Did Pope Francis help the church by going woke?

[Paradoxical#1]

Nope. That's not evidence. Evidence would be physical manuscripts or documented history recorded by historians or the first Christians literally worshipping Jesus as God. Shit like that.

For example... are there any historical written accounts which refute that Jesus performed miracles?

The ones written decades and even centuries later you mean? By unknown people who were not eyewitnesses? THOSE manuscripts?

 

[Meriweather]

While some modern theologians or Catholics may interpret hell more symbolically, the official teaching remains that hell is a real, eternal consequence for unrepented mortal sin. The Church also emphasizes God’s mercy and the hope of salvation through repentance.

Yes. Hell is real. Yes. Hell is separation from God, a separation where the individual chooses to continue in this sin instead of abandoning it and instead turning to God.

Yes, fire also represents purification. However, the verse you quoted in Mark is Jesus comparing a person entering into a life of not sinning as opposed to choosing to spend one's existence at the city dump. (Gehenna was the name of Jerusalem's city dump. Smoke, fire, worms.) Jesus (John's Gospel) explains that one who chooses sin becomes a slave to sin and is bound by those choices. Consider how, even today, sins seemingly start out as a choice, but that choice quickly becomes a necessity and one becomes enslaved to that sin as it is now a necessity.

In other passages, Jesus uses fire as a symbol of purification, and while one will emerge from this fire purified, it is better to turn away from sin rather than to undergo purification for that sin. (Purgatory).

Final Catholic teaching: The Church does not know who--if anyone--is in hell. That is between God and each individual. Eternal separation from God is an individual choice--free will--where an individual freely chooses hell (eternal separation from God).

 

[Meriweather]

The ones written decades and even centuries later you mean? By unknown people who were not eyewitnesses? THOSE manuscripts?

Are you arguing that people should turn instead and listen to you--an unknown person who lived two thousand years later, who was not an eyewitness to Jesus or even to any of the people who lived in Biblical times and heard the Apostles' stories first hand?

 

[Paradoxical#1]

Yes. Hell is real. Yes. Hell is separation from God, a separation where the individual chooses to continue in this sin instead of abandoning it and instead turning to God.

Yes, fire also represents purification. However, the verse you quoted in Mark is Jesus comparing a person entering into a life of not sinning as opposed to choosing to spend one's existence at the city dump. (Gehenna was the name of Jerusalem's city dump. Smoke, fire, worms.) Jesus (John's Gospel) explains that one who chooses sin becomes a slave to sin and is bound by those choices. Consider how, even today, sins seemingly start out as a choice, but that choice quickly becomes a necessity and one becomes enslaved to that sin as it is now a necessity.

In other passages, Jesus uses fire as a symbol of purification, and while one will emerge from this fire purified, it is better to turn away from sin rather than to undergo purification for that sin. (Purgatory).

Final Catholic teaching: The Church does not know who--if anyone--is in hell. That is between God and each individual. Eternal separation from God is an individual choice--free will--where an individual freely chooses hell (eternal separation from God).

Thank you, father for telling me things I already knew.

 

[Paradoxical#1]

Are you arguing that people should turn instead and listen to you--an unknown person who lived two thousand years later, who was not an eyewitness to Jesus or even to any of the people who lived in Biblical times and heard the Apostles' stories first hand?

What continually amazes me is that the Christian right is identical to the far left, who believes what they hear on CNN or MSNBC without question and when they find out that those anchors were lying or deceiving, they still believe them anyway.

So, even though we know The politicians and anchors lie through their teeth about things that happened yesterday, last month or last year, we are told that people of 2000 years ago would never do that. We are told to believe that people like the apostle Paul and Unknown writers decades after that would never lie or fabricate or imagine in that their recall was 100% accurate.

 

[Meriweather]

Thank you, father for telling me things I already knew.

Grin. Isn't that what you were doing to me with your post, quoting the Bible and the Catechism?

What continually amazes me is that the Christian right is identical to the far left, who believes what they hear on CNN or MSNBC without question and when they find out that those anchors were lying or deceiving, they still believe them anyway.

