I can give you the perspective of someone raised Catholic and attending Catholic schools. In my 12 years of Catholic schooling - with 12 separate religion teachers - not once did a single homework assignment require opening the Bible. NOT ONCE!
I was at a political event last week and discussing my high school with a lady who had kids my age that also went to Catholic schools. She herself had been a convert to Catholicism. We were talking about how I go to a non-denominational church now and she was asking me questions about why. When I told her my above observation here was her response...
Of course not! Only priests have gone to school long enough to
interpret the Bible. Can you imagine how confusing it would be if we all had our own interpretations? Lay ministers do not have the schooling needed to attempt such a thing! What Catholic schools taught you was
prayer.
Now mind you, I'm pretty well able to get along with most people and I'm not antagonistic so I didn't mention that Catholic prayer, other than the Lord's prayer - is simply memorization and repetition. It's not about having a relationship with God or talking to Him. According to the Church, we still need that mediator (priest).
So I then ask her where she goes and she admits its been years since she went to church because the parish she was going to had too many Democrats...
Anyways - so my own personal experience and conversations with people like the lady last week tells me that they believe being Catholic is all that is necessary. The rest - reading the Bible, prayer, attending church, serving, etc - don't really matter. This is the common attitude of all my friends I grew up with as well - so she's not an extreme example.
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