Why Catholics become Protestants

[Colin]

It is very sad that so many Catholics leave the Church. I often wonder if maybe they would stay if they had been better catechized.

I am sure that this is one of the reasons .

From my experience the Catholic Church is very good at sacramentalizing , poor at catechizing , and abysmal at evangelizing .

There is a lot of talk about the New Evangelization , but we can talk about it till the cows come home , and nothing will have been achieved . We need wise leadership from bishops to get the whole thing moving .

In his 1975 Apostolic Exhortation to the whole Church , " Evangelii Nuntiandi " , Pope Paul VI wrote : " The Church is an evangelizer , but she begins by being evangelized herself....and the Holy Spirit is the principal agent of evangelization .

That's nearly 30 years ago , and all we get are further documents being written and Pontifical Councils set up .

The laity look for effective leadership , but on the whole we just get words, words , words , and none of them are words of evangelization .

Let's stop talking and start acting .

And I confess that I am a hopeless evangelizer , and many probably feel totally inadequate , but with the Holy Spirit in the driving seat and the encouragement of our fellow Catholics we will start moving .

We can't afford to wait . Western Society grows increasingly Godless as each day goes by . In the West the Church is in a state of decline . We need to get moving .

 

[QuantaCura]

The stat concerning quality in that article doesn't say a whole lot.

First, it's completely subjective, not objective. Their only standard about quality is how the person individually thinks about his faith. Obviously, someone who makes a conscious decision to switch faiths is going to feel his new faith is strong. If you polled converts to Catholicism from Protestantism and compared that with the general population of Protestantism, the converts to Catholicism would also have way better numbers than cradle Protestants--converts pretty much always have zeal.

Likewise, objectively, a strong faith in heresies and moral evils is worse than a weak faith in truth and goodness.

 

[benedictaoo]

I am sure that this is one of the reasons .

From my experience the Catholic Church is very good at sacramentalizing , poor at catechizing , and abysmal at evangelizing .

There is a lot of talk about the New Evangelization , but we can talk about it till the cows come home , and nothing will have been achieved . We need wise leadership from bishops to get the whole thing moving .

In his 1975 Apostolic Exhortation to the whole Church , " Evangelii Nuntiandi " , Pope Paul VI wrote : " The Church is an evangelizer , but she begins by being evangelized herself....and the Holy Spirit is the principal agent of evangelization .

That's nearly 30 years ago , and all we get are further documents being written and Pontifical Councils set up .

The laity look for effective leadership , but on the whole we just get words, words , words , and none of them are words of evangelization .

Let's stop talking and start acting .

And I confess that I am a hopeless evangelizer , and many probably feel totally inadequate , but with the Holy Spirit in the driving seat and the encouragement of our fellow Catholics we will start moving .

We can't afford to wait . Western Society grows increasingly Godless as each day goes by . In the West the Church is in a state of decline . We need to get moving .

Thank you.

Its as if we think the Spirit is going to do all the work and make it happen and we are just along for the ride, nit picking and complaining about all the bad guys out to get us.

It squarely lies on our shoulders and its been an epic fail as far as I'm concerned.

 

[benedictaoo]

You can get huffy all that you want, but the bottom line is your earlier post as well as this post was demeaning to protestants, IMO.

For what it's worth, my post was not specifically geared towards you - it was due to some Catholics that love to bash and make fun of the way some protestants worship.

I do apologize if you felt like a punching bag - that was not my intention.

However, I would ask that when you address your fellow Christians, that you speak to them in love. The tone of your posts do not appear to reflect that, IN MY OPINION.

No. It wasn't an attack in the least nor was it unloving. It was stating a fact. I can not help it if you do not understand this.

If the Catholic Church is not "the" Church, then Christianity is a sham. Protestantism comes from the Catholic Church, all are born from this one and only Church.

That is not attacking or demeaning anyone. Its a fact of the matter.

I am posting in the Catholic section. I do not feel I have to qualify this statement unless I were posting in a Protestant section.

If you feel it unloving and/or demeaning to say, "for me, its the Catholic Church or nothing", then I'm sorry you do not understand the full scope of what that statement means in reality. It has nothing at all to do with Protestants or their churches.

