Passing on the faith . . .

Matthew Warner of Fallible Blogma has an excellent post on passing on the faith.

He discusses the question which is often debated, whether or not parents should pass on their faith to their children.

I know it's not much debated by those who practise their faith but I've heard arguments from non-practising friends and family members about the 'damage' done to children by parents 'indoctrinating' them from an early age.

As Matthew says, it seems obvious that if you believe something to be true and valuable then naturally you wish to share that with your children as parents obviously wish the best their sons and daughters.

He draws a