One way to address the widespread confusion about the nature of marriage would be to properly catechize children and teenagers about the faith, the cardinal continued, beginning in Catholic schools.
But in my most humble opinion the problem is much deeper than just light catechesis. It is a problem of faith or the loss of Catholic Faith to be exact.
What has contributed to this for the last 50 years? Change, change, change. The Church prior to Vatican II with all its warts was at least a rock and one knew exactly what the Church taught and there was little or no room for dissent.
After Vatican II even more warts came to be but now the Church wasn't a rock or any kind but a marshmallow! No one knew or knows what to believe any more and this has led to the ambivalence with have today and the fact that Catholics are more influenced by the secular culture and its ideologies than the Rock of Salvation, Jesus Christ and His Church!
Before we start with catechesis as important as it is, may I suggest a hierarchy of things that need to be addressed?
1. The Reform of the Mass to make it more like the EF Mass and more standard worldwide. Kneeling for Holy Communion and receiving on the tongue. This will emphasize the superiority of God to the individual and that God is to be adored!
2. Emphasize the four last things, death, judgment, heaven and hell! That should be the number one thing taught and everything falls thereafter!
3. Make sure that all Catholic schools elementary through graduate school use proper catechetical materials, proper worship and teach reverence for God almighty and fear of displeasing God.
4. Continue what Pope Francis is emphasizing, popular devotions and the very real power of the very real Satan!
12 comments:
Excellent suggestions.
Emphasize the Four Central Mysteries of the Faith: Incarnation, Trinity, Redemption, Eucharist. These are the Number One Truths of the faith and everything falls thereafter.
You are correct. What once was built on rock is turning into a bounce house.
5. Get back to the good old way of instilling more guilt...keep children terrified...much of what they see and read and think is a mortal sin. They will probably burn in hell. Jesus is like the cracker cop in the Ludowici, Ga. speed trap. He's hiding behind a signboard waiting for you to do 35mph in a 30mph zone. Then he'll lock you up.
Hey! It worked/works for me!
People need to feel guilty for the sins they commit. It is called having a healthy super-ego. People like you, Anonymous, being pretty much total id, have lost any sense of shame and guilt and spend their sociopathic lives playing the game and conning people in order to
achieve their ends, whatever they may be. For them, morality is a game to be played and social structures are merely means to a selfish end. Freud was an atheist, but he certainly understood the concept of original sin…"the tendency of human beings is to desire to live like psychopaths." Read up on it while looking in the mirror.
So...Fr. and Gene...you both think of Jesus as the cracker cop in Ludowici? Maybe you haven't heard about "the good news"...
Jesus is not the enemy who's trying to entrap us.
Anonymous, no one sees Jesus as a "traffic cop." You have a pretty strange Christology, and you sound like a typical 70's sophomore philosophy student with a major authority problem. Why don't you tell us your definition of the "Good News." I'd like to hear it.
Someone who uses racial slurs against the President, then excuses that behavior by saying that all his intelligent buddies do the same, doesn't have a lot of room to accuse others of having " lost any sense of shame and guilt..."
Using racist slurs is as selfish as it gets.
Fr., Whether "It worked/works for me" is a matter of opinion.
To clarify...Whether "it worked/works" for you is a matter of opinion.
I feel no guilt or shame over using stereotypical terms or social humor. People today get more upset about politically incorrect language than they do about murder. We are a completely de-railed society.
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