I promise you that if the Catholic Church ever falls, all the other Christian faiths are coming down like Dominos because those denominations all in some way all come from this one Church, not the other way around. We are not all equal churches, all started by Jesus. Only one was and the others broke from her.

So, its this or nothing... if this proves to be false, that means Christianity is a sham. So where am I gonna go? Leaving is just not an option.

 

[Fantine]

Many of you are converts, and so the answer should be obvious.

Most Catholics were baptized as infants, and when they became adults, they went through the same process you did in choosing their religion.

 

[Nicaenum]

I think we have to be careful about where we are when we're talking about this issue. The American Catholic becoming a Protestant might be doing so for vastly different reasons than a Western European doing it, or a Latin American.

I'm an American in France right now (finally leaving soon) and I can tell you that the reason people are leaving here really is about parishes not serving their flocks. The masses here are...I hate to say this, I really do...dreadful. Also, it's almost impossible to go to confession or adoration here. Almost no church really provides it, and even when they do they don't even put it in the bulletin or tell their parishioners. You have to ask. Churches make no effort to evangelize, or have a presence in the public place. Some of this is due to French anticlerical sentiment, more is from a general sense of having given up. The homilies I've heard in churches here have been read from note cards, emotionless, and lasted about 7 minutes on average (outside of tourist-packed churches in Paris of course). Average age of the congregation was about 60. It's astounding to walk into a beautiful 14th century church where saints once preached to see a handful of people, no organist, hardly any music, a dry sermon and confessionals with broken kneelers because no one uses them (seen in multiple churches btw).

Churches don't feel like churches here, they feel like museums...or worse: mausoleums. I went to try and pray the other day and a tourist took a picture of me and walked right up to the altar (a tabernacle behind it) to touch it and take more pictures. No one cares. The French government owns many of the church buildings anyway, and treats them as tourist traps.

There is a reason this Pope is writing and speaking so frequently about a new evangelization for Europe.

The immigrant Protestant churches that spring up, however, tend to do well here. It's in the French media a lot (usually to be harangued since this is one of the most religion-hating countries in the West). They make a lot of effort to get people into their faith.

 

[Bryne]

Wow...so sad. I will pray for the churches in France.

 

[LittleLambofJesus]

Originally Posted by justladyc You can get huffy all that you want, but the bottom line is your earlier post as well as this post was demeaning to protestants, IMO.

For what it's worth, my post was not specifically geared towards you - it was due to some Catholics that love to bash and make fun of the way some protestants worship.

I do apologize if you felt like a punching bag - that was not my intention.

However, I would ask that when you address your fellow Christians, that you speak to them in love. The tone of your posts do not appear to reflect that, IN MY OPINION.

No. It wasn't an attack in the least nor was it unloving. It was stating a fact. I can not help it if you do not understand this.

If the Catholic Church is not "the" Church, then Christianity is a sham. Protestantism comes from the Catholic Church, all are born from this one and only Church.

That is not attacking or demeaning anyone. Its a fact of the matter.

I am posting in the Catholic section. I do not feel I have to qualify this statement unless I were posting in a Protestant section.

If you feel it unloving and/or demeaning to say, "for me, its the Catholic Church or nothing", then I'm sorry you do not understand the full scope of what that statement means in reality. It has nothing at all to do with Protestants or their churches.

I promise you that if the Catholic Church ever falls, all the other Christian faiths are coming down like Dominos because those denominations all in some way all come from this one Church, not the other way around. We are not all equal churches, all started by Jesus. Only one was and the others broke from her.

So, its this or nothing... if this proves to be false, that means Christianity is a sham. So where am I gonna go? Leaving is just not an option.

That may or not be the case. I for one do not see the RC falling in the far distant future

Matt 7:26 And all the ones hearing of Me these words and no doing them, shall be likened to stupid/foolish man, whoany builds of him the House upon the sand.
27 And descended the rains and the streams and blow the winds and they toward-strike the House, that, and She falls,
and was the fall of Her great.' [Luke 19:44/Revelation 14:8]

Reve 14:8 And another Messenger, second-one follows saying "She falls, She falls, Babylon the Great,
the out of the wine of the fury of the fornication of her she has given to drink all the nations".


.....

