Latinos Leaving the Catholic Church

[avemaria40]

[quote name='Budge' post='1040875' date='Aug 10 2006, 10:42 AM']
Rome smells of elderberries many into her net, using the sensual, and earthly beauty.

Sensusal services, using smells, bells, stained glass, magnificant cathedrals...and much more.

[font="Lucida Console"]Pro 31:30 Favour [is] deceitful, and [b]beauty [is] vain:[/b] [but] a woman [that] feareth the LORD, she shall be praised.
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[font="Lucida Console"]
Psa 39:11 When thou with rebukes dost correct man for iniquity, [b]thou makest his beauty to consume away like a moth: surely every man [is] vanity[/b]. Selah.[/font]
[/quote]

Those verses are talking about a man's or woman's physical beauty, not the way we glorify God. What is wrong with using all of our 5 senses to glorify God in prayer? It is based on the ancient Jewish liturgy used by the Israelites(correct me if I'm wrong but they had the images of the cheribum on the mercy seat, the colored vestments, the Temple, which was supposedly very beautiful, trumpets, incense, etc.) Why wouldn't liturgy continue after the New Covenant?
Sorry double post

Edited August 10, 2006 by avemaria40

[curtins]

[quote name='Eutychus' post='1040858' date='Aug 10 2006, 10:21 AM']
That is sad, very sad.

Could have been written by Mormon's or Jehova's Witnesses.

You join a church on the PAPERWORK, and ignor the REALITY?

Sad, that grieves me terribly that people actually can be that deceived...and at the same time, call THAT the FULLNESS of anything.


[/quote]

Actually upon thinking about it I misquoted him (and these are my words not exact quotes):

He said something like: The TRUE Christian Church is not based upon whether their congregation is the nicest, or the kindest, or the most charitable, or the most prayerful, or most well read in Scriptures or anything else.

Its great that your church does all those great things but that DOESNT MAKE IT THE ONE TRUE CHURCH CHRIST ESTABLISHED ON EARTH.

And I'm not saying the Catholic church doesn't have plenty of people like described above but it has more than that. It has the unbroken line of succession all the way from St Peter himself. It has the gaurentee of not teaching any wrong in faith and morals. IT HAS CHRIST HIMSELF present in all churches. It has the AUTHORITY to forgive sins. IT HAS THE COMPLETE GUIDENCE OF THE HOLY SPIRIT. IT HAS THE GAURENTEE OF NEVER BEING ABANDONED BY CHRIST HIMSELF. IT HAS ALL THE MEANS NECESARRY FOR OBTAINING ETERNAL SALVATION.

Sorry about the mix-up with the quotes and what not but its basically saying the same thing.

Theres nothing to do with paper work. I honestly don't know what your talking about. It has everything to do with reality. THE REALITY is that The Catholic Church is Christ's true establishment on Earth. Thats reality. Whether you chose to accept it or not.

As to the phrase "fullness of truth" it gives no notion that truth can be truth with some lies. That is a contradiction. That is your own made up deffinition to suit your agenda. Fullness of truth means that there is nothing lacking in the Catholic Church. It means that other religions such as Protestantism have some truths but not all the truths as the Catholic Church has. Example: Christ died to save us. That is a truth. Catholics Hold that, Protestants Hold that. So even though protestants leave out truths as they see fit (as it suits their personal agendas) such as the Eucharist being the true body blood soul and divinity of Christ, They still hold some truths.

Its like I came home to my mom and she asked me where I was and I said I was downtown, that would be a truth, but I could conveniently leave out that I was downtown stuffing my face with Mcdonalds. So the full truth is not there.

Some say the Chruch is NOT the true Chruch of Christ because some of its members currently or in the past live and have done things that are not Christ-like. If you determine the True Chruch of Christ based on the actions of its members, who are sinners just like yourself, then you are being nieve and superficial. The Church never claimed its members or clergy were perfect or incapable of doing wrong. Quite the opposite. You look at the priest abuse scandel and say well because of that The Catholic Church can't be God's true establishment. Thats completly absurd. The actions of certain members of the Church do not change that the Catholic Church is God's True Church.

