Becoming Catholic?

No, question everything. Especially prevailing mindsets and attitudes. In my own surroundings a prevailing mindset in the last decade is the arelgious (quite often antireligious) atheist one. I'm not saying we should reject a dominant cultural mindset just because. I'm saying question everything. Consider everything you like. Use your brain (and heart). Don't let anyone bully you in a certain direction, as the majority of a society often tends to do.
They did it when the far majority was christian and they are doing it when the majority is areligious. Hey, I think it is great that so many people can get away from their traditional relgious roots these days when those clearly do not suit them and live the spiritual life they want to openly. But I often see a certain judgemental closemindedness that we used to associate with the christian society of our ancestors that is now apparent in a new crowd who feels overly right.

Or... join the church of satan Or maybe try some yoga and meditation.

 

Aerianne, on 16 Oct 2015 - 12:02 AM, said:

"Or... join the church of satan Or maybe try some yoga and meditation."



Or...get into Ceremonial Magick. Or Peyote Shamanism

 

Or maybe join the italian mafia.

 

I grew up catholic, a lot of my family still is catholic. The ritual stuff was boring for me as a kid, interesting to me as an early teenager when I looked for something behind it all. Now I view it as nothing more than reminders, or maybe practices meant specially for the priests (whether they actually obtain some other worldly merit, "grace", or rather some placebo effect, probably can't be determined one way or another - I just had to add that in).

If you are interested in ritual, why not find a religion or philosophy in which the rituals serve a purpose of helping people, or making oneself and the world better, or more at peace. Why not start your own religion or philosophy and make your own rituals that support your own current philosophy or beliefs?

Why are you interested in a religion that is run by people who say all things were created by a god, but then these same people try to say that others (who were also created by their god) should be looked down upon, discriminated against, and or persecuted?

 

What I remember from going a couple of times in my youth, is that you have to have good knees.

 

Christian Mysticism is different than Catholicism, and Mysticism is based on an inward experience. You can have a Mystical Experience on a Psychedelic drug, and I maintain that despite that there is a Scientific data explanation for this, it in no way actually is saying that your experience isn't real.

Every day you are looking at the world through a certain lens that doesn't represent the full picture, which you could explain with brain data, just as a Mystical experience can do. You can or can't argue whether your everyday experience of life is real or not on a philosophical basis until the end of time, but at some point you have to accept that your experience, even if not a complete view, is REAL.

 

And why are you bashing every religion in the world only to go "with that all being said, I'm going to gently introduce to you my own religion, which is surely more perfect than every other, especially since it's based on logic and reason"? Sorry but Logic and Reason don't come close to making up the whole of the All.

And if you checked out the Gospel of Thomas, which was left out of the Bible intentionally, it shows Jesus talking about the exact same things as that of the Buddha. It's because every religion at its core leads to the same place.

 

LMAO!!

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j-552ZT3LNs

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pvhYqeGp_Do

 

I was raised a Catholic, but left to become a Methodist. I have a good friend who went in exactly the opposite direction. The Church is the center of his life, and he loves it deeply. I'm really glad to have broken out. I think you should think long and hard before you take the plunge. Let me give you some of the pros and cons, but realize that my views are personal and biased :

Pros: (1) Rational and open to science. You're right that relative to Southern Baptists the Church is receptive to science, especially evolution. Many prominent scientists have been Catholic, including Fr. Lemaitre, the Catholic priest who authored the Big Bang theory and evolutionary biologist, Kenneth Miller, who defended Darwin the the Dover, Pa., textbook trial. Catholics, especially Jesuits, place a high value on reason as well as faith, and are non-literalists when it comes to the Bible. Of course, there are limits. They allow and encourage you to use reason as long as you come up with the right answers. If you said that God wasn't somehow involved in the process, you'd be a heretic bound for hellfire and damnation unless you repented or unless your error was the result of "invincible ignorance" (you said you had a Southern Baptist upbringing, so that might qualify). (2) Ritual and history. One of the big draws of Catholicism to many is its antiquity and ritual (some might say "Smoke and Mirrors"). The pomp and circumstance, chanting, liturgy, and majestic churches give people the impression of transcendence into another world more spiritual than this--which is the whole idea. (3) Certainty: the comfort of "right answers". Unlike the Southern Baptists, Catholicism offers not just the Bible but a living church with unbroken apostolic succession (if you believe the myth), whose councils are inspired by the Holy Spirit and whose Pope is infallible. For people at sea in a world of relativism, the church provides a beacon and an anchor; (4) Liberal about alcohol, bingo, and dancing.

Cons: (1) Sexual hangups: Impure thoughts are sinful. Masturbation is sinful. All sex outside of marriage is sinful. ( Being homosexual is not sinful, as long as you don't act on it, but if you actually have sex, or have dirty homosexual thoughts, you're in big trouble! ) Of course, birth control, abortion and gay marriage are mega-sinful, and the church has made a fetish about the "culture of life". (2) Guilt. Next to Jewish mothers, nuns are notorious for inculcating guilt. Right now, my Inner Nun is clobbering me over the head with her ruler, yelling at me that if I dissuade you from converting to God's Only True Church I'll be responsible for leading you astray and I'll burn in the hottest regions of hell (to which I give her the usual raised finger of defiance.) Since you haven't had the experience of nuns with rulers, you might actually escape that problem; (3) Dogmatism. Holy Mother Church always knows best and never changes her mind on important matters, even though to her fallible children and critics it might seem that way.--for what do they know? For example, the Church teaches transubstantiation--that at communion, the wafer and wine are literally turned into the body and blood of Jesus. They look and taste like bread and wine but they're really Jesus. Believing Catholics find that the powerful centerpiece of their worship. I find it hard to believe. In fact, I find it hard to believe how anyone can believe it. The standard answer is " "It's a mystery." There are a lot of those. The Trinity, of course, but also distinctively Catholic ones like the Virgin Mary's birth without original sin and assumption into heaven before death. If you can accept those, you might find them comforting.

As an alternative, have you considered other ritualistic religions, like the Episcopal Church--especially the Anglican "high church" form which provides "gilt without guilt", as the saying goes? They're nothing if not flexible. Re communion, you can believe in transubstantiation, consubstantiation, or just commemoration--whatever turns you on. Gay is okay, no hangups about masturbation, no standard position on abortion, etc. They bend over backwards to tolerate other faiths and practice multiculturalism. I was at an Episcopal study group where they actually used "Allah" in praying to God. Queen Elizabeth I thought it was more important to have a common liturgy and prayerbook than to actually think alike. Some people find it too flexible, and prefer the "our way or the highway" approach of Catholicism. After all, it's God's will that's at stake, and finding a religion isn't like picking food items at a cafeteria. In closing, I'd like to say some good words about Pope Francis, who is bringing to the church a truly Christian emphasis on helping the poor and society's rejects, and practicing universal love and tolerance for all, including atheists. His namesake, St. Francis, is said to have heard Christ's voice saying :"Go Francis and repair my home which, as you see, is falling into ruin." Pope Francis seems to have had a similar call, or acts like it. Maybe the Holy Spirit is moving through the Church after all. May God guide you to the right choice.