Catholicism: Criticism & Debate Thread

[Samseau]

The logical consequence of recognizing Vatican II popes as legit is the total loss of faith in the Church. This is the reason why traditionally inclined people who have been in communion with Vatican II popes all these years are now looking at "Eastern Orthodoxy" as a viable option (!). Sad!

Thanks for this link. It's always difficult to get Catholics to commit to a position. It's filled with errors which I am happy to discuss at length:

Catholics recognize the fact that Saint Peter was made the indubitable head of the apostles by Christ. There are a good number of references to this preeminence of Saint Peter in the Gospels and in the Acts of the Apostles, which we will not take the time to enumerate here. Saint Peter, upon leaving Jerusalem as the Church began to grow and spread, first set up his seat of authority in Antioch. Recognizing, however, that Rome was the center of the Empire at that time, he wisely moved his seat of authority to Rome. His successors in the bishopric of Rome have always been recognized as the vicars of Christ—as having the authority of Peter. Many quotations could be given of the Eastern writers of the early centuries acknowledging this fact.

Notice the contradiction right here - Peter was first Bishop of Antioch, which was the first Church in recorded history. Book of Acts 11 states Antioch was where "they first called themselves Christians." They gave up the title of being a Jew, and called themselves Christians. Because there is nothing more Jewish than to follow the Christ, the King of Jews and of all mankind. It's therefore redundant to call oneself a Jewish Christian.

Thus, all of the Bishops created by Peter in Antioch during this time, before he moved to Rome, have exactly the same Apostolic authority as does any of the Bishops created by Peter in Rome.

The idea that simply because Rome was more politically significant, made it more spiritually significant, is false. Peter never appointed any of his Bishops over the others. The reason Peter never appointed any of his Bishops over other Bishops was because Christ himself did not appoint any of his disciples over any other of his disciples.

Christ did not pick 1 disciple. Christ picked 12.

Thus when the Roman Church decided they could unilaterally make decisions on their own, they contradicted both Jesus and Peter, setting them on a path to ruin, which persists to this day. The Roman Church is run like a dictatorship, when Christ said to his disciples,

"The least among you will be called greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven." Christ wanted an Aristocracy for his Church, not a dictatorship.

Therefore Peter himself did not take his position of authority as absolute, and this was clearly seen during the controversy over circumcision. Peter was at first considering requiring circumcision in order to be baptized, as Christ was circumcised, but was forced to reconsider from the least of the disciples, Paul, who said that faith alone was necessary for conversion and circumcision was unnecessary. Peter prayed and thought hard about this, and had a vision in a dream telling him to relax, and declared afterwards that circumcision was not required.

All of this is in the Book of Acts. This set the precedent for councils, the first which was the council of Nicaea. The Great Schism occurred when a Pope declared himself dictator and tried to change The Creed unilaterally, with the addition of the Filioque, without calling for any council. It wasn't that the Filioque was heretical in itself, it was that it was done without a council and agreement from the other Churches, which was the tradition laid down by both Christ and Peter for handling disputes within the Church.

This is why, after the Pope declared himself King of Christianity, everything started to go wrong for them, and one heresy after the other started to come out of the Papacy: requiring celibacy for Priests, ordering crusades against other Christians who didn't submit to the Pope, the rebellion of the Germans (reformation) and then English (Anglican Church), and pretty much every negative impression of Christianity people have today comes from the Roman Church's Papal abuse. There were so many horrible Popes in the past, including a Pope who sold the Papacy, and then returned by killing the guy he sold the Papacy to, there were several Popes with harems of whores and fathered many illegitimate children with who then grew up to become powerful rulers. Completely insane Popes drunk on power.

That today, the Papacy has degenerated into child abuse (very small compared to the Roman Church as a whole, but still) sex scandals, and now LGBT acceptance, comes as no surprise to Orthodox. The Roman Church has been reckless for centuries and we all suffer for it.

Although there were later attempts (at the Council of Lyons in 1274 and the Council of Florence in 1439) to heal the schism, these were not lasting. That schism has persisted to this day.

