishes were callously abandoned; our disabled children were excluded from our elitist Catholic school system.[/quote]

She is so right. And today they are taking money away from the poor first and foremost.


Praying for you Connie!

Yes many people have left and abandoned Christian faith all together. I come from a family of total agnostics, atheists who have openly avowed these beleifs. They go to church as a ritual that is seperated from everyday life. That is one thing I have noticed about Catholic church, they have liberalized, paganized and intellectualized the Christian faith to the point that the gospel has been obliterated. People think what do these rituals and such have to do with my day to day life? In fact I never heard Catholic sermons or teachings in any of the RCCs that I attended that really took peoples day to day lives into consideration. I am having the wonder and glory of learning how the Christian faith can DIRECTLY transform ones life.

[EcceNovaFacioOmni]

Is this "massive" amount of people leaving the Catholic Church for 1500's theology supposed to mean that our religion is wrong? I think not. I take comfort in the words of St. Cyprian of Carthage:
[quote]"There [John 6:68–69] speaks Peter, upon whom the Church would be built, teaching in the name of the Church and showing that [b]even if a stubborn and proud multitude withdraws because it does not wish to obey, yet the Church does not withdraw from Christ[/b]. The people joined to the priest and the flock clinging to their shepherd are the Church. You ought to know, then, that the bishop is in the Church and the Church in the bishop, and if someone is not with the bishop, he is not in the Church. They vainly flatter themselves who creep up, not having peace with the priests of God, believing that they are secretly [i.e., invisibly] in communion with certain individuals. For the Church, which is one and Catholic, is not split nor divided, but it is indeed united and joined by the cement of priests who adhere one to another."[/quote]

Budge,
[quote]I know when I came back after 13 years in UU, they had become more like the UUs in every way. The Catholic Church has become very secularized with modern values, collusion with the world.[/quote]
Just because you had a bad Catholic parish doesn't mean they represent the entire Church. Trust me, I've seen good and bad ones.

Edited June 16, 2004 by thedude

[Crusader_4]

Well...Bruce if it is the case your claim it is i feel sorry for the Catholics in the United States (i dont believe it is though) thankfully the Winnipeg Free Press printed an article last year on the decline and rise of secularism in our province and an interesting stastic surfaced only the Orthodox and Catholic Church maintained members and grew substantial out of the mainstream church's not lutheran, anglican (was hit really hard), presbyterian, bapstis, and pentecostal (showed some growth) but it was really these two that were able to grow. I am not saying that your statitcs are wrong but up here in Manitoba they dont seem to be fact. I was at the Rite of Intiation this year and we waited for over four hours during the ceremony since all the new candidates had to sign their names i dont know about you but in Manitoab Canada Catholicsm is alive and well. There are parts of the country were it suffers (quebec) but from our persepctive its a great picture.

[Kilroy the Ninja]

Bruce please plainly state your topic of debate for this thread or I will close it.

So far it seems that this thread exists simply to antagonize.

God Bless.

[Aloysius]

it is clear to me that the Church is undergoing a test to see who is truly faithful and who has little faith, just like in John 6:66 some will leave, and others will stand by the truth. your predictions of the fall of the Roman Catholic Church are not new, people have believed that whole-heartedly in the past, but it has yet to happen, bruce. so continue to predict something wordly people have been predicting for 2000 years, and we'll keep in mind the words of our King who promised to defend us from the enemy. it truly is THAT SIMPLE. fruits don't mean numbers and statistics, fruits mean TRUTH, we don't sway to the whims of the people in our flock, if a bunch of people in our flock suddenly become heretics they either leave the church, repent, or are excommunicated. they cannot CHANGE the Church, only God is left up to doing that. those who hear His call go into position to become tools for God to use.

pAx

[theculturewarrior]

I quit responding to Bruce, because for some reason he never responds to me. *grin*

[1337 k4th0l1x0r]

[quote name='theculturewarrior' date='Jun 16 2004, 05:22 PM'] I quit responding to Bruce, because for some reason he never responds to me. *grin* [/quote]
I'm offering 3:2 odds that bruce responds to this thread before he starts another one.

[Hananiah]

[quote name='Bruce S' date='Jun 16 2004, 10:16 AM'] HIS church isn't the Catholic Church.

It is ALL believers. [/quote]
You're inserting a false dichotomy here. The Catholic Church is ALL believers.

[Hananiah]

[quote name='Bruce S' date='Jun 16 2004, 09:22 AM'] Another Catholic is about to become a plain old, just Christian it would seem. [/quote]
[quote]Connie is a soon be ex-Catholic I suppose.[/quote]
I wouldn't get my hopes up. She sounds more like she's soon to become a traditionalist.

[IcePrincessKRS]

[quote]Christiandom. [/quote]

Christendom. It is spelled C-H-R-I-S-T-E-N-D-O-M. (Proper spelling and pronounciation of that word is a big pet peeve of mine. Sue me.)


[quote]Bruce please plainly state your topic of debate for this thread or I will close it.

So far it seems that this thread exists simply to antagonize.

God Bless. [/quote]


Still waiting Bruce...

[Brother Adam]

The way to eternal life is narrow. . .

And yet corporate Protestants promote "easy believism" (say a prayer and be on your way). PUL-LEEZE.

Many are called, but few are choosen.

[Brother Adam]

The way to eternal life is narrow. . .

And yet corporate Protestants promote "easy believism" (say a prayer and be on your way). PUL-LEEZE.

Many are called, but few are choosen.

[1337 k4th0l1x0r]

Well put, Bro. Adam. So well put, it was worth posting twice

Don't worry, it happens to the best of us

[Justified Saint]

Did I ever mention that there is a brick wall up ahead? You may want to try your luck there.

[P3chrmd]

[quote]Now I'm a bad guy because I don't post POSITIVE stories on the Catholic Church?[/quote]

Pretty much!

What do you do...spend all of your time looking for anti-catholic things! Thats really sad...all the other non-catholics on this board...join in on discussions and do their own theing and their cool...you seem to go out of your way to find the most crazy stories and such to post on our Church...oh well! But I still say for anyone to just HATE the catholic church like you do...you must secretley love it inside!!