this is real important (former catholics please read)

Hi RDG,

I am a former Catholic, born and raised in an Irish Catholic community in the West of Scotland. All of my education was Catholic and I was married in the Catholic church and they buried my first son. I know well of the issues that you have raised so let me give you my opinion.
Indeed we were well versed in our sinfulness and our guilt, but we were never pointed towards Jesus as the answer, the answer lay with the Sacraments. Repenting to a Catholic means going to confession and then Communion. Communion to a Catholic means a wafer of bread which they claim is Jesus. This Jesus is a counterfeit Jesus and not the Jesus of the Bible, it is the Jesus of transubstantiation, whereby the priest turns the bread and wine into the actual Body and blood of Jesus and then you take Jesus, by taking the wafer, into you.

True repentance comes when we " believe," in Jesus. Now that word in the Greek is way more than the modern day version of giving mental assent to an abstract truth, which every Catholic would certainly do. A Catholic has no problems in saying that they believe Jesus is the Son of God and that He died for our sins. The meaning of the word " believe," is to " trust with ones life." You see the difference? When we come to Jesus in repentance, we are giving Him our whole lives thus becoming born again of the Spirit and we are radically changed. Jesus said those who try and save their lives would lose them, and those who would lose their lives for His sake would gain eternal life. Now He was not talking about physically dying ( although obviously many martyrs down through the ages have been killed for Jesus) He was talking about losing our old lives and gaining a new eternal life in Him. So, when I was born again at the age of 27, the old Frank died, literally, not theologically. So much so that my wife said, who was not a Christian, that she woke up one morning to find a different man in her bed.

Being a Catholic cannot save anyone, nor could being a Baptist or Pentecostal. The only thing that saves is if one is born again by the Spirit of God. When reaching out to Catholics my suggestion is to let them know that Catholicism cannot save them, nor can their sacraments. Take them to John 3 and show them where Jesus says that unless a man or woman is born again they cannot enter the Kingdom of heaven. Then ask them what they think this " born again" means. It is a good starting point and of course all of it has eternal consequences which would not be lost on someone who already mentally assents to the fact that there is a heaven and a hell and an eternity in one or the other. I hope this helps sister..............bro Frank

Hi RDG,

"i think that is the difference and i see that more clearly now. when we come to Jesus we do surrender all and everything, and doing so is such much more then just receiving forgiveness its a promise or understanding that from this day forward i am going to be living daily with Him. its not my wants or desires any more its all about Him. From now on Jesus is Lord and i surrender, submit, and obey no matter what that might look like to the world around me or cost me to self"

Amen sister, indeed. It is all about giving your life over, surrendering to a Holy God and the way that He has so graciously laid down, that way is named Jesus and Him being Lord over your life. Now there are many parts of the Protestant world who could claim that Jesus does not have to be Lord of your life, they are simply wrong.

" i was taught that i was a sinner but i can remember also being told that "its ok, cause God knows, He understands that were human, He will forgive us our sins." while that is all true its has never felt right to me, almost as if the attitude it self gives into the idea that its alright to sin because after all God will forgive you, your just a mere human after all."

This teaching can be found in many places and is the essence of hyper grace and also those who would deny the necessity of Jesus being the Lord of your life. The Catholic answer lies in their sacramental system, mere empty symbolism. By a combination of infant baptism, confession, communion and perhaps the last rites, you could get into heaven. It would depend on how you ranked on the sacramental scale, but in most likelihood most Catholics think they will end up in purgatory. Problem with all of that? It's all a lie. It's a lie that started at the very inception of the Catholic church in 313ad. So many of those who at the time were known as catholics wih a small c had denied Jesus during the greatest persecution of all, the Diocletian persecution. They became known as traidors, similar to our modern word of traitor. Traidor meant " to hand over." Diocletian would spare the life of anyone who denied Jesus and handed over their scriptures to be burned publicly. This is what the majority of catholics did, not only handing over scriptures but also handing over people know as " rigorsts," or " donatists." These brothers and sisters were killed.

After the persecution, there was, of course, a split between those who had stood strong through the persecution and those who had denied Jesus and burned the scriptures. The catholics won the day with the support of Constantine who took over after Diocletian apologized to the Christians and hung himself. The catholic theologians then came up with a theology that covered their denials of Jesus and their burning of Scriptures. The Donatists main point were that these people were unholy and unworthy of ministering to the saints. The Catholics said that it did not matter the state of the minister, only the holiness of God mattered as men were imperfect, therefore those who had denied their faith were allowed to be ministers. This was actually a form of Gnosticism. Needles to say it did not end well for the so called Donatists or rigorists. Just a little history :) ...............bro Frank