So, even though we know The politicians and anchors lie through their teeth about things that happened yesterday, last month or last year, we are told that people of 2000 years ago would never do that. We are told to believe that people like the apostle Paul and Unknown writers decades after that would never lie or fabricate or imagine in that their recall was 100% accurate.

Who do you mean by "the Christian right"?

I get that you read the Bible with skepticism and probably greet anything anyone tells you the same way.

Did you ever spend time in creative writing classes, history of words, etymology, etc.? Didn't your fifth and sixth grade teachers spend time and then time again explaining literary devices, starting with theme and defining fables, folklore, mythology, legends, just so stories, allegory, apocalypse, fairy tales, etc. Being a Catholic school student we found most of these literary devices before we finished Genesis. We also had to identify the themes (lessons) in each story.

Could our early ancestors craft stories! I mourn that we seem to have lost that ability--and our ability to understand stories--along the way.

When we studied miracles in religion class, I found them a lot less interesting that parables. Okay, so Jesus walked on water, healed lepers, widows and those possessed by demons. He multiplied loaves and fishes, raised Lazarus from the dead, and sent a paralytic home carrying his bedding. Whoop-de-do. Yawn.

Like everyone else, I'm mostly about me. Parables, Beatitudes, teachings such as lights in a bushel basket and yeast in bread dough is what fired my imagination with how to incorporate all these things in my own life. Prayers such as, "Here I am, Lord, send me", "Here I am, Lord, I come to do your will" (after spending time wondering about God's will and discerning God's will for me). It seemed the only assignment God had for me was to rescue worms stranded on hot sidewalks. (Yes, I'm exaggerating, but not that much.) Where no exaggeration is needed are the results of working the lessons in the Parables, Beatitudes, Commandments, and prayer throughout everyday life.

You pshaw Paul's description/vision of his encounter with Christ. That tells me you have never noted any miracles in your own life, and thus arrived at the conclusion no one else has experienced miracles either. Shrug. If I've stumbled upon a handful of miracles in my own life, I'm not going to dismiss the miracles in the lives of others. Plus, as I said before, those Biblical miracles have nothing to do with me. My own miracles were all about me. (And, of course, so much more interesting. No yawning there! )

How many Bible study classes have you taken part in as an adult? Even though you were raised Catholic, you seem to believe every word, every story of the Bible is to be taken literally--using of course the English language and modern Western perspective. If so, you've missed a lot.

 

[Donald H]

Grin. Isn't that what you were doing to me with your post, quoting the Bible and the Catechism?

Who do you mean by "the Christian right"?

I get that you read the Bible with skepticism and probably greet anything anyone tells you the same way.

Did you ever spend time in creative writing classes, history of words, etymology, etc.? Didn't your fifth and sixth grade teachers spend time and then time again explaining literary devices, starting with theme and defining fables, folklore, mythology, legends, just so stories, allegory, apocalypse, fairy tales, etc. Being a Catholic school student we found most of these literary devices before we finished Genesis. We also had to identify the themes (lessons) in each story.

Could our early ancestors craft stories! I mourn that we seem to have lost that ability--and our ability to understand stories--along the way.

When we studied miracles in religion class, I found them a lot less interesting that parables. Okay, so Jesus walked on water, healed lepers, widows and those possessed by demons. He multiplied loaves and fishes, raised Lazarus from the dead, and sent a paralytic home carrying his bedding. Whoop-de-do. Yawn.

Like everyone else, I'm mostly about me. Parables, Beatitudes, teachings such as lights in a bushel basket and yeast in bread dough is what fired my imagination with how to incorporate all these things in my own life. Prayers such as, "Here I am, Lord, send me", "Here I am, Lord, I come to do your will" (after spending time wondering about God's will and discerning God's will for me). It seemed the only assignment God had for me was to rescue worms stranded on hot sidewalks. (Yes, I'm exaggerating, but not that much.) Where no exaggeration is needed are the results of working the lessons in the Parables, Beatitudes, Commandments, and prayer throughout everyday life.

