First, I am not "cheerleading" the Catholic Church.
You (along with the priests and bishop who taught you to think as you have) precisely capture the heart and soul of what the modern Church is about today––each other.
Not even sure where you got that from. Surely not from my post.
Not God, but simply the relationship and interactions between our neighbors and friends.
Really? You assume that's what I think from my post?
The vast majority of those Catholics who are still attending Mass, believe, like the Protestants, that the Holy Eucharist is merely a symbol of Jesus Christ.
I've never met anyone who thinks that. We all receive Communion with the belief that it IS Christ.
Your post is a declaration of your self assumed superiority when it comes to beliefs regarding the mass and the Catholic church. Your post is pretty typical for a "holier than thou" Catholic of which there many here on FR. You preach instead of try to teach. You approach posters like me with the attitude that I can't possibly know as much about Catholicism as you nor can I possibly be able to understand Catholicism as well as you. All that from a two sentence post.
Hmmm. Dost thou protest too much? Whether you like it or not, your comment strongly suggested that the handshaking and the hand-clapping that goes on within a Church during the Mass is a good thing, and that people who attend Mass to see and adore God that do not buy into that behavior would do as well to wait in their car. Now tell me why that doesn’t suggest that you believe that those modernistic rubrics foisted upon Catholics by the Vatican II supporting bishops does not imply that you are not one of their cheerleaders?
And if you haven’t met any “practicing” Catholic today who denies the Real Presence and views the Holy Eucharist as merely a symbol, then you must neither discuss this issue with other Catholics nor read the multitude of opinion polls on the topic. If you are reticent about discussing this issue with other Catholics, I can understand that; but if so, go online and read some of the many polls that have been conducted on this question for years. You can do the research yourself, but when you do you’ll find that the numbers vary between 17% and 30% of Catholics who still believe that it is the Flesh and Blood of Jesus Christ. Before Vatican II the percentage of believers in the Real Presence was in the high nineties. So as for those “symbol believers”, perhaps they might be as well off as listening in their car.
Yes, I am a Catholic who still believes in the true teachings of the traditional Catholic Church, and while your ad homonym (“holier than thou”) sounds pretty Protestant to me, it does not change either the truth or my belief. I have no idea as to your knowledge of the Catholic Church but when you offer a snarky, two sentence comment criticizing someone who states that he attends the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass for the purpose of visiting with God and not his neighbors, expect that some traditional Catholic (like me) might reach some very reasonable conclusion as to your beliefs. Hopefully I was wrong.
Finally, if you read my comment as a “declaration of self-superiority”, I apologize; that was not my intent. I was simply attempting to point out that the modernist bishops and priests of the Catholic Church have abandoned their flocks and have allowed the faithful to embrace the Protestant and humanist belief that our existence is about us and not God. What I have stated is Catholic doctrine and dogma, nothing more. And if you sense that I feel very strongly about the wrongness of this disgraceful push by the modernist bishops, you are correct. It is because of these actions that many souls will be lost for eternity. Perhaps I’m hoping that by saying something on a site like this might stem the tide.