joefromchicago wrote:
CC: Those kinds of distinctions don't matter to me. Catholics, Protestants, Jews, Moslems, Hindus -- everyone worships the same god. They're just different paths to the same truth.
Me: Oh, in that case, you're not even a Lutheran, you're a Baha'i.
Nuh uh, not unless CC accepts Baha'u'llah as the most recent prophet and speaker of the Truth. Even Baha'i has a doctrine. CC would also have to pray twice daily and follow the other rituals.
CC is actually a UU :wink:
JPB--
Takes one to know one, eh?
JPB wrote:Nuh uh, not unless CC accepts Baha'u'llah as the most recent prophet and speaker of the Truth. Even Baha'i has a doctrine. CC would also have to pray twice daily and follow the other rituals.
CC is actually a UU :wink:
Given that CC was a Catholic who didn't follow the pope, I don't think she would have had any difficulty in being a Baha'i who didn't follow Baha'u'llah.
Joe--
You seem to be somewhat cynical about the human race--or some members of the human race.
Noddy24 wrote:Joe--
You seem to be somewhat cynical about the human race--or some members of the human race.
Hmmm, that doesn't sound like me.
joefromchicago wrote:Noddy24 wrote:Joe--
You seem to be somewhat cynical about the human race--or some members of the human race.
Hmmm, that doesn't sound like me.
Ahhh . . . you'll go to Hell for lyin', too, boy.
joefromchicago wrote:JPB wrote:I have a friend who is Roman Catholic except she doesn't believe in the immaculate conception or that Jesus was physically resurrected.
I've known people like that myself. A conversation I once had went something like this:
Me: You're a Catholic, but you don't follow the church's teachings on abortion?
Confused Catholic: That's right. I don't feel compelled to condemn abortion just because the pope says so.
Me: But church doctrine says that the pope is infallible on matters of doctrine.
CC: I don't agree with that.
Me: Well, then, you're not a Catholic, you're a Lutheran or something.
CC: Those kinds of distinctions don't matter to me. Catholics, Protestants, Jews, Moslems, Hindus -- everyone worships the same god. They're just different paths to the same truth.
Me: Oh, in that case, you're not even a Lutheran, you're a Baha'i.
CC: I belong to the Catholic church because I agree with most of what it stands for. And that stuff that I don't agree with, I just don't agree with.
Me: Church doctrine isn't a cafeteria menu from which you can just pick and choose the parts that you like. If you don't follow
all of the Catholic doctrine, then you can't be considered an observant Catholic.
CC: Says who?
Me: Says the pope.
CC: I don't agree with him on that.
Me:
Joe, just about every person of faith I've talked to does this exact same thing. I swear, this could be a transcript of some of my conversations with friends or friends of friends.
I've constantly got to remind myself that expecting a consistent logical discussion with a "person of faith" is pointless. They get just as frustrated trying to discuss the strengths of faith with a "person of logic".
Church 'poised to cut ties to state'
This is an interesting development. ---BBB
Church 'poised to cut ties to state'
By Jonathan Petre, Religion Correspondent
18/06/2007
Telegraph UK
The Church of England could begin severing its links with the state next month when it debates whether the Prime Minister should continue choosing cathedral deans.
The debate at the General Synod in York will be initiated by one of its most senior members, Canon Christina Baxter, the chairman of the House of Laity and a member of the Archbishops' Council.
It comes at a critical moment for the Church as Gordon Brown, who will shortly take over as Prime Minister, has indicated that he wants to reform the whole area of ecclesiastical appointments.
He appears willing to give up the Prime Minister's historic right to select Church leaders, including Archbishops of Canterbury and other diocesan bishops.
Mr Brown, the son of a Church of Scotland minister, has reportedly asked officials with close links to the Church to investigate how best to renounce powers of patronage. But he will need Church cooperation if he is not to spark a constitutional crisis.
If the Synod votes to remove the Crown from the process of appointing deans - the clerical "chief executives" of the country's cathedrals - it will be pushing at an open door at Downing Street.
But traditionalists will nevertheless warn that going too far down such a route could lead to the unravelling of all the Church's ties with the state, including the right of bishops to sit in the Lords.
Canon Baxter's call for the Crown to end its role in choosing deans will come during a debate on a report reviewing the appointments of a raft of senior clergy. The report is expected to urge better methods of identifying and promoting talented candidates.
Insiders say there is a groundswell in the Synod for the Church to wrest greater control of its affairs from the state to give it more freedom to deal with the unprecedented pressures facing it.
Its a standing joke in this country that the Church of England is so tolerant of opposing views and religions that it stands for nothing in particular. So being more definitive about its beliefs and drawing lines in the sand might be seen as a good idea. Personally I think its doomed. Schism is inevitable, in fact its already happened, just not formally acknowleged. There is no way liberal homosexual Americans want to be in the same church as evangelical Africans who would excommunicate them if they could.
I, too, have been sort of within the Catholic fold for many years but am increasingly dissident of certain dogmas. In fact, I hold to few dogmas and I no longer believe that Jesus was anything but a Jewish sage -- a charismatic and influential one, to be sure.
I do hold to Catholic social teaching, which is pretty much the last six of the ten commandments as doctrine.
So why do I sometimes attend services? I get a feeling of community there and feel part of a group with good intentions toward their fellows and holding to morals that are, if only vaguely, tending toward the good of the citizenry. Is this warm and fuzzy?....probably so, but sometimes I need warm and fuzzy. It is a harmless thing and keeps me off the streets.
I have seen the closing in and narrowing of the Church's teaching under the new Pope. Whenever this happens, you know that the hierarchy fear the loss of their core. Karen Armstrong has spoken of this often...how fundamentalism rises when faith weakens or when the faithful begin to stray. I think the Catholic church is dying and will continue toward irrelevancy unless they restate the myths and core beliefs that underlie the faith. When they stop relying on the old stories and rewrite them to work in today's world, when they admit that change does not destroy but strengthens, when they let women be priests and rewrite the rules for such positions of sanctity...then that might be a church for a new generation.
But, really, this generation must reconcile science and the old myths...that will not be easy, and the old myths will lose.
