what is a roman catholic?

Why do we use the term "Roman Catholic" instead of "Catholic"?


We use the phrase "Roman Catholic" in place of "Catholic" to avoid confusion.

Most Christian faith groups acknowledge the Nicene Creed and thus regard themselves as "Catholic," at least as far as being part of the "catholic and apostolic church." Within any one given faith group, the meaning of the term "Catholic" is relatively clear.


Beliefs of non-Protestant groups:
This essay deals with the cardinal beliefs of Protestant groups. However, Protestants do not form the entirety of Christianity. Consider just two other groups:

It is perhaps ironic that if one considers the very earliest Christian movement -- the Jewish Christians in Jerusalem under the leadership of James the "brother" of Jesus and in the period immediately after Jesus' execution before the arrival of Paul -- they might not be considered Christian by today's standards.

That group apparently did not believe in the Trinity, the deity of Jesus, salvation by grace, or the virgin birth.

They expected that Jesus' second coming would occur sometime in the first century CE, not millennia later.


Roman Catholicism expects its members to believe in a much larger list of cardinal beliefs than is listed above. One example that is not shared by Protestants is the assumption of the Virgin Mary into Heaven at death. Pope Pius XII wrote in Munificentissimus Deus:

"... we pronounce, declare, and define it to be a divinely revealed dogma: that the Immaculate Mother of God, the ever Virgin Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory.


(ya right) and u know this ...because????

Hence if anyone, which God forbid, should dare willfully to deny or to call into doubt that which we have defined, let him know that he has fallen away completely from the divine and Catholic Faith." 13


ck out deu 13..


Worshiping Other Gods

1 If a prophet, or one who foretells by dreams, appears among you and announces to you a miraculous sign or wonder,

2 and if the sign or wonder of which he has spoken takes place, and he says, "Let us follow other gods" (gods you have not known) "and let us worship them,"

3 you must not listen to the words of that prophet or dreamer.

The LORD your God is testing you to find out whether you love him with all your heart and with all your soul.









4 It is the LORD your God you must follow, and him you must revere.

Keep his commands and obey him; serve him and hold fast to him.

5 That prophet or dreamer must be put to death, because he preached rebellion against the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt and redeemed you from the land of slavery;

he has tried to turn you from the way the LORD your God commanded you to follow.

You must purge the evil from among you.




But our site deals with all Christian denominations and all other religions.

To assure clarity and to avoid ambiguity, we use the term "Roman Catholic" when referring to the church headed by the pope in Rome.

We use similar terms (e.g. Evangelical Catholic, Anglo-Catholic) when referring to some other faith groups.

Christianity:
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Beliefs, creeds, history,
practices, trends, relics, etc.


Beliefs: Cardinal Protestant doctrines: Beliefs that many Protestant denominations hold

Specific beliefs: (Creeds. Opinion polls. Topics including abortion, afterlife, atonement, environment, evolution, homosexuality, salvation, sin, virgin birth, etc)

Systems of beliefs: Arminianism, Calvinism, Christian Identity, end time events, etc.

How religions established, changed, and continue to change their teachings on slavery, the role of women, sexual orientation, and other topics

Is compromise possible over homosexuality, or are denominational schisms inevitable?

Hoaxes; Christian "urban legends" Really neat stories of events that never happened



Practices: (Eucharist, Marriage, divorce, baptism, religious identification, speaking in tongues, symbols, past support for slavery, etc.)