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What is the catholic stance on creation?
Who determines what is meant to be literal and what is not? The church or the pope or the individual?we should therefore allow our selves to the literature of people during those times (way, way back), not taking all the verses literally for there are verses written as historical records, prophetic speeches, stories that impart morals and greatness of God, etc. As Catholics, we do accept the ToE.
Who determines what is meant to be literal and what is not? The church or the pope or the individual?
Thanks. I'm hitting subscribe on this one.
Can you talk about any mystic or contemplative traditions in the Roman Church?
I'd like to know more about the differences between the Protestant (I am aware there are many different denominations with slightly differing views on some things) and Catholic doctrines, if that's okay.
What is the status of Mary? I know that neither Protestants nor Catholics would say she is God, of course, but from what little I know, Catholics hold extremely high reverence for her. What is the nature of this reverence? Is she considered a Saint, or Divine, or Sinless, or something else? Protestants for the most part consider her blessed, and special in that she bore Christ on earth, but we do not pray to her or the saints. Apologies in advance if I'm making wrong assumptions or misinterpretations.
I can give you three. St. John of the Cross- who joined St. Teresa of Avila in her efforts to effect a reform in the Order. He founded the house of reform at Duruelo where he took the name St. John of the Cross. Some of his writtings include the Ascent of Mt. Carmel, The spiritual canticle, and the Dark Night of the soul. Hence he is one of the greatest West mystical writters and is also a Doctor of the Church. Another is St. Teresa of Avila aka St. Teresa of Jesus. She wrote Counter reformation and theologian of contemplative life through mental prayer. Also a doctor of the church. St. Catherine of Sienna was a theologian and a scholastic philosopher; brought papacy back to Rome from its displacement in France. And those writtings that I've mentioned are examples of contemplative (or contains guidelines) traditions of the Church. There are many others and it'll be extensive for me to elaborate on them.if you have questions about one of them though, just ask.
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Just remembered the writtings of St. Iganatius of Loyola, the Spiritual Exercises. It's also one of the "contemplative writtings" in the Church.
3) Protestants do not recognize the 7 Deuterocannonical books in the Catholic Bible.
Thank you both! That was very informative. The reason I asked about the differences, although there is an abundance of similarities, is because of that. Many people (myself included) sometimes get confused between the two, and the mass media does not help things.
Thanks for sharing, Sagetree! Sure, that's fine. Besides, I'm not the authority here on this DIR.
If you mean me as a Staff person.... we can still get our butts kicked for venturing where our knowledge and spiritual practice is not
Thanks for letting me share.
As of what the Church teaches about it, the Church believed that it is not aimed to answer how everything was created or to explain the origin of life (how would the author of Genesis know what had transpired if he's not yet living when everything began?) but rather, the story shows how powerful and creative God is; that from nothingness He has made everything and has made order/harmony into his creations. It should be noted that while some believe that God has dictated everything into the authors of the Bible and they just wrote it word per word(verbatim) , the Bible does not work that way. Ofcourse, God has helped them in writting it, through inspiration etc but God did not disallow the authors to put what they wrote based on the understanding and the literature existing when they existed. Therefore, when we read the Bible as well as the story of creation, we should therefore allow our selves to the literature of people during those times (way, way back), not taking all the verses literally for there are verses written as historical records, prophetic speeches, stories that impart morals and greatness of God, etc. As Catholics, we do accept the ToE.