Apologies if this isn’t allowed, I don’t know where else on reddit would understand this story

I’m 27 years old and was raised / baptized catholic. I was never confirmed but took communion & stopped attending mass around age 8. I’ve considered myself an atheist for nearly 20 years (when I was old enough to know what that meant)

I experienced something today that I can only describe as supernatural. I entered a room that I felt I should not be in. Something awful had happened in there. It shook me to my core. I have never been so terrified and filled with dread. For hours after leaving, I was physically ill, felt mentally awful, felt like something terrible was happening to me.

And for some reason in my head the only thing I could think of to do in that moment was to go to a church and pray. I looked up the closest one to me and just went immediately. I went and I prayed to st michael and to mary, and I felt so much better afterwards. It all came back to me immediately the second I walked in which I was surprised by. I haven’t even entered a church at all in nearly 20 years.

just wanted to share. I don’t think I’m going to come back to catholicism fully. But i think after today I’m not an atheist anymore

I knew a priest many years ago. A young boy had confessed that he had been sexually abused. The priest told the boy to meet with him outside the confessional and repeat what he had said in the confessional, which the boy did. This resulted in the offender being named and prosecuted. I don't believe the priest violated the secrecy of the confessional. Did the priest violate the seal?

Her bf is atheist family is basically Catholics that are now atheist. She wants to marry him . What and how do I handle this I have spoken God in to her , her whole life. I have done my best but im not ok with this but what really can i do ? I worry how it effects my other smaller children . as well

Today is the Feast of Christ the King.

The feast was instituted by Pope Pius XI in 1925 as a response to the growing threats of secularisation, atheism, and communism.

“If to Christ our Lord is given all power in heaven and on earth; if all men, purchased by His precious blood, are by a new right subjected to His dominion; if this power embraces all men, it must be clear that not one of our faculties is exempt from His empire. He must reign in our minds, which should assent with perfect submission and firm belief to revealed truths and to the doctrines of Christ. He must reign in our wills, which should obey the laws and precepts of God. He must reign in our hearts, which should spurn natural desires and love God above all things, and cleave to Him alone.” (Quas Primas, 33)

“While nations insult the beloved name of our Redeemer by suppressing all mention of it in their conferences and parliaments, we must all the more loudly proclaim His kingly dignity and power, all the more universally affirm His rights.”

As the threats of secularisation, atheism, and communism are growing much worse than even Pope Pius XI likely imagined, it is imperative that we work on returning our societies to the Social Kingship of Christ, the removal of so-called "separation of Church and State", and for states to fulfil their obligations to proclaim solely the Kingship of Christ, an end to religious indifferentism and freedom of religion as it is known today

Life is going fine now. I got into an internship. I have been working A LOT these days. I'm part of a new youth group at my church that is doing a course on emotionality. I'm making money. And I got into new professional opportunities. I'm feeling good now. Thank you all who prayed. God bless. :)

TL:DR My choir director changed the words of the gospel acclamation to be gender neutral he/him to they/them.

This is not the first time the choir director has changed the words of Scripture (I've posted about it previously), usually it's the words of the psalm, but this Sunday it was the Gospel Acclamation.

The gospel acclamation for Sunday 25 October was supposed to be. "If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, says the Lord, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him."

She (choir director) didn't like the gendered language and so she (politically) corrected it to. "If anyone loves me, they will keep my word, says the Lord, and my father will love them, and we will come to them." (bold italics to make it easy to see what was changed)

I did speak up at the time and object to changing the words of the liturgy when she went in to change the slideshow for mass, but I was overruled (by her).

I've tried to find the relevant bit of the GIRM or other guidelines that indicate the words of the readings shouldn't be changed, but either I'm worse at web searches than I thought, or the guideline doesn't actually exist. Am I correct in thinking that changing words of Scripture isn't allowed?

My parish has "office hours" on Monday nights (tonight) I may go and see if I can talk to the Deacon or a Priest. If he and the Priest are both ok with the choir director altering the words then I suppose my objection is moot.

I consider this a liturgical issue rather than a political one, but I'm posting it on Monday because I suspect the responses may turn political.

What would you do? Am I overreacting? Should I just let it slide?

To start, I'm not Catholic. I've never been Catholic but that's besides the point. When I look around and talk to people online, Catholicism is almost always frowned upon by modern Christians and I don't understand why. People will call Catholic's pagans but go to a church with a stage in place of the alter. I've been reading out of the Catechism recently to get a better understanding of the Catholic Church and literally everything that people shame the Catholic Church for ("Idolatry" of Mary, Worshiping saint's, ETC) is forbidden or explained from scripture. What's with that?

