amitymamaThe Attachment Parenting Community

Sontanned · 04-20-2005, 10:58 PM

Jeni,

Those are good questions about a preacher and of course I can only speak of how we do it at my church (and those I've attended in the past). Our pastor is a teacher of the Word. He does read it and interpret it and then shares his views on it, I think the difference is, we aren't suppose to take it at face value. We are to to seek answers ourselves. It is my understanding (although I could be wrong) that Catholics are encouraged to not read the Bible on their own because they may misinterpret.

I have no hostitlity towards the Catholic church, I'm actually quite interested in it. I don't agree with alot of it, but it still fascinates me.

Just wanted to add a thank you for trying to explain this a little bit more to me. Its really hard to have such conversations without hurting the other persons feelings. Thank you for taking the time to explain your faith a bit more to me. I hope that I haven't stepped on your toes.

jeni · 04-21-2005, 08:06 AM

April, you have some outdated information. Catholics used to be discouraged from reading the bible because of misinterpretation. But, times change and Catholics are urged to read the bible for themselves. When we go to our liturgies, we are called to reflect on the message of the readings for that day. What we get out of it may be different from the message of the sermon, but that doesn't make it wrong. I, myself, have been known to e-mail my pastor or deacon following a sermon and readings I have reflected on and come to a different conclusion. But most of the time I get something I had never thought of. In fact, last week we heard two readings about Jesus healing a paralyzed man. Our deacon spoke about spiritual paralysis that can affect every one of us. It was beautiful and interesting, and went straight to my heart. (One of the things I love about my church!)
As far as hostility, I guess I thought that maybe some other posts were a little hostile. If you have a question or wonder why, just ask it. But if you want to tell me that what I am doing is wrong and don't really care about the answer, that's different. It is hard to tell in what tone people ask things on a board like this. Your posts always seem to be genuinely asked out of curiousity - so there are no hard feelings. My feelings were not hurt as much as I was tired of dealing with anti-Catholicism yesterday. (I am a public school teacher and heard a lot about how the new Pope was a Nazi.)
I wonder if poeple confuse the influence of the Pope for Catholic influence. I mean, JPII was an influential guy because of some basic values that most Christians (and non-Christians) share - a desire for violence to end, a desire for all people to have basic, human dignity, a desire for the wealthy to care for the poor and helpless. If we reflected on the Pope's message, rather than the messenger, maybe we could see why he had such great popularity and was so respected.

Sontanned · 04-21-2005, 09:50 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jeni

April, you have some outdated information.

Well, I guess thats what I get for going on old informations.

Glad to know things have changed. I think its extremely important to seek for yourself.

Sorry about your school day, that would make me upset too.

maryalene · 04-21-2005, 10:27 AM

I was thinking about this thread on my ride into work this morning. Specifically, I was thinking about what Charity said about wouldn't the pope be just as suseptible (sp?) to misinterpreting scripture as any one else. And to a certain extent that may be possible. We certainly have had popes in the past that were not holy and used the papal office for their own selfish purposes. However, because of the long tradition of the Church, there is a bit of a standard by which popes can be judged. For example, if the pope suddenly says that there is no Divine Presence in the Eucharist, he would be suspect because the Divine Presence has been taught for the past 2000 years. While rituals, devotions and practices have evolved over the years, I don't believe doctrine has ever changed. One of the things I like about the Catholic Church is that I can go back to the early fathers who were students of the disciples and read their teachings and see how our beliefs have remained constant over the years.