The many different religions.

[hoops5]

I simply have never heard a Catholic talk about Grace. I am not an expert on Catholicism but I know and are related to many traditional and contemporary Catholics.

 

When I have theological or eschatological questions I usually hear about confession, rite, saying the correct prayers, and participating in the other sacraments.

 

I never hear them mention the Holy Spirit. But maybe they do, I've only been to about 3 masses in my entire life.

St Patrick used the Shamrock to explain the Holy Trinity to the people of Ireland. 3 leaves. One God in Three Divine Persons. The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. All connected to one stem.

 

All people baptized in the Catholic Church are baptized with these words: "In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit", just as Jesus instructed His Apostles to baptize new Disciples.

 

At every Mass, Catholics profess their faith in a the Apostles' Creed.

"I believe in God, the Father Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth; and in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord: Who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary; suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died and was buried. He descended into hell; the third day He rose again from the dead; He ascended into heaven, is seated at the right hand of God the Father Almighty; from thence He shall come to judge the living and the dead. I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Holy Catholic Church, the communion of Saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and life everlasting. Amen."

[PP1]

Ok. @rockmon @hoops5 I've learned something new today.

[ThrillVille Cardinal51]

I simply have never heard a Catholic talk about Grace. I am not an expert on Catholicism but I know and are related to many traditional and contemporary Catholics.

 

When I have theological or eschatological questions I usually hear about confession, rite, saying the correct prayers, and participating in the other sacraments.

 

I never hear them mention the Holy Spirit. But maybe they do, I've only been to about 3 masses in my entire life.

 

I can only speak to what I've seen in my life, but I've had the same experience. I was raised Catholic, went to Catholic school, and my first three years teaching were at a Catholic school. My experience was that faith wasn't really an open thing(I'm generalizing. Obviously there are lots of Catholics who are very open and love sharing faith and the gospel). Literally every guy that I hung out with growing up have a "my relationship with God is none of your business" attitude. The conversations that I've had with them about God usually involve lines like "well I personally believe..." with no real biblical basis at all. All of them still consider themselves to be Catholic too, which in retrospect seems odd. I don't have any profound knowledge or anything, but I think that's a dangerous way to go about your walk with God.

 

Again, just my own experience.

[Science Friction]

The parts I emboldened in your post is one reason I feel that most religions are man constructed, particularly the Abrahamic religions, used mostly for political power over the centuries. It's not so much that God created man in his own image, rather man created God in his image. That's my thinking, anyway, by just reading how most of the books are written.

 

All start out as a cults and when enough people can be convinced that the writers of these books, or the people they're writing about, have a direct line to a creator, then that makes that person very powerful, almost god-like themselves. The ancient pharaohs got a lot of mileage from those beliefs, enough to have huge Pyramids built that took many years and thousands of lives to complete. It's no different in in recent centuries. In 1823 Joseph Smith convinced his followers that he had a direct conversation with an angel sent by God and from those conversations and translations the Mormon religion began.

All cults don't make it to the "accepted" religion stage because they never get enough numbers and most fade away.

 

In addition, all the holy books that I know of, since they are written by the male gender, are written for men. That's one of the reasons women are not equal to men in many religions.

 

If I create the game and make the rules to be tilted in my favor I'm usually going to win.

 

Excellent post, Prof. Spot on .