Howdy It's Sunday, so let me give you a Sunday question (please, see poll). I just watched the service in the Berlin cathedral on TV. It was magnificent. How about you?
How about those hats, cerberus? https://www.usatoday.com/story/life...iss-twitter-has-hilarious-theories/103063894/
Everyone is free to do whatever they want on Sundays as far as I am concerned. If it is going to church then by all means do it and enjoy the experience. If instead you want to lie in bed then that is good too. Go to the beach, climb a mountain, go for a drive, watch a movie, spend time with the kids, it is all good.
I go to church with my wife on Sundays but I regard Friday sunset to Saturday sunset to be the real Sabbath. My wife thinks it is kind of strange but she knows that there are all kinds of things that I don't want her to try to get me to do on Saturday / the Sabbath. I do chauffeur her around where she needs to go though....... so I cannot say that I really observe the Sabbath like an observant Jew would do.
Jehovah Witnesses and some of the more extreme fundamental baptist churches in my area observe the sabbath on Saturdays just FYI, though I am neither.
I come from generations of priests and I used to go often when I was younger. My family wanted me to follow up(5th gen priests after all) but I declined since very young and they never insisted. The church songs have a dreamy and relaxing effect, even though I'm not really religious. Occasionally, when I'm near a church/monastery/cathedral I'll visit it for a couple minutes, saying a quick prayer and lighting some candles and it always boosts my spirits. People forget religion is like a soul medicine, even if God does not exist, praying and attending churches makes you feel better, it is in our nature. Catholic songs are definitely better than orthodox ones, as I found out in a Paris cathedral (me being eastern orthodox).
After the Catholic Church deposed the legitimate Pope Benedict XVI four years ago, I no longer considered myself to be a Roman Catholic in any sense that involves active participation. The current "pope', Francis, is little more than an entertainer who harangues everyone with internationalist, hyperliberal diatribes of Socialist dogma. Thus, I have no 'church' to go to....
so you no longer believe God picks the Pope because you did not agree with the choice of Pope last time?
What I said was, "After the Catholic Church deposed the legitimate Pope Benedict XVI four years ago, I no longer considered myself to be a Roman Catholic in any sense that involves active participation." The thread topic asks whether or not we go to church on Sundays. So, that was my answer. Read into my answer whatever you wish... I'm not debating the 'mechanics' of religious philosophy with you. I have my own ideas about who in Rome did what, and why. But none of that is related to the thread topic. As I said, I don't 'go to church' anymore.
Feel welcome to denigrate and disparage any 'church' you wish, for whatever reason you wish. Your opinion of mine, or anyone else's religion is of less than microscopic concern to me.... The thread topic asks whether or not we GO to church (any church) on Sunday. I don't. Believe, or disbelieve anything you wish... I could not care less....
Interesting take on the removal of a pope who was protecting pedophiles and doing nothing whatsoever to repair the damage the child molestation scandal was doing to the institution of the Catholic Church. FTR I know an ex priest who told me that while he was in the seminary his tutors told him that everything written by pope ratzinger was the exact opposite of what he should believe and do as a priest. It was the appointment of ratzinger that made him stop going to church entirely. He could no longer reconcile his own devout faith with the institution that appointed him.
Well, I don't know what you heard 3rd or 4th-hand from an ex-priest and his tutors in a seminary, but below is a link to something that is documented fact about the current 'entertainer-pope', Francis, who took over the papacy after the Church deposed the legitimate Pope Benedict XVI. Enjoy!: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/pope-confesses-he-stole-priests-cross-casket-n45856 . "Try it, my son... we've been ruling people with 'a pen and a phone' for many years!"
So the worst thing you can say about Francis is that he took a rosary from a dead person? What about Pope Ratzy and the gay mafia in the Vatican? What about the Vatican bank scandal under his regime? What about the worldwide pedophile priest scandal that he tried to cover up? Ratzinger was a major part of the PROBLEM and to deny that is to deny reality.
Pope Benedict XVI, like nearly every Pope since the foundation of the Roman Church, was tasked with being a spiritual "Father" to everyone in that church, not developing powers of omniscience or clairvoyance sufficient to be able to ferret out every sex pervert or every corrupted bean-counter who had access to the church's finances. Indeed, your undocumented opinions about "Ratzy", per se, remind me a lot of the kind of sh*t that the ignorant masses threw at Pope Pius XII for supposedly somehow deliberately colluding with the Nazis to murder millions of Jews during World War II. After all, Jews were, in fact, murdered by the millions... and it's all that Pope's fault... right? The supporting logic in this kind of thought process is breathtaking.... But, I won't stray from the thread topic. For reasons entirely of my own, then, I don't go to church anymore... and I won't as long as the Roman Catholic Church can do no better than to have a man with "situation-ethics", scumbag thievery, and a shill's devotion to hyperliberal, socialistic dogma as its 'pontiff'.... My life already has enough 'entertainment' in it so that another 'entertainer', especially of 'pope' Francis' calibre, is nothing but a wearisome, low-brow distraction....
Aw, gee! And I was hoping that you would at least make one attempt to put some factual evidence out here supporting your theory that all the problems of the Roman Catholic Church were "Ratzy's" fault.... And, by contrast, we can presume that there are no sex perverts in the Catholic clergy now? And that all the corrupt bean-counters have been expunged, too, thanks to the miraculous appearance of pope Francis...? .. Nothing to offer? Nothing at all? Well, since you evidently feel that God is on pope Francis' 'side', you should pray for guidance to show his cruel detractors (like moi) how wonderful Francis is when compared with wicked, old Pope Benedict XVI....
No, because I havnt found a church that I honestly believe is more concerned about Jesus' philosophy and a relationship with God than money and power. I know theres a few out there, but they're hard to find.