Finally, in 1453, Constantinople fell to the Ottoman Turks, and its position as a principal city of Christendom was gone forever.

This part of your site, which completely ignores history is also why many Roman Catholics are totally ignorant of the evils of the Pope.

For example, in 1202 AD the Fourth Crusade resulted in a near-total genocide of the largest Christian city in the world at the time, Constantinople, which is why the entire East fell to Islam. Conveniently left out of this Catholic propaganda piece as to why the Great Schism has never healed.

---

Anyhow, PurpleUrkle,

One of the funniest conversations I've had was with a Orthodox Priest who was born a Catholic. I asked him how he started his conversion, and he said, "Oh, that's easy. I opened a history book!"

The Catholic Church simply keeps its people in the dark about its history, and did so for centuries. Not possible anymore in the age of the internet, so the fiction the Catholic Church has created cannot be sustained.

"Ye shall know them by their fruits," and huge numbers of Catholics see the fruits of modern day Catholicism, and look back into the past to understand what went wrong.

I pray for the Roman Church to come to its senses and return to the lawful Church created by Peter at Antioch with the rest of Christ's disciples. May it be so.

 

[Cornelius V.E.]

Personally, I'm not so interested in the history of all this, though I find it educational and I enjoy reading about it. My personal issue is with the pedophilia of the modern (and I assume historical) Catholic Church and that the current Pope seems effeminate and gay. And I mean literally gay. I can find no other excuse for his inexcusable semi-defense of homo-marriage. A real Christian would come out and say, "Faggotry is a sin and all that engage in sodomy are going to hell. There is no room in the Roman Catholic Church for sodomites and we will never encourage their 'unions' much less their blasphemous 'marriages'. Homosexuals are not welcome in this church unless they're here to repent. This is non-negotiable." End of story.

The other explanation comes from control and subversion. The modern Roman Catholic Church basically supports, or is gradually on its way to supporting, everything that Western globalist oligarchs support (covidism, depop, climate change agenda, lgbt, feminism, etc). This is not a coincidence. The oligarchs, through proxies like intelligence agencies, have subverted the Vatican to use it for their own purposes. This is also why the notion of an infallible office at the head of the Church is patently absurd. The CIA, for example, wanted to use the Vatican (with its over 1 billion followers) as a tool to help the US fight the Cold War. It's no surprise, then, that in the 1960s onwards the Vatican started to adopt positions that were previously condemned in the RCC as the heresy of Americanism (ecumenism, preference for democracy over monarchy, separation of church and state, etc).

If anyone doesn't believe this, just ask yourself 2 questions:

1. If I was a trillionaire in control of entire countries, would I be interested in using the influence of a large powerful organization like the RCC (with over a billion followers) for my own purposes?
2. If I was a trillionaire in control of entire countries, could I find a way to infiltrate the Roman Catholic hierarchy if I wanted to?

If you answered yes to both of these questions, then it's pretty obvious what the reality is.

Orthodoxy has similar problems, but thankfully it's much more decentralized, and so infiltrating the Orthodox Church would require infiltrating thousands of dioceses around the world instead of just focusing on one diocese that controls them all (Rome). Moreover, the Orthodox Church keeps the ancient tradition of appointing bishops locally (instead of the pope single handedly choosing every bishop in the world since the 1100s in the RCC), through local councils, and drawing these bishops from the ranks of the monks (men who've already been living harsh/ascetic lives in some monastery where there's a lot of accountability for many years before being appointed a bishop). Furthermore, parts of the Orthodox Church keep other parts accountable, and there's no infallible head who can't be challenged. So, if the Soviets infiltrated the Russian Orthodox hierarchy (which they did), then they can't just start changing things, because everyone will see that there are still entire Orthodox countries outside of their control who didn't change, and there are respected/beloved leaders like the holy elders on Mount Athos, who show and teach what authentic Orthodoxy is.

