* Not all Christians are Catholic.

* Not all Catholics are Christian.

* "His nature does not change, nor does the truth He has revealed..."

How would you know that? Being omniscient, omnipotent and eternal, He/She/It is certainly capable of changing His, Her, It's mind and activities.

Perhaps the Diety sometimes decrees for itself the equivalent of New Year's resolutions, or concludes that It might not have acted as perfectly as was possible.

He/She/It might even change It's mind.
Yahweh did (though the Cathers thought he was only "The Ignorant Demiurge").

Hope,

I really enjoyed your piece. For me, the greatest sign of hope is that so many Christians - Catholics, Protestants, Evangelicals, Orthodox, Pentacostals - are doing some serious soulsearching and are willing, more and more, to entertain the thought that others are as well. Giving each other the benefit of doubt about sincerity and devotion is a real act of charity and is certainly inspired by the Holy Spirit who ceaselessly acts on the heart of every Christian to draw us into Christ so that we all "might be one," (Jn 17:21).

God bless, Hope. Let's keep soulsearching together.

Holy Cow has made it his mission to spew anti-Catholic hatred. He is supposedly doing God's work and spreading the word about his television Christianity. For more read Professor Arroyo's blog Obedience and Pfleger: Tough love of the Church.

"He burneth part thereof in the fire; with part thereof he eateth flesh; he roasteth roast, and is satisfied: yea, he warmeth himself, and saith, Aha, I am warm, I have seen the fire: And the residue thereof he maketh a god, even his graven image: he falleth down unto it, and worshippeth it, and prayeth unto it, and saith, Deliver me; for thou art my god." (Isaiah 44:16-17)

Part of the wood he uses to cook his food. The remaining wood, he carves it into a god and worships it. "DELIVER ME ; FOR THOU ART MY GOD. "

"WOODEN ROSARY, show us your power by connecting to God. "

CAN'T YOU PEOPLE SEE THE SIMILARITIES? The other portion of that wood which the rosary came from could have been burned to cook food.

PURE STUPIDITY !

Mary, The Queen Of Heaven

Many Roman Catholics , if not all, believe that Mary is the "Queen of Heaven". The idea may have originated from the fact that since Jesus came from her womb, therefore she is the "Mother of God" and henceforth the "Queen of Heaven". Even Davao City Archbishop Fernando Capalla declared in a local tv broadcast that "Mary is the Queen of Heaven". With him pronouncing it, no doubt, this is a Roman Catholic doctrine.

Many Roman Catholic beliefs are false because many of them are based on wrong presumptions. Here are the reasons why Mary is not the Mother of God.

First, God is eternal. He has no source and has no ending. God created Mary and it should remain that way. The devil wants to turn it around and voila ! God now has a mother. The Eternal God is now under the "dictates" of a "mother".

The Almighty God will judge us purely by our own merits and not by how the "mother" will intercede for us. The real question is " what is our relationship with God and God alone?" Forget about Mary. Like us she will have her own appointment with God.

In II Corinthians 5:10, Apostle Paul said, "For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ..." .

The phrase "we must all" pertains to him (Paul), us and certainly Mary also. As what the Parable of the Ten Virgins suggests, she too can't share her oil. It means that she cannot intercede.

Second, the Spirit of Jesus Christ existed even before Mary was born. In John 8:57-58, it says " Then said the Jews unto Him, thou art not yet fifty years old, and hast thou seen Abraham? Jesus said unto them, verily, verily, I say unto you, before Abraham was, I am. "

In Colossians 1:17 Paul said " And He is before all things, and by Him all things consist."

Not only He was before Abraham, He was also before the existence of the universe and the creator of it as well.

To give us a glimpse of His power, Apostle John described his encounter with Jesus in Heaven in Revelation 1:16-17 " ... His countenance was as the sun shineth in His strength. And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead."

Mary is really only one of the children of God and to distort this order by making her the Mother of God is just pure blasphemy.

This "Queen of Heaven" Doctrine is really not new. In the time of the prophet Jeremiah, the people of Israel worshipped her. In Jeremiah 7:18, God said " The children gather wood, and the fathers kindle the fire, and the women knead their dough, to make cakes to the queen of heaven, and to pour out drink offerings unto other gods, that they may provoke me to anger."

In verse 20, He continues "... behold, mine anger and my fury shall be poured out upon this place..."

Thirdly, Jesus never called Mary as mother. He called her "woman". (John 2:4 , John 19:26)
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Surely, there must be a reason why He didn't call her mother and that is simply because she is not His mother. In one instance, when somebody told Jesus that His mother was looking for Him, He insultingly replied, " Who is my mother? " (Matthew 12:48)

I wonder how many times the Lord will have to ask this question for people to wake up from their trance. It's a pity that everytime a person prays the rosary, He's not only doing a vain act of repetitious prayer but in so doing, he also invites the anger and fury of God. If they'll finally meet God face to face, I doubt if they will hear that question again if they will mention her name in His presence or would it be the painful parting words "depart from me, ye cursed into everlasting fire". I hope not, and I hope they will listen.

“God is bigger than the spaces we’ve carved for Him to inhabit. His nature does not change, nor does the truth He has revealed…” WOW, thanks for writing that, it is so true. God is immutable, He is and always was. We change the way we feel and think about God. But God does not change. Luckily for us, He loves us and He reveals himself to us. He has given us gifts that we are often not even aware exist.