Ok I'm done for now

[LouisvilleFan]

[quote name='dUSt' post='1039745' date='Aug 8 2006, 12:52 PM']
What kind of Protestants do ex-Catholics make, when they were so weak in their faith when they were Catholic?
[/quote]

Probably about half the people I know here in Louisville are ex-Catholic Protestants... and they all take an active role in their faith, much more so than they did as Catholics. It's the people who don't care enough to bother converting, either from or to Catholicism, who are lukewarm.

For that matter, outside of my relatives, I hardly know any cradle Catholics who give a rip. And my Catholic relatives are second generation of my aunt who converted sometime before she married, so that explains why they actually care.

Which is why like to say that if you want to raise non-Catholic kids, send them to Catholic schools.

[Budge]

[quote]Probably about half the people I know here in Louisville are ex-Catholic Protestants... and they all take an active role in their faith, much more so than they did as Catholics. It's the people who don't care enough to bother converting, either from or to Catholicism, who are lukewarm.[/quote]

Ive noticed the same thing.

In fact while Catholic, I remember being in the church discussing bringing people to Christ, end times, and more, and I was told over and over to COOL IT. They wanted me to be lukewarm in everything they said and did. In fact I was told once at an church meeting..."Catholics dont need to prolestyze because it is offense"

Most Catholics would rather someone stay in a dead lukewarm New Age ridden Catholic church rather then go to a Prot. church where they can become closer to God.

The Church membership is put much much higher then anyone's relationship with God.

One thing I have noticed as a Christian apologist over many years is how MOST CATHOLIC APOLOGISTS--the FAMOUS WELL KNOWN ONES, are all EX-PROTESTANTS. I suppose most of those raised cradle Catholic dont care.

Most Catholics dont even bother hanging out on religion message boards. I know that the Catholics I deal with online are NOT your typical pew Catholics. For most God and church is for sunday morning and holidays. It is not a topic they even think about daily.

[Eutychus]

[quote]And I'm not saying the Catholic church doesn't have plenty of people like described above but it has more than that. It has the unbroken line of succession all the way from St Peter himself. [/quote]

Goodness, have you EVER ACTUALLY read about MOST of those men?

Here, is some reading material for starters:


[img]http://images-eu.amazon.com/images/P/184223000X.02._SCMZZZZZZZ_.jpg[/img]


[quote]This book had me shaking with laughter and trembling with rage--rage at the misdeeds of the papacy, not the book.

It brilliantly recounts the endless crimes, hypocrisies, errors, indecencies, murders, debaucheries, illogicalities, idiocies and fanaticisms of the papacy from the "first pope" to the present.

It is written in a highly engaging and breezy journalistic style, with more than a dash of humour and wit.

For the most part the author lets the deeds (or rather, misdeeds) of the Bishops of Rome speak for themselves, although his own dim view of his subject is abundantly clear throughout. He is himself a former priest (educated at the Gregorian University in Rome) who unfolds the theologial groundlessness of the office of Pope itself, the ethical depravity of a depressingly high percentage of its occupants, the religious zealotry of many Popes, and the laughable absurdity of so many Roman Catholic doctrines such as Papal Infallibility.

The overall effect of this is devastating for the Papacy, which emerges from the pages of this book as one fo the most hypocritical, malevolent and unjustifiable institutions in human history--which is saying a great deal.

The book is the perfect antidote to the awe in which the office of Pope is held today, and a very welcome reminder of the dark history of a powerful institution built on a mountain of absurdities and atrocities that we all-too-easily forget.

De Rosa has done his readers a great service in putting that history into a single volume without mincing his words of pulling his punches.

[/quote]

[img]http://images.amazon.com/images/P/0750933372.01._AA240_SCLZZZZZZZ_.jpg[/img]

[quote]"We cannot serve God & Mammon at the same time"---de' Mussi, May 5, 2005

I picked up The Bad Popes because of its intriguing title. Its cover artwork (my copy has a different, more appealing cover than the one advertised here) and style reminded me of another book with an equally intriguing title also reprinted by Barnes & Noble Books: The Medieval Underworld by Andrew McCall. McCall's work, although interesting and well researched, was very difficult to read.

