misunderstandings about Catholicism

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Hello All,

Recently I have been somewhat alarmed about how many people really and truly misunderstand catholicism, or at least how the majority of catholics practice. I welcome corrections of my claims here because I am only speaking from my experience in a few parishes. I want to make it clear that some of what I address here is specific Church Doctrine, and some of it is actually just how the majority of Catholics practice, which may or may not be in accordance with the doctrine. Again, I am no expert, and I am speaking only from experience and not from lengthy study. I am bringing this up because I would like to hear from those who have studied Catholicism at length and also those who have pre-existing notions about it. Here goes:

1) (This is the claim that bothers me the most) Catholics worship idols: In Catholicism, there is one God, just like in any other sect of Christianity. He is represented in three persons - the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. This is a divine mystery, but it helps to think of it as though they are members of one body. A body cannot function without its arms, legs, or head, yet none of these can function on their own either. Thus, they are independent of eachother, but also dependant on eachother, however paradoxical that seems.

A lot of people make this claim because of the veneration of Saints, and especially the Virgin Mary. Catholics do not believe that Saints are in any way, shape, or form divine. They are extraordinary people who have accomplished good things in both life and death. We do not pray to them to fix our problems. We pray to them to pray to God for us. It is fundamental to Catholicism that prayer for others is as important as prayer for ourselves, and to have somebody who has gained Gods favor pray for us is a way of accessing even more of his attention. Mary remains a singled out figure in Catholicism because she mothered Jesus, who was free of sin. Catholics believe that she was as perfect and free from sin as any human can be. It is impossible to be free from sin in the human condition, but she was the ideal, virtuous woman. She needed to be to be chosen by God. And that deserves a certain respect in the Church. The problem has been that her role has been blown out of proportion by many sects, including "The Cult of the Virgin" in the Middle Ages, and in recent years Latin American Catholicism.

2) Catholics are extremely conservative, backward, and narrow I am speaking only from personal experience here, so correct me if I am wrong. In my experience, many people in my church were accepting of all sorts of people. The rules of the church were seen as guidelines for good living. I also think that the Vatican has said that the Old Testament is not literal in some places. I don't have backup for that at the moment, but will look through the Catechism when I get the chance. Catholics do not have the same policies of witnessing that many more evangelical groups of Christians do. We believe in spreading the Gospel by living the Gospel. In fact, in the northeast right now, there are programs going on for Catholic women that teach them how to be disciples of Jesus not by walking around shouting Bible verses about condemnation and accepting Christ into your heart, but by living the type of life that Jesus left.

I cannot tell you how many sermons I have heard about not judging your neighbor, about accepting those who sin, and loving them anyway, accepting your own sin. I suppose this implies an inherent belief in sin, which many on this forum would argue is narrow, but I think everyone, regardless of religious belief, believes in right and wrong to a degree, and that is what "sin" really comes down to.

When I was going to make my confirmation, I told my CCD teacher that I though I was gay. He told me that if I believed in Christ and believed in the church to make it anyway. He said he knew of many Catholics who actively choose to love the lord, and to belong to this church because they like the opportunity to take the body and blood of christ every week, but do one or another thing that the Church condemns. It is hard to live by all the rules of the church, and I dont think anyone does. Just like very few jews are completely orthodox. Maybe I am describing a phenomena known as "Cafeteria Catholisim" but I dont know if that is necessarily negative.

I am sorry for the length and informality of this. My experience has been that Catholics are a generally accepting group. But some of you may have had different experiences, or may have reason to believe otherwise. Thanks for reading this far, and I look foward to your responses.

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daniellejean,

I'm glad you started this thread because I have relatives that are Catholic. Now, I was around them all the time when I was a kid and I only remember some of what they told me about Catholicism. So, to say the least, I'm pretty ignorant of it's doctrine.

