jeudi 2 novembre 2006
More prayers
I've had a busy week lately, part of that whole midterm-papers-panic time in the semester, but here are more of those Catholic prayers and notes that I found in addition to the first set:
Blessing of Religious Articles (Short Formulary)Phew! Pretty different from Protestant Christianity eh? After learning some of this, I couldn't believe how many things there were within the Catholic faith that needed to be done in order to be a "good Catholic", a term I recall seeing in the beginning of the book. I asked my Catholic friend about Ephesians 2:8-10 and she replied that it has always been faith and works for her (and not of the James sort either). She didn't realize that Protestants believed that faith alone was enough which really surprised me. All this to say, I am so very grateful that Jesus' sacrifice was once for all and that I don't need to do anything to add to that other than to accept Him into my life. My poor memory wouldn't be able to handle much more than what Romans 10:9 says: "That if you confess with your mouth, 'Jesus is Lord,' and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved."
- To be used to bless medals, small crucifixes, statues, or pictures that will be displayed elsewhere than in a church or chapel; scapulars, rosaries and other articles used for religious devotions.
Summary of Christian [Catholic] Beliefs
- That the 7 sacraments were instituted by Christ to give us grace; especially, that Baptism is necessary and that the Eucharist is a pledge of our future glory.
- That Sacred Tradition and Sacred Scripture, which together form one sacred deposit of the Word of God, are entrusted to the church.
- Whatever God teaches us by His Church, who in her teaching cannot deceive us or be deceived (infallibility of the Pope).
The 6 Precepts of the Church
1. You shall attend Mass on Sundays and holy days of obligation.
2. You shall confess your sins at least once a year.
3. You shall humbly receive your Creator in holy Communion at least during the Easter season.
4. You shall keep holy the holy days of obligation.
5. You shall observe the prescribed days of fasting and abstinence.
6. You shall provide for the material needs of the church.
Mixed Marriages
- Marriages between a Catholic and a baptized Christian who is not in full communion with the Catholic church are called mixed marriages.
Indulgences
- An indulgence is partial or plenary according as it removes either part or all of the temporal punishment due to sin. It may be applied to the living or the dead: through indulgences the faithful can obtain - for themselves and also for the souls in purgatory - the remission of temporal punishment resulting from sin.
Brief Examination at Night
- Ask your guardian angel for light to acknowledge your defects and virtues.
- Make an act of contrition, sorrowfully asking our Lord's pardon.
- Pray 3 Hail Marys to the Virgin Mary, asking for purity of heart and body.
Offer your day to God through the intercession of our Lady.
The Mass: The Sacrifice of the Church
Trinity on Earth: Joseph, Mary, Jesus
Priest: Representative of Christ
Baptism: Remission of original sin.
Libellés : theology-ish
samedi 28 octobre 2006
Catholic prayers
I had the opportunity a few months ago to go through a Handbook of Prayers that belonged to my devoutly Catholic friend and came across some interesting beliefs that I had not heard of before in my casual study of Catholicism. I want to pursue a deeper study of their doctrine because ecumenism has been gaining popularity in the last few decades and I have to admit that I'm hesitant about this movement and concerned that accepting conflicting doctrines without examination will have disastrous effects. I know of some Christians who are attracted to Catholicism and who have incorporated elements of it into their faith. I guess this and my interest in Quebec have led me to wonder more about what Catholics believe; I know that I have a long way to go before I have some semblance of their faith. That being said, here's a bit of what I found in that book:
Devotions to the Holy SpiritUhh.. this "bit" is larger than I thought. I'll have to write another post soon :)
- Holy and divine spirit! Through the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary, your spouse, bring the fullness of your gifts into our hearts.
Devotions to the Blessed Virgin Mary (devotions to Mary take up 91 pages, devotions to Jesus take up 43)
- The Church's devotion to the Blessed Virgin is intrinsic to Christian worship. The Church rightly honours the Blessed Virgin with special devotion.
- Fourth Glorious Mystery: The Assumption - God has taken Mary, body and soul, to heaven; and the angels rejoice! ...The most blessed Trinity receives and showers honours on the Daughter, Mother and Spouse of God.
- Fifth Glorious Mystery: The Coronation of the Blessed Virgin - If you and I had been able, we too would have made her Queen and Lady of all creation.... The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit crown her as the rightful Empress of the Universe.
- Novena to the Immaculate Conception: Pope Pius IX formally instituted the celebration of the Immaculate Conception when he proclaimed this dogma on 12/8/1854. Affirming the constant faith of the church, he expressed in that definition, the exact meaning of the truth of Mary's Immaculate Conception: that she was conceived free from the stain of original sin.
