Why Is Doubt Considered A Good Thing In The Catholic Church

[T-Bone _]

[quote name='Budge' post='1375554' date='Sep 1 2007, 09:32 AM']As I have said before, as a child I realized the Catholic "god" was an ogre. Youre not doing much to supress that view but doing more to back it up.[/quote]

Did your Ouija board tell you this?

[Budge]

[quote]No one says these disciplines cause God to love us more, or themselves earn us salvation.[/quote]

So why do them?

Why beat yourself or wear the clicie? Give me a reason.

St. Paul did not beat himself. He may have been speaking of withholding his flesh from sin in that verse. But it has nothing to do with Catholic fantasties about corporal mortification, {masochism}.
[quote]You have yet to explain why light beatings and such are so displeasing to Our Lord, while denying the body needed nourishment to the point of near starvation is not.
It is your postings that make no sense.[/quote]

Fasting is different from beating the stuffing out of yourself.

[quote]Did your Ouija board tell you this?[/quote]

Actually when us Catholic kids played Ouija, we called up SAINTS on the board.

Hey having been indoctrinated into contact "familiar spirits" for *help",

what did we know?

[Mateo el Feo]

[quote name='Budge' post='1377886' date='Sep 4 2007, 04:30 PM']Why beat yourself or wear the clicie? Give me a reason.

Fasting is different from beating the stuffing out of yourself.[/quote]Words like "beating the stuffing out of yourself" betray your ignorance on this subject. But, I tell you what: you spend 40 days without food in the desert and I'll follow the actual practice of wearing a cilice (i.e. hairshirt) and we'll see how each practice affects our bodies' health. While we're going through this 40 day exercise, I'll make it a point during my prayers to ask St. John the Baptist why he wore a sackcloth (latin=[i]cilicium[/i], go figure).


[quote name='Budge' post='1377886' date='Sep 4 2007, 04:30 PM']Actually when us Catholic kids played Ouija, we called up SAINTS on the board.[/quote]That would be "we" Catholic kids. Apparently your religious education is on par with your English grammar education.

Honestly, take some ownership for your own bad decisions and stop blaming the Church. Heck, I made my own mistakes when I was a kid, but I wouldn't attribute them to my family's religion, because I can take responsibility for my decisions.

[T-Bone _]

[quote name='Budge' post='1377886' date='Sep 4 2007, 01:30 PM']Actually when us Catholic kids played Ouija, we called up SAINTS on the board.

Hey having been indoctrinated into contact "familiar spirits" for *help",

what did we know?[/quote]

So when you violated Church teachings, and contacted what were (according to doctrine (ooops, more "paperwork" ), at best your own subconscious delusions, and at worst demons, that was the fault of the Church? Or was it that you never paid attention in Church, nor did you ever care to learn what the Church really teaches.

[Budge]

Hey I never said it was right to do. We were dabbling with the occult. Sure we had a few warnings not to touch Ouija boards, I was 11 years old.

Anyhow why would us kids, think of calling up Catholic saints on it?

Think about that.

talking to "familiar spirits" is wrong if you do it without a board with letters or with one.

[T-Bone _]

[quote name='Budge' post='1378153' date='Sep 4 2007, 06:17 PM']Anyhow why would us kids, think of calling up Catholic saints on it?[/quote]

Because you were poorly Catechized? Honestly--you're the only alleged Catholic I have ever met that has used a Ouija board.

[Thy Geekdom Come]

[quote name='Budge' post='1377886' date='Sep 4 2007, 03:30 PM']So why do them?

Why beat yourself or wear the clicie? Give me a reason.[/quote]

I gave you a reason. As always, you've ignored my answer because you can't refute it.

[quote]St. Paul did not beat himself. He may have been speaking of withholding his flesh from sin in that verse. But it has nothing to do with Catholic fantasties about corporal mortification, {masochism}.
Fasting is different from beating the stuffing out of yourself.[/quote]

St. Paul resisted sin to the point of shedding blood, did he not? If you'd actually considered what I wrote above, you'd realize why mortification is no different.

[quote]Actually when us Catholic kids played Ouija, we called up SAINTS on the board.

Hey having been indoctrinated into contact "familiar spirits" for *help",

what did we know?[/quote]

As for calling up saints on the Ouija board, I highly doubt you were asking for their help as saints...most people playing that game are asking questions and seeking a sort of secret knowledge. We're not gnostics. We don't believe in that carp. We ask the saints to help us, not to give us secret knowledge, and we do it through the Holy Spirit of God, not through demons.

You are entirely incapable of differentiating between Catholicism and your own misguided past.