I do have a question for you. You say you pray to the saints to pray to God for you? Since Jesus died on the cross to save us from our sins and the bible says that no one can get to the Father except through the Son, why do you not pray in Jesus' name (or do you?)? I guess I just have a hard time with praying to someone who was a human being. I am very interested in your reply!

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Catholics are Papists, they have the Knights of Columbus stocking weapons in the church basements for the upcoming war to kill all the protestants.

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http://web4.ehost-services.com/el2ton1/gunsmilie.gif

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We do pray to Jesus, and to the father directly. We say the Our Father, and we pray in our own words too. We concentrate more on the new testament than we do on the old or on Psalms and Proverbs like many other Christian groups. Through through my friendship with some protestants, I have learned to love the poetry and pure emotion of Psalms. That was off the question, sorry. Anyway, we do pray to Jesus. When we pray to the saints (and many modern catholics no longer do), we do so for specific reasons. For example, St. Stephen is the patron saint of forgetfulness, so if you forgot something or lost something, you would pray to him to pray for you. St. Agnes is the patron saint of purity (along with many others), if you are having problems with lust, you could pray to her to interecede on your behalf. Also some saints have left us poetic words or inspiring intellectual thinking that we can follow. St. Francis of Assisi for example, was a poet and artist before he became a monk, and he did not follow the traditional modes of practicing. He left us with a beautiful prayer asking the Lord to make us an instrument of his peace... it is basically a request for the Lord to inspire charity in our hearts. And St. Thomas of Aquinas was a learned man (Im still studyingh is teachings and am not really clear), but he took philosophy and applied it directly to Christian theism.

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Thank you daniellejean. I appreciate you answering that for me. I love the St. Francis of Assisi prayer. I use it often.

I am just still at a loss as to why you don't just pray straight to God/Jesus? Why the intercessory of man? To me Christ is the intercessory between God and man, so I don't see the need (?) for the praying to saints.

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Re: misunderstandings about Catholicism

daniellejean wrote:

1) (This is the claim that bothers me the most) Catholics worship idols: In Catholicism, there is one God, just like in any other sect of Christianity. He is represented in three persons - the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. This is a divine mystery, but it helps to think of it as though they are members of one body. A body cannot function without its arms, legs, or head, yet none of these can function on their own either. Thus, they are independent of eachother, but also dependant on eachother, however paradoxical that seems.

A lot of people make this claim because of the veneration of Saints, and especially the Virgin Mary. Catholics do not believe that Saints are in any way, shape, or form divine. They are extraordinary people who have accomplished good things in both life and death. We do not pray to them to fix our problems. We pray to them to pray to God for us. It is fundamental to Catholicism that prayer for others is as important as prayer for ourselves, and to have somebody who has gained Gods favor pray for us is a way of accessing even more of his attention. Mary remains a singled out figure in Catholicism because she mothered Jesus, who was free of sin. Catholics believe that she was as perfect and free from sin as any human can be. It is impossible to be free from sin in the human condition, but she was the ideal, virtuous woman. She needed to be to be chosen by God. And that deserves a certain respect in the Church. The problem has been that her role has been blown out of proportion by many sects, including "The Cult of the Virgin" in the Middle Ages, and in recent years Latin American Catholicism.

I am sorry for the length and informality of this. My experience has been that Catholics are a generally accepting group. But some of you may have had different experiences, or may have reason to believe otherwise. Thanks for reading this far, and I look foward to your responses.

Actually with regards to your first point and the worship of idols, what I remember seeing over the years...usually from older Catholics...has been a matter of praying before a statue or touching or even kissing a statue. Candles are burned which are set before certain statues. All of this leads the non-Catholic to believe that the Catholic is praying directly to a statue or an idol. I had a friend who when ill would place his hand on a small statue and recite a prayer, now to many this would seem to be idolatry. I understand that for certain people the statue is essentially the avenue of connection they use to reach their Higher Power (some say it is God, some say Jesus, and some The Blessed Virgin Mary) use of a statue as an avenue to a Divine Being, to me is not a sin or a problem. I have more of a misunderstanding regarding the statues when a person says that St. Lawrence or St. Agnes will save them...that nullifies God just about entirely in my mind; but then again I am not a Catholic. I bring this to you as a way to see where at least some non-Catholics get their beliefs.

