How one can let other people influence their faith negatively

[dUSt]

I often think, "Why would someone leave their faith because of other people?"

For example, some people leave the Church not because of what the Church teaches, but because of how other people in the Church have treated them.

How can this happen?

I still don't know why, exactly, but I've been thinking recently how my own faith has been negatively influenced by other people--and unknowingly, I allowed it to happen.

The Latin mass for example. When I first returned to the Catholic faith, I had a great love for the Latin mass. I wanted to find a Latin mass near me. I wanted to experience it. I wanted to promote it. I wanted to tell everybody I knew how amesome it was and how we should be asking our bishops for more more more!

Then, because of other people who loved the Latin mass, but disliked the Novus Ordo, I found myself having to defend the Novus Ordo. I never felt that I should have had to do that. In my overly optimistic brand of newfound Catholicism, I thought all Catholics should have a great love for all of the Church's treasures. After all, we are universal, yet, have many different orders and forms of worship. It's what makes us amesome.

So, because of "people", I found myself on the defensive, and over time, my love and zeal for the Latin mass never blossomed into what it should have been. This is directly because of overzealous people forcing me to take a side--as my love for the Church demanded.

So, unintentionally, I allowed people to influence my faith and the way I worship.

I guess it's not so hard to imagine how something like this can manifest in other walks of faith.

[Winchester]

It's an excuse. A post facto justification for a decision already made.

 

Usually. Or sometimes. At least 56% of the time.

[Gabriela]

Maybe 56% of the time.

I can totally understand it. I don't think most people approach the Faith intellectually. Even those who think they do don't in reality. Stuff like how Christian other people seem makes a big difference to us. We tend to assume that, if your religion is right and true, then it should make you a better person. So if we see bad Christians, we think they've got something wrong, cuz their Faith hasn't made them good.

There's something to that: If someone is an awful person, there probably IS something wrong with their faith. But that's 'faith' with a little 'f', not a big one. THE Faith has the power to make people good, but people are so rotten that they resist it.

Other times we meet someone who's awful and think their religion stinks because it hasn't made them good, and we don't realize that, without their religion, they'd be even worse. So it's hard to say about anyone's religion "how good" it really makes them.

I confess that, when I was weighing the move from Judaism to Christianity, I did look at the Jews and Christians around me. It seemed perfectly reasonable to me to ask what kind of person a particular religion creates. They do create different kinds of people. Not in any specific case, necessarily, but generally speaking, for groups, you can definitely see trends. I also looked at the cultures that had grown out of each of these religions and compared them.

Not to knock the Jews, but guess what I concluded.

 

Anyway, whether it's reasonable or not to doubt your own faith/Faith because of other people's behavior, we do it. It's fallacious, for sure, to judge the objective ontological truth of a religion by the effects it has on its believers—and yet somehow, that seems really relevant. If you make the assumption that the true religion will produce a disproportionate number of good folks, I think it's not so illogical after all.

[Winchester]

It's understandable. It's just the essence of cow.

[dUSt]

I think I'm looking at it a little differently. I think if a Catholic dude has a Catholic friend that bashes Jews all day--and the Catholic dude, out of charity and honesty, has to defend Judaism every single day from the falsities and exaggerations that his friend spews all day--subconsciously, the dude defending Judaism may be drawn to it. Not because he thinks it's true, but because he's been forced to be on it's side so consistently. So, the extremism of his friend has caused this dude to take the other extreme.

We see this in politics all the time. Instead of being rational people, two extremes fall into a competition, where victory is achieved by taking the opposing extreme stance. It's just turrible.

[Gabriela]

I think I'm looking at it a little differently. I think if a Catholic dude has a Catholic friend that bashes Jews all day--and the Catholic dude, out of charity and honesty, has to defend Judaism every single day from the falsities and exaggerations that his friend spews all day--subconsciously, the dude defending Judaism may be drawn to it. Not because he thinks it's true, but because he's been forced to be on it's side so consistently. So, the extremism of his friend has caused this dude to take the other extreme.

