Catholic Q&A November 2011

Hello everyone,

It is Finals week, so I am of course very busy.  So I thought I’d share with you a recent e-mail conversation.  I received a comment on the blog from someone asking me to e-mail her to answer some questions about the Catholic faith.  I am going to put two e-mail exchanges with her here.  I have removed her name for privacy.  Enjoy.

Peace,
Adam

Her to me #1

 Lately, God has been placing it upon my heart to become more aware of other denominations, which is when I came across your blog. After reading it, I was in awe of how different this denomination is from what I am used to. I grew up Lutheran but now I do not affliate myself with anything other than a follower of Christ.  So there were a few questions I had about catholicism that I would like to ask you-I feel it would be more insightful to learn from a devout catholic themself, rather than an online wikipedia entry.  With that said, I was wondering if you could tell me what catholics believe about Mary and what the significance of the Rosary is in relaion to her? What do catholics believe about Jesus Christ and His divinity?  Why do catholoics go to a priest to confess their sins?  No need to elaborate too much on these questions, just a general response would be great.  Thank you so much for your time!

God bless,

Me to her #1 Reply

May God Bless you in your inquiry.  Since you asked for the short answers I will try to keep this short.  

Your first question was in regards to Mary.  We honor Mary because she is the first Christian and the one who said, "Yes" to bringing Christ into this world.  We also see her as an able to, willing to, and wanting to plead for us to her son.  If you look at the story of the Wedding at Cana you will see this in action with her pleading with her son to help out those hosting the wedding.  Also, on the cross Christ pointed to John and said, "Behold your mother."  We see that as a message to all of us, not just John.  When praying "to" Mary we are truly praying through Mary.  God the father and God the son both honored Mary so we feel that we should to.  If you look at prayers like the Hail Mary (the most frequent in the rosary) they do not ask for Mary to do anything more than to pray for us.  Also, in regards to the rosary, it is more than simply reciting the words.  There are four sets of five "mysteries" which are announced before each decade (Our Father, 10 Hail Marys, and a Glory Be) to be meditated on during the decade.

As for Jesus Christ and His divinity it is most likely the same as you learned growing up as a Lutheran (by the way, which synod were you part of, I may be able to explain stuff better knowing this, I have a great deal of family and many friends in different synods of Lutheran)  We believe that Christ is both fully God and fully man, understandable only as a mystery of the faith, in the two thousand year history of the Church we have battled the teachings of some who have taught that either was only an illusion, one thing that helps our Church is the extensive history of clarifying the understanding from the scriptures.

The reason that Catholics participate in the sacrament of Reconciliation (confession) is because Christ told us to.  Upon the sending of the Apostles he gave St. Peter the keys to Heaven and told the Apostles "who's sins you forgive are forgiven, whose sins you hold bound are held bound" so we see this as Christ forgiving sins through the priests.  We are not confessing our sins to the priest, at that time they are acting as a mediator between us and Christ by the power that Christ gave to His Church.  I understand the difficulty that some would have with this when you can go directly to God and I am struggling to explain it in short.

I think that this answers what you were asking at least to some extent... let me know if there is more that I can help you with.  One website that may help you with questions is www.catholicscomehome.org this site is focused on bring those who left the Church or those from other Christian faiths to a better understanding of the teachings.  It has the goal of bringing people into the Church, I don't know if that is a possibility with you or not, but it has a pretty good frequently asked questions section.

Peace,
Adam

Her to me #2

Hello,
Your answers have definitely given me a better understanding of the Catholic faith so I appreciate you taking the time to answer them!  The website was very helpful as well. Thank you for the scriptural basis-I now have a clear picture of where the catholic beliefs come from, especially the role of Mary. There are only 2-3 more questions that I have.  What are catholics' beliefs on believers performing miracles/healings today?  What do they believe the role of the Holy Spirit is in our daily lives?  On a more personal note, what does your relationship with God look like (quiet time, prayer life, etc. )  I promise, those will be the last of my questions!  No need to feel rushed in answering the questions-I understand that you're busy with your class obligations.

Thanks!

Me to her #2 Reply

Feel free to ask more questions, I enjoy answering peoples questions, it helps me get things ever more clearer in my mind every time I do so.  I am glad that the website was helpful.  I wouldn't imagine giving information like that without the scriptural references (although I don't often cite book chapter and verse unless you want me to).  Now onto the questions here.

No believer can perform miracles themselves.  All miracles are acts of God.  God may and does work through His believers in this regard.  As Catholics we put a great deal of emphasis on science as a gift from God to help us understand and better serve the world, but there are many areas that He gets involved and will go against science to help us out.  If our prayers line up with His will it is very easy to see miracles happening often.  Many of these are small miracles while others are bigger.  We wouldn't give the credit for a miracle to a believer, but to God working through them.  This applies both to believers still alive on earth and those living in Heaven.  The definition of a canonized Saint is someone that we are sure is in Heaven with God, but they are still simply a believer.  When someone says that they were healed through their prayers "to" St. so-and-so it is simply a way of saying that we asked that St. to pray for us and God worked a miracle.

The Holy Spirit is very, very important in the Catholic Church.  In fact, the feast of Pentecost is considered the birthday of the Church (Pentecost is the celebration of the Holy Spirit descending upon the Apostles to guide them in their ministry)  We believe that the Holy Spirit is involved in our understanding and growth.  Most Catholics ask for the Spirit to be with them when reading scriptures since it was the Spirit who gave the authors their inspiration.  As a future priest I will be asking the Spirit to guide my ministry to the people at all times.  We see the Sacrament of Confirmation as a Holy Spirit sacrament in the growth of the gifts of the Holy Spirit in promoting and defending the faith.

As for my personal relationship with God.  All of us are to be constantly growing in our relationship with God.  As Catholics we see this as a life long process.  Our faith and relationship with God should be (and for me is) centered around the Eucharist.  The Eucharist is the true presence of Christ in communion.  When we receive communion we are receiving the body, blood, soul and divinity of Christ into us as He instructed at the last supper.  Christ is everywhere but in a special way is present in the Eucharist both during Mass and when it is reserved in the tabernacle.  (The tabernacle is the place where we place consecrated hosts for times when the sacrament is needed for those who are unable to attend Mass such as the homebound or the sick.)  So I spend time every day just saying prayers in front of the tabernacle since Jesus is there in such a special way.  I of course go to Mass every day to receive the Eucharist and be fulfilled by the Word that is part of the Mass.  I pray at all times, sometimes these are formalized traditional prayers and other times it is just something that the Spirit moves me to make up as I go.  In my previous career I was a forester so I see God's work in all of His creation so I spend a lot of time praying outdoors too.  I also have a book called the liturgy of hours which is a set of prescribed prayers to be prayed at five times during the day, this is required of priests and religious (nuns and brothers) and a good practice for me as a seminarian to get into.  This is something that is growing among the laity, but probably most Catholics that you would ask wouldn't be familiar with it... it just isn't out there as much.  I also am a very visual person so I use icons and statues to point me to God.  Many of these are of different biblical stories which is obvious how they point to God.  For a protestant you may not as easily understand the statues to the Saints, but these are all tools to guide us to God.  When I see a statue of St. Francis I can think of the mission that God gave him to rebuild His Church and so on.  I also try to spend time in the scriptures every day.  There are prescribed readings every day for Mass and I like to take these to my personal prayer as well as listening to them at Mass and listening to the Homily (sermon) during Mass.  I can find these every day either in a book that I have or at http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings  

I hope that this answers today's questions.  Feel free to ask more.  I don't check this e-mail account a lot unless I am expecting something so please be patient if you send and future questions.

Peace,

Adam