I have taken up a hobby of understanding the beliefs of the Catholic church.
I was raised Catholic from birth until I was confirmed in the church. After my confirmation, I stopped going all together, but I wasn't going to church a whole lot during middle school anyway. Growing up in the church left me with a lot of pressumptions I made on account of my experience. Some of these pressumptions might be fair, others may not. I want to take a more responsible look at the church, and see what is scriptural and what is in need of reform. In an honest hope to be more fair to Roman Catholics, and in an honest hope to open eyes and ears in the Roman Catholic church, I would like to share my findings in a series of posts. I look forward to any insight Catholics, Protestants, and anybody else has to offer on my findings.
During this jourey, I am going to use the Catholic Cathechism to talk about what Catholics believe. While I completely understand that not all Catholics hold one hundred percent to this cathechism, it is what the church calls all Roman Catholics to believe. So, I think this is a fair way to discover the church in an unbiased way. This is the site that I am going to be getting my information from: http://www.vatican.va/archive/catechism/ccc_toc.htm
As I read through the Prologue of the Catechism, the first thing that sticks out to me as a Bible-believing Christian, is the principal sources the catechism uses to describe the Roman Catholic faith. "Its principal sources are the Sacred Scriptures, the Fathers of the Church, the liturgy, and the Church's Magisterium. It is intended to serve "as a point of reference for the catechisms or compendia that are composed in the various countries".15 (III The aim and intended readership of the Catechism, Prologue)
But look at what the Westminster confession of faith has to say about sources of inspiration
(http://www.reformed.org/documents/wcf_with_proofs/):
X. The supreme judge by which all controversies of religion are to be determined, and all decrees of councils, opinions of ancient writers, doctrines of men, and private spirits, are to be examined, and in whose sentence we are to rest, can be no other but the Holy Spirit speaking in the Scripture.[24]
VI. The whole counsel of God concerning all things necessary for His own glory, man's salvation, faith and life, is either expressly set down in Scripture, or by good and necessary consequence may be deduced from Scripture: unto which nothing at any time is to be added, whether by new revelations of the Spirit, or traditions of men.[12] Nevertheless, we acknowledge the inward illumination of the Spirit of God to be necessary for the saving understanding of such things as are revealed in the Word:[13] and that there are some circumstances concerning the worship of God, and government of the Church, common to human actions and societies, which are to be ordered by the light of nature, and Christian prudence, according to the general rules of the Word, which are always to be observed.[14] (Chapter 1, Of the Holy Scripture)
To summarize:
Catholics use Scripture, historical church mentors, traditions, and current church leaders to write out their confession of faith.
Reformed Christians use Scripture and reason to discuss their faith.
My question for the readers (Or as Rachel always says, "sword drill"):
What would persuade a person, one coming from a totally neutral stand point, choose to believe on stance over the other? What does God say about what one is called to believe? Tell me what you think and prove it.
I leave you to ponder as your
Mrs. Pickett
6 comments:
Lauren, I think that people are drawn to the RCC because they feel inadequate to interpret Scripture themselves, and don't trust other people's 'private judgement' either as there is such a variety of opinion within Protestantism on almost any given issue. They feel that in committing themselves to the tradition of the RCC they are getiting a unified, consistent, authoritative interpretation of Scripture that is traceable back through history. The problem is 1- they are using their private judgment to choose this tradition, 2- it is not unified or consistent, nor does it go all the way back through history. If they would read their own documents they would discover this. Have you read Pascal's Provincial Letters? He stands for the best in RCC tradition: I think you would very much enjoy him. And it is hugely eye opening, as regards the inconsistency and massive variation in Rome's positions and teacings, with 'probable opinion' etc. I'm looking forward to the series....
Lauren, I am hugely interested in this thread. I have been too lazy, or maybe frightened to look into it myself. I have had some conversations with Catholics on College Ave on Thursday mornings that have taught me much about the convictions of the dedicated Catholic on the street.
