Originally posted by Ps104_33:
If only there were someone who could tell me exactly what to believe and end my confusion.
Problem number one. I can tell you that the world is flat and that this history books are full of lies. Or I can tell you that Jesus Christ died for your sins. Neither one matters if the person doesn't have faith. Reading through this whole letter, the person just wants to be spoonfed faith instead of taking charge of it himself. I converted to Catholicism and found answers that my faith gobbled up; I was called to this place by God. And my faith maintains my relationship with Christ and His institution. Faith is essential, and I'm not finding it here.
Originally posted by Ps104_33:
Then along comes a Roman Catholic e-pologist who lays out the case for Catholicism, and it sounds great to me. He convinces me that all the Catholic beliefs that I thought were unbiblical really aren't.
Here we have again someone feeding the answers and them accepting them blindly. How do we know exactly what this person taught them? Where is this e-pologist? Can I shoot him an email? Surely if they spent this much time with this person, they must be pretty good, right? How about his/her website? Anyone? Anyone?
Originally posted by Ps104_33:
My whole problem was that I was trying to interpret the Bible without the infallible Catholic magisterium to tell me what it really means and without the knowledge of all those infallible traditions the Catholic church has been faithfully guarding all these centuries, and that's why I didn't know that Mary was born without sin, that she's the Queen of Heaven and the dispenser of all graces, and that Peter was the first pope.
This makes me REALLY wonder about the validity and sincerity of this letter. There's no mention of Jesus. No protestant/fundamentalist convert to Catholicism would be putting such a deemphasis on Christ, and especially not find the Catholic Church's beautiful dogmas of Christ. If this IS real, this person is confused because she's missing the key of Catholicism: Christ. The surrounding dogmas are all subthemes that extend from the center. They all make one faith, but without Jesus, the rest of the dogmas lose their meaning.
Originally posted by Ps104_33:
So I sign up for my nearest RCIA classes and eventually I'm confirmed into the Roman Catholic Church. When I'm not sure what God really wants from me, I can whip out my trusty Catholic catechism and find out everything I need to believe and do to remain a faithful Catholic. No more confusion. Just one big happy family, united in doctrine, one in faith! Great!
I've had more Catholic-Protestant/Fundamentalist debates than I can count, and they always involve the Bible as well as a CCC. You need a Bible, confused Catholic. The CCC feeds from the Scriptures, and you should be looking up the supporting Scripture verses to see where this doctrine is coming from. No wonder you're confused.
Originally posted by Ps104_33:
Once I start attending Catholic Church, I'm a little disappointed to find that there aren't too many people there who are really faithful Catholics.
Is there a reason you remained in this parish, then? Surely you can find another Catholic Church around if this one is so bad. However, I find it hard to believe that there were so few faithful people in your Church. My church has a large percentage of students (college town), and for the typical lackadaisical attitude of college kids when it comes to Church, the amount of devout followers of Christ never ceases to amaze me. Devoutness is there; I question how closely you are looking.
Originally posted by Ps104_33:
The people I talk to seem indifferent to Catholic dogma, often openly disagreeing with some of the basic teachings.
The leaders of our RCIA team here, on a personal note, don't see a problem with women ordination of priests. However, that's a personal belief, and they faithfully follow the Church's decisions. People can disagree and still follow the Church's teaching. Also, I think lumping everyone together ("the people") is way overboard. Everyone is most certainly not this way.
Originally posted by Ps104_33:
Although most of them call themselves faithful Catholics, it's obvious that they're really not because they disagree on the dogmatic teachings of the church, and as I learned from the Roman Catholic e-pologist I talked to, that's the criteria for determining who's a faithful Catholic and who isn't.
No, the criteria is if they continue to follow what is correct despite personal differences. Sometimes don't "feel" like their a sin, but deep down, we know it's wrong, and we abstain from it. It's the same thing.
Originally posted by Ps104_33:
So because my faith is of the utmost importance to me, I want to fellowship with other faithful Catholics who feel as strongly as I do about my faith. I decide to go online and join a discussion board to talk to other faithful Catholics about our mutual faith. There I meet a Catholic, though, who begins sharing with me about the problems with the post-Vatican II Catholic Church. He tells me that the Church has strayed from the original faith.
Are there problems in the Church? Of course. There always will be. That doesn't mean the Church has strayed from the original faith; that's absurd and unsupported. These problems will be remedied through time, as all previous ones have.
Originally posted by Ps104_33:
I tell him that it does seem strange to me to hear that documents that seemed to make it clear that no one could be saved outside the Catholic Church don't really mean what they sound like they mean, but that we can't be going around interpreting church documents on our own any more than we can the Bible.
Again, I question the validity of this letter. Catholics are free to read and interpret the Bible as often as they like, as long as it is done within the guidelines of the Church. Even then, no one has control of your mind, and you're free to interpret however you see fit. Just realize, as with any Church, if you start believing contrary doctrines with the Church, you're going to find yourself leaving that Church.