:Lastly, no reason to apologize for the length of your post, it was well defined and covered many matters.

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I guess Im not exactly sure about that myself. I think it helps a lot of people to feel closer to God. Catholics take a more distanced approach to god than many protestants. ive been to many different churches of different denominations, and have noticed that. We tend to see God as distant in some way, and that is why people are more likely to find figures they can identify with. God created the universe, and so its a given that He is virtuous. And Jesus is God, so it is a given that He is virtuous. For many people, they need to find an example of virtue and right living that they can identify...somebody who is just like them, or was at one point.

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I personally dont pray to saints, i like praying directly to the father. Though I do pray to Mary. I just wanted to show that we do not see them as divine because that is a common misconception.

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Here, D.Jean, I'll help you out... Catholics pray that the Saints will pray for them as intercessories.

For example:
The Penitential Rite, spoken in unison during every Mass:
Penitential Rite
I confess to Almighty God,
and to you, my brothers and sisters,
that I have sinned through my own fault.

we lightly strike our breast

in my thoughts and in my words,
in what I have done,
and in what I have failed to do;
and I ask blessed Mary, ever virgin,
all the angels and saints,
and you, my brothers and sisters,
to pray for me to the Lord our God.

May almighty God have mercy on us,
forgive us our sins,
and bring us to everlasting life.

Amen.

If you believe that heaven is a place where all the Saints are in constant communion with the Godhead (as Catholics do), then it is only natural that they might ask specific Saints with specific interests to intercede on their behalf in regard to those interests.

For example, the beautiful Hail Mary:
Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with You.
Blessed art Thou
And blessed is the Fruit of thy womb, Jesus.

Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now
And at the hour of our death.
Amen

Or the Prayer to St. Jude:
O most holy apostle, St. Jude, faithful servant and friend of Jesus, the church honors and invokes you universally, as the patron of hopeless cases, of things almost despaired of. Pray for me, I am so helpless and alone.

Make use, I implore you, of that particular privilege given to you, to bring visible and speedy help where help is almost despaired of. Come to my assistance in this great need that I may receive the consolation and help of heaven in all my necessities, tribulations, and sufferings, particularly (state your request) and that I may praise God with you and all the elect forever.

I promise, O blessed St. Jude, to be ever mindful of this great favor, to always honor you as my special and powerful patron, and to gratefully encourage devotion to you.

Amen.

And here is a more coherent explanation... with Biblical references:

Quote:

Fundamentalists often challenge the Catholic practice of asking saints and angels to pray on our behalf. But the Bible directs us to invoke those in heaven and ask them to pray with us.

Thus, in Psalm 103 we pray, "Bless the Lord, O you his angels, you mighty ones who do his word, hearkening to the voice of his word! Bless the Lord, all his hosts, his ministers that do his will!" (Ps. 103:20-21). And in the opening verses of Psalms 148 we pray, "Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord from the heavens, praise him in the heights! Praise him, all his angels, praise him, all his host!"

Not only do those in heaven pray with us, they also pray for us. In the book of Revelation, John sees that "the twenty-four elders [the leaders of the people of God in heaven] fell down before the Lamb, each holding a harp, and with golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints" (Rev. 5:8). Thus the saints in heaven offer to God the prayers of the saints on earth.

Angels do the same thing: "[An] angel came and stood at the altar [in heaven] with a golden censer; and he was given much incense to mingle with the prayers of all the saints upon the golden altar before the throne; and the smoke of the incense rose with the prayers of the saints from the hand of the angel before God" (Rev. 8:3-4).