You pshaw Paul's description/vision of his encounter with Christ. That tells me you have never noted any miracles in your own life, and thus arrived at the conclusion no one else has experienced miracles either. Shrug. If I've stumbled upon a handful of miracles in my own life, I'm not going to dismiss the miracles in the lives of others. Plus, as I said before, those Biblical miracles have nothing to do with me. My own miracles were all about me. (And, of course, so much more interesting. No yawning there! )

How many Bible study classes have you taken part in as an adult? Even though you were raised Catholic, you seem to believe every word, every story of the Bible is to be taken literally--using of course the English language and modern Western perspective. If so, you've missed a lot.

The significant part of the C.C. going woke is it's new interpretation that has to come on discoveries by the JWST on there most likely proof now that space and time has always existed.

That then forces the Vatican to accept that the god isn't responsible for the big bang, because the B.B. is now shown to not be the beginning.

The Vatican can now list the B.B. under the 'allegory' heading and remove it from what they're always held to be literally true.

That's woke or more appropriately, the awakening of the C.C!

space and time had no beginning - Search Videos

www.bing.com

 

[OhPleaseJustQuit]

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It's a miracle, what Jorge Bergoglio has done! He has turned all the left cultists into pope worshipers!


.

 

[Paradoxical#1]

Grin. Isn't that what you were doing to me with your post, quoting the Bible and the Catechism?

Who do you mean by "the Christian right"?

I get that you read the Bible with skepticism and probably greet anything anyone tells you the same way.

Did you ever spend time in creative writing classes, history of words, etymology, etc.? Didn't your fifth and sixth grade teachers spend time and then time again explaining literary devices, starting with theme and defining fables, folklore, mythology, legends, just so stories, allegory, apocalypse, fairy tales, etc. Being a Catholic school student we found most of these literary devices before we finished Genesis. We also had to identify the themes (lessons) in each story.

Could our early ancestors craft stories! I mourn that we seem to have lost that ability--and our ability to understand stories--along the way.

When we studied miracles in religion class, I found them a lot less interesting that parables. Okay, so Jesus walked on water, healed lepers, widows and those possessed by demons. He multiplied loaves and fishes, raised Lazarus from the dead, and sent a paralytic home carrying his bedding. Whoop-de-do. Yawn.

Like everyone else, I'm mostly about me. Parables, Beatitudes, teachings such as lights in a bushel basket and yeast in bread dough is what fired my imagination with how to incorporate all these things in my own life. Prayers such as, "Here I am, Lord, send me", "Here I am, Lord, I come to do your will" (after spending time wondering about God's will and discerning God's will for me). It seemed the only assignment God had for me was to rescue worms stranded on hot sidewalks. (Yes, I'm exaggerating, but not that much.) Where no exaggeration is needed are the results of working the lessons in the Parables, Beatitudes, Commandments, and prayer throughout everyday life.

You pshaw Paul's description/vision of his encounter with Christ. That tells me you have never noted any miracles in your own life, and thus arrived at the conclusion no one else has experienced miracles either. Shrug. If I've stumbled upon a handful of miracles in my own life, I'm not going to dismiss the miracles in the lives of others. Plus, as I said before, those Biblical miracles have nothing to do with me. My own miracles were all about me. (And, of course, so much more interesting. No yawning there! )

How many Bible study classes have you taken part in as an adult? Even though you were raised Catholic, you seem to believe every word, every story of the Bible is to be taken literally--using of course the English language and modern Western perspective. If so, you've missed a lot.

I was essentially raised by some very fine nuns and am the youngest of a very large Catholic family. I learned to sing in Latin as an altar boy and was mandated to take catechism classes. The school was just across from the church where I did the Stations of Criss and knelt before statues saying rote prayers. I hope and trust this backdrop suffices for your veiled attempts to cast doubts on my knowledge of Catholicism.

Many people have claimed miracles and answered prayer and have never been able to prove them. Those same individuals conveniently forget all the times they prayed when what they were praying for did not take place even though Jesus said that all you needed to do was to ask anything in his name and it would be given. They pick that rare instance when they asked something like God making Johnny get good grades in school and lo and behold, he got straight these and see and that was an answered prayer.

