A few Louisiana Catholic Blogs and Sites to Look at

Fr. Victor Brown’s Catholic Daily Message is becoming quite a treat to visit. Even though the good father is in Texas now he will always be a Louisiana guy I bet. He has a post up on the Feast of St James the Greater(my Patron Saint) that we celebrated few days ago. I hate to say it but the day passed without me realizing it. I so much would have liked to have gone to mass on that day. If I had been praying my Liturgy of the Hours like I should have that would not have been a problem. Anyway he also hits on the Church'es recent clarification on what is the "Church" and talks about Apostolic succession.


Catholic Tube has a nice vid up by an Catholic Apologist that debunks the Catholics treat Mary as God myth.

Full Circle has a several good post up. This one is about the Sacraments and especially marriage. I want to point something out as to his observations. He comes from the Episcopal Church tradition. How often have I heard that Episcopals and Catholics basically believe the same things. Well of course that is nonsense. Don't get me wrong there is a lot I respect about the Episcopal Church. In fact I find that we are often have a common vocabulary and even outlook at times. But his post just show that yes there are substantial differences.

Before I swam the Tiber, the first exposure I had to Liturgy and any sort of "Catholic" tradition was at a Episcopal Church and through my very devout Episcopal neighbors. I can still remember the night I went with them to Church . It was Holy Week. I went all week with them to services. Something special happened that week and it was the first part of my journey that led me to the Catholic Church .

I would like to point out this part of what Full Circle said :
I found that whether or not we believed the contents of the "39 Articles" was really up to us. I could hold a sacramental belief about marriage. I further found this difference in belief also included our beliefs on the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist which we found differed in the church from actual belief in the Catholic doctrine all the way to those who believed it no more than bread and wine.To me this was even more bothersome. The Eucharist either IS or it IS NOT Christ.

That is so true. My neighbors had a very Catholic/Orthodox understanding of the Real Presence. In fact if one goes to a service chances are that everyone is kneeling at the altar rail in a devout manner to receive. Thus to the Catholic looking on it appears that everone is agreement. However, like Full Circle, I came to realize that one could have a full range of belief from Catholic to basically baptist as to that. I found that disturbing. A wife of a Priest told me that her husband was doing nothing special on the altar. Wow!!! In Louisiana I tend to believe that the majority have a more real presence Catholic view. But what if I went to Arkansas or Kansas? I have to say the discovery that one could have several different views and it was all ok pretty much put a dead end for me going down the Anglican road at that point. Note at that point, I had not decided if something was happening or not. But I recognized it as too important for it to be so sort of so up in the air.

For instance every Episcopal Church I have been too has open communion. That basically means that if you are baptized you are invited to take communion. However what if a person is in serious sin? Do Episcopals believe that one is eating and drinking damnation upon oneself if they receive the body and blood in a unworthy state like St. Paul teaches? Should they not be aware of what they may be receiving? President George Bush is now a Methodist. However he is a regular communicant at St John's Episcopal Church right across from the White House. Does he have a Methodist view or a more High Church Anglican view of what he is receiving? When the Priest says to President Bush "The Body of Christ" and "Blood of Christ" and he answers AMEN what is he amening too? Amen means it is so or So be it; truly . Does it matter? I think it does.