Do any catholics speak in tongues?

[Goatee]

How do you know that what they are speaking is not just some mumbo jumbo talk?

 

[Colin]

How do you know that what they are speaking is not just some mumbo jumbo talk?

I know in the same way as I would know that praying the Lord's Prayer is not just some mumbo jumbo talk to a non-existent Father .

 

[Goatee]

I know in the same way as I would know that praying the Lord's Prayer is not just some mumbo jumbo talk to a non-existent Father .

Even though you cannot understand what they are saying?

 

[Colin]

http://bustedhalo.com/questionbox/speaking-in-tongues

The Catholic Catechism teaches about the Holy Spirit's charisms , including the gift of tongues .

" There are furthermore special graces, also called charisms after the Greek term used by St. Paul and meaning "favour," "gratuitous gift," "benefit." Whatever their character - sometimes it is extraordinary, such as the gift of miracles or of tongues - charisms are oriented toward sanctifying grace and are intended for the common good of the Church. "

By the way , Paul , thanks for reminding me of the gift of tongues . I made use of the gift during Eucharistic Adoration prior to Mass , and during the Eucharist this morning .

I didn't go into ecstasy .

 

[Colin]

Even though you cannot understand what they are saying?

Yes , in the same way a baby babbles love talk to his own mum and dad and doesn't understand what he/she is saying .

 

[Goatee]

I don't know what to think of it to be honest. How do you know it is not an evil spirit working within you?

 

[Godlovesmetwo]

By the way , Paul , thanks for reminding me of the gift of tongues . I made use of the gift during Eucharistic Adoration prior to Mass , and during the Eucharist this morning .

you dark horse you, how clever!

 

[Colin]

I don't know what to think of it to be honest. How do you know it is not an evil spirit working within you?

I don't think St Paul would have said , " I would like every one of you to speak in tongues......I thank God that I speak in tongues more than all of you.......and do not forbid speaking in tongues." if such were the case .

 

[Goatee]

I don't think St Paul would have said , " I would like every one of you to speak in tongues......I thank God that I speak in tongues more than all of you.......and do not forbid speaking in tongues." if such were the case .

It still does not say if it is good or evil that is speaking in tongues though. I would be very scared myself. How would you know that it is not from evil that the tongues is coming from?

 

[Tigger45]

It just so happens that the Maronite lectionary for today is 1 Cor 12:1-11. Very fitting for this discussion but I'm limited on time this morning to add a comment.

 

[Dave-W]

My brother ( a Pentecostal Protestant) says he has been praying for the gift of tongues, so he can cast out his own demons. He said several members of his Church have the ability but he doesn't want to bother them.

IMO trying to cast out your own demons is not wise. First off, there is no example of that in scripture, and secondly, one needs the gift of discerning of spirits (not necessarily tongue) to properly understand what is going on; which can be difficult if you are the one going thru the machinations of deliverance.

 

[pdudgeon]

It still does not say if it is good or evil that is speaking in tongues though. I would be very scared myself. How would you know that it is not from evil that the tongues is coming from?

by the spirit that the person has within them. The Holy Spirit cannot denegrate God, nor can an evil spirit praise God.
Being able to recognize The spirit works basically on the same principal as a magnet works.
two magnets with the same orientation will attract each other, but two magnets with the opposite orientation will repel each other.
We see this attraction and recognition of the Holy Spirit in the Bible at the meeting between the Virgin Mary, who was pregnant with Jesus, and her relative Elizabeth, who is pregnant with John the Baptist.

Christians who are baptized are baptized with the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit is the one who speaks for us in a heavenly tongue to the Father when we don't know how to pray.
It is the same Holy Spirit who is the one speaking in a foreign language when there are listeners from mutiple countries with multiple languages.
This is what happened at Pentecost. The group who heard the disciples were from several different countries, and they each of them heard the disciples speaking in their same foreign tongue. As a result each one of them could readily understand what God was saying to them.

One of the commands that Jesus gave to his disciples was to go out into all the world and tell the world about Him.
in order to do that they would either need to communicate themselves in the native language of that town, or else have someone accompany them who could speak both the disciple's tongue as well as the native tongue.
But with the gift of tongues from the Holy Spirit, that solved two problems;
1. it made sure that everyone who heard could also understand, and
2. it made sure that God's intended message was indeed delivered as He wanted it to be delivered.

 

[Fish and Bread]

and one of the Pope doing an exorcism

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wor...991/Pope-Francis-performs-first-exorcism.html

Exorcisms *by ordained bishops and priests* are an ancient tradition in some of the Apostolic churches (Those with bishops in Apostolic Succession) including Roman Catholicism that go back many centuries. They are rarely done, especially these days, and usually restricted to bishops, or priests whom bishops specifically designate as exorcists, who receive special training.

Whatever the merits or lack thereof of this practice are, confusing it with "exorcisms" performed by lay people as part of the "charismatic" movement is not historically accurate. Exorcisms predate both the charismatic movement, which dates only to around 1901 (according to some sources) or 1960 (according to other sources) among Protestants, and to 1967 among Roman Catholics.

Though the charismatic claims to be a revival of something done in biblical times, there is no direct lineage. In other words, there is no historical evidence of continuity of most of these practices between the early church and the modern church, nor is there real evidence that they are actually the same practices.

For example, charismatics say they are speaking in tongues, like some do in the bible. How do they know what they call speaking in tongues is the same thing as what happens in the bible? One of the primary examples in the bible of someone speaking in tongues is when they can speak in one language and be understood by several different groups non-native listeners as if they are speaking the languages of those listeners. No modern charismatic claims of that nature are substantiated- people speak in a "language" that linguists who've studied it say does really have the features of a language and seems to be nonsense words, and occasionally one or two people claim to understand it, but not in a scientifically demonstrable way.