But let’s discuss briefly God‘s will. I have had lengthy discussions with learned Christians on this topic that were so long that one thread could be enough for an entire book. My hobby that I gave up was debating Christians. Most likely, I will disengage from my discussions with you as debates on religion always get tied up in theology and what the translation from Hebrew really was instead of what people think it was and of course the person I am debating with knows everything and believes, and because they believe they want me to believe as they do because they have the truth. If it is God‘s will, there is no way that we can change God‘s will. Therefore, prayer is useless.

After months and months of debating that topic, there was only one Christian and he was one of the more honest ones, that admitted I was right. Why it took him so long I do not know.

 

[Meriweather]

I was essentially raised by some very fine nuns and am the youngest of a very large Catholic family. I learned to sing in Latin as an altar boy and was mandated to take catechism classes. The school was just across from the church where I did the Stations of Criss and knelt before statues saying rote prayers. I hope and trust this backdrop suffices for your veiled attempts to cast doubts on my knowledge of Catholicism.

I was not casting doubts, but reproaches. As a Catholic, you know quite well (and I quote your post), "Your contrived bible god is just like the mafia. Do what he says or he'll fry you for all eternity" is far from how Catholicism presents God and hell. Then next you try to use Gospel verses addressing sin and its consequences as God "frying" people.

So tell me, why the twisting of Catholic doctrine and theology?

 

[OhPleaseJustQuit]

I was not casting doubts, but reproaches. As a Catholic, you know quite well (and I quote your post), "Your contrived bible god is just like the mafia. Do what he says or he'll fry you for all eternity" is far from how Catholicism presents God and hell. Then next you try to use Gospel verses addressing sin and its consequences as God "frying" people.

So tell me, why the twisting of Catholic doctrine and theology?

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Has anyone seen the emblem of the RC Church's 2025 Jubilee?

Says all we need to know.

 

[Meriweather]

Many people have claimed miracles and answered prayer and have never been able to prove them. Those same individuals conveniently forget all the times they prayed when what they were praying for did not take place even though Jesus said that all you needed to do was to ask anything in his name and it would be given. They pick that rare instance when they asked something like God making Johnny get good grades in school and lo and behold, he got straight these and see and that was an answered prayer.

You should also know that asking for something in Jesus' name means what is being requested coincides with Jesus' will, his plans, and his objectives. It's not about Jesus being everyone's genie granting them their personal wishes. Understanding the Lord's prayer and how he taught us to pray would you dare ask Him to zap straight A's onto your child's report card? How could it be an answered prayer when it was not a prayer to begin with?

 

[OhPleaseJustQuit]

You should also know that asking for something in Jesus' name means what is being requested coincides with Jesus' will, his plans, and his objectives. It's not about Jesus being everyone's genie granting them their personal wishes. Understanding the Lord's prayer and how he taught us to pray would you dare ask Him to zap straight A's onto your child's report card? How could it be an answered prayer when it was not a prayer to begin with?

.

My priest repeats over and over, "God always answers prayers. Sometimes the answer is NO".


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[mudwhistle]

https://shiftnews.com/article/CMSP2CHGCRRK4S1SC9J32E9GCRSK0SB26SHP6R9M69HKADHS6GV3MCHG68TJTC1M5MS3281G70X34CST68RKMKJ368?category=News

Francis Worked to Make Catholic Church More Inclusive​

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The cardinals who will choose Pope Francis' successor will have to decide whether to follow his path toward a more welcoming, global and collegial church or restore the more doctrinaire approach of his predecessors. Francis made strides in addressing the church's sexual abuse crisis and tackled its murky financial culture. He created thousands of bishops and appointed more than half of the College of Cardinals. He also reached out to Muslim leaders.