(Note: There is a common misconception that the Immaculate Conception refers to the virgin birth of Jesus Christ (see: Incarnation) whereas the original doctrine is actually about Mary's sinless birth.)
Devotions during the Month of Mary
- May 18 - Mary the Co-Redemptrix: "It is with good reason that the popes have called Mary Co-Redemptrix." ...It can rightly be said that she redeemed mankind together with Christ.
- May 26 - Mary the Way to Jesus
- May 30 - Mary the Channel of Grace
Prayers for the Dead
- The Church prays for the dead and this prayer says much about the reality of the Church itself. It says that the Church continues to live in the hope of eternal life.
Libellés : theology-ish
mercredi 27 septembre 2006
The connotation of evangelicalism
Just as I was leaving to run an errand today, a story came up on the local news about a Jesus Camp held in North Dakota where campers are shown to be in "God's army" and are doing some interesting, if not outright bizarre things. I only saw a clip of this documentary but it included elementary school children speaking en masse in tongues and praying for/at a cardboard cut-out of President George W. Bush. This camp was called evangelical but it made me wonder how accurately that term was used. Is it synonymous with fundamentalism? Does American evangelicalism differ from Canadian evangelicalism? Shouldn't this camp/documentary be described as focusing on a charismatic group?
In terms of the way this story was reported here, it made it seem as though many evangelicals fall into this extreme category (which certainly isn't true!). The assertion was made that this bordered along the lines of brainwashing, which is one of the first times that I have ever heard evangelicalism being accused of such an activity. I'm not sure what implications this will have for Canadians who may see that report and now associate evangelicals with fundamentally religious, right-wing Americans. Can you imagine, a cut-out of Prime Minister Stephen Harper at a Bible camp? Oy. Anyways, I've been reading about Realpolitik in relation to religion and this seems be a fitting illustration of how politics and faith can get really tangled up.
Update: For a detailed critique of this documentary from a Pentecostal perspective, see Rich's article.
Libellés : theology-ish
mercredi 26 janvier 2005
Rare inklings
Back when I had to fill my sidebar with tons of stuff (i.e. meaningless information) to keep the page from getting cut off, I had a list of some of my favourite posts. Since I'll be away for the next few days, I thought I'd post it again.
- Would that I had the answers
- Filthy language
- The five worship songs I skip over in my MP3 player
- Perspectified
- It's not too big as long as people still exist
- Big, fat, and bothersome
- "Lift your eyes to heaven"
- Looking in
- Singleness
- No more tippy-toeing
- Sexual immorality
- Last speel of the month
- Traditional church
- Large vs. small
- Who are we worshipping here?
- Theological smorgasbord
- The Apostles' Creed
- Sound familiar?
- Church hypocrisy
- Marriage
- Words - worth
- Fire... works
Libellés : theology-ish
samedi 29 novembre 2003
Last speel of the month
I am so beat. We had our Christmas banquet last night as well as our after-banquet party. I didn't get home until three in the morning and I was so exhausted that I slept in until this afternoon. I only have a week of classes left but I am so behind on everything. And I have absolutely no energy left in me to do anything, much less study or do homework. Being on the net has probably kept me from falling asleep again.
I really appreciate all of the classes I have been taking, especially New Religious Movements. I'm going to share some verses that have impacted me greatly in this course:
"See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the basic principles of this world rather than on Christ. For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, and you have been given fullness in Christ, who is the head over every power and authority. In him you were also circumcised, in the putting off of the sinful nature, not with a circumcision done by the hands of men but with the circumcision done by Christ, having been buried with him in baptism and raised with him through your faith in the power of God, who raised him from the dead. When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcised of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the written code, with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; he took it away, nailing it to the cross. And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross."
- Colossians 2:8-15
The book of Colossians was a letter that Paul wrote to combat the Gnostic beliefs that were prevalent in the town of Colossae. These people believed that salvation was dependent on achieving special knowledge. I'm not going to be spending too much time here on gnosticism but I just wanted to provide the context in which Paul wrote these verses.
Anyways, learning about all of these new religions and the New Age movement has helped me appreciate my faith even more. For people who claim that Christianity is the same as every other religion out there, I would have to say it's not. And believe me, I know what I'm talking about. I grew up in a different religion than Christianity and now that I am a Christian, I know the differences and I can testify to them.