Jesus himself warned us not to offend small children, because their guardian angels have guaranteed intercessory access to the Father: "See that you do not despise one of these little ones; for I tell you that in heaven their angels always see the face of my Father who is in heaven" (Matt. 18:10).

Because he is the only God-man and the Mediator of the New Covenant, Jesus is the only mediator between man and God (1 Tim. 2:5), but this in no way means we cannot or should not ask our fellow Christians to pray with us and for us (1 Tim. 2:1-4). In particular, we should ask the intercession of those Christians in heaven, who have already had their sanctification completed, for "[t]he prayer of a righteous man has great power in its effects" (James 5:16).

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Daniellejean - you make some great points, but try to explain this to a Christian who has never studied Catholicism. I used to be considered a Catholic, but for other reasons than you point out here, I find other Christian Churches to that reflect my beliefs more closely. My husband who has never attended a Catholic Church, criticizes Catholics especially about idol worshipping and confessing to a priest rather than directly to God. I have given him the same facts you state, however, it does not sink into his closed minded head.

General question - I know going to a Protestant Church that often when some one is severely ill or some other problem, we frequently ask others to pray for us. What is the difference between asking a saint and our pew mate to pray for us?

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linkat,

I guess the difference is when I ask a church to pray for someone I am asking them to pray to God through His Son Jesus Christ. In the other instance, it's man praying to man to pray to God for man (as I understand it, that is.).

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Isn't the Church just a group of people praying for you to pray to God also? The Church itself cannot pray, but the people within the Church that prays. So in that case it is a person asking a group of other people to pray to God. In the case of a saint, it is one person asking another (a saint in this case), to pray to God. The only difference I see is the number of people involved and that you state it is through Jesus Christ.

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Linkat wrote:

Isn't the Church just a group of people praying for you to pray to God also? The Church itself cannot pray, but the people within the Church that prays. So in that case it is a person asking a group of other people to pray to God. In the case of a saint, it is one person asking another (a saint in this case), to pray to God. The only difference I see is the number of people involved and that you state it is through Jesus Christ.

Linkat,

I understand what you are saying. But, the difference here is ASKING people to PRAY to GOD and ASKING people to PRAY to PEOPLE ASKING THEM to PRAY TO GOD.

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Momma Angel wrote:

Thank you daniellejean. I appreciate you answering that for me. I love the St. Francis of Assisi prayer. I use it often.

I am just still at a loss as to why you don't just pray straight to God/Jesus? Why the intercessory of man? To me Christ is the intercessory between God and man, so I don't see the need (?) for the praying to saints.

just dropping my 2 cents in....

thanks danielljean, I was raised catholic, and although do not practice that relegion, it was not because of lack of faith in God, but in being disillusioned with other matters.

So your sentiments really hit a chord in my heart....being raised in the NE also, I never realized into well into adulthood what crazy ideas some people had about Catholics.....It's made for some amusing moments.

MA, you ask about praying to saints as the intercessary to man.....well, that is akin to the feeling I get about praying to Jesus....

I know I won't be able to state this properly, maybe danielljean understands....but, praying directly to Jesus makes me feel like I'm not giving all my attention to God, my Creator......

OK, it's like this, if Jesus is our Savior, God the Creator was the one who sent him to do the job.....so I should be thanking the Creator directly for sending him...

Let's say you have a terrible illness, that only one doctor in the world can cure, but he/she lives in Switzerland and you cannot get there....However this doctor says he has a nurse who has been trained in his/her ways, and can send that nurse to you, to help you overcome your illness.
The nurse arrives, and you work with him/her, using the techniques the doctors instructed the nurse in, and I make a full recovery....

Now, of course I will thank the nurse who came all that way from Switzerland, and tell him/her I was never forget their skill and kindness.

HOWEVER, it's the doctor I'm going to give the vast majority of the credit to. The nurse was just the instrument.....
I will be much more grateful, and feel more love towards the doctor. I might even want to become a nurse or doctor myself, and who would I better learn from? The doctor of course.