 

[steve_bakr]

That may or not be the case. I for one do not see the RC falling in the far distant future

Matt 7:26 And all the ones hearing of Me these words and no doing them, shall be likened to stupid/foolish man, whoany builds of him the House upon the sand.
27 And descended the rains and the streams and blow the winds and they toward-strike the House, that, and She falls,
and was the fall of Her great.' [Luke 19:44/Revelation 14:8]

Reve 14:8 And another Messenger, second-one follows saying "She falls, She falls, Babylon the Great,
the out of the wine of the fury of the fornication of her she has given to drink all the nations".

.....

What are you implying by your quotation of Revelations?

 

[Rhamiel]

What are you implying by your quotation of Revelations?

LLOJ has said before that he does not think that the Catholic Church is the Babylon of Revelations
I think he is just trying to stir stuff up
to be honest, I do not understand most of his posts but he seems like an ok guy

 

[ivebeenshown]

What are you implying by your quotation of Revelations?

He just really loves Holy Scripture. Just about anything you post he will have some verse off the top of his head that has a similar phrase or word.

 

[crimsonleaf]

The missionary work of the majority of Protestant churches are targeted on Catholics rather than non-Christians. They justify this because they don't consider Catholics to be Christians. They are very good at going after the less educated Catholics, who really know very little about the Catholic faith. A little "real" Catholic education can go a long way in preventing such conversions.

Spiritual nourishment it is not! The so-called spiritual nourishment in most Protestant churches is little more than a quick emotional high from loud Christian rock music, sometimes with a little wild dancing, and fire and brimstone preaching that the rapture may happen any minute. In the end all the jumping, singing, and pounding preaching do little for their souls. The Holy Sacraments are true spiritual nourishment!

In my experience another reason Catholics convert to Protestantism is because protestantism is easy. You walk up to the front of the church, kneel down, accept Jesus as your personal personal savior, and you are SAAAAAAAVED. As a believer your salvation is assured. And since they are now following Faith Alone there no more need for Good Works, they just do whatever in the hell they like because they have been "Saved in the blood of Jesus!". In short, a lot of such conversions are rooted in Christian lazyness.

Ran

I'm sorry to appear negative here but this is the most slanted and innaccurate piece of prose I've read. And it's insulting.

The church in which I worship has a piano to accompany the 4 hymns we have at morning service, and we listen (yes, listen) to a 45 minute sermon at every service. We have two services a day on Sundays and prayer groups on Saturdays, Sundays and Wednesdays. We adhere to the 1689 Baptist Confession and church membership is voted on by fellow members. There is no jumping, arm waving, falling over or anything other than the simple and I hope harmonic singing of hymns, which I know you do too.

Missionary work is carried out in Kenya, the Sudan and the Phillipines, where we directly pay for pastors who live and work there, usually from the indigeonous population. The majority of our giving goes to these countries, largely because church funds don't go into a central worldwide fund to pay for stipends.

Everything you've said seems to come from the mouth of a closed-minded, thoroughly indoctrinated individual who has probably never set foot in a non-Catholic church and who would be wise to make several adjustments to his acceptance of fellow-Christians before he might even be welcome.

Having said that, it is a mark of most Protestant churches that you WOULD be welcomed. It's what we're about.

 

[crimsonleaf]

No. It wasn't an attack in the least nor was it unloving. It was stating a fact. I can not help it if you do not understand this.

If the Catholic Church is not "the" Church, then Christianity is a sham. Protestantism comes from the Catholic Church, all are born from this one and only Church.

That is not attacking or demeaning anyone. Its a fact of the matter.

I am posting in the Catholic section. I do not feel I have to qualify this statement unless I were posting in a Protestant section.

If you feel it unloving and/or demeaning to say, "for me, its the Catholic Church or nothing", then I'm sorry you do not understand the full scope of what that statement means in reality. It has nothing at all to do with Protestants or their churches.

I promise you that if the Catholic Church ever falls, all the other Christian faiths are coming down like Dominos because those denominations all in some way all come from this one Church, not the other way around. We are not all equal churches, all started by Jesus. Only one was and the others broke from her.

So, its this or nothing... if this proves to be false, that means Christianity is a sham. So where am I gonna go? Leaving is just not an option.