I think the most compelling attraction of the Catholic church from a strictly human perspective would be the history and unity. Although I think that we fight not against those things that we see so much as those things unseen.
May God bless your efforts and strengthen through you the faith of us all and our love for the lost, and protect you from error and us from pride.
Love,
Rachel
I think my draw to the Church and it's methods and theology was very gradual and even started with my protestant days. I came from a very "charismatic" and fundamentalist protestant church. I was put through the rigerous theological and evangalistic training and scripture memorization of this church and really enjoyed it. I was taught very calvanist faith-based stuff and was really into it. I still draw on that inner discipline and hunger for divine truth. It is what started my drift to Roman Othodoxy.
I was reading a lot of CS Lewis, a lot of Thomas Merton, and a lot of John Paul II's books during college. These were men I could not dismiss as Mary worshipers, or un-biblical men. These Catholic men cited scripture like I had never heard a protestant pastor do, but they had no need to "interpret" with words. (Baring Lewis, who is very good at that, too.) They did it with their actions and with their lives. This is fundamentaly what I would call a basic "Catholic" theology. It is the word of God as applied to the everyday and as spoken through life.
OTS-Lewis used alagory and real life experiences in his stories. His book, "The Great Divorce" really put the Catholic belief in pugatory to rest in my heart and in my head.-BTTS
Catholic theology was new to me and as its interpretation had caused many wars, schisms, and fights I went to the source, the scriptures, and to its immediate fathers, the disciples. As a record of the diciples I went to their immediate successors, the church fathers of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd century. A lot of these writings actually predate, or coincide with the writing of the gospels we have in the cannon today. They are also very far ahead of the protestant spilt and any other huge schisms and represent a fairly unified Christianity.
Although it is not tidy, there was a lot of healthy debate, it is amzing to note how much was already held to be common knowledge among Christians that we still hold as basic truths. I'll give you a few examples I thought major, then to save space will stop for comment and email if you'd like not to have me fill your blog. : )
1.Cofession
"And with that He breathed on them and said, "Recieve the Holy Spirit. If you forgive anyone his sins they are forgiven; if you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven."
(Gospel of John 20:22-23, NIV)
-This was key! How did I miss things like this in all my time as a Christian? Were there other things like confession that are obviously scriptural, but never talked about, or demomised in protestantism? The Roman Orthodox Church is not random, but based squarly on the scripture!
2.Baptism
We know the scripture and there is very little dabate on that, but the tradition of Catholic thought and writing on it is beautiful.
"But there is no other way than this: to become aquainted with this Christ; to be washed in the fountain spoken of by Isaiah for the remission of sins; and for the rest to live sinless lives."
(Justin Martyr c.160AD)
3.Real presence of Christ in Communion.
"While they were eating, Jesus took bread gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to His deciples saying,"Take and eat; this is my body."
Gospel of Matthew 26:26 NIV
"While they were eating, Jesus took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to His disciples, saying,"Take it; this is my body."
Gospel of Mark 14:22 NIV
Same in The Gospel of Luke 22:19 NIV
The Gospel of John doesn't mention it explicitly.
A great reference for the early church fathers is at Barnes and Noble. "A dictionary of Early Cristian Beliefs." It is an abstract type guide to a much larger work.
Please email me for more references, etc.
joelv@catholic.org
Thanks for letting me type!
OK, I know that you haven't posted again because the Holy Spirit knows that I haven't actually done my homework... I was letting Mrs. Pickett digest the Roman stuff for me, and that's just not good enough. I guess it will have to wait until after Reformation day because I'm just too busy with the band right now.
;C)
Mrs. Pierson
Ok, it's been seven months to ponder this one...It's time to crank it up again!
Rachel
One site has changed my life - both practically and (more importantly) spiritually...
www.LighthouseCatholicMedia.org
The answers you're looking for can be found here.
May God bless you and guide you in your search. :)
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