Not All Catholics are Like Me - Thank God

I mean it: Thank God that the Roman Catholic Church is just that: Catholic. "Universal." (I mean really universal - but that's for another post, another day.)

The Church isn't geared for one sort of personality. It's not intended for one culture, or one period in history.

The down side of being in an organization that spans so much of time and space is that sometimes it's hard (for me, at least) to find out exactly what the Church teaches about some point that's important to me, here at the dawn of the Information Age, in America.

Whatever I'm concerned about didn't matter a thousand years ago, when half of my ancestors were raiding the other half of my forebears. Odds are that it won't matter a thousand years from now.

It's not that the Church is stuck in the past: Bishops and Archbishops are expected to apply what the Church teaches to local conditions. That's why we have movie reviews today, in America.

About a dozen centuries ago, St. Cuthbert and other bishops of Lindisfarne didn't address social, artistic, and ethical implications of a technology that didn't exist yet. They had other concerns. Vikings, for example, after that 793 incident.

A Really Nice Catholic Blog

Not mine: One called A Catholic Mom in Minnesota. She's doing Lenten reflections this season. Yesterday's mentioned Matthew 18: 21-35. You know: where Peter asks Jesus, "Lord, if my brother sins against me, how often must I forgive him?"

The prayer that wraps up that post ends with "Give me the grace I need to live a holy life. Instill in my heart the constant desire to do Your Holy Will."

From

• "A Lenten Journey"
  A Catholic Mom in Minnesota (March 17, 2009)

There are more "A Lenten Journey" posts in A Catholic Mom in Minnesota - type lenten in her blog's search box (odds are that it's near the top right corner of your screen).