I anticipated Chamberlin's work, first published in 1969, to pose a similar challenge. I was pleasantly surprised. The Bad Popes is sophisticated and scholarly as is Medieval Underworld, but it is much more accessible. I have almost no background knowledge of the topic, but was able to follow along relatively well. It is clearly written, not burdened with details, and even on occasion offers some humor and wit.

Chamberlin briefly goes back to the pagan traditions of Ancient Rome and then to Christophorous' forgery of The Donation of Constantine to establish the point where temporal powers transferred from the emperor to the pope. For example, in 755 A.D. the King of Franks believed in the veracity of the Donation and gave Pope Stephen the keys to 20 cities foreshadowing the Papal states and the pope in the role of feudal lord (p. 17). Such power magnified the attraction of the office and sparked the interest in some of the more greedy and power-hungry candidates to the Papacy. The most interesting story of this period is when Pope Stephen VII had the corpse of Pope Formosus dragged from its tomb to be put on trial (p. 19)

The book divides into six sections and features seven "bad popes" with some information on their predecessors who do not seem that much better. The first section entitled The House of Theophylact covers two popes as well as the senatrix of Rome Marozia and the legend of "Pope Joan." The first pope covered is John XII (955-63) whose biggest crime in Roman eyes was that he gave land to his mistress, but he was also involved with other crimes and would end up being killed by a man who caught John in bed with his wife. Pope Benedict IX (1032-1046) flat out sold the Papacy. I found that the political intrigue surrounding the selection of the popes to be as, if not more, interesting than the events during each pope's reign.

The next five sections each feature one "bad pope." First, Benedict VIII (1294-1303) who was so horrible that Dante had him dragged through all three chapters of the Divine Comedy only to be viciously condemned at the end.

Urban VI (1378-89) earned several conspiracy plots against him by the cardinals. When several of his conspirators were tortured, Urban complained that he did not hear enough screaming (p. 153).

Nepotism was one of Alexander VI's greatest faults. He reduced the Papacy to his own family and earned such hatred that, upon his death, his corpse lay unattended and swelled to the point where it could barley fit in the coffin (p. 204).

Pope Leo X (1513-21) ushered in a "Golden Age" but it was only seen as that by the Papacy because of his free spending. One ceremony cost 1/7 of the reserves left by the previous pope (p. 218) .

Clement VII is the last pope covered. He, like Leo X, was a member of the legendary Medici family. Centuries of messy politics caught up with him and Rome was caught between France, Spain, and a rising group of German mercenaries known as the landsknecht. Rome fell and the Romans suffered five months of agony at the hands of their conquerors (277).

It is amazing how much happened during the seemingly short reigns of these popes. The book ends abruptly. A chapter putting the centuries of "bad popes" into context with information on the behavior of Popes since the Reformation would have been useful, as would a map. The book includes four sections of illustrations and family trees. I recommend this book to anyone intrigued by the title even if one is only slightly interested in the subject due to its accessible, well-written style and its reasonable price.[/quote]

Edited August 10, 2006 by Eutychus

[Mateo el Feo]

[quote name='Budge' post='1040875' date='Aug 10 2006, 10:42 AM']
Rome smells of elderberries many into her net, using the sensual, and earthly beauty.

Sensusal services, using smells, bells, stained glass, magnificant cathedrals...and much more.[/quote]You should see all those Catholic churches with their $100,000 sound systems and praise-and-worship rock bands on the church's stage.

Wait a second, that's not the Catholics!

PS--You've got your metaphors mixed up a little bit. Generally, things don't get "sucked" into a net.

[SJP]

From Catholic News Agency:

Catholic parishes flourish in Southern U.S.

Charlotte, Feb. 09, 2005 (CNA) - The Catholic Church in the southern U.S. is flourishing and growing at an impressive rate. But its rebirth in the historical Protestant Bible Belt is not only about numbers in the pews, but the creation of a Catholic culture and a strict adherence to Catholic teachings, says a report by journalist Tim Padgett.