Any RC priest could be pope or bishop one day. If a man is pre-selected by some oligarch institution to infiltrate the RCC, then he doesn't necessarily have to sacrifice much to become a RC priest if he's homosexual. He works only one day a week if he wants, lives comfortably off of his salary and flock, and usually lives alone so can continue pursuing a homosexual lifestyle in secret if he wishes. If he was forced to be in a monastery for 10+ years he probably wouldn't be able to handle it, everyone in the monastery would see that he's not trying to change his life, and so finding people who are willing and able to infiltrate the hierarchy will then be much more difficult.

 

[Thomas More]

I am seeing a lot of argument about Catholics never allowing divorce at all, vs other denominations wrongly allowing it. This is disingenuous. The Catholics just use annulment as a workaround for divorce. It amounts to the same thing.

It is definitely possible for a married couple to become unmarried with the good graces of the Catholic church.

 

[Samseau]

They also have great relations with the Eastern "Orthodox". Hmmm...

As I said at the end of my post, I desire reconciliation, just as most Orthodox and Catholics do. We are still very much brothers in Christ, differences aside. Anyone who denies this does evil.

There are many Catholics, however, who have no desire to bear the cross of their Church, and would rather just join an Orthodox Church so they can focus on saving themselves. There's nothing wrong with that either.

Notice, I never tell anyone to leave their Church and come to the Orthodox Church because "We're the best!" I actually tell people, if you love your Church then stay in your Church and make it better. I fully believe in the superiority and truthfulness of the Orthodox position, but, that doesn't mean one needs to abandon their Neighbors.

At the same time, if there are Catholics or Prots who feel completely alienated by the changes within their Church, to their spiritual detriment, then it is far better for them to come to a solid Church that never changes instead of becoming separated from God.

God's plan is beyond any of our comprehensions and He will shepherd His flock on a individual basis; what is right for someone may be wrong for another. There are some who will be called to tend to their Church faithfully, and there will be others who are called to another Church. There is no sense in trying to fight the will of God.

The only thing I can predict, as a mere human, is what problems will arise due to heresy or structural problems within a Church. Since history shows that the Orthodox model is the most rock solid, and suffers the least from internal problems - not that it is without any problems of course - it is rather simple to predict that the centuries long decline of the Catholic Church will continue until they correct their errors. Likewise for Prots.

It's not that other denominations are somehow less worthy of salvation, or aren't created by God. Any organization based on the Holy name of our Lord Jesus Christ is placed under divine jurisdiction and will be carried along by His most tender mercies, despite our sins and shortcomings.

This is what Lord Jesus says in scripture, and that is why there have been billions of Prots and Catholics. No Orthodox in their right mind would deny the awesome power of God in the face of such facts. We just know that, eventually, Satan will find a way to tear down Churches that aren't structurally or doctrinally sound.

The Orthodox are the big brothers of Christianity, and we aren't going to abandon our family simply because of some fights here and there, or because our younger brothers stumble and sin. You pick your brother up and march onwards in the great struggle of man, labels be damned.

 

[Northumber]

If you want an authentic, non-ethnic Orthodox experience, try an Antiochian Orthodox Church.

I can confirm this. The Orthodox church I've been attending is Antiochian and it's almost entirely made up of recent converts (Church of England, mainline protestants, young guys with little church background, and trad Catholics). On top of that they are also using the Western Rite so the liturgy is essentially the Latin Mass in english. Calendar is Orthodox.

 

[GodfatherPartTwo]

Is this meant to answer my question? There's some good there, but the devil is in the details.

Let's walk through it logically. The Catholic Church validated your marriage. Years later, you get an annulment, the Catholic Church pronounces that no valid marriage ever occurred. Were you ever in the state of being married or were you not? If you were not, then the Catholic Church was wrong to validate your marriage in the first place. If you were, then the Catholic Church is wrong to pronounce you as never married.

The annulment is an inherently contradictory and inconsistent doctrine.

 

[scorpion]

magoo has received a temporary ban for his extremely insulting and antagonistic posting, this coming after he already received a warning earlier today.