Originally posted by Ps104_33:
If something has been infallibly defined, we must accept it by faith. He then goes on to tell me that that's true, but that many people are confused about the infallibility issue.
Your friend is the confused one. He's not logically making sense here. First the Church is wrong and falling away from the faith BECAUSE OF Vatican II, and now it's only the people's problem for interpretting it wrong. Make up your mind, friend.
Originally posted by Ps104_33:
He directs me to a website that gives a good argument for the idea that the problem these people have is that they don't understand the difference between the Ordinary Infallible Magisterium and the ordinary, "authentic," non-infallible Magisterium. I read in this article why Vatican II cannot validly overturn the history of the Church in this matter and why. Now I'm a little confused. Vatican II certainly does seem to contradict prior Catholic teaching, but how can I be sure?
You can be sure by reading the documents yourself, and seeing that there is not contradiction. Take your faith into your own hands, and don't let your friends live it out for you.
Originally posted by Ps104_33:
I know I'm supposed to obey the infallible decrees of councils, but how do I know for sure what constitutes an infallible decree?
Try the CCC, which you say you use all the time.
Originally posted by Ps104_33:
But before I have a chance to get too disturbed by this newfound information, along come other faithful Catholics who tell me that this person is a schismatic because he doesn't submit to the authority of the Church. I wonder to myself. One person says that the changes of Vatican II don't meet the criteria for infallibility, and that they contradict prior teaching, so as a faithful Catholic, I should reject them. Another person tells me that a faithful Catholic would never reject an infallible teaching from the church, and Vatican II meets the criteria for infallibility. And before long, I begin to feel those same old feelings of doubt and insecurity about what to believe. But I put those thoughts aside for the time being.
Why are you even questioning this? Vatican II was an official council of the Catholic Church. I don't know why because of one person on an Internet message board you've come to question it so much. How did everything make perfect since before, but one person has so dissuaded you?
Originally posted by Ps104_33:
I decide to educate myself more about my faith, so I pick up some books by Catholic scholars to see what else I can learn. I want to be sure that the authors I read are really faithful Catholics, so I look for books that bear the official seal of approval of the Church, the Nihil Obstat and Imprimatur. Imagine my shock when I find all kinds of divergent opinions in these books that stand in direct conflict with some of the defined dogmas I've been told I'm required to believe. Why are these scholars accepted by the Church and their books being officially approved by Catholic bishops?
How am I to help you? I don't know the books, nor the authors, nor these "divergent opinions." With so little information, there is no way I can help you, because you've given me nothing to work with.
Originally posted by Ps104_33:
Why, instead, aren't they being disciplined or excommunicated? Why can they publicly teach heresy with an official seal of approval by bishops whose authority comes straight from Rome? This doesn't sound biblical to me, but I remember that I can't interpret the Bible if my interpretation leads me in a different direction from the Church--after all the church is the pillar and foundation of the truth, not the Bible--
Oh give me a break. This person is making the Catholic Church look like the Bible means nothing, and I'm personally offended by it. This is either a fake letter, or the person became Catholic without ever doing any personal study.
Originally posted by Ps104_33:
But still, this not only doesn't seem biblical, but it doesn't sound like the response from the early church to heretics, either. These early heretics were forced out of the church and roundly refuted by the church fathers--faithful Catholics if ever there were any, according to Catholics. But these scholars are teaching in Catholic universities and writing books with the approval of the Church. Huh?
So now sola scriptura all of a sudden sounds Biblical, when you were so ready to dismiss it? And on what basis? There is no basis. The train of thought is not logical. And, again, I have no authors, books, or doctrines, only that you tell me you encounter them. I can't help you if I can't examine the texts.
Originally posted by Ps104_33:
Even so, in my newfound zeal for the Roman Catholic Church, I can hardly wait to share the good news with my Jewish neighbor, and tell him about the true Church that I've come home to, and to tell him that Jesus is the Messiah. But then I hear that the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops says that Jews don't need to be evangelized because they already have their own covenant relationship with God.
How convenient, seeing as outside this board, I had not even seen this document. Why? Because it's some preliminary writing that carries no weight. If you want to read it, fine, but don't EVEN pretend like this is something that you're bound to, and that the Church is telling you to not evangelize to your neighbor. It's like you're seeking any and every excuse to point angry fingers at the Church.
Originally posted by Ps104_33:
Of course, my first thought about that is that it seems very strange that Peter and Paul weren't aware of that, and that they wasted a lot of effort trying to evangelize the Jews. But then I remember that I'm not supposed to be interpreting the Bible for myself in these matters, so maybe I misunderstood all that stuff about sharing the gospel with Jews in the early church.
Gullibility is detrimental to the health. You're not Catholic; you have your eyes closed and you're grabbing at any hand that will lead you through the dark, regardless of where you might end up. Try grounding your faith instead of free-floating.