• The cardinals are at a crossroads, deciding whether to continue Pope Francis' vision of a more inclusive and global church or revert to the traditional stance of previous popes. This choice will spark significant discussions among them.
• Pope Francis leaves behind a complex legacy, as early hopes for a 'Francis effect' to boost church attendance in the secular West have largely not materialized, even as attendance grows in the global South.
• While Francis made notable progress in addressing the church's sexual abuse crisis and financial issues, the future direction he set is likely to be a contentious topic among the cardinals.
• His openness to discussing major theological issues like divorce, married priests, same-sex couples, and women's roles excited many liberal Catholics but raised concerns that a less reform-minded successor could undo these changes.
• Francis aimed to shift the church's trajectory away from the conservative paths of John Paul II and Benedict XVI, especially in response to the latter's failure to adequately address child sexual abuse within the church.
• Despite his progressive agenda, Francis was not afraid to confront conservative elements within the church, even dismissing high-ranking officials who resisted his vision.
• His global outreach, particularly in engaging with Muslim leaders and addressing issues affecting vulnerable Catholic communities, was significant, but his lasting impact is likely to be seen in the church's internal structure and the bishops he appointed who align with his priorities.

I referred to being more "inclusive" as being woke. Many may disagree, but it's the truth nonetheless.

Was it worth it? Did it help spread the gospel of Christ? According to church attendance, not so much.

Politically, did it help the church? Will governments around the world, which have progressively gotten more woke themselves, now treat the Catholic church better politically? If so, is that a good thing, considering that Christ basically upset every world government on earth as well as every religious institution, causing them to put him to death?

 

[Meriweather]

But let’s discuss briefly God‘s will. I have had lengthy discussions with learned Christians on this topic that were so long that one thread could be enough for an entire book. My hobby that I gave up was debating Christians. Most likely, I will disengage from my discussions with you as debates on religion always get tied up in theology and what the translation from Hebrew really was instead of what people think it was and of course the person I am debating with knows everything and believes, and because they believe they want me to believe as they do because they have the truth. If it is God‘s will, there is no way that we can change God‘s will. Therefore, prayer is useless.

And I tends to disengage from discussion with those who are determined to twist Biblical verses to suit their own purposes rather than relying on the author's original intent to his original audience.

By the way...I do not want anyone to believe as I do. Everyone is their own person, and to buy into another's beliefs without doing his/her own work and learning through their own experiences, is wasting the person they are.

 

[OhPleaseJustQuit]

.

This is Jorge Bergoglio's Catholic church. Can't tell you how disgusted I am.

 

[Meriweather]

After months and months of debating that topic, there was only one Christian and he was one of the more honest ones, that admitted I was right. Why it took him so long I do not know.

He was wrong.

 

[Paradoxical#1]

I was not casting doubts, but reproaches. As a Catholic, you know quite well (and I quote your post), "Your contrived bible god is just like the mafia. Do what he says or he'll fry you for all eternity" is far from how Catholicism presents God and hell. Then next you try to use Gospel verses addressing sin and its consequences as God "frying" people.

So tell me, why the twisting of Catholic doctrine and theology?

None of the nuns or priests ever refuted that notion nor did they use your apologetics that hell is just being excluded from your kind and loving god because you just couldn’t bring yourself to believe the story.

 

[Paradoxical#1]

You should also know that asking for something in Jesus' name means what is being requested coincides with Jesus' will, his plans, and his objectives. It's not about Jesus being everyone's genie granting them their personal wishes. Understanding the Lord's prayer and how he taught us to pray would you dare ask Him to zap straight A's onto your child's report card? How could it be an answered prayer when it was not a prayer to begin with?

I said the Lords prayer tens of thousands of times. The primary ways to indoctrinate humanity is to repeat something over and over and over again until your mind believes it to be true. This is why commercials are run repeatedly. The rosary beads are a perfect example of indoctrination by repetition. If there is any loving God out there that delights in someone saying the Lord‘s prayer over and over That is the most preposterous God anyone could ever imagine.

You are saying that Jesus wants you to pray for something that Jesus wants? How would anyone ever know that? So what is your plan that you keep saying different prayers until you say the one that Jesus wants? This sounds very absurd to me.

 

[Meriweather]

None of the nuns or priests ever refuted that notion nor did they use your apologetics that hell is just being excluded from your kind and loving god because you just couldn’t bring yourself to believe the story.

Of course nuns and priests (not to mention the Catechism of the Catholic Church) refuted the "notion"! I heard them myself; I read it myself. I also did a deep dive into what Jesus said.

What is the purpose of you changing the story/truth into something that suits you better? Not only that, why does it suit you better?