 

[Samseau]

Okay, I know the guy has been banned temporarily, but here's a general question for all to consider: if any denomination led to Hell, why would Satan bother trying to subvert it? If Protestants are Satanic Jews, why push LGBTQI+ nonsense if they're subtly leading people to Hell anyway? Why subvert Catholic priests into diddling altar boys if Catholicism itself leads to Hell? Just let it run and collect the souls, right? Fly under the radar.

I'd have to say that the attacks on various churches is proof enough that there is more than one denomination in Heaven. We can argue about which is best, but in the face of such evil right now, are we really called to engage in brother wars?

This is a good question for hardline Catholics and Orthodox who hold their denomination to be the "only true path to Heaven."

It's not a good question for theological moderates like myself, which I've learned from my Bishop, that anyone who calls upon the Holy name of Jesus Christ can be saved, like the thief on the cross. We simply state that Orthodoxy is the least error prone and will have the highest success rate to reaching heaven. We have reliability, which counts for a ton in the game of eternal salvation, but it is still possible for those who even believe in heresies to be saved.

After all, heresies are not unforgivable. Only Blasphemy is unforgivable. So it is entirely within Biblical theology for God to forgive a heretic who has been a good Christian their entire life, provided they've forgiven those who have sinned against them, and practice their faith with good works (i.e. not be a hypocrite). But this becomes less and less likely the more heretical a belief becomes, and, the fact that Churches infected with heresy degrade more and more over time is no surprise to Orthodox. At some point the heresy, which grows like cancer, completely overtakes its host Church and makes salvation all but unobtainable, such as the Churches which deny the consubstantial trinity or are flying the Pride flag outside of it's doors.

 

[analyst_green]

My understanding is not so strong but basically when Jesus set up the church he set it up with a Pope and so the Catholic church has roots stretching back to Christ that the ORTHO church does NOT.

The issues with current Pope can be avoided by joining SSPX which does not follow current Pope but still the Catholic traditions.

Then there is the issue of men with absolutely no connection to Orthodox countries following the church there. Why is a man in Birmingham going to a Greek Orthodox church? I am not an expert but it makes sense I believe if you have some links through ethnicity or geographical location but not really otherwise.

But I am still learning.

I don't understand how some of you guys can put ethnicity and nationality over God. It's baffling to me that you put your physical life over the eternal fate of your soul.

By this logic, no one would ever convert and follow Christ. Indian Hindus should just follow along with their demonic religion, and Saudi Muslims should just stick with their delusional belief system. And yet the apostles were given the gift of tongues and traveled to foreign lands to convert the pagan masses.

 

[analyst_green]

It´s not the same. You are putting christianity against other form of religions. When what is being said is there´s already many western christian denominations to chose from. You make it seem as theres no other christian options. Which is not true. There might be differences. But there are christian options available. If orthodox is the most pure. I don´t know. Maybe. Catholics are not the equivalent to Hindus or muslims. SSPX is hardcore christian. Opus also. Protestants I don´t know. Maybe they should be treated like Hindus or more appropriately jews.

Christianity is not only a religion. It´s a life system. Which is superior to all others. And it´s empirical obvious when you set foot outside of Europe.

The inspiration for this Ortho movement. Roosh. Was armenian descendant. I think. But I could be wrong it started from here.

My point wasn't to compare Christian denominations with other religions. It is simply to say that any religion should be judged solely on the merits of its objective claims to truth. It's good and healthy to be proud of your origins. But ethnicity and nationality are trivial compared to the glory of the spiritual realm.

In any case, before the great schism practically all European Christians were Orthodox. Some of our great saints come from Ireland, France, or Scandinavia. So Westerners do have roots in Orthodoxy, they've just forgotten them.

Mark 9:41 was also mentioned earlier in this thread. And so I do believe anyone who confesses Jesus Christ to be the Son of God, coeternal and cosubstantial with the Father and the Holy Spirit, is on our side. No one can believe that Jesus is the Son of God without the guidance of the Holy Spirit, and this goes for Protestants and Catholics too. They just don't have the fullness of the truth that is found in the Orthodox Church.