Originally posted by Ps104_33:
Or maybe something has changed since then and although they were supposed to do that, we're not. Or maybe, oh never mind.
So it's important, or it isn't??!? Make up your mind! Do you care or do you not? Do you want help or do you want to drown in your confusion? I think you want the latter.
Originally posted by Ps104_33:
I don't need to worry myself over these things anymore, because I have the Church to tell me what to do and what to believe, and these kinds of thoughts only lead to confusion and schism, so I try to ignore them. After all, I don't want to be accused of being my own pope.
You get accused of that a lot, huh? The Church doesn't want blind followers; she wants active participants. Get out of your wheelchair and walk!
Originally posted by Ps104_33:
Still I'm curious about this, so I go online and ask other Catholics what they think. I find that many Catholics say that the American Bishops have no authority to make that decision, so they're free to disagree.
It's amazing how much this letter appears as if it's written by someone who reads the Baptist Board regularly.
Originally posted by Ps104_33:
Okay, I think, that settles it. I'll share the gospel with my Jewish neighbor. Just to ease my mind, I pull out my Catholic catechism again, so I can be reminded of all the unity I have with my Catholic brothers and sisters. But, much to my dismay, what do I find? According to the catechism, I'm supposed to faithfully obey my bishop. What now? Do I talk to my Jewish neighbor about his need to trust in Jesus Christ and the Church or not? Does my Jewish neighbor even need Jesus or not? Faithful Catholics are telling me that I should talk to him about Jesus, and yet according to the catechism, a faithful Catholic is to submit to the teachings of the local bishops who've told me that Jews don't need Jesus.
You answered your own question. This letter by the Bishops is not binding, so why are you now saying that you are mandated to follow it? Now I'm the one getting confused!
Originally posted by Ps104_33:
I'm in such a tizzy over these things, I go back to the e-pologist who first told me about the truth of the Catholic Church and ask him what I'm to do? Again, he reassures me that the Catholic Church is completely unified, and anyone who disagrees with his beliefs is a schismatic and should be ignored. He reminds me again that all faithful Catholics agree on all defined dogmas (and those are the only things of real importance), because by definition, that's what makes them faithful Catholics. Then suddenly some old familiar feelings start to surface. I remember the time when my fundamentalist church where I first believed the gospel told me to stick with them for the true interpretation of the Bible. Whenever I went to someone there with a question, they'd tell me that faithful Christians are unified over doctrine, and those who teach other things are introducing strange doctrines that tickle men's ears. "Just ignore them, believe the Bible, and if you're confused about anything, ask us," they'd say. But yet, as I met more Christians not from my denomination, they had some cogent sounding arguments of their own about why their beliefs were the true biblical ones, and they told me that my denomination was teaching some false doctrines. So I wondered, how do I know if my denomination is teaching the truth, and not these other people? That's why I left evangelicalism for Rome; so I wouldn't have to experience that kind of confusion anymore. But now here I am, and what's changed? Catholic apologists tell me that all "faithful Catholics" are united over the "important issues"--defined dogma; traditionalist Catholics tell me that the modern Church is teaching heresy (not infallibly, of course), and that "faithful Catholics" must reject this modern teaching that opposes the true faith; Catholic scholars who teach in Catholic universities are publishing officially approved books, even saying things like Jesus wasn't even born of a virgin, and Rome doesn't object, leading me to believe that these scholars must be considered "faithful Catholics" by Rome or they'd be removed from their positions and disciplined and eventually excommunicated if they don't repent and recant; and my bishops are telling me not to evangelize my Jewish neighbor because he doesn't need Jesus, and although Rome hasn't confirmed this teaching, they have told me that "faithful Catholics" are to obey the bishops, even though the "faithful Catholic" who showed me the "true Church" says these bishops are wrong, that they have no authority to teach what they're teaching, and that they can be ignored by "faithful Catholics."
You're facilitating this confusion. These matters are not that hard. Psalm, feel free to give me this person's email address and I will answer his/her questions on a one-on-one basis, and he/she can make whatever decisions he/she wants to.
Originally posted by Ps104_33:
These are just a few examples of the kinds of issues a thinking Catholic runs into. I could go on and on with many more, but these will suffice for now. Is there any Catholic apologist who can help me with this? I'd really like to be a "faithful" Catholic, but I'm afraid I don't know what that is anymore. What I find instead is that, for all their differences, Evangelicals seem to have more true biblical unity than Catholics. What I mean by that is they seem to embrace each other as brothers and sisters in Christ in spite of their differences. Could it be that it is really the Catholic system that is "unworkable," and that sola Scriptura really does promote biblical unity?
So now Catholics don't embrace other Christians as brothers and sisters? There is no cause for such confusion.
NE outside the church could get into heaven. Has this changed to include non-catholics? Yes (by your own words in another thread). Then, this is either adding to confusion or contradicting an earlier declaration or both...which is it? 
