[Sca-cooks] My final word on the Catholicism/Christianity thing

[Tara]

Ok, I'm getting slammed six ways to Sunday here for statements that I've
constantly qualified, so I'm going to state *only* my qualification
again, not the arguments, then not say another word.

I understand that the statements I made were inaccurate.  They are the
arguments that I've heard from *some Protestants* when I myself have
asked questions like "Why don't you consider Catholics to be
Christian?"  I was merely stating the fact that these are the arguments
used, not that I consider them to be anywhere near to airtight.  Nor am
I silly enough to lump all Protestants in together.  They have widely
varying sets of beliefs themselves, as well as being all over the
liberal/conservative scale.

We can argue the fact that these arguments are inaccurate until we're
blue in the face, but you know what?  We're not the ones who need
convincing.  I think it's a safe bet, based on the discussion here, that
the folks on this list aren't the ones going around perpetuating these
misinterpretations.  I've never gone and said these things were
accurate, only that some other people consider them to be true.  I
reported them here because somebody wanted to know why some other people
don't consider Catholics to be Christian.  They are the reasons that
some people absolutely do give, do believe, have told me, and I can't
change that fact just by failing to report it.

As a corollary, I can't make people un-racist by failing to report that
they consider purple polka-dotted people to be subhuman.  *I* know
they're not subhuman, and saying that "that skinhead down on the corner
says they are, and that's why he doesn't like them" doesn't make me
either not like them or proscribe to his belief.  It only means that I
heard him say it once and reported it when someone wondered why "that
skinhead doesn't like purple polka-dotted people."

There are those who will simply not believe that anybody who's beliefs
are really different from them can call themselves Christian like they
do.  This is the real problem we're facing here, and the arguments
themselves are only ways that these people can justify themselves when
people ask.  If you talk to some real hard-line Baptists, they'll
probably tell you that Lutherans, Methodists, Mennonites and especially
Quakers are barely Christian if at all.  It's all a matter of "You're
not like me so you can't be as pious as I am, so you can't be a
Christian and I'll find any argument I can to substantiate that fact."

What makes these arguments most complicated is the fact that all of
them, although they are misinterpretations of fact, have some small seed
in fact.  For instance, Catholics don't worship saints; But, they do
pray to them, which is the same in many people's minds.  Not all
Catholics are discouraged from reading Bibles.  It's certainly common
practice these days.  But, in the past many were discouraged - my father
was 50 years ago.  There's a lot more solid basis for argument for those
who want to believe these ideas than there was for "Jews drink the blood
of Christian babies," and that one was believed for hundreds of years.

-Magdalena