[Thy Geekdom Come]

[quote name='T-Bone _' post='1378158' date='Sep 4 2007, 08:21 PM']Because you were poorly Catechized? Honestly--you're the only alleged Catholic I have ever met that has used a Ouija board.[/quote]
I used one when I was a little kid. Didn't think it was anything more than a bunch of nonsense and make-believe. Of course, now I know better...but still, I don't think that most kids are intending to contact demons through them.

[Socrates]

[quote name='Budge' post='1377886' date='Sep 4 2007, 02:30 PM']So why do them?

Why beat yourself or wear the clicie? Give me a reason.[/quote]
As St. Paul said, to subjegate the flesh. It is easier to resist temptation and endure hardships if we deny the body legitimate comforts.

[quote]St. Paul did not beat himself. He may have been speaking of withholding his flesh from sin in that verse. But it has nothing to do with Catholic fantasties about corporal mortification, {masochism}.[/quote]
Your own assertion. [b]Chastise[/b] means to punish, as by beating. It means more than simply not sinning, which should be obvious to the Christian anyway.
You tend to water down the literal meaning of Bible verses to suit your own ideas - guess old UU habits die hard.

[quote]Fasting is different from beating the stuffing out of yourself.[/quote]
No one's dicusssing "beating the stuffing out of yourself." And this is just me, but personally, I'd take wearing a cilice over going without food in the desert for forty days and forty nights!

And John the Baptist fasted and wore a hairshirt.
But apparently John's acts of self-mortification attracted the condemnation of the self-righteous in his time as well.
"For John came neither eating nor drinking; and they say: He hath a devil." ~ Matt. 11:18

Edited September 5, 2007 by Socrates

[Mateo el Feo]

[quote name='Socrates' post='1378217' date='Sep 4 2007, 10:28 PM']"For John came neither eating nor drinking; and they say: He hath a devil." ~ Matt. 11:18[/quote]Interesting quote. There may not have been "Independent Fundamentalist Baptists" 2000 years ago, but I think we're seeing the same spirit of attacks against Christianity today from Budge.

[N/A Gone]

With the publication of some of her personal writings, media wags have expressed shock that she confessed to feeling distant from God at times. Dah! It makes me worry about the maturity of some of the people who set the storylines for Newsweek, CNN, and USA Today (I’ve always been concerned about the maturity of the folks who put People together). Faith is not straight-line surety, but a relationship (with waves and troughs). So, this day that serves as the Church’s commemoration of Blessed Teresa of Calcutta, some reflections on faith by Presbyterian minister and writer Frederick Buechner:


[quote]“Faith is better understood as a verb than as a noun, as a process than as a possession. It’s on-again-off-again rather than once-and-for-all. Faith is not being sure where you are going, but going anywhere. … Paul Tillich said that doubt isn’t the opposite of faith; it’s an element of faith. I have faith that my friend is my friend. It is possible that all his motives are ulterior. It is possible that what he is secretly drawn to is not me, but to my wife or my money. But there’s something about the way I feel when he’s around, about the way he looks me in the eye, about the way we can talk to each other without pretense and be silent without embarrassment, that makes me willing to put my life in his hands, as I do each time I call him friend. I can’t prove the friendship of my friend. When I experience it, I don’t need to prove it. When I don’t experience, no proof will do. If I tried to put his friendship to the test somehow, the test itself would qwerty the friendship I was testing. So it is with the Godness of God.”[/quote]

[Budge]

At times???

The span of TIME with this doubt is given as 1949-1979 and beyond.

Edited September 5, 2007 by Budge

[Farsight one]

Even the faith of Jesus Christ himself faltered right before He died. (my God, my God, why have you forsaken me)

Frankly, I'd be really suspicious of someone's honesty and sincerity if they claim that their faith never falters at all.

[Socrates]

[quote name='Farsight one' post='1380128' date='Sep 6 2007, 10:47 PM']Even the faith of Jesus Christ himself faltered right before He died. (my God, my God, why have you forsaken me)[/quote]
The Faith of Jesus Christ never faltered. This verse is commonly misinterpreted. Christ was beginning to recite the the 22nd Psalm (or 21st, depending on version of Bible). This psalm foretells the passion of Christ and in the end proclaims the triumph of the Lord over all nations (fulfilled after His Resurrection).

[Farsight one]

I would agree that the faith of the divine "side" of Christ never faultered. It would be ridiculous to say it did, but I see him being quite human on the cross. Just because he said a section of a verse from psalm doesn't mean he was quoting it. I find the relationship you're drawing to be about as absolute as some of the Horus-Jesus similarity "facts".

Even if you're right, then I'll just say that even Peter's faith faltered. And who can forget doubting Thomas? The rest of my previous statement still stands on those premises.