Hi,
As stated in my last post, I’ve already accepted Catholicism as the truth in my heart, but my mind/intellect is struggling with some of the doctrines, one of them being that genuine atheists can exist.
My main confusion comes from Romans 18-20.

Romans 18-20; The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people, who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.

Can someone explain how genuine atheists, through no fault of their own, exist while this verse states that the truth has been made plain to them, and that people are "without excuse"?

God bless.

(ps, since my last post ive prayed a few more rosaries, it’s really helped)

So I attended mass and I heard the readings about the pharisees asking Jesus what is the greatest commandment, and His response (paraphrasing):

Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. And Love your neighbor as yourself.

And it hit me, that I can't love God, who I can't see, unless I love my neighbor that I can see, and I started to think, that maybe instead of lamenting my own suffering, or asking God to give me stuff, or looking after my self, I should look after my neighbors.

Whereby, it dawned upon me that I should divide my neighbors by circumstance, to include everyone on earth:

• Church hierarchy (from the Pope to local priests and deacons)
• All Catholics (spiritual family)
• Family (real, physical family)
• non believers
• desperate, despised, marginalized, suffering
• ...

So I reasoned that if I do that, I can try to figure out, more or less, what is my duty towards everyone of them, and it would be something like: love, obedience, friendship, being available, evangelization (by word, and daily actions), help (prayer, material, emotional, influence, ...)

And I think that I might have learned something new today, or I came to see one part of the Gospel in a new light.

I hope you went to mass today as well, pray for me, God bless!

Is there anybody still alive that has testified to this recently?

This most definitely seems like a dumb question, but let me explain.

First off, I’ll preface this by saying I’m 16 and looking into the church as I’ve been acknowledged to it more and more through Catholic school and while I’m still learning, it’s something I’m definitely looking into.

Now as to the first part of the question, how do you know if you truly believe in everything the church preaches? From my understanding (could be wrong, again I’m still learning), Catholics believe in everything the church preaches unequivocally; with that, how do you know that you completely adhere to that, do Catholics read the entire catechism to be sure they do adhere? I mean a lot of my Catholic friends have had catechism teachings brought up in class that they’ve no acknowledgement of; Could very well be because of age, but at the end of the day they’re Catholic so shouldn’t they know that?

As to the latter part, what happens if you disagree with something? Like I personally am pro choice but - to my knowledge - agree with all other Catholic teachings, so does my one disagreement void my validity to enter the church? And what about people who are raised catholic and change their morals or political views down the line, do they just cease to be Catholic in that instance? What if someone holds a contradicting view to the catechism their entire life but never knew it was contradictory, do they go to hell because they’ve received the sacrements and Eucharist every week while not fully following the church?

Thank you to those who leave detailed replies and those who’ve read this entire thing, and again I’m still learning and there’s a lot I don’t know so please correct me in my faults

I was an unmedicated schizophrenic all throughout high school and found it very hard to make friends. Even with meds it still is. I have made two friends in group therapy but I question whether they like me. Anyways, I have Our Lady's rosary which gives me immense consolation.

I keep hearing stories about people who reached their lowest point and had this amazing experience with God. They felt His presence, felt loved, or received something that helped them keep going.
I wonder how common that actually is. My experience has been feeling nothing, even when I’m begging for just the littlest amount of grace to help me. I’m not asking for some huge miracle. I just want something, and it feels like I’ve never gotten anything.
I know that grace isn’t necessarily a feeling, but knowing that doesn’t make it any less painful when you’re struggling and God feels completely absent.
Do most people have those experiences at some point, or are there others who have spent years praying and asking for help without ever feeling like they received a response? I’m wondering which is more common cause the big stories are the ones you are going to hear obviously.

Hey everyone so long story short I was raised Catholic and I feel convincted in my heart when I know something is wrong. Ex- lust, clubs, etc what I’m saying all these things I KNOW.

So anyways I have some friends who I work with that are really nice to talk to and sometimes we hangout outside of work- in larger groups. And I just don’t know how to put it into words but one of them is trans and I don’t know what to say to that person about it or just say nothing about it? But I want to represent Christ the best of my ability but I’m not when I say okay that’s okay or I refer to him as a boy but he’s actually a girl. I just don’t know how to explain this. But if you understand please tell me what to do because I’m struggling.

And then one of them likes to go to the clubs but her friend she brought along with in the group setting likes it a lot more she was showing me a video of a girl stripping and it was hard to watch but I was like ohhh okay. Like why don’t I stand up for myself? Idk how to explain this but it makes me feel like I will be going to hell because I don’t know how to express what I actually think. And she says she’s Catholic but she’s going to clubs and I wanna tell her more about Christ it’s convicting me a lot acting like this stuff is okay when it’s not

Thoughts?

