The center of our faith-Jesus 
This statue is a representation of St. 
Anthony and the Child Jesus. 
COMMON MISCONCEPTIONS 
AND MISREPRESENTATIONS
 OF THE CATHOLIC 
FAITH: 

if you want to know what we believe..just 
ask.Here's a run down of a few things 
we DON'T(usually the first to come up)believe. 
What people(everyone BUT us) SAY we believe.

1. We DON'T worship 
statues. We venerate 
the sacred. Simply put: if it has to do 
with God-it's sacred. For instance-scripture 
is sacred. That's why we call *scripture * 
sacred scripture-but we don't worship a 
book. Statues are representations.
Whether it's Jesus or someone who followed 
Jesus. 
I doubt anyone who's Christian would want 
images of Jesus to be destroyed or 
forbidden. A painting of Jesus is a 
representation of Jesus and so is a 
statue. Some people have nativity sets 
at Christmas. That's a set of statues. 
There are knick knacks of angels everywhere 
these days and no one has a fit-but 
that's a representation of angels(not an idol & 
not to be worshipped) 
I doubt very much anyone misunderstands that!
The statue of liberty IS a statue. Do you 
worship the statue of liberty-no,right? 
But the difference is that we venerate 
(not worship)sacred images because they 
ARE sacred- they represent images 
of Jesus or people who followed Him.
 

3.Priests are not forced to be 
celibate- 
unless they're forced to be priests. And 
the Church does not forbid marriage-in 
fact it is a sacrament-but the Church does 
forbid divorce. Most Catholics stay married 
for many many years.
Sound like a Church that forbids marriage?

4. And no,we don't "work" our way into 
heaven.The Church teaches faith and works 
but not faith alone or works alone. 
Our good works are the work of Christ in us- 
and we'd have neither without the grace  
of God. (Sola Gracia)

5. We beleive Sola Verbe Deum-the Word of 
God. Spoken and written. We hear 5 scripture  
readings at every Mass. 
And the Church didn't 
"burn the Bible"(or Bibles)." There was
only one & that was ONLY because it was
a very corrupted version by a heretical  
sect. They taught that suicide and fornication  
were permissible and that Jesus was not God.
That's not just heresy either-that's apostasy! 
And no, we DON'T 'pray to the dead'-that's 
necromancy. We ask for the intercession 
of the saints in heaven(eternal LIFE)and 
for the souls of those who have died.  
Necormany,the occult,seances,fortune telling  
etc. is strictly forbidden. We definitely 
DON'T believe in these things.  
We do know that Jesus said,"God is the God  
of the living,not the dead" to teach that 
there is ETERNAL life-so this is what a 
Catholic does believe. 

6.We DO believe that the Pope is infallible. 
Infallible does NOT mean the Pope is 
sinless,perfect or impeccable.It does 
mean when he speaks re certain matters of  
faith and morals he cannot speak in error-  
we know this from the words of Jesus and 
because the Holy Spirit was sent to guide 
His Church. Scripture says,"the church is  
the pillar and foundation(bulwark)of truth."  
There are other doctrines of the Church we 
can talk about.It will take more time than  
we have here-and we can tell you honestly 
what we DO believe and what we DON'T believe. 
If you want what we don't believe and 
what we do believe
to get confused-go to an anti-  
Catholic 
source. If you want to know what we really 
believe and what we really don't believe 
it might be a good idea to ask someone 
who REALLY does know.  


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