What's so amazing about Jesus then? He is radically different from anything this world has seen before. To be a Christian is not to do things of our own efforts. Our salvation does not come from doing things or performing human traditions. We don't rack up our status by being baptized, taking communion, counting our prayers, making a list of our good deeds or reading the Bible everyday (keep in mind I'm talking about earning our salvation through these methods). We can't do anything ourselves. Seriously, is there any human being on earth who would be able to do enough of these to save his soul? To the point where it would be guaranteed completely and he would know for sure that he made it to heaven? No!! There is no assurance in performing human tasks! This philosophy that we can is false. No, we have no choice but to admit that there is nothing we can do to attain God's favour.
Yet we aren't despairing because we don't have hope! Rather we have Jesus Christ!! He is the only one we can depend on. Unlike all other religions, we do not rely on ourselves, or anything within us. We rely on Jesus! That is completely different from other religions where we would have to follow some mandates and obey some steps to save our soul. With Jesus, we don't need to follow the Five Pillars or the Nine Steps to Enlightenment or reach nirvana within ourselves or break through to the pinnacle of our thinking. No, He has done everything for us already that we need to be saved.
I love that Paul says, not with a circumcision done by the hands of men but with the circumcision done by Christ. Done by Christ. We are utterly dependent on Him. God doesn't need us to say three prayers a day or abstain from certain food or anything like that. All we need to do is accept what Jesus has done for us out of the free will that we have. Everything else that we do (pray, read the Bible, help others) flows out of our new life in Christ. They come as an "after" to our life, not as a "before".
All of the rules that are imposed on people in religions stand opposed to people, for who is able to fulfill all these regulations? They count against us, not for us. They are a trap, binding us into a written code that we think we need to follow in order to make it to heaven. Think about it, all of these beliefs say that YOU need to do something, YOU need to not do this or that and then you'll make it. Essentially, you become your own Saviour through this.
But then comes the twist. Christ makes a public spectacle of all of these through the cross. It is through His crucifixion that His Lordship is declared to the world. People don't need to rely on keeping the rules or keeping the observations any longer in order to be "safe". HE is the Saviour! We trust in Him and what He has done.
This is another reason why Christianity is different from all the other religions. We don't need to be one of the selected few who has been able to follow all the rules or gained enough knowledge to save ourselves. There is no initiation or process that is mandatory for us to continue further in our religion. All that is needed is an acceptance of Christ's Lordship. It is because of this that Christ is available to any who call on Him. It is not limited to the rich, the intellectual, or the elite. This is what struck me the most: you don't have to be smart enough to be saved, whereas gnosticism and a lot of other belief systems who have roots in that emphasize that you need to have enough knowledge and information to be.
Remember when I had to read "The Celestine Prophecy"? It was all about attaining each of the secrets in the manuscript and knowing enough to understand them and put them into use. A lot of religions are like this, where the amount of knowledge you have gained is connected to your salvation. But Jesus is not about this! Yes, we have the Bible, but we read that to understand God better. We don't read it because it'll score us brownie points or take us to the next level of heaven.
I hope this didn't come across as an excuse for Christians not to do anything. When we accept Jesus as Lord, that changes our lives and that compels us to do things for Him - but these acts are for His glory, not ours. It is only through God's amazing grace that we can even do these at all! Thank You Jesus that we are saved by what You have done. Thank You that the things we do are for You as expressions of Your love for us, and that they are not things we do to earn our way with You. You have paid the price. We do not need to add anything to that perfect and complete sacrifice.
Libellés : theology-ish
lundi 17 novembre 2003
Who are we worshipping here?
I went on another field trip today with my New Religious Movements class to a human potential movement "church", which believes in the Science of Mind and is affiliated with the Church of Religious Science. We were all incredibly heartbroken at what we experienced this morning. Before we left, we prayed that there would be a real spirit of humility upon these people (since the human potential movement bases everything on the abilities and powers of humankind). But discover my shock when I found something in their songbook that seemed to go completely contrary to what we were praying for! Perhaps you've seen this little ditty before. Maybe it was originally written as a parody. I've no clue since I did not see it until today for the first time.
Lord, it's hard to be humble
When you're perfect in every way.
I can't wait to look in the mirror
Cause I get better looking each day.
To know me is to love me
I must be a heck-of-a-One [lyrics changed from the original - these are the words in the songbook]
Oh Lord it's hard to be humble
Cause I'm doing the best that I can.
