The Problem:
The Catholic Church promotes
hundreds of hours of Catechesis for
almost every adult Catholic (e.g.,
RCIA, CCD), but most (more than 95
percent?) confirmed Catholics don't
meet the basic requirements. A lack
of Faith is a part of it, but
ignorance is the majority of it. At
no point, are Catholics taught what
is expected.
It can be argued that God is a
relationship (not a bunch of
rules), so meeting the letter of
the law doesn't matter. Let us not
forget, though, that the rules lead
us into the relationship, and
besides that, the Church has an
exact and simple set of basics, the
precepts of the Church, which we
need to learn.
While it might be argued that only
the precepts of the Church are
required, that attitude leaves us
with no guideline to sin or outline
of Faith. As a matter of
practicality, a lot falls between
the cracks when they are not
understood.
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The Test:
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1.
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Ten Commandments: Do
you know the 10 commandments, and
try your best to follow them?
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2.
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Church Precepts: Do you
follow the Precepts of the
Church?
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3.
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Apostles' Creed: Can you
recite the Apostles' Creed, and
do you believe what you are
saying?
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The Results:
Let's start with the short answer. A
"yes" to all three questions is the
Catholic answer, because we would
likely be in a state of grace. Only
an unconfessed mortal sin would
prevent us from being Catholic. From
a legal perspective, the Church has
made it impossible for us to determine
whether we are in a state of grace or
sin, because Jesus is the Judge. We
would never try to be in a state of
grace, unless we were motivated by
the Holy Spirit. If we are making a
sincere effort to be in a state of
grace, then we are very likely a
Catholic.
Apostles' Creed: Most of us
would never stand on some point of
heresy, unless we were led astray by
the modern media. The Church has a
good system for dealing with heresy.
If we take a heretical stand, we will
probably hear about it.
Church Precepts: The precepts
of the Church are rather easy as
well. For the most part, we need to
do the following. We are required to
do these things, but we are
encouraged to do much better.
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1.
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Show Up: We need to go
to Church on Sundays
and
Holy Days. The
Church only has a few
Holy Days which are as
follows (Ascension
is not usually practiced
on Thursday in the United
States, and this list
assumes Roman Rite which
is largest rite by far).
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What
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When
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Mary Mother of God
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January 1st
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Ascension Thurday
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40 days after Easter
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Assumption
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August 15th
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All Saints Day
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November 1st
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Immaculate Conception
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December 8th
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Christmas
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December 25th
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2.
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Don't Divorce: A legal
divorce is okay, but remarriage
is not allowed without an
annulment which is difficult to
get at this time.
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3.
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Do Penance: Healthy adults
have to abstain from meat on
Friday or the equivalent. In
addition, we have to abstain from
meat on Friday during Lent (the 6
weeks between Ash Wednesday and
Easter), and on Ash Wednesday and
Good Friday, we must fast (1 meal
and maybe something else if
needed) and abstain from meat.
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4.
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Confess Sins: Any mortal
sin (impossible to know for sure)
must be confessed. When in doubt,
be devout, and go to confession.
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5.
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Celebrate Easter: We are
required to receive the sacrament
of Eucharist sometime between the
week before Easter (Palm Sunday)
and 8 weeks after Easter (Trinity
Sunday).
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6.
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Be Catholic: We can't be
Catholic unless we consider it
our Church. As we do for our
bodies and families, we provide
for her needs and participate in
her vocation (spreading the news
of Jesus).
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Ten Commandments: The ten
commandments introduce us to the
concept of good and evil. Good things
flourish, and bad things die. For
example, life is created and
nourished through love, but it is
violated and destroyed through sin.
Holiness is so simple, until we try
to practice it (as we shall see in a
moment).
All good things work together. For
example, the precepts of the Church
help us to follow the ten
commandments (and vice versa). All
bad things take us away from God,
because good is an attribute of God.
For example, if we break one of the
commandments, we usually break other
commandments (if not all the
commandments) with the same sin.
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1.
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Order Priorities: We must
put God first in our lives. We
can't say that we are in
compliance as long as we don't
have a golden calf in our
backyard. To say the least, we
all struggle with this
commandment.
Let's just take one of many
examples. Among people who consider
themselves Catholic, about 97% of sexual
acts (
Guttmacher Institute 4-13-11) are
frustrated with contraception,
but sex is a procreative (not
recreative) act. It's one thing
to succumb to temptation, but we
make the offense much more
serious when we systematically
put our sexual appetites before
God. We might think that we are
getting away with something, but
we are not fooling our appetites.
If we don't get our appetites
right before we meet God, we are
not going to be attracted to God.
We need to remember that sin is
not good. In the first place,
mutual masturbation is a poor
simulation of charitable sex. On
top of that, frustrated sex
makes the partners more selfish
(because the whole point of
masturbation is to satisfy
selfish sexual appetites),
whereas real sex draws the lovers
into the charity of their
vocation (children change
everything thing which includes
our appetites).
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2.
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Respect God: Imagine a
married couple that doesn't
respect each other. How long
would that last? One "ugly witch"
remark would damage the
relationship. At the very least,
an "I'm sorry" would be required.
God is much more than marriage,
and the respect is just as
important. We need to watch our
mouth.
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3.
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Show Up: We can't have a
relationship with God if we don't
take time for the relationship
with the Church. God manifests
Himself through the Church, we
can't be distant to the Church
and close to God. Our
relationship to the Church is our
relationship with God.
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4.
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Respect Parents:
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5.
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Don't Kill: We can't kill
other people.
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6.
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Respect Families: We
should help other families, and
we definitely should not mess
them up by committing adultery.
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7.
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Don't Steal:
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8.
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Don't Lie:
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9.
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Avoid Lust: The sixth
commandment tells us no, and this
one tells us to not even think
about it. As Jesus pointed out,
if you are thinking about it, you
are already exercising your
appetites.
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10.
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Avoid Envy: The seventh
commandment tells us not to
steal, and this commandment tells
us to not even want something
that is not ours.
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If all of this seems like a lot
of rules that we are not
inclined to follow, then our
relationship with the Divine is
certainly sagging and maybe
missing. Very few of us are
motivated by legality, but all
of us respond to love. We can
change everything by going to
Church and making friends. If we
are still doing poorly or we
simply want to do better (we
should!), we need to add a
personal prayer time. As we
progress through the spiritual
journey, everything else will
fall into place.
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