Unfortunately, the part I underlined is not what you said in your original post, which in fact was:

Originally Posted by benedictaoo

I both agree and disagree Charlie. The good Catholics are just disgusted and fed up of all the bull but if they were really good they would stick it out cuz where else they are gonna go?

Its either this Church or none.


​

No reference to you personalising the argument or referring to your situation, and is therefore antagonistic.

The rest of your argument is equally unsuccessful. Believing that Protestant Churches will fail if the Catholic Church does is like saying Toyota will go out of business because Ford no longer manufacture the Model "T".

 

[christseeker45]

I am not sure I am not repeating myself. Maybe the Catholics become Protestants is that they see the joy of Salvation in Protestants. I was thinking that all the Catholics I know there is no joy like there is in my Protestant friends. Most seem to really just blase about being Catholic, but Christians have this joy and they don't use the name of there religion but just say that are a Christian and there is excitement about it.

Te massage are different to between the two. With Catholics you have to do all this stuff and hopefully you may get in if your lucky (may not be real but that is how the message comes across) and Protestants will tell you that Christ done it all and that there is nothing we can do to gain Salvation and the Holy Spirit will come and change a person.

 

[lismore]

Very interesting thread! Thank you all for sharing. Former Catholic here.

One friendly comment. I don't think a lot of Evangelicals/ Charismatics and BACs would be comfortable with the label 'Protestant'.

 

[Michie]

Prot·es·tant

1. A member of a Western Christian church whose faith and practice are founded on the principles of the Reformation, especially in the acceptance of the Bible as the sole source of revelation, in justification by faith alone, and in the universal priesthood of all the believers.
2. A member of a Western Christian church adhering to the theologies of Luther, Calvin, or Zwingli.
3. One of the German princes and cities that supported the doctrines of Luther and protested against the decision of the second Diet of Speyer (1529) to enforce the Edict of Worms (1521) and deny toleration to Lutherans.
4. protestant also (pr

-t

s

t

nt) One who makes a declaration or avowal.
adj. Of or relating to Protestants or Protestantism.

 

[steve_bakr]

I am not sure I am not repeating myself. Maybe the Catholics become Protestants is that they see the joy of Salvation in Protestants. I was thinking that all the Catholics I know there is no joy like there is in my Protestant friends. Most seem to really just blase about being Catholic, but Christians have this joy and they don't use the name of there religion but just say that are a Christian and there is excitement about it.

Te massage are different to between the two. With Catholics you have to do all this stuff and hopefully you may get in if your lucky (may not be real but that is how the message comes across) and Protestants will tell you that Christ done it all and that there is nothing we can do to gain Salvation and the Holy Spirit will come and change a person.

Protestant was a term primarily used by Catholics. Although some Protestants welcomed the term, it is slowly falling out of use. I think the front of the missal uses the term non-Catholics or non-Catholic Christians. I don't recall the CCC ever using the term Protestant; I think it is avoided in order to get passed Reformation language. Most Protestants--there I go using that word again--refer to themselves as Christians or by their denomination--ie., Methodist, etc.

 

[christseeker45]

Kinda of hard to figure what to call em sometimes

 

[Lady Bug]

I am not sure I am not repeating myself. Maybe the Catholics become Protestants is that they see the joy of Salvation in Protestants. I was thinking that all the Catholics I know there is no joy like there is in my Protestant friends. Most seem to really just blase about being Catholic, but Christians have this joy and they don't use the name of there religion but just say that are a Christian and there is excitement about it.

Te massage are different to between the two. With Catholics you have to do all this stuff and hopefully you may get in if your lucky (may not be real but that is how the message comes across) and Protestants will tell you that Christ done it all and that there is nothing we can do to gain Salvation and the Holy Spirit will come and change a person.

the problem is (and I have a huge problem with this) that in some Protestant circles, I get the feeling that we're supposed to exude all this joy and fire and zeal for the Lord and that if you don't, it means that your relationship with God is supposedly not good enough.

 

[MikeK]

Kinda of hard to figure what to call em sometimes

Is "people who choose to believe a truncated, half-true version of Christ rather than the Truth as handed down from Him through the ages" too wordy?