- Mac Davis "Lord, It's Hard to Be Humble"
Wow. They took this song and put it in their songbook to be sung during their services. Not only that, they changed the sixth line in that song from "I must be one hell of a man" to "I must be one heck-of-a-One". (I like how they made hell into a nicer word, heck, hehe). Notice that they changed it to refer to a divine person, namely themselves. That scared me. It wasn't only in this one instance, however, that they referred to themselves as the One, etc. They also had a song of the Lord's Prayer where the ending was changed to I AM. I AM!!! The holy name of the Lord (Exodus 3:14)!! This movement thinks they are the I AM! The name that Jesus was going to be stoned for, for saying. This was what got me the most - how the utter holiness of God was not revered at all in these beliefs.
So imagine my relief when I went to church this evening and we sang this:
Humble thyself in the sight of the Lord
Humble thyself in the sight of the Lord
And He shall lift you up higher and higher and He shall lift you up
So I will humble myself in the sight of the Lord
Humble myself in the sight of the Lord
And He shall lift me up higher and higher and He shall lift me up
- Bob Hudson "Humble Thyself"
This is what many call the paradox in Christianity:
- "He must become greater; I must become less." (John 3:30)
- "So the last will be first, and the first will be last." (Matthew 20:16)
- "If anyone wants to be first, he must be the very last, and the servant of all." (Mark 9:35)
- "Who [Jesus Christ] being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness." (Philippians 2:6-7)
- "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me and the gospel will save it." (Mark 8:34-35)
- "For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many." (Mark 10:45)
You know what? Though this paradox may never be fully figured out in this life, I love this idea! I believe that one of the most wondrous yet mind-boggling concepts within Christianity is its essence of irony. A faith that is based on the denial of oneself to the worship of Christ? Where to become great, one must become a servant? Simply wonderful. I cannot imagine serving a God like the God of the Bible in any other way. I am so thrilled that God extended His grace and mercy to me, allowing me to worship Him in this most spectacular way - by focusing all my attention on Him rather than on myself. A faith where I can look upon His holiness, His majesty and His awesome splendor and praise Him for He is worthy of all praise. Thank You Lord for humbling me, for showing me who I really am before You. Just like Isaiah fell before God and cried out: "Woe to me!" I cried. "I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the LORD Almighty." (Isaiah 6:5)
Now, I suppose I should add a disclaimer since this is something that can be found on the Net and there will be those who will stop by and read what I have written and disagree with me. So let me say this flat out: I do NOT wish to convey a judgmental tone through this post at all. The last thing I want is to condemn people for their beliefs simply because they are different from mine. What my purpose is in writing this is, is to point out the main difference between these new religious movements that have popped up as of late who proclaim worship of the self as opposed to the historical biblical Christian faith that proclaims worship of its LORD and only of Him. It burdens my soul to see that people are falling into the trap of creating a "god" out of themselves in order to fill that hole in their lives that only God can fill. I am troubled because, without God in my life, I may easily have been one of these people. But God extends His love and mercy to all who call on His name, acknowledging their unworthiness before such a just God. And because He is so just, He sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to earth to pay the price that we could not pay for what we have done. Our lies, our secret filth, our evil malicious thoughts - everything was cleared and wiped clean when Jesus died on the cross for us. All we need to do is confess this and our need for a Saviour outside of us. We cannot do it on our own. We will inevitably fail. We need Jesus Christ. This is what I write about. This is my life, a life where Jesus Christ is the Lord of all that I am.
Apologies for the length once again (I know, I know, ruining the perfect blog post standards). I just have so much to say and this was the best I could do to condense it. I really need to work on my brevity. Oh here I go again, I am going to stop now--
Libellés : theology-ish
dimanche 9 novembre 2003
Theological smorgasbord
I must be extremely bored because I just read through a bunch of threads on Beliefnet's forums. While I certainly didn't read them all word-for-word (some were just tedious to get through), a lot of it was interesting. Especially on threads where there were upwards of over a hundred and something responses. I did notice however, that, Christians and non-Christians just went back and forth a lot of the time, using big words and complex theological or scientific ideas to prove or disprove their beliefs. Funny thing was sometimes, they would use the same concept to argue their point of view that the other side would use to prove theirs! I had the small urge to respond to some of these threads, but really, the non-Christians seemed to attack the Christian beliefs, which led to the Christians attacking back, meaning a full scale war was on in no time. So I will post what I think here where it's at least a bit friendlier :)
- "Jesus Christ is not God" thread: this belief subscribes to the heresy of Arius that the early church combated; this belief can be easily refuted by numerous Bible verses of which I will not be giving references because there's a lot and it's late; historical biblical Christianity believes that Jesus Christ is God, which means that anyone who calls them self a Christian will agree with this; as stated in the sidebar, I believe He is Lord!
