Cafeteria Catholics?

[fabshelly]

I remember what my very liberal RCIA teacher told me: "Sometimes you have to look at the Church as it is today and look at what Jesus said and did, and separate out the parts of the first that don't match with the second."

So, yeah, Cafeteria Roman Catholic.

 

[JunieJay]

I understand you were reared in the faith - but - from some of my experiences with RCIA we've had plenty of people over the years who were taught in Catholic school and went every Sunday and the whole nine yards but NOW that they are more mature in life they sometimes get a new understanding of a concept they thought they knew everything about.

Gotcha. I probably would have considered this several years ago when I was so conflicted, but now I'm happy being a cafeteria Catholic. I finally am at peace with my decision, but it took many years to get there.

When you're a kid, it means doing what you are told until you pass out.

Seriously, we were in church one spring and they were doing the up, kneel, up, sit, kneel, say the rosary, walk around with incense thing. It was HOT out and hotter in, and they wouldn't even open the windows...until Jaime passed out.

When fourth graders start dropping, they open the windows.

LOL, tell me about it! I had 8 siblings, pretty much everyone of us passed out in Mass at least once. Your parents just picked you back up off the floor and told you to sit still and listen to Father.

 

[Jenn Lynn]

I did not know that. I didn't even know that there were branches of Lutherans. (sorry if I'm using bad terminology)

The communion thing is a big difference between MO Synod and WI Synod. I know there are other branches out there as well. DH and I had to take a class to become members of our current church and there are quite a range of beliefs in the Lutheran religion. MO Synod (in general) falls about in the middle of them all.


Lutherans is fine.

 

[Jenn Lynn]

Anybody could go up and take communion since nobody asks you are you Catholic, but the Church prefers if you don't take communion.

From what I understand you would be allowed to take communion at a Catholic Church because you do believe it is the body and blood of Christ. Sodaseller am I right about this?

I was told by my Grandmother that I could not, but she is old school Catholic. Maybe it has changed over the years, but she has not.

 

[Marie17]

I remember what my very liberal RCIA teacher told me: "Sometimes you have to look at the Church as it is today and look at what Jesus said and did, and separate out the parts of the first that don't match with the second."

So, yeah, Cafeteria Roman Catholic.

That's one problem there - very liberal RCIA teacher....

The Church and it's teachings are not political. The church is not conservative or liberal - it is not liberal or conservative. It is the Catholic Church. Everyone can have a thought if it is one way or the other but the church does not have a politcal bent. Some people may try to alter some things based on their own political leanings but the Church doesn't say we need to be this way or that. It is all very Traditional - not political.

 

[Cool-Beans]

That's one problem there - very liberal RCIA teacher....

The Church and it's teachings are not political. The church is not conservative or liberal - it is not liberal or conservative. It is the Catholic Church. Everyone can have a thought if it is one way or the other but the church does not have a politcal bent. Some people may try to alter some things based on their own political leanings but the Church doesn't say we need to be this way or that. It is all very Traditional - not political.

I think she meant "liberal" as in not hard-lined or literal...more "open" type. I don't think she was talking "Liberal" like "vs. Conservative."

 

[Disney Doll]

You know, as I read through the responses, many of the folks who have had "a problem" with "the Catholic Church" have actually had a problem with a specific person or group of people in the Church. Generally a priest or a nun, and in one case the Confirmation teacher.

Goes back to my previous statement of being grateful for the ability to separate the God part from the human part. Humans make the rules of the Church...one would hope the rule makers' hearts are in the right place, and they are making the rules for the right reasons. But of course, we know as humans that this is not always possible. Humans get caught up in very human emotions, such as greed, power, desire and so forth. So, you end up with some bad rules and some bad people. But still a good God.

The first line of the Apostles Creed says it all for me "We believe in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of Heaven and Earth, of all that is seen and unseen..."

That's it in a nutshell, without all the trappings, without all the "human frailties" added in, without any of the BS. That's what I believe.

 

[nuke]

You know, as I read through the responses, many of the folks who have had "a problem" with "the Catholic Church" have actually had a problem with a specific person or group of people in the Church. Generally a priest or a nun, and in one case the Confirmation teacher.