Catholics make up about 12 percent of the South’s population. While still quite low, Catholics saw growth of almost 30 percent in the 1990s, compared with less than 10 percent for Baptists, who make up the area’s largest denomination. Reported Padgett.

Padgett notes that Catholic Church was present in the south before the Civil War, but it virtually disappeared after the war. It aided the civil rights movement, but its numbers didn’t rebound until the 1980s, when northerners moved south chasing jobs in the technological industries and Hispanics immigrated to the area. From 1980 to 2000, the region’s Catholic population doubled, to more than 12 million.

Hispanic immigrants are the fastest-growing group in the south. In the Diocese of Charlotte, for example, Hispanics make up half the diocese’s 300,000 Catholics. Thousands of Vietnamese and Filipino Catholics are moving in as well.

The Catholic population in Charlotte is growing almost 10 percent a year, and the ratio of newly ordained priests to parishioners there is 1 to 7,000, more than seven times as high as Chicago’s.

St. Mark Parish in the Diocese of Charlotte, for example, which began with a handful of Catholic families eight years ago, now has 2,800 families and is awaiting the completion of its new church. Bishop Jugis blessed five new churches in the diocese last year alone.

Southern dioceses like Charlotte boast some of the highest numbers of priestly ordinations in the U.S. and attract clergy from the North.

Fr. Timothy Reid, 34, an Indiana native who serves as vicar at St. Mark Parish in Charlotte told Padgett he was drawn to the South and its orthodox spirit. “Here it’s more vibrant because we’re creating a Catholic culture almost from scratch,” he was quoted as saying.

Padgett reports that these southern Catholics, “influenced in no small degree by their morally hard-line Protestant neighbors, as well as the strong piety of Latin America,” are practicing a more conservative faith than Catholics in many other parts of the U.S.

Fr. Jay Scott Newman, pastor of St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Greenville, South Carolina, told Padgett that the Protestant influence has also led to something he calls “evangelical Catholicism,” which includes exuberant hymn singing, intense Bible study, spirited preaching and witnessing.

He also says cultural Catholics are not common in the south. “Here you’re not Catholic because your parents came from Italy or Slovakia. It’s because you believe what the church teaches you is absolutely true,” he was quoted as saying.

There is also a rising number of native converts. The adult catechumen class at Fr. Newman’s parish has more than 60 members compared with only a few less than 10 years ago.

Deacon Carlos Medina, 55, who arrived 10 years ago from Nicaragua told Padgett: “In 1983 U.S. bishops prophesied in a pastoral letter that Hispanic people would revive, maybe even save, the church in this country.”

“I think it came true,” he said.

[Mateo el Feo]

[quote name='Budge' post='1040965' date='Aug 10 2006, 02:29 PM']In fact while Catholic, I remember being in the church discussing bringing people to Christ, end times, and more, and I was told over and over to COOL IT. They wanted me to be lukewarm in everything they said and did. In fact I was told once at an church meeting..."Catholics dont need to prolestyze because it is offense"[/quote] As for the position "Catholics don't need to proselytize," it's terribly unfortunate that this view is so often found among western Catholics, not to mention mainline protestantism. I think everyone at Phatmass sees this as a problem. Of course, great efforts such as Catholic television (e.g. EWTN) and radio are helping turn this around.

My own view of evangelical protestants who aggresively proselytize is that they often seem to market religion using Amway tactics. It can be exciting to create a pyramid scheme centered around selling soap; but, if people are more interested in selling the soap than actually using the soap, people stay dirty. I believe that this may be why Americans, in general, are left with a bad taste in their mouth when the thought of proselytization comes up.

BTW, I think some of this anti-proselytization among American Catholics is the result of the inculturalization of previous generations of Catholics, who were more interested in "fitting in" than spreading the Faith.
[quote name='Budge' post='1040965' date='Aug 10 2006, 02:29 PM']Most Catholics would rather someone stay in a dead lukewarm New Age ridden Catholic church rather then go to a Prot. church where they can become closer to God.[/quote]Given the facts that protestants have neither a complete Canon of Scripture, nor do they believe that Communion is anything more than symbolic, I think most faithful Catholics would challenge the idea that one can become "closer to God" by leaving these things behind.