- "I Am God" thread: started off as a joke by some guy claiming to be God but the topic moved onto the previous thread's subject; relating to the "I Am God" idea, that belief is pantheistic and monistic and in no way should be believed by those following Christ; this was what led to the Fall - "For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil." (Genesis 3:5)
- "Catholic vs. Protestant" thread: this is something that has been personal to my life (if I get the chance, I will post something on this); I disagree with some things in the Catholic tradition but I think there is still a lot that can be learned from them, such as their reverential approach to God, the importance of confession (though the means to do so are different), as well as the sacred treatment of the sacraments (not saying that Protestants don't do so); there is a lot of hate between the two groups and that is sad because Jesus prayed in His High Priestly Prayer that there be complete unity for His believers (see verses); I still don't understand this though because if there are so many theological differences between the two, how can unity be achieved?
- "The KJV vs." thread: I think that God has carefully protected His truth throughout the ages so in my mind, I don't see an issue in terms of inaccuracies between the versions or anything; there are people who prefer the traditional version because it may communicate the holiness of God better for them (revered and traditional language); modern translations allow people to have a better understanding of the scriptures because it is in accessible language to them; overall, I think we should treasure the fact that we have so many versions and translations available to us to study from because those in other countries only have one, if any, so any bickering about which one is the best seems irrelevant to the big picture here; that said, I do like the NIV best because that was my first Bible and I love pouring over those familiar verses
- "Demons in Christians" thread: again, this is something that has been personal in my life (but not personally thankfully!!!) - maybe I'll post about that soon as well; I do believe that Christians can allow demons to oppress them if they are allowing themselves to be, are not plugged in to the power source (GOD), and are not guarding themselves with the full armor; I think it is impossible for Christians to be possessed though because the Holy Spirit dwells within them; "You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world." (1 John 4:4)
- "Speaking in Tongues" thread: yes, the gift of speaking in tongues was given to the believers at Pentecost when they were baptized of the Holy Spirit; Paul addresses this later on in 1 Corinthians, when he states that speaking in tongues is a gift of the Spirit or a spiritual gift; I don't think that it is evidence of the Holy Spirit in a believer's life because if so, I wouldn't be considered one!; I'm not a cessationist because I think God may still gift some today with this for personal edification; Paul does has clear guidelines for its use: interpreter must be present, must be conducted in an orderly manner, cannot disrupt a worship service, only one at a time, that sort of thing; so basically, I believe it to be a gift of the Spirit (just like gifts of teaching, administration, etc. are - but should not be given prominence over them or be considered the only true gift) that still exists today but should not be presented in a manner that is contrary to the guidelines Paul has set
Actually, I have a story about the last one. My best friend and I were at a Starfield concert a few months ago, and it was held at a Pentecostal church. I am in no way discriminating against this denomination or attacking its beliefs; I am only describing my experience. So we were sitting there in the foyer waiting for the concert to begin when we noticed that a bunch of adults were huddled together in a circle. We weren't really sure of what was going on until we noticed a man saying a bunch of weird stuff. He was quite loud and before long, we figured out that he was speaking in tongues. Then a woman (I think?) started interpreting for him just as loudly. The whole group seemed seized during this moment and it scared my best friend and me to the point that we had to leave the church. Now it could be that they were experiencing some sort of God manifestation then, but clearly, it made anyone there who was not exposed to that sort of behaviour uncomfortable. I think that there is a time and a place for such an experience but if it was enough to drive Christians out of that church at that time, then I wonder what non-Christians would have felt like if they were there. Though I think it is a valid gift (a pastor I know has it but would never use it in front of others in that sort of manner), I think it can easily be abused. Like at that moment in that church when we felt the need to leave. Or when many start speaking in tongues just for the sake of getting attention but they aren't really. Or when a crowd goes wild and starts speaking in gibberish all at once and it confuses the heck out of everyone.
Well this was a very long post! I'd break it up more but it's already 3 in the morning and I have to get up in three hours to go to church. Oh and when I mean that it's friendlier to post on my blog than to interact with non-Christians on those forums, I am not advocating that we shy away from places where truth can be imparted; I strongly encourage it for people who are able to "give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have" (1 Peter 3:15). I'll be honest - I'm a chicken. Plus, I know there is so much more to learn about my faith before I can defend my beliefs as well as I would like to before others. I don't want to sound like a babbling fool to others nor do I want to speak extensively about something that I have not spent much time on in study or in prayer. The things which I have written above on are my elementary thoughts on certain subjects. I am a learner and I am certain that when I look back on them a few months from now, I probably will have even more to add. So take them for what they are, coming from a believer in Jesus Christ, who is learning more each and everyday on her walk with Him :)
Libellés : theology-ish