Goes back to my previous statement of being grateful for the ability to separate the God part from the human part. Humans make the rules of the Church...one would hope the rule makers' hearts are in the right place, and they are making the rules for the right reasons. But of course, we know as humans that this is not always possible. Humans get caught up in very human emotions, such as greed, power, desire and so forth. So, you end up with some bad rules and some bad people. But still a good God.

The first line of the Apostles Creed says it all for me "We believe in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of Heaven and Earth, of all that is seen and unseen..."

That's it in a nutshell, without all the trappings, without all the "human frailties" added in, without any of the BS. That's what I believe.

Excellent post!

 

[nuke]

That's one problem there - very liberal RCIA teacher....

The Church and it's teachings are not political. The church is not conservative or liberal - it is not liberal or conservative. It is the Catholic Church. Everyone can have a thought if it is one way or the other but the church does not have a politcal bent. Some people may try to alter some things based on their own political leanings but the Church doesn't say we need to be this way or that. It is all very Traditional - not political.

Liberal doesn't always mean democrat.

 

[smartestnumber5]

That's one problem there - very liberal RCIA teacher....

The Church and it's teachings are not political. The church is not conservative or liberal - it is not liberal or conservative. It is the Catholic Church. Everyone can have a thought if it is one way or the other but the church does not have a politcal bent. Some people may try to alter some things based on their own political leanings but the Church doesn't say we need to be this way or that. It is all very Traditional - not political.

Actually it seems pretty clear that the Catholic Church is political in that it gets involved in politics. The Catholic Church of Michigan was the largest donor of funds to the organization which passed an anti-gay marriage, partnership, health insurance amendment in Michigan last year.

 

[Marie17]

Actually it seems pretty clear that the Catholic Church is political in that it gets involved in politics. The Catholic Church of Michigan was the largest donor of funds to the organization which passed an anti-gay marriage, partnership, health insurance amendment in Michigan last year.

Don't really know anything about this because I am not from there but I would imagine the diocese maybe funded an organization that promotes man/woman marriage and not gay marriage. All the other stuff that stems from that is lagniappe and could easily be "interpretted" being against it such as a health insurance amendment. I could easily see why the church may donate to an organization who promotes man/woman marriage.

The church does support in some ways pregnancy crisis centers throughout the country. Just because they support it does not mean they are the only means necessary to run that organization. The crisis centers provides a different alternative to women other than Planned Parenthood.

I may look it up on the internet but since you never really know what sort of spin is out there it would be really hard to get to the real truth.

 

[Marie17]

Liberal doesn't always mean democrat.

Didn't say that liberal was democrat.

There are plenty of people that are considered liberal Republicans and some that are considered conservative Democrat.

What I did say was that the problem could lie there - a liberal RCIA teacher. Whenever you teach RCIA - as a teacher - you SHOULD always give the teachings of the Church and not YOUR interpretation of what it means. This is a problem throughout the Catholic Church as people always want to inject how they view the teaching instead of just explaining what the teaching is. The Catholic Church has published books such as the Cathecism and companions so that the teaching is given as it is. It should not be amended by any teacher - liberal RCIA or a conservative RCIA.

 

[mickeyfan2]

LOL, tell me about it! I had 8 siblings, pretty much everyone of us passed out in Mass at least once. Your parents just picked you back up off the floor and told you to sit still and listen to Father.

Darn, I never passed out or knew anybody who did. Must complain to the Bishop.

 

[Disney Doll]

Darn, I never passed out or knew anybody who did. Must complain to the Bishop.

I have seen old folks pass out in church, more because of health issues than what was being said or the length of the Mass!!!

Being a nurse, I have to run and help when someone drops. We had one guy faint, myself and a couple of others went to help him, laid him out on the pew, he came around, looked up at me and said "You're wearing white and I hear church music. Did I die? Are you an angel?" I told him I had been called a lot of things in my day, but never an angel!!!!

 

[Fitswimmer]

Actually it seems pretty clear that the Catholic Church is political in that it gets involved in politics.

Many churches get involved in politics. In the last several elections, Democratic candidates have spoken at churches. I know John Kerry did a speech at a church in NYC when he was running, as did Al Gore, Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton has spoken at churches during her Senate run.