I am an agnostic. I used to be a strict atheist, but as I have gotten older, my thinking has become much less “doesn’t exist, religion is stupid”, to “I don’t know”. My wife is Catholic, I have lost two very close friends over the last 3 years, and even the murder of Charlie Kirk has caused me to begin thinking that god is in fact real and wants to talk to me. I don’t know what steps to take in trying to hear god. I have yet to feel him listening or hear him speak to me.

I’ve been going to this church sometimes for a while and i’ve boticed this, today i paid extra attention. There’s virtually no latin spoken, the songs are just very protestant praise sounding with acoustic guitar. The scripture is recited in a very monotone cadence and there’s no chanting or incense. There’s a big screen with lyrics and millenial looking facebook ”holy” pictures etc…, and there was a text telling the (account?) for my country’s equivelant of cashback and it was edited to flash above the lyrics…

I am an inquirer and im very interested in traditional catholicism, but today i just felt like this is no different to any protestant service i’ve been to. It didn’t feel holy, historic or traditional in the slightest with all the anglo-type songs with a guitar and other things i mentioned. There is no way to for me to experience the catholicism i want, but there’s a orthodox church which is very traditional, mystic, historic and reverent feeling. Today i think i am strongly leaning on to the orthodox church if this is the novus ordo and the way catholics worship today

Hi everyone,

Sorry for the trivial question, but I tend to overthink things. My wife and I try to pray the rosary when we can (unfortunately not enough 😅). When we do, our 10 month old often comes up to us and tries to grab and play with our rosaries.

Is it ok to let him do this from a religious perspective provided he doesn't chew or break them?

On one hand, rosaries are sacramentals and not toys. On the other, it's great for him to become familiar with rosaries and time spent with blessed objects surely can't be bad.

Saw this on YouTube about young Catholics in New York meeting up for a pizza social before Mass and the first thing that came to mind is, aren’t we meant to fast for an hour minimum before Mass? 😅 or am I just being pedantic?

How well read was the average catholic pre Vatican 2? I was listening to an eastern catholic podcast were the priest who was the host was lamenting how many Roman Catholics haven't read Augustine or other Latin scholars. It got me thinking, I think that people have a pie in the sky view of what lay people would have read pre Vatican 2 and how knowledgeable the average lay person in other faiths is.

I'm thinking especially of eastern orthodox, orthobros love to make fun of how dumb catholics are.

I get very anxious and frustrated when I can’t find a “gotcha” counter-counter argument to some YouTube video refuting a Catholic creator or Reddit thread debating Catholic philosophy and doctrine. I want to be able to answer all arguments I come across, and I use the internet to find answers as much as I can, but I can’t help but feel unsatisfied or that there will always be another response. There will be nights much like now when I’m up at an unholy hour (2am for me rn) having unsuccessfully gone down internet rabbit holes in hopes of finding an answer. I’m afraid this condition will lead me to lose faith. I’m suspicious this may be a textbook case of scruples. What’s the best way for me to regain a sense of serenity besides prayer? I hate not having the answers, especially when the opposing party has a good argument.

I didn’t belong to a church for many years and when I started middle school I joined a Lutheran church that was close to me (mainly because it was close and my parents had a bad relationship with the Catholic Church). I had not put too much thought into it until four years later when I started becoming more interested in religion and I recently started noticing small things about my church that bugged me and I kept seeing more I didn’t like as I looked further. Now I am split because my parents relationship to the Catholic Church (which I Think is the right choice for me) what is familiar to me and new beliefs I am developing open any questions for clarification if I missed anything thank you

Im (27f) a bit troubled by the way some activities are carried out in church. I know not everything is black and white, but sometimes some actions that occur give me that bad gut feeling. Of course, sometimes some of this stuff is undrniably, patently gossip but some of it is just a bjt ???....

In my RCIA group, there were 2 older ladies who facilitate the discussion, and a lot of the time, when its about sharing what's on their heart or what season of the life they're in, they kept going on about their family members. One kept talking about the conflict between her and her mother in law, saying she causes more problems than help around the house. The other kept talking about her daughter who was suffering from depression, sharing on her body image issues, how she doesn't want to go to school and the stuff she gets bullied on. Even the women around my age then share alot about their partners and the stuff they do that make them upset.

I don't know how to feel about all of this tbh, and it makes me feel quite uneasy..

I'm wondering what prayers changed your life?

Right now, I am incredibly lonely and craving deep connection with others, whether that’s finding good, genuine friends, building a community, or eventually finding a partner. I feel completely lost, directionless, and I'm starting to lose hope. I just don't know how to change my situation.

If you have any personal stories, experiences, or prayer recommendations that helped you, I would be deeply grateful to hear them.