No one has mentioned the root of what it means to be Catholic: the Blessed Sacrament and the Blessed Mother, Mary the Mother of God. When Catholics leave the Church, they universally never understood the unique gifts Christ gave us at the Last Supper. He promised us He would never leave us, and so He gave us His body and blood in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. We Catholics believe in the True Presence: that Jesus Christ is physically present in the form of a consecrated wafer, a piece of bread that has undergone Transubstantiation – the Eucharist. This is why non-Catholic Christians seek out the Church. The Church is not Cathedrals, incense and bells. The Catholic Church is the body and blood of Christ alive in the world in a very real, supernatural way. Without the Blessed Sacrament the Church is just good words and good works. That could be anyone’s Church. Anyone can have that “personal relationship” with Christ. The Catholic Church is a gift from Christ Himself. He built the Catholic Church on its people and Peter was the first to be given this gift. As Christ said to Peter: “Thou art Peter and upon this rock, I shall build My Church.”

Catholic clergy are not just people that are inspired with the love of God. They are the living sacrifices of Jesus. They give up the opportunity to have a wife and family and trade that for the love of God and Service to God. They die to the world during ordination and are reborn to a new family that is the Church. They are the successors of St. Peter, the first Pope. They have the sacred duty to be part of the daily miracle of the sacrifice of the Mass. Every day they turn bread and wine into the body and blood of Jesus. This is a gift that only Catholics can enjoy, as we understand that is not a symbol, but a real fact. This is the gift of Jesus’ everlasting love for us. We consume Jesus’ body and blood in a state of grace, free from sin through another gift from God: penance.

Priests can forgive sin. This is a wondrous gift from God that is poorly understood by non-Catholics. Jesus said “those you hold bound are bound, those you forgive are forgiven.” Jesus gave mortals the ability to forgive sin. How is this possible? The gift of the Priesthood provides a way for the Priest to be in “Persona Christi” or the person of Christ. Man cannot forgive sins without the gift from God. God works through his Priesthood. It is not the Priest who forgives sin, it is God. The Priest is a holy instrument. This is why the line of succession from Peter and the apostles to every Catholic Priest is so important. Ultimately, Catholics do not need anything else but the Priesthood. The Buildings, the amazing governance and the rest are reflections of our love for God. They are not the Church. The Priest and his people are the core, the heart of the Church.

The Blessed Mother is the other unique gift of God that is manifest in the Catholic Church. God gave us a woman conceived without sin. She agreed to bear the human essence of God. Mary is the very vessel of God’s love. She is the hope of all mortals. Mary, like any good mother, constantly intercedes with God on our behalf. Catholics do not pray to Mary for a miracle or grace. Catholics pray to our Mother for her to implore God on our behalf, for she is powerless without God’s love. Yet she is the hope of all creation and God loves her, His creation, as a son loves his mother. How is this possible that the Creator of everything so loves a creature of His creation? It is a mystery and a gift from God. She is our Mother and will always be there for us.

Mary conceived without sin, pray for us.

PS

It goes without saying when the Spirit of Jesus and His truth go missing, then the pomp and ceremony will have served no purpose at all. Cultural Catholics with no faith to go with it, merely go through the motions in a mechanical way and hence do not find any beauty or spiritual meaning in the rituals.

Dear Ms Hodge

It is nice to read an essay by a non-Catholic that is open to what is good and beautiful in Catholicism. Christian or Catholic? is a question that sounds strange to the ears of a Catholic like me who grew up in a culture (Syro-Malabar Catholic, Kerala, India) where the question, if asked, might have been Christian (Catholics and Orthodox) or Protestant?

The God of the Catholics does not dwell in huge cathedrals alone(the Church of England with various names in different countries put their God in grand cathedrals and some worship with pomp and ceremony too!) but some Catholics couldn't help offering up their best talents in architecture, sculpture, art and music etc to God as an expression of their love for God from whom all their talents came.

The beautiful rituals are not an end in themselves. They point to a higher reality. Just as God created a world with an abundance of beauty with no materalistic benefit in mind (e.g. think of the colossal waste of magnificent sunrises and sunsets, each one unique everyday even if there is no one to watch it, every snowflake is unique and who even knows that much less care!), so do Catholics offer their devotion in a way that reflects God's abundance of beauty. Some of us love old traditions, the sense of continuity with a two thousand year old Christian Church (don't forget many popes for the first three hundred years were martyred, so it was not all pomp and ceremony) and the grandeur of God as reflected in the pomp and ceremony with which we worship Him.

Soja John Thaikattil
Sydney, Australia

Hope,
I liked your essay. It was fair minded, thoughtful and brings out the conflict many have on their religious choices. Keep exploring and be open to where God takes you. Its interesting that in the same essay, you note that your mother lost God because of the mundaneness of religous rituals in the church, while at the same time, your friends have found God through the very same liturgy and sacrements. And you describe their view of it as fervency. Funny how what works for some people doesn't work for others.actaul

People can experience Catholicism at many levels. Some call themelves Catholics but are really cultural rather than spiritual in that they don't really practice their faith. Others practice fully, going to weekly mass, partaking in all the sacrements, having an active prayer life and doing good works as befits their character. Some take it to another level altogether, going to daily mass, practicing the various Catholic devotions, reading about the saints,actively participating in teaching or the liturgy, being active in church based functions like the Altar Rose Society, the St. Vincent DePaul Society or the Knights of Columbus. Some make it their lives, becoming priests, deacons, or nuns. The church is indeed rich in its spiritual opportunities for those that wish to partake.

Hope, that was nicely phrased:
"When it says in the Psalms, 'better is one day in your courts than a thousand elsewhere,' I’m pretty sure the writer does not have country chapels or stone cathedrals in mind."

Still, I do enjoy country chapels and stone cathedrals. Even more, I enjoy the tangible presence of God when God chooses to manifest that presence to me at any site. I hope that God enjoys me as much as I enjoy God.