Posted on 05/28/2014 5:50:04 AM PDT by WVKayaker
There are a lot of people who claim to be Catholic and I feel they are either out and out lying or were so poorly catechized that they really don't know what they are talking about. There should be no excuse for that now. There is plenty of information plus the Catechism that the Church sells at a very reduced rate.
There also a lot of fallen away Catholics who think they know what the Church teaches but they did not go to instruction past the third grade and were not paying attention even then.
That is NOT at all what we Protestants are trying to say to you. We have no problem with you wanting to "pray the Rosary, read the epistles and gospel and chant psalms and commemorate Christ’s Last Supper, Passion and Death at Mass, feed the hungry, clothe the naked, protect the unborn, and, when you stray, go to confession and do penance"..... you are to be commended for wanting to do all of the above.
Our point is that you tell us Protestants that if we do not do all the above the same way you do (for instance, we pray, just not with a rosary, we confess our sins, but directly to God, not through a priest)then you tell us we are not saved.
We are saying that being saved does NOT hinge on that list of good works, as good as they are. Being saved hinges on one thing and one thing only... profession of faith in Jesus Christ and exactly what He taught.
I would not have such a negative feeling about the Roman Catholic Church if they would quit telling me that because I don't pray to Mary and the their designated "saints", confess to one of their priests, attend their Mass, give my money to them, be baptized in their particular ceremony (and I can go on and name hundreds of more works)then I am not saved. I am confident that it is NOT the Roman Catholic church that will save me, nor will any particular Protestant church save me. ONLY Christ Jesus will save me. And if I chose to worship Him in a Protestant church rather than in a Roman mass, then do NOT tell me I am wrong, for doing so, you are adding "works" to the conditions of salvation.
If Christians of all flavors on FR would put as much energy into evangelizing non-believers as they do arguing over which Christian is better, imagine the souls that could be won.
Just sayin’
I find you all contemptible.....both Protestant and Catholic alike engaged in this waste of time.
Protestants are not going to listen unless you can prove in the "Bible" using God's word and once you add an ounce of extra non-Biblical garbage into your argument they walk away and shut down to listening. Catholics are so stuck on tradition and an institution they could care less about only following the "Bible" using only God's word as their guide.
There is no way for there to be a real discussion and all know it so the real goal is evil....it is only to cause a fight.
Congratulations none here really cares about God and being Christ like because none of this is done in his spirit.
This entire subject matter is T-I-R-E-S-O-M-E.
I have lived in the South with many incredibly racist people (who have expressed in my lifetime that “Black people” have no souls).
They are very SELF-RIGHTEOUS — not righteous — but they can tell the day and the hour that they were saved and are going to heaven regardless of their actions, because “I was saved through my faith in Jesus Christ.”
A close relative, married for the 4th time now, is one of those “saved people” whose own mother called blacks “cockroaches” until the day she died in her 80’s. She swore she was saved too, took joy in belittling her daughter until her death also. But she was saved, don’t you know? She also didn’t mind criticizing Catholics and the Pope on a daily basis as well.
1 Peter 1:17-19
Beloved: If you invoke as Father him who judges impartially according to each one’s works, conduct yourselves with reverence during the time of your sojourning, realizing that you were ransomed from your futile conduct, handed on by your ancestors, not with perishable things like silver or gold but with the precious blood of Christ as of a spotless unblemished lamb.
I think I’ll go with Mother Theresa’s response to “being saved and going to heaven.” She said, “Who am I to judge, particularly concerning myself? I will go to heaven through God’s mercy alone.”
Only HE judges.
So, for all you racists, wife beaters, greedy exploiters — who have been saved through faith — I say this, “REPENT and ask for God’s mercy and quit telling yourself you’ve been saved.”
Acts 7:51
You stiff-necked people, you always resist the Holy Spirit. We, by our own freewill, can resist God and His grace, and turn away from Him.
Again, only God knows and only God can judge you concerning your salvation.
As I was taught, the word “catholic Church” in the Nicene creed meant “universal Church” rather than referring specifically to the Roman Catholic Church. For it was created at the time before the separation of the Christian church into eastern and western factions, one in Constaninople and the other in Rome. And this was at St. Joseph’s College of Indiana back in the mid-1960’s.
This stupid fighting is not Christ like nor should it continue.
