[Scared to post] Serious misunderstanding about the Virgin Mary...

very difficult to answer this queston. because it's not something i'm "kinda sure" about. i'm convinced...whether that's delusion or not is for you to decide.

 

i'm not doubting your"sureness". i have no idea if you are delusional and am not judging. what i want to know is that if "truth" ever contradicted your faith, would you be shattered, embarrassed, what?

 

I guess. I can't keep up with it all.

 

understood...i'm quite tired of denominations.

 

i understand...hmmm...it's a hard hypo, because i can't imagine it. it's akin to asking me, "what if you discovered your father wasn't really real...it was all an illusion."

i would be shattered...that's a good word for it. not embarassed. shattered.

 

Yes. My brain was saying one word and my fingers another. Btw, I was not trying to broaden the Catholic/Protestant divide in this thread by bringing up other points of contention. I was just trying to say that Mary isn't the place to start hashing it out.

 

kinda like the end of contact, huh?

 

honestly, i don't remember. but sure.

but it's a fair question...and i won't hide from it. i'm either right or i'm wrong. i'm either right or ultimately, a little bit crazy...delusional even.

 

Only if you take things too literally.

From a Buddhist perspective, we are all delusional.

 

yeah, but i'm not Buddhist.

 

Doesn't mean you can't learn a thing or two.

 

well, if my world got turned upside down like that i think it would be, to use a MadMaxim", awesome. i'd be thinking, wow, what a trip. unless less there was torture or any other unpleasantness involved. then i guess i'd be shattered.

 

but this isn't a theology to me. it's not a study...it's a relationship. it's why the hypo is so difficult for me to grasp to begin with. it's not a belief in something completely unseen or unknown to me. it's not just beliefs..it's experential.

 

okay, it's official, you are delusional

 

fair enough!

 

I've met many a Catholics who would tell me I was going to hell, yet I've never told a Catholic they would. I'm a Baptist, which makes me a "lazy Christian" with very little structure in my worshiping practice. We have communition only a few times a year, we don't go to confession, we don't believe in saints or worshiping the Virgin Mary. In my opinion none of those things are required to enter the kingdom of Heaven and I could care less if you believe you do need to do them, that is between you and God, not me. I am not a judge or jury so I have no clue if these things really trouble God I just know what my faith shows me. I'm dating a Catholic and have been for three years (she also goes to Notre Dame) and we discuss these things constantly. There are a lot of things Catholics do that I don't agree with, but that is why I am a Baptist... but that doesn't mean I think they are wrong or going to hell, it is just not what I've been called to do. I don't see how any Christian group could sit and point fingers at others as long as they believe what is truly important.

 

part of my point is that christians are pulling for a certain reality and outcome. it is easy to draw a conclusion and to rationalize the how and why when you know the what. i have no idea and it took a lot to get this stupid. feels pretty good. you, however, might be setting yourself up for disappointment. or, you might be going to heaven and i to hell. good luck, say hi to mary.

 

how is that different from EVERYONE else? everyone has a religion.

 

Actually, it is much more difficult to have complete faith in something that you can't touch, taste, see or smell then it is to think this life and this body is all there is to it. I know many athiests, agnostics and other "non-religious" people who will openly admit to as much.

 

Growing up Catholic I never witnessed real hostility towards another denomination. They might poke fun but we can do it to ourselves too. But I was a kid and wasn't really "into" it, I just thought Baptists were weird, that's all, and my dad grew up Church of Christ and his family was coc. So to me it seems really one sided. And I know it used to be worse. My mom told me stories of kids getting into fist fights at her school in Arkansas about this stuff. I just chalked it up to being "the olden days". I thought that stuff was long gone until college really. The hosility was suprising. I'm just glad I got out of all of it and found something more suiting for me.

And as a Catholic who went to Church for 20 years every Sunday in tons of different Catholic churches I have never seen anyone worship Mary. Ever.