We see this in politics all the time. Instead of being rational people, two extremes fall into a competition, where victory is achieved by taking the opposing extreme stance. It's just turrible.

Oh, I see. Yeah, there's a small mountain of research verifying the existence of this phenomenon. It's one reason why college professors sometimes make their students defend (in writing, speech, or debate) a position on a controversial topic that's not the students' own. Persuasion research has shown that defending a position not your own warms you up to that position.

[PhuturePriest]

I think I'm looking at it a little differently. I think if a Catholic dude has a Catholic friend that bashes Jews all day--and the Catholic dude, out of charity and honesty, has to defend Judaism every single day from the falsities and exaggerations that his friend spews all day--subconsciously, the dude defending Judaism may be drawn to it. Not because he thinks it's true, but because he's been forced to be on it's side so consistently. So, the extremism of his friend has caused this dude to take the other extreme.

We see this in politics all the time. Instead of being rational people, two extremes fall into a competition, where victory is achieved by taking the opposing extreme stance. It's just turrible.

I can definitely see this in my life.

I've always loved Bishop Barron, but many I know would bash him constantly for his optimistic view on hell and kept calling him a heretic leading people to damnation, etc. This led me to defend him constantly, which led me to watch his videos on a daily basis, which led me to become a super big ultra fan of his, much to said people's ire.

I am now known as a Barronite spy, and have been told in no uncertain terms to stop watching his videos. However, because I am a self-proclaimed super big ultra fan, I see being called a Barronite spy as a badge of honor. 

None of this would have transpired had people not continually bashed him and accused him of heresy in my presence.

It's interesting business how humans work.

[CrossCuT]

Dust, you really should take a break. Youre causing more drama from all this than needs be. Really bro. No judgement, but maybe you need a beer.

 

PS. Church Millitants were instrumental in leading me away from my faith, could you ban them?

[LionHeartedCrusader]

In Medieval times in order to attack another kingdom, kings would need a "Casus Belli" or "Reason of war". If they attacked for no reason and/or without the proper reason, it would be considered a War Crime.

When people unfortunately leave the flock of the church, they need to find justification or a "Reason of leaving" sorta like the "Reason of war". It immediately means their conscience is bothered by it and they feel an obligation to provide the reason. All we can do is pray for their return.

[Winchester]

Dust, you really should take a break. Youre causing more drama from all this than needs be. Really bro. No judgement, but maybe you need a beer.

 

PS. Church Millitants were instrumental in leading me away from my faith, could you ban them?

Thank you for illustrating my statement. Grow up. Take responsibility for your decisions. You led yourself away.

[dUSt]

Dust, you really should take a break. Youre causing more drama from all this than needs be. Really bro. No judgement, but maybe you need a beer.

No, you take a break.

PS. Church Millitants were instrumental in leading me away from my faith, could you ban them?

 Which ones? Maybe I will.

Edited October 28, 2015 by dUSt

[LionHeartedCrusader]

No, you take a break.

[KnightofChrist]

I'm having a beer. Crosscut is a good friend even though she and I rarely if ever agree on anything.
 

There may be people that may effect our will in what we choose, but unless they force us with a gun against our heads or something of that nature we choose by our own free will to do this or that.

The hate the world and some non-traditional Catholics in the Church show for traditionally minded Catholics and the TLM did have a very small effect on my choice to become a traditionally minded Catholic and attend the TLM. It was mainly that I noticed that the world hates anything that is orthodox or faithfully Christian. But no one forced me to take a side and no one was instrumental in my choice other than myself.

Edited October 28, 2015 by KnightofChrist

[veritasluxmea]

 Which ones? Maybe I will.

Probably people that don't post anymore. 

[dominicansoul]

Unfortunately the only person who can affect my faith in a negative way is me.  And I have to live with myself :/