Neither side will ever listen to the other and we all know it....so end it if the goal is not hatred.. The spirit this is being done in is not from God and we all know it.
Good replies to both sides in this religious food fight. We Christians, of all persuasions must focus on what unites us, not what divides us.
I did neither. Strikes one and two.
Very well said.
This creed was first formulated at the First Ecumenical Council, held at Nicea, located in what is now Turkey, in 325, as a response to the Arian heresy, which denied the divinity of Christ. It was revised at the Second Ecumenical Council, held at Constantinople in 381 as a response to the Macedonian or Pneumatomachian heresy, which denied the divinity of the Holy Spirit.
Many Years ago I went to work for a Christian company, the owner was real deal, not one of those phonies who slap a fish on their logo and rip people off, he walked the walk and talked the talk. Not so some of his employees, a number were well like you. My first week one of them heard I was Catholic and told me I would never go to Heaven. The first thing I said was “Wow, does the Pope Know about this?”, the second was to tell him to worry a little more about his own soul and salvation and a lot less about mine.
Thanks Shery for you thoughtful post. You sound like a True Christian who love Jesus.
As a former Catholic and now Saved by Faith in Christ Alone I can only ask does your confession of Faith jive with the still in force anathemas of Trent?
I believe to remain in Good Standing as a Catholic you must attend mass every sunday, refrain from sin and must confess to a priest to be forgiven of any sin. You Must believe in ALL that the Church teaches including the various Marian doctrines, Purgatory, and Papal doctrines.
I cannot in good conscience and in light of history submit to this organization.
I believe the anathemas below are still in force,
CANON 9: “If any one saith, that by faith alone the impious is justified; in such wise as to mean, that nothing else is required to co-operate in order to the obtaining the grace of Justification, and that it is not in any way necessary, that he be prepared and disposed by the movement of his own will; let him be anathema.”
CANON 12: “If any one shall say that justifying faith is nothing else than confidence in the divine mercy pardoning sins for Christ’s sake, or that it is that confidence alone by which we are justified . . . let him be accursed”
Canon 14: “If any one saith, that man is truly absolved from his sins and justified, because that he assuredly believed himself absolved and justified; or, that no one is truly justified but he who believes himself justified; and that, by this faith alone, absolution and justification are effected; let him be anathema.”
Canon 23: “lf any one saith, that a man once justified can sin no more, nor lose grace, and that therefore he that falls and sins was never truly justified; or, on the other hand, that he is able, during his whole life, to avoid all sins, even those that are venial,—except by a special privilege from God, as the Church holds in regard of the Blessed Virgin; let him be anathema.”
Canon 24: “If any one saith, that the justice received is not preserved and also increased before God through good works; but that the said works are merely the fruits and signs of Justification obtained, but not a cause of the increase thereof; let him be anathema.”
Canon 30: “If any one saith, that, after the grace of Justification has been received, to every penitent sinner the guilt is remitted, and the debt of eternal punishment is blotted out in such wise, that there remains not any debt of temporal punishment to be discharged either in this world, or in the next in Purgatory, before the entrance to the kingdom of heaven can be opened (to him); let him be anathema.”
Canon 33: “If any one saith, that, by the Catholic doctrine touching Justification, by this holy Synod inset forth in this present decree, the glory of God, or the merits of our Lord Jesus Christ are in any way derogated from, and not rather that the truth of our faith, and the glory in fine of God and of Jesus Christ are rendered (more) illustrious; let him be anathema.
You BET!
I'm a church going Catholic and I have had to deal with with people like this personally. I had something similar to a near death experience one night and met my dead father in-law in heaven in the presence of Jesus Christ. When I told these fundamentalists they left me alone after that.
Look at that 20yr who went on a killing spree because he was still a "virgin". Did he have ANY religion in his life? When I say religion I mean Christian religion. I bet not.
So for all of you fundamentalist Christians out there who are "worried" about Catholic's salvation, don't worry we are "good to go." We know the only way to Heaven is through Jesus Christ. There are millions of people out there who are "Nothing" that face potential eternal damnation. Work on them,they need it.
Is this the Cannon Code of 1917?
Bravo!
Don’t know. thought the council of Trent was Universal and could never be reversed.
“She warned me once, she warned me twice
But I dont take no one’s advice
So scratch it on over (move it on over)
Shake it on over (move it on over)
Move over short dog cause the big dog’s moving in”
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