That's why frankly I feel uncomfortable giving Jesus more than a nod, when my love is going towards my Creator.

Maybe Jesus doesn't even WANT us to make such a big deal about him....He might be thinking, well, I was just doing my job, a simple thanks is enough, now, all you people get on with the business of thanking the Creator....

In the same way some may feel catholics use saints as a less than optimum conduit to God....I feel Jesus is a less that optimum way, I perfer to make my connections direct. God can hear me directly, I'm sure of it.

No, Catholics do emphasize Jesus as much...so?

What is your take on what I just said Daniellejean? I'd be really interested.

Boy! could I tell some funny stories about stuff people believe about catholics...

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Chai Tea,

Just throwing my two cents back in there real quick. Ok, now, for me I believe in the trinity. God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit. Three co-existing in one.

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Oh! Sorry, left out one thing....

I don't believe in original sin, because I don't believe a sin can be passed down from generation to generation, like red hair or a propensity to certain illnesses, physical or mental.

So, no original sin, no need for Savior.....

I think Jesus came here for some reason though...which I'm not going to address here.

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Thanks daniellejean (I love that name) for starting this thread. I'm very interested to see more.

Chaitea, you may as well have spoken for me on that last post. That was so dead-on to how I feel. Raised Catholic, no longer practising, and I echo your feeling about JC. That is why I have always felt a fascination with the saints. There is a saint for anything under the sun; and they were real people! I really like that.

Some more of my 'personal notions and feelings' about catholicism:
Catholicism always struck me as very ritualistic and magical. Don't you say that to a Catholic though! "It's not magic!". To me it is though. I love that aspect of it. As a child; I was told it was wrong to find church magical. It was fun! There is a lot of beauty in it.
I suppose I simply am not a traditional religious person. I can't follow any religion I have come across. They are all just fun n' games to me; a way to further open up the mystery of Life to my silly eyes.

Okay, sorry about that. I got excited by what Chai said and the memories this thread is stirring! Embarrassed

continue....

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flushd, i would agree with you about magic...though we use different words, like "miracle" and "divine mystery" One of the things that keeps me tied down to the Catholic faith, as opposed to other Christian organizations that are more liberal is that we believe that God has given the Priest the right and ability to transform the bread and wine into the ACTUAL body and blood of Christ. And we have the right, and obligation to take part in this meal as much as possible. For me to be considered worthy enough to take the body and blood of Jesus Christ every week is something I am not willing to forsake. Many consider this to be too ritualistic, they consider it "hocus pocus" (We talked about this with regard to John Milton and his thoughts on Catholics in my English Renaissance class), and it also is reminicent of canibalism, which turns a lot of people off. But to me, if our sins are healed through Christs body and blood, which was given up for us, we must take in that body and blood and make ourselves one with Christ. Of course, nobody is worthy of have God, Himself, floating around in our digestive systems. But that is why we confess, and that is why we say an Act of Contrition before we take the body and blood, and that is why we, as a congregation say, "Lord, I am not worthy to recieve You, but only say the word and I shall be healed" What do others think about Eucharistic practices?

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Momma Angel wrote:

Chai Tea,

Just throwing my two cents back in there real quick. Ok, now, for me I believe in the trinity. God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit. Three co-existing in one.

uh huh, and you prefer to pray to God through Jesus the son, and I prefer to God my Creator.

Same God. you could agrue that jc is god, I could say god is god, using the doctor/nurse example from above, my allegiance is more with the creator than the son......

reading edgar's post, "no christians please" you'll see more of what i mean that i really hesitate using the term christian, because it seems to mean such a different thing today in america than how i was raised to understand the word.

i can't connect with praying the way "christians" today pray, the important thing is the connection is made.

jc just isn't a facet of god that is my prime source of worship. that's all.
I've said the word several times, but "creator" just says it all.....that's who I worship, my creator. It's all very private.

flushd, i bet you see what i mean....

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