In any event, if some people find this helpful, I am not one to rain on people's parade too much, but I think it would be a mistake for any church to lean too heavily as part of their mainstream practice. Also, my preference would be that the modern speaking in tongues be seen for what it probably is (at best)- a way of people clearing their minds and communicating or connecting with God without formulating conscious words in a real language, someone similar to mediation, although meditation goes back thousands of years in continuous practice and is scientifically shown to activate the same centers of the brain as nuns in deep prayer, which I have not yet heard to be the case with this charismatic stuff.

Also, I would be surprised if lay people "casting out demons" were something recognized as a legitimate part of the charismatic movement as Rome recognizes it. Roman Catholic charismatic practices, where they exist, do have restrictions placed on them to prevent some of the more questionable stuff that goes on elsewhere.

 

[Tallguy88]

The Charismatic movement started with the Pentecostal revivals in the early 1900s, especially the Asuza Street Revivals in Los Angeles, California. The 1960s was just when it spread to the mainstream churches.

 

[Tallguy88]

Exorcisms *by ordained bishops and priests* are an ancient tradition in some of the Apostolic churches (Those with bishops in Apostolic Succession) including Roman Catholicism that go back many centuries. They are rarely done, especially this days, and usually restricted to bishops, or priests whom bishops specifically designate as exorcists, who receive special training.

Whatever the merits or lack thereof of this practice are, confusing it with "exorcisms" performed by lay people as part of the "charismatic" movement is not historically accurate. Exorcisms predate both the charismatic movement, which dates only to around 1960 among Protestants, and to 1967 among Roman Catholics.

Though the charismatic claims to be a revival of something done in biblical times, there is no direct lineage. In other words, there is no historical evidence of continuity of most of these practices between the early church and the modern church, nor is there real evidence that they are actually the same practices.

For example, charismatics say they are speaking in tongues, like some do in the bible. How do they know what they call speaking in tongues is the same thing as what happens in the bible? One of the primary examples in the bible of someone speaking in tongues is when they can speak in one language and be understood by several different groups non-native listeners as if they are speaking the languages of those listeners. No modern charismatic claims of that nature are substantiated- people speak in a "language" that linguists who've studied it say does really have the features of a language and seems to be nonsense words, and occasionally one or two people claim to understand it, but not in a scientifically demonstrable way.

In any event, if some people find this helpful, I am not one to rain on people's parade too much, but I think it would be a mistake for any church to lean too heavily on this as their mainstream form of practice. Also, my preference would be that the modern speaking in tongues be seen for what it probably is (at best)- a way of people clearing their minds and communicating or connecting with God without formulating conscious words in a real language, someone similar to mediation, although meditation goes back thousands of years in continuous practice and is scientifically shown to active the same centers of the brain as nuns in deep prayer, which I have not yet heard to be the case with this charismatic stuff.

Also, I would be surprised if lay people "casting out demons" were something recognized as a legitimate part of the charismatic movement as Rome recognizes it. Roman Catholic charismatic practices, where they exist, do have restrictions placed on them to prevent some of the more questionable stuff that goes on elsewhere.

"Legitimate" or not, recognized or not, lay exorcisms happen and are very real.

 

[Goatee]

I would be very wary of 'speaking in tongues'.

 

[Fish and Bread]

One theological consideration is also whether or not the Church can be said to "lose" things for a couple thousand years that it originally had, and then artificially paste them back on later, and whether or not that fits the model of Church progression that we generally think of as Catholic. Generally we evolve and unpack, not lose and restore.

Also, that most of these practices disappeared after Apostolic times if they ever existed in these forms in the first place, and then were not mentioned by the early Christian Fathers is worth considering. What if there were reasons why these things were not part of the parsimony of Apostolic Tradition that our fore-bearers received? That it so completely disappears so quickly makes me wonder if these were things temporary granted only in the aftermath of Pentecost and the first era of the Church, or even things that in some cases the Church decided were exaggerated and started to discourage.

There is actually potentially more to this than the surface level issues. It says something about what the Church is in a fundamental way if we accept these things as anything more than a human-driven method of prayer or meditation.

 

[anjelica]

Many people spoke in tongues in my old Protestant (Methodist) church. It ripped the church apart. People thought they could cast out demons. Tried to. People attacked the altar. A friend of mine committed suicide believing she was irredeemible. I was ostracised from the church because I was said to have demons because I did not like sitting in a circle on the floor holding hands. Mut hit one of our lical Catholic Churches too, and went completely out of hand and in the end the priest had to stop it. I would not touch it with a barge pole. But that is only my,personal experience. I guess there must be good in it too. But there are a lot of dangers also.

 

[Michie]

Because what you experienced was not a gift of the Spirit. Obviously! churches can be scary in the protestant world at times!

Many people spoke in tongues in my old Protestant (Methodist) church. It ripped the church apart. People thought they could cast out demons. Tried to. People attacked the altar. A friend of mine committed suicide believing she was irredeemible. I was ostracised from the church because I was said to have demons because I did not like sitting in a circle on the floor holding hands. Mut hit one of our lical Catholic Churches too, and went completely out of hand and in the end the priest had to stop it. I would not touch it with a barge pole. But that is only my,personal experience. I guess there must be good in it too. But there are a lot of dangers also.

 

[Fish and Bread]

churches can be scary in the protestant world at times!

She specifically mentioned both a Protestant congregation and a Roman Catholic parish where she saw the charismatic movement get out of hand.