 

[smartestnumber5]

Don't really know anything about this because I am not from there but I would imagine the diocese maybe funded an organization that promotes man/woman marriage and not gay marriage. All the other stuff that stems from that is lagniappe and could easily be "interpretted" being against it such as a health insurance amendment. I could easily see why the church may donate to an organization who promotes man/woman marriage.

The church does support in some ways pregnancy crisis centers throughout the country. Just because they support it does not mean they are the only means necessary to run that organization. The crisis centers provides a different alternative to women other than Planned Parenthood.

I may look it up on the internet but since you never really know what sort of spin is out there it would be really hard to get to the real truth.

Your story is far from what actually happened:

There was a ballot proposal in Michigans's 2004 election which defined marriage as between “one man and one woman,” and prohibited the state from recognizing any other arrangement “as a marriage or similar union for any purpose.”

You can find info here

The story is that the Citizens for the Protection of Marriage is a group that seemed to have been born in order to do nothing but get this ballot proposal passed (and apparently it died after the proposal passed); they raised $1,000,000 in order to fund the passage of the proposal. The Catholic Church of Michigan is known to have provided half of that amount as the article (and many others online) states. (So clearly, without the Church's help it is unclear that the proposal would have passed with the organization having only half the budget it actually had.) It was not providing this money to an organization which was vaguely in favor of trying to promote marriage as good or help married people or anything like that. Not even to a crisis pregnancy center. The organization's sole reason for existence was to pass this ballot proposal. So clearly the Church (of Michigan at least) knew exactly what it was doing--funding the passage of a law. This is clearly the Church doing politics.

At the time of the campaign folks who were against the proposal had large objections to the second half of it--the language of "for any other purpose." They claimed that these four words would be used by conservatives to take away domestic partner health insurance benefits once the proposal passed. The Citizens for the Protection of Marriage denied this over and over again. What do you know, after the bill passed conservatives began suing the state saying that obviously proposal 2 meant that domestic partner health insurance benefits were now illegal. How quickly their interpretation of the four words changed! There were a number of court cases, and as far as I know they still have not been completely settled.

 

[ElizaB39]

Actually it seems pretty clear that the Catholic Church is political in that it gets involved in politics. The Catholic Church of Michigan was the largest donor of funds to the organization which passed an anti-gay marriage, partnership, health insurance amendment in Michigan last year.

In my old church we were also preached to vote what the Catholic church teaches, pro-life. That means vote republican baby. Yes, the church IS political in many ways that we see and very likely in many ways we DON'T see.

 

[goofygirl]

I have seen old folks pass out in church, more because of health issues than what was being said or the length of the Mass!!!

Being a nurse, I have to run and help when someone drops. We had one guy faint, myself and a couple of others went to help him, laid him out on the pew, he came around, looked up at me and said "You're wearing white and I hear church music. Did I die? Are you an angel?" I told him I had been called a lot of things in my day, but never an angel!!!!

LOL! He could have also thought you were God, hehe!

(Glad my church has central a/c!)

 

[momof2inPA]

In my old church we were also preached to vote what the Catholic church teaches, pro-life. That means vote republican baby. Yes, the church IS political in many ways that we see and very likely in many ways we DON'T see.

We have been, not so subtly encouraged to vote pro-life by the Pittsburgh Catholic newspaper, especially under Bishop Weurl. I wish the government would crack down on this politicising. A church should be a church, not a political tool. At least my priest called out the people who put pro-life political flyers on cars during mass. He did it right in church, and the people who did it got up and left. The drama.

 

[Fitswimmer]

In my old church we were also preached to vote what the Catholic church teaches, pro-life. That means vote republican baby.

Not so fast. The Republican party supports the death penalty which is against the pro-life position of the Church. I was taught that the pro-life position covers abortion, euthanasia, and the death penalty, so it's really tough to vote! I can't vote Democratic because they support abortion and euthanasia and I can't vote Republican because they support the death penalty. Not to mention the issue of whether or not the Iraq war qualifies as a "just war" according to Catholic teaching. I've read arguments on both sides of that issue. I believe Pope John Paul II said it was not, and I'm not sure if Pope Benedict has addressed it at all.