Why Are You Catholic?

But, why AM I Catholic? - I got sick of all the differing interpretations of how to live out the Bible by the differing opinions of what Scripture means by so many pastors however well-meaning. I'll be glad to explain more if any one is really curious.

It sounds like your reason for being a Catholic is that you got tired of studying the Bible for yourself. Instead of being like the Bereans (Acts 17:11) who were more noble than those in Thessalonica because they searched the Scriptures daily with all readiness or openness of mind to see whether or not those things that Paul preached were actually true. They put real effort into the study of the Scriptures. You know that they had to know their Bibles. Think about it. All that they had at their disposal was the Old Testament--no concordance, no computer programs, no Bible helps, etc. Just the Old Testament and that is all. Using that Old Testament they were able to verify the things in Paul's New Testament message as being true, authentic, and indeed of God. They searched the Scriptures.

Your problem seems to be that you don't want to do that. You would rather the magesterium, the Cathechism, and the Catholic Church in general tell you what to believe. Now you don't have to study the Word at all. Just look in your catechism; it will have all your answers, or failing that you must ask a priest. You don't have the soul liberty to study the Bible any more and come to your own conclusions, even if the Holy Spirit would lead you contrary to the heresies of the Catholic Church. You now have to go to a priest for your interpretation, or the magesterium, not the Holy Spirit.

Catholics don't need to study; neither do they have the soul liberty to study the Scriptures.

So when you got tired of all the differences that you heard of, you were too lazy to study and see what was right and wrong (like the Bereans), and joined a church (falsely so-called) where you wouldn't have to study.
Is that about it?
DHK

 

DKH,

Do you feel justified in telling people that they are too lazy to study and they joined a church where they don't have to study?

That's truly amazing. Intense study of the scriptures is what lead me to the Catholic faith. I saw how all the scriptures fit together for the full picture and this is how the Catholic Church interprets the scriptures.

I have never understood why the Baptist (remember I used to be one)believe that what Paul said is more important than what Jesus said. It would appear that many people believe Paul to be the final authority and not God.

Here is another shocker for you....Catholics have Bible Study. They also read books too. Some of the best books written are by those who used to be evangelical, protestant, baptist, fundamentalist, ect.

 

You're missing a KEY word;

 

As said before, I TOO am a 'Catholic', and find the term used for ROMAN Catholics exclusively to be wrong but also offensive. Of course, the RC's use the term 'Catholic' because they believe they are the ONLY true church. But Anglicans and Orthodox know better. As posted in 'Catholicity key to Church Unity,' I quoted from St Vincent...

Again, from St Vincent...

"Moreover, in the catholic Church itself, all possible care must be taken that we hold that faith that has been believed everywhere, always, by all. For that is truly and in the strictest sense "catholic," which, as the name itself and the reason of the thing declare, comprehends all universally. We shall observe this rule if we follow universality, antiquity, consent. We shall follow universality if we confess that one faith to be true which the whole Church throughout the world confesses. We shall follow antiquity if we in no wise depart from those interpretations which it is manifest were notoriously held by our holy ancestors and fathers. We shall follow consent, in like manner, if in antiquity itself we adhere to the consensual definitions and determinations of all, or at the least of almost all bishops and teachers."

We Anglicans ARE Catholic. I am Catholic because I too, want my faith based on 'solid rock', not on the 'opinions of men'.

 

Some very well may, but the majority doesn’t. My wife’s family are Catholic and none can tell me from the bible how they know they are saved. Only by what work they’ve done through the Catholic Church (the sacraments) are they supposedly saved. But from the answers I get, they are lost and without Christ.

I work with a former Catholic who converted to Christianity (in his own words), after 26 years in the Catholic Church. He’s told me that it wasn’t until a Baptists co-worker started quizzing him about his faith, that he had to research the bible for answers, not just what the Vatican said, but what God said. It wasn’t until then did he finally take notice that he had been mislead and that he really wasn’t saved.

He said that he never carried a bible to church, and that looking back, the clergy were the ‘educated’ and the laity were kept ‘stupid’. The clergy told them what they needed to hear and that they were the ‘final authority’. Once he final decided to read the bible, he started to discover how much the RCC is in error. He said that for a long time and in some Churches they (the clergy) still speak in Latin, when addressing the laity!!!

Nowhere in the Bible could he find where one man was to head all churches, like fashion of the pope. Or that pastors had to be celibate. Nowhere could he find nuns in the early church. Or were anyone of the early church prayed to Mary or any other person other that God. That Mary was the queen of Heaven and that she was sinless. Identifying dead people as saints and praying to them, purgatory and indulgences. He has an extensive list that he’s shared with me.

He said he finally realized that after all the money he gave to the church in order to get his deceased love ones out of purgatory, that the RCC was getting rich and that they’ve taken advantage of him and million of other poor people, which the Vatican has made millions off of.

He’s right. Take a trip to Mexico and see for yourselves, the RCC has huge Churches, with gold plated interior items, all at the expense of the poor and downtrodden. Right in the middle of the slums of Mexico!

 

Actually, there is one MAJOR reason why you shouldn't take these words of Christ in a literal manner (i.e. as implying transubstantiation): Christ is now risen and dwells in an immortal and incorruptible body.

The elements of the supper, on the other hand, were meant to memorialize in the minds of the disciples his broken body and shed blood, all of which pertained to his body when it was in its mortal and corruptible state, when he went to the cross, suffered and died. This is why he thus said "Do this in remembrance of me."

