Quoting Ray Brown <ray.brown@...>:
> > My Christian education, however, has been Catholic (Mum's side) and
> > Baptist (Dad's side).
> >
> >> May I ask, tho, how long-standing these parts of the Catholic Catechism
> >> are? It
> >> strikes me as, well, a bit 20th century.
> >
> > Yes, you may. Go ahead :)
>
> This is the post-Vatican II Catechism.
Ah.
> I don't have the Tridentine Catechism. But that was drawn up at the time of
> the Counter-Reformation so probably more euro-centric and inward looking.
>
> I suspect during the Crusades remarks about Muslims were not so charitable.
Both sound highly plausible.
> But I don't want to engage in a "mine church is more charitable than yours"
> or "my church is more faithful to the Bible" type of debate.
Since I'm apparently on the "mine church is less charitable than yours" side of
the debate, I guess I should be thankful!
> Attitudes
> have
> simply changed over the ages; there was a time, e.g. when suicides would
> not
> be buried in consecrated ground because they had committed a "mortal sin"
> by
> killing themselves. But in these more enlightened times we realize suicide
> is not as simple as that - it ain't black and white - and judgment is God'
> s alone.
>
> "He [God] wants everyone to be saved and reach full knowledge of the truth,
> " wrote
> Paul to Timothy [1 Tim. 2:4]. If that's what God wants (and I believe
> Paul is right),
> then that is my wish & hope.
I share that wish and hope. In the meantime, I'm not pretending to actually
_know_ the fate of any given individual after death.
Andreas