 

[PurpleUrkel]

I think it will be easier for you as a Catholic to do the transition to Orthodoxy as you are already quite similar in many things... Have you ever attended a service at an Orthodox church?

No, not yet. There aren't any in my current vicinity but where I'm moving in a couple of months there are several. I'll attend a service then and see how it goes.

 

[Rodion]

This was an interesting read, though as Samseau noted, there are errors and inconsistencies. I’ll tackle this from a different angle.

The 6th paragraph states (emphasis is mine):



You can perhaps guess where I’m going with this, but for those who don’t know, I’ll respectfully continue.

That section alone tells me the author has an incomplete picture of what “Eastern Orthodoxy” and “Oriental Orthodoxy” are, and why the “Eastern Catholic churches” is somehow an exception. I kept reading, thinking perhaps I’m mistaken and the author will provide the factual evidence later. Alas, there were no mentions of the two councils of Ephesus (second one only recognized by the Oriental Orthodox Communion) and no mention of the Council of Chalcedon. Instead, the “Eastern Orthodox” category of the author which somehow also includes “Oriental Orthodox”, separated – according to the author of the embedded letter – from the Roman Catholic Church in 1054. By that point, the Oriental Orthodox communion had been separated for over 600 years, following the Council of Chalcedon.

But then the author creates an exception for the “Eastern Catholic churches” because of the full communion with Rome. One of the churches within that eastern communion, is the Chalcedonian Armenian Catholic Church. Interesting to note, however, is that this church uses the Armenian Rite of the Divine Liturgy. The same one used by its originator, the Oriental Orthodox Armenian Apostolic Church. Why is that important? Because whereas the Oriental Orthodox churches (such as the Armenian churches) chant the Trisagion with a reference to Christ, others may think of it as a reference to the Trinity. I won’t go into it in details, you may look into the Trisagion dispute, but suffice it to say that Rome does not accept its reference to Christ - that makes it odd that they are in full communion with the Armenian Catholic Church, which chants it during Divine Liturgy.

My point is that without even going in-depth, just scratching the surface merely on definitions, and there are already inconsistencies.

Please, let this not be interpreted in any way as bashing any denomination. I love and honor my brothers and sisters in Christ who love and worship our Lord – be they Roman Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, or Protestants. I am merely pointing out a fairly significant error, using a historical lens.

Eastern Catholics venerate St Gregory Palamas, and recite the creed without the Filioque. They don’t care about doctrinal unity, only that you submit to the pope

 

[scary_robot_music]

This part of your site, which completely ignores history is also why many Roman Catholics are totally ignorant of the evils of the Pope.

For example, in 1202 AD the Fourth Crusade resulted in a near-total genocide of the largest Christian city in the world at the time, Constantinople, which is why the entire East fell to Islam. Conveniently left out of this Catholic propaganda piece as to why the Great Schism has never healed.

Thank you for your summary. It explained the Orthodox position on the pope vs. no pope controversy about as well as I've ever seen for a layman like me who's neither Catholic or Orthodox or inclined toward becoming either.

That said, speaking of leaving things out, whenever the Fourth Crusade is mentioned the Orthodox massacre of the Roman Catholic population of Constantinople in 1182 should be mentioned too for proper context. It's almost entirely forgotten today but was certainly on the minds of the Catholic crusaders in 1204:

"The Massacre of the Latins (Italian: Massacro dei Latini; Greek: Σφαγὴ τῶν Λατίνων) was a large-scale massacre of the Roman Catholic...inhabitants of Constantinople, the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire, by the Eastern Orthodox population of the city in April 1182."

"Although precise numbers are unavailable, the bulk of the Latin community, estimated at 60,000 at the time by Eustathius of Thessalonica, was wiped out or forced to flee...some 4,000 survivors were sold as slaves to the (Turkish) Sultanate of Rum."

