Protestant and Catholic couples scenario.

[googol]

Say for example the husband is Protestant and the wife is Catholic.
If memory serves me correctly, the Catholic church allows Protestant and Catholic people to marry each other so long, as any children bore to the couple is raised as Catholic.

I think this is wrong and selfish. I mean, if I were in this situation and I were the protestant, I would want the children to be protestant.

I don't see protestant churches with such policies such as this. What is your view on this?

 

[ElizaE]

Say for example the husband is Protestant and the wife is Catholic.
If memory serves me correctly, the Catholic church allows Protestant and Catholic people to marry each other so long, as any children bore to the couple is raised as Catholic.

I think this is wrong and selfish. I mean, if I were in this situation and I were the protestant, I would want the children to be protestant.

I don't see protestant churches with such policies such as this. What is your view on this?

Why would the Church marry anybody just so they could raise their children in another faith. The Catholic Church believes that it has the wholeness of the Truth so why would they allow any children to be raised in a different denomination? That would be irresponsible.

The couple has a choice in where they marry. If they do not wish to raise their children Catholic they can be married in a Protestant Church or by a JOP. If a couple discusses the matter and wants to be married in the Catholic Church then they must agree to raise their children Catholic. I see nothing wrong with this.

 

[HisEagle]

Edit: nevermind.

 

[Yody]

Why would the Church marry anybody just so they could raise their children in another faith.

Who says we have different faiths


Different beliefs maybe but dont we all have faith in the same thing-Jesus died on the cross for all of us

 

[CrystalBrooke]

im a protestant and my husband is Catholic and our child will be raised Catholic, i have no problem with it because as long as they believe in Jesus the same way I do, why does it matter if she's protestant or Catholic?

 

[ReformedChapin]

Who says we have different faiths


Different beliefs maybe but dont we all have faith in the same thing-Jesus died on the cross for all of us

Their doctrine does....

 

[Rin4Christ]

im a protestant and my husband is Catholic and our child will be raised Catholic, i have no problem with it because as long as they believe in Jesus the same way I do, why does it matter if she's protestant or Catholic?

Me too, though I'm not married yet, my fiance is Catholic. I have no problem with children being raised Catholic so long as they are raised in a Catholic faith. They will know that it is ok to not be Catholic, but I don't think that most Catholics are that closed minded these days anyway.

 

[CaliforniaJosiah]

Some thoughts....


1. I think it should be a HIGH PRIORITY for a couple to be one in their religious life - that means, at the least, participating in the same congregation. I think this should be addressed in the engagement process, and ideally, the congregation they marry in is the one they belong to (or at least in the process of joining). If you are okay with your children being raised in a church, why isn't the parent okay with that? Yet the child will get a "mixed message" and the family will be divided.


2. No spouse should act against their conscience. We may not totally, completely, absolutely agree with how they dot every "i" but on the other hand, we do need to feel very comfortable so identifying and associating ourselves for the rest of our lives.


3. Often, one spouse is more involved than the other. This should be a good indicator and the one less involved should change to the faith community of the other (given point #2 above). Frequency of church worship might be fairly easy to determine. If the Catholic was last in church when it was all in Latin and John XXIII was the Pope - that might indicate something. Often, one spouse is clearly more involved than the other.


4. If BOTH are equally involved, searching for a third option makes a lot of sense. For Protestant/Catholic couples, Lutheran or conservative/tradition Anglican makes a LOT of sense. In my Lutheran congregation, about half of the members are former Catholics. I know many changed for theological reasons, but I suspect a lot of them did for this reason. I spoke with a couple just a couple of weeks ago - he was very active in the Baptist church and she in the Catholic Church (they are an African - American couple from the South), they found the Lutheran church and now they BOTH like Lutheran better than where they were raised and went before.


5. Although Jennifer and I are not engaged eek: ) we've been mutual significant others for over two years and now live near each other at different colleges. While we are both PK's (Pastor's kids) and both are extremely active, we chose to "find" a church for both of us to get involved in - TOGETHER. My liberal Protestant and Catholic background, with her ECLA Lutheran background. Because I tend to lean heavily toward Lutheranism in theology anyway, and since so many of the other aspects are similar to Catholicism, and since I had departed from Catholicism anyway, this made Lutheran a pretty obvious choice - athough we did visit an Epistcopal church, a big nondenom and a number of Lutheran ones before we found the LCMS Lutheran church we've been attending now for about a year.


Just a few of my thoughts....


Pax!


- Josiah