Became a Catholic

[pcgame]

Been a Christian my entire life, never belonged to any specific denomination. Earlier this year, I started attending a Catholic Church and was baptized and confirmed into the church. I also experienced being a weekday lector during mass a few times. And yes it was my first time ever having been baptized.

The reason I chose a Catholic Church is because it is one of 2 churches accessible to me.

One thing I have always agreed with the Catholic Church on even before having joined the Church is the validity of the Apocrypha, also known as the Deuterocanonical books. Infact, I take this concept one step further and accept all of the books the Eastern Orthodox Church accepts.

[jllundqu]

In B4 your derided as a heretic

[RonZeplin]

Congratulations on joining the largest chain religion. Catholic churches are like McDonald's, you can find them anywhere.

[Superfluous Man]

Infact, I take this concept one step further and accept all of the books the Eastern Orthodox Church accepts.

Are you aware that the Council of Trent anathematizes you for this?

[pcosmar]

Whatever Church community works for you,, They all have error,,the result of men over the years..
Basic truths are presented along with,,,,stuff.

I was raised Catholic,, and though I disagree with much,, the Gospel is there.. And Christian Believers are there,,
as well as a lot of people who are just religious.

Continue to grow. He teaches us what we need when we need it.. and unlike churches,, His lessons are highly individualized.

[american.swan]

There are many wonderful Christian people in the Catholic Church and every denomination for that matter.

For me personally, I cannot join an institution that sets itself above the Bible. The Pope being God on Earth is complete nonsense to me. I belong to a church that believes God works with individuals and not institutions.

God bless you.

[dean.engelhardt]

Do you have small children or planning on having them?

[fisharmor]

I cannot join an institution that sets itself above the Bible. The Pope being God on Earth is complete nonsense to me. I belong to a church that believes God works with individuals and not institutions.

I was going to write a long and snarky post where I changed every reference to the Church in the NT to the word "Bible" to show that the people who wrote the Bible thought otherwise, but I'll opt instead to earnestly entreat you to look into the position of the overwhelming majority of Christians throughout history - that Scripture is not the sole rule and norm of the Christian faith.

It cannot be. Not without condemning 15 centuries of Christians. The Son of a loving God cannot have stated "the gates of Hell shall not prevail against my Church" and then immediately consigned unknown billions to judgment.

There are three mutually exclusive logical positions on the topic of Sola Scriptura. Either it's wrong, or God is fickle or evil, or Christianity itself is false.

[shakey1]

I imagine there are worse things... most of the 10 commandments are pretty much common sense.

don't kill
don't steal
respect your folks
don't cheat on your spouse
don't give false testimony
don't bang your neighbor's wife or envy him otherwise
don't worship false idols (i.e. the goobermint, etc)

I remember when I was just a kid, keeping the sabbath day holy equated to sunday being a day of rest... when we would take a drive around town on sunday, many, if not most shops were closed... made it a pretty quiet day all & all. Bit by bit, it would change to what we see today.

[Anti Globalist]

I was born and raised Catholic but then I became agnostic 5 years ago.

[JohnGalt1225]

Been a Christian my entire life, never belonged to any specific denomination. Earlier this year, I started attending a Catholic Church and was baptized and confirmed into the church. I also experienced being a weekday lector during mass a few times. And yes it was my first time ever having been baptized.

The reason I chose a Catholic Church is because it is one of 2 churches accessible to me.

One thing I have always agreed with the Catholic Church on even before having joined the Church is the validity of the Apocrypha, also known as the Deuterocanonical books. Infact, I take this concept one step further and accept all of the books the Eastern Orthodox Church accepts.

Ave Maria! Ave Christus Rex! Viva Christo Rey!

[r3volution 3.0]

Potential heresy aside, I'm happy so long as you're not rolling around on the floor.

Catholicism, Orthodoxy, and even certain very high church Protestant faiths (Anglicanism, high Lutheranism, etc) are acceptable.

Congratulations; go to Rome if you haven't been.

[Muwahid]

I was going to write a long and snarky post where I changed every reference to the Church in the NT to the word "Bible" to show that the people who wrote the Bible thought otherwise, but I'll opt instead to earnestly entreat you to look into the position of the overwhelming majority of Christians throughout history - that Scripture is not the sole rule and norm of the Christian faith.

It cannot be. Not without condemning 15 centuries of Christians. The Son of a loving God cannot have stated "the gates of Hell shall not prevail against my Church" and then immediately consigned unknown billions to judgment.

There are three mutually exclusive logical positions on the topic of Sola Scriptura. Either it's wrong, or God is fickle or evil, or Christianity itself is false.

Is there any actual basis for the position of a pope in the gospels?

[Stratovarious]

Catholicism is great in my book, but isn't the current pope a socialist
lgbt sanctioning globalist?

[TER]

Is there any actual basis for the position of a pope in the gospels?

It doesn’t have to be in order to be true. The Gospels tell of the life and teachings of Jesus Christ during His earthly ministry. It is not the complete story either of His earthly life, His divine acts, or the story of the Church which He is the Head of.

Christ sent down the Holy Spirit in to the world (part of His saving mission, and the consequence of His Ascension into the Kingdom at the right hand of the Father). It is the Holy Spirit of God Who has guided the God-bearing Saints of the Church to establish the structure of the Church. Most of the ecclesiological structure of the Church was formed after Christ’s resurrection. The earliest beginnings can be found in the Book of Acts (for example, the trinitarian hierarchal structure of episkopos - Bishop, presbyter - priest, and diakono - deacon), and described also in the first century writings of the Saints (Pope Clement and St. Ignatius in particular.). By the end of the first century and most definitely into the middle of the second, the basic formulation and ecclesiological structure was firmly established and has remained essentially the same.

The Pope of Rome was simply the Bishop of Rome. He was the Shepard of the baptized Christians in the imperial capital, just as Jerusalem, Antioch, Alexandria, and a whole host of other regions were under the spiritual direction of an ordained Bishop of the relative geographic area/city as became necessary for administrative reasons and to protect the faithful from heresy and those who sought to divide the Church. Because of the importance of the city of Rome in the first centuries, the Bishop there did have special privileges as a ‘first among equals’, which was an administrative and spiritual role in settling disputes within the whole Church, similar to a chairman of the board. This is different then the path that the Roman Church has since taken, assuming to be the sole leader of the Church (ie Head of the Church, which belongs to Christ alone), and with supreme authority over the bishops of the other regions throughout the world. This is the main reason why the Schism occurred in the 11th century and resulted in Rome falling away from the Church.

[Schifference]

Don't let your son's become altar boys or be left alone with the ordained pedophiles.