Massacre of the Latins - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[PurpleUrkel]

Nor can I believe that the Roman Catholic sect is the same church as the Orthodox Church. This is flat out heresy.

Personally, I'm not so interested in the history of all this, though I find it educational and I enjoy reading about it. My personal issue is with the pedophilia of the modern (and I assume historical) Catholic Church and that the current Pope seems effeminate and gay. And I mean literally gay. I can find no other excuse for his inexcusable semi-defense of homo-marriage. A real Christian would come out and say, "Faggotry is a sin and all that engage in sodomy are going to hell. There is no room in the Roman Catholic Church for sodomites and we will never encourage their 'unions' much less their blasphemous 'marriages'. Homosexuals are not welcome in this church unless they're here to repent. This is non-negotiable." End of story.

 

[GoodShepherd]

As I said at the end of my post, I desire reconciliation, just as most Orthodox and Catholics do. We are still very much brothers in Christ, differences aside. Anyone who denies this does evil.

There are many Catholics, however, who have no desire to bear the cross of their Church, and would rather just join an Orthodox Church so they can focus on saving themselves. There's nothing wrong with that either.

Notice, I never tell anyone to leave their Church and come to the Orthodox Church because "We're the best!" I actually tell people, if you love your Church then stay in your Church and make it better. I fully believe in the superiority and truthfulness of the Orthodox position, but, that doesn't mean one needs to abandon their Neighbors.

At the same time, if there are Catholics or Prots who feel completely alienated by the changes within their Church, to their spiritual detriment, then it is far better for them to come to a solid Church that never changes instead of becoming separated from God.

God's plan is beyond any of our comprehensions and He will shepherd His flock on a individual basis; what is right for someone may be wrong for another. There are some who will be called to tend to their Church faithfully, and there will be others who are called to another Church. There is no sense in trying to fight the will of God.

The only thing I can predict, as a mere human, is what problems will arise due to heresy or structural problems within a Church. Since history shows that the Orthodox model is the most rock solid, and suffers the least from internal problems - not that it is without any problems of course - it is rather simple to predict that the centuries long decline of the Catholic Church will continue until they correct their errors. Likewise for Prots.

It's not that other denominations are somehow less worthy of salvation, or aren't created by God. Any organization based on the Holy name of our Lord Jesus Christ is placed under divine jurisdiction and will be carried along by His most tender mercies, despite our sins and shortcomings.

This is what Lord Jesus says in scripture, and that is why there have been billions of Prots and Catholics. No Orthodox in their right mind would deny the awesome power of God in the face of such facts. We just know that, eventually, Satan will find a way to tear down Churches that aren't structurally or doctrinally sound.

The Orthodox are the big brothers of Christianity, and we aren't going to abandon our family simply because of some fights here and there, or because our younger brothers stumble and sin. You pick your brother up and march onwards in the great struggle of man, labels be damned.

One of the many reasons I left the protestant church was because I realized that there is only 1 church and I wasnt in it, doesnt mean God doesnt have some kind of plan for those denominations or that they not saved etc, non of that, but theres only 1 church not many churches and the Orthodox church doesnt recognise any other church as part of the church, some might think this is cruel or proud but I see it as a factual statement and I had to make a decision

 

[Cornelius V.E.]

I think we should start a new thread for a debate about divorce and conflicting views on the matter if people want to debate that. It seems like a bit of a red herring to focus on that in this topic.

I'm open to creating a new thread as I'm sure the Orthodox teaching will shine the light of truth in any debate, but this topic is not a red herring to the topic at hand. Roman Catholics presuming to have a superior teaching on divorce and remarriage is what keeps many Roman Catholics in papalism. They see how the protestants have divided endlessly and have liberalized, and so that seems like a dead end. Then they look to the Orthodox and see almost everything they want, but they've convinced themselves that the Orthodox have "caved in" and "liberalized" on questions of divorce and remarriage and contraception, and so they believe that the Orthodox Church is in error and not worthy of converting to.