[Eutychus]

[quote][color="#660000"][b]You should see all those Catholic churches with their $100,000 sound systems and praise-and-worship rock bands on the church's stage.

Wait a second, that's not the Catholics![/b][/color] [/quote]

Nah.....certainly NOT THE CATHOLICS....noway, Jose, not US not ever, not here, or there. [/sarcasm]

[img]http://www.paisleydiocese.org.uk/flug2s.jpg[/img]

[img]http://www.christiantoday.com/files/asip/asip_20050810_wed5art.jpg[/img]

[img]http://www.crossroadsinitiative.com/pics/Pope_Benedict_XVI_World_Youth_Day_2005.jpg[/img]

[img]http://www.martin.fr/casestory/images/World-Youth-Day_main.jpg[/img]

[Justified Saint]

Captions on aerial photos showing large crowds of indiscriminate people would be nice. Is this from World Youth Day or something? It happens like once every four years! Anti-Catholics LOVE pictures -- more to misrepresent!

The thing is this stuff goes on every Sunday at Protestant megachurches and they even throw in a happy meal!

[LouisvilleFan]

I still haven't seen an answer to what I think is a pretty simple question:

Before any of the New Testament was written, were Christian martyrs dying for the Church or for "the book"?

[curtins]

Christian martyrs die for Christ.

[Mateo el Feo]

[quote name='Eutychus' post='1041041' date='Aug 10 2006, 03:27 PM']Nah.....certainly NOT THE CATHOLICS....noway, Jose, not US not ever, not here, or there. [/sarcasm]
[/quote]Generally, an organization that holds an outdoor event goes to a leasing company, they don't own the equipment.

If one honestly surveys both Catholic and evangelical/non-denominational protestant churches, my point stands. A person can be much more "entertained" by the local evangelical church than the Catholic one. Heck, take it as a compliment, for all I care. My problem was with Budge's claim that people get "sucked in through a net" because of the incredibly entertaining Catholic religion. Budge's criticism is almost [url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manichaeism#Theology"]Manichaen[/url], taking the position that physical=bad and spiritual=good.

The contrasting Christian view (i.e. the Catholic view) is that when God created our bodies (including its senses) and looked at all of His Creation, He found it "very good." There is no reason for Catholics to lament that the Sacrifice of the Mass, which unites Christians to Our Lord's eternal sacrafice on Calvary, should affect all of our senses.

As a little aside, it always humors me when protestants either implicitly or explicitly attack the use of [url="http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07716a.htm"]incense [/url] during Catholic worship, as if its use is somehow extra-Biblical (see [url="http://www.usccb.org/nab/bible/luke/luke1.htm#v10"]Luke 1:10[/url], [url="http://www.usccb.org/nab/bible/revelation/revelation8.htm#v3"]Rev 8:3-5[/url]).

[curtins]

Again my protestant brothers here do not want to (because they CANNOT) answer to my point that simply because their protestant church may have better people, may evangelize more, may pray more, may be nicer etc etc- that doesn't make them the one true church. Just because there ARE catholics out there who are not good people and who don't practice there faith and may do bad things does not mean the Catholic Church is somehow wrong. Even if Popes did bad things which no doubt there were bad popes- that doesn't Change the fact that the Catholic Church is the true Church. Keep in mind also that even the 'bad' popes never taught anything in faith or morals that contradicted Church teaching. In fact there has never been any contradiction in faith and morals throughout the Church's 2000 years.

You guys can't even admit that the Catholic Church is the Church started by Christ. Even though thats a historical fact- if you do then your admitting protestantism is wrong.

[Budge]

Im not a supporter of Prot megachurches.

Most Megachurches including Rick Warren's and other liberal apostate ones [b]are quite ecumenical with the Catholic church.
[/b]


Havent you folks heard of the EMERGING CHURCH MOVEMENT?

Where Prots are joining hand and hand with Rome and seeking after false Catholic practices.

Edited August 10, 2006 by Budge