The implications of the above truths against the claims of Catholicism, therefore, is obvious: transubstantion denies the fact of the resurrection by virtue of asserting that the bread and wine become once again the broken body and shed blood of Jesus Christ, which is a virtual impossibility since Christ is indeed risen from the grave immortal and incorruptible.

SchracktheBaptist

 

That's a shocker all right. After 20 years of being in the Catholic Church the Lord saved me, by His grace. (through faith alone I might add). In my first Bible study I was asked to turn to a reference like John 3:16. I couldn't find John, didn't know what the 3 stood for, neither the 16. Never had a Bible before that time, never was encouraged to read one. The Catholic Church never encouraged or even had Bible Studies. They frowned upon the laity studying the Bible. The Knights of Columbus would not study the Bible; they would study church doctrine. In most of the centuries down throughout history, the Bible has been a condemned book by the Catholics. Ask William Tyndale. They burned his Bibles, and then they burned him--at the stake. No friend of the Bible are the Catholics, and never have been.
DHK

 

DHK:

After having pastored I am convinced that most people in most chruches just want to be told what to believe. I used to spend a lot of time helping people to see how I arrived at a particular doctrine or conclusion. So many times I heard from people, "Pastor just tell us what we need to believe." They wanted to know the answer but not how I got there.

Now I didn't hear that in Bible study I heard that after a sermon. Those who were students liked it but those who just wanted quick easy answers didn't. Just ask yourself how many people after high school or college actually study or read. The numbers are small.

 

You do have a point. There are many Christians in Baptist and other evangelical churches that "have lost their first love," so to speak. When I first got saved, the person that led me to the Lord got me involved in weekly Bible studies immediately. This was outside of the church. I am still studying. Now, I freely admit that not all in our church study the Bible regularly, but there are many in our particular church that are fond of studying their Bibles. I believe that that percentage that study the Bible is far higher in fundamental baptist churches, where the Bible is stressed as the only authority for faith and doctrine, compared to a church that stresses the magesterium as its primary authority.
DHK

 

"We are confident, I say, and would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord." 2 Cor. 5:8

"For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain. If I am to go on living in the body, this will mean fruitful labor for me. Yet what shall I choose? I do not know! I am torn between the two: I desire to depart and be with Christ, which is better by far; but it is more necessary for you that I remain in the body." Phil. 1:21-24

Could someone explain how you get, "To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord", from these verses? Is it somewhere else in the Bible?

How does
**Away from the body and at home with the Lord**,

or how does
**to depart and be with Christ**

become equivalent to
**absent from the body = being immediately present with the Lord**?
This is not what Paul wrote. Just because one thing follows another does not make it identical. And if you read 2 Cor. 5 further, what do you make of vv. 9-10?

"So we make it our goal to please him, whether we are at home in the body or away from it. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive what is due him for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad."

 

I don't know what version you're using. I use the KJV and it doesn't say it would be nice to be absent from the body and present with the Lord, it says "to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord".
Gina

 

Here is a question for anyone. If we use the following logic:
"Jesus ascended bodily into heaven (Acts 1:9-11), therefore He remains in heaven (Heb. 10:12), and His body/blood cannot be truly present at (or in) communion."

Then how are we to understand Saul's conversion in Acts 9? Verses 5-6 read:
"Who are you, Lord?" Saul asked.
"I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting," he replied. "Now get up and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do."

Then he recalls that same experience in Acts 26:14-16:
"We all fell to the ground, and I heard a voice saying to me in Aramaic, 'Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me? It is hard for you to kick against the goads.'
"Then I asked, 'Who are you, Lord?'
" 'I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting,' the Lord replied. 'Now get up and stand on your feet. I have appeared to you to appoint you as a servant and as a witness of what you have seen of me and what I will show you."

How did Jesus really "appear" to Saul, since He is in heaven?

 

"Virtually impossible."
Matt. 19.26 Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”

 

What chapter and verse is it? Is it 2 Cor. 5:8? My KJV says--
"We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord."

I didn't use the words "it would be nice". The text says this is what Paul preferred.

 

Jesus is only trapped in heaven in the Baptist/Reform version of the bible:

"He must remain in heaven until the time comes for God to restore everything, as he promised long ago through his holy prophets." Acts 3:21, NIV

 

I'll throw in my 2 cents worth!!

I'm now a Baptist - and a happy one. In the past I attended a Catholic church and at one point in my youth I thought seriously about becoming a priest.

The problems I found in catholicism:

1. Too much attention to Mary - not that we shouldn't hold her in high esteem. I just think it's a good bit more than would seem appropriate based on the biblical writings.

2. Too many lax members - the churches to which I went were not "full" of earnest worshippers, rather yuppies and those ethnically connected with catholicism. No that that's bad - it's just that there was not such an atmosphere of devotion as I find in the Baptist churches.

3. Sacraments - nothing bad here really... I just think that we shouldn't see grace as being primarily dispensed by means of works.

Now... Looking back one thing I do appreciate about catholicism is its mature approach to the scriptures. The catholic church does not get bogged down in some of the literalism emphasized in baptist churches. I have found ALOT of baptists who seem to take more stock in a few of Paul's one-liners than in the whole four gospels. In addition catholic theologians are not bent on having to see EVERYTHING in the bible as being a prophecy about a literal future event!

So there you go! No denomination ever gets it completely right - but baptist works for me.

 

Gotta hand that one to you, it doesn't say what I thought it did!
BTW, I thought soul sleep was a rather common belief for Baptists and most Baptists originally believed in it.
(going for a record of wrong thoughts today perhaps? )
Gina