I've seen it happen many times that once a Roman Catholic realizes that he or she had grave misconceptions about Orthodox teaching on these two topics, they immediately decide to embrace Orthodoxy. I would even be so bold as to say that the vast majority of "trads" I know would seek to become Orthodox tomorrow if they realized that what they were taught about history/tradition regarding 1) divorce and remarriage and 2) contraception, and about how the Orthodox Church treats these matters, is false. They rightly perceive that things are not right with Rome, but they feel boxed in and trapped with nowhere else to go because they've been convinced that the Orthodox have "caved in" and "liberalized" on divorce and remarriage and contraception, so the Orthodox Church is not an option for them.

It might sound really strange to non-Roman Catholics, but trad RCs have largely fetishized these two topics (divorce/remarriage and contraception), and the perceived superiority of the RC position on these topics for them is what keeps them RCs and keeps them distrusting of Orthodoxy.

 

[Lawrence87]

I can see this is yet another fruitless Orthodox circle jerk thread.

Recognizing your own bias and lack of good-faith research would prevent divisive threads like this.

I rarely see Catholics start threads like this here, or on other platforms.

Strawmanning Catholic positions isn't charitable. This whole thread reeks of pride. The truth speaks for itself.

I would be the first to admit that Orthodoxy has its issues.

Certain jurisdictions being influenced by the CIA causing persecutions in the Ukraine, membership of the World Council of Churches, liberalising elements in the church, jurisdictional chaos in the West and so forth.

I'm not going to stick my head in the sand about any of this. Even ignoring the beef that is between the Catholic and Orthodox churches that has arisen since the schism, and just zeroing in on the current Papacy, you cannot deny that there are problems for the Catholic church. If you don't want to hear any of that then go to an exclusive Catholic forum, or stick to the sub that is here.

It seems to me like theres an awful lot of cope going around in Catholic circles when it comes to the lunacy that Francis is spouting.

 

[Perseus66]

Im in classes again…

Pew research is funded by Protestants(Jews). Templeton.

We would have to see official data

Found this site from googling.

Religious Demographics of Divorce in the United States | Sacks and Sacks Law - Jacksonville

Discover the religious demographics of divorce in the United States with this compelling analysis. Gain insight into how different religious communities navigate divorce.

sacksandsackslaw.com

You hear about some Jewish/Protestant lunacy in US. Give it 2-4 years it arrives Europe. Now it’s reparations for blacks. FFS. This is Jewish. They’ve been stealing Germans for the last few decades with that bullshit. Wanna bet blacks will fuennel the money to Jews?

Protestants = Jews?

paternos, I thought you wanted to take a break from CiK.​

 

[Samseau]

You are correct in theory that the truth has no geography. The issue with Orthodoxy in the US is the ethnic component. It’s extremely off putting to enter a church and be the only non Greek or non Romanian or whatever nationality exists in that church. Services are in a different language sometimes.

Certain Greek Orthodox churches especially, and I don’t mean to be facetious seem like a total joke. Guys are rolling into church wearing gold chains and driving a white Benz, the girlfriend or wife is dressed in tons of makeup. A friend of mine got married to a Greek woman and told me the priest was watching soccer games during their discussions about marriage.

Yes which is why I always recommend Antiochian Orthodox if you can find one. It's the "original" Orthodox Church, and they don't idolize language like many other Orthodox Churches tend to do because it was always converts from the beginning, they spoke Hebrew and Aramaic, then converted Greeks and Romans and built all the Churches we know today.

"They first called themselves Christians in Antioch..." Book of Acts 11.

 

[Iacobus]

I don't understand how some of you guys can put ethnicity and nationality over God. It's baffling to me that you put your physical life over the eternal fate of your soul.

By this logic, no one would ever convert and follow Christ. Indian Hindus should just follow along with their demonic religion, and Saudi Muslims should just stick with their delusional belief system. And yet the apostles were given the gift of tongues and traveled to foreign lands to convert the pagan masses.

Yes I've been trying to make this point and it keeps flying over folks' heads. It's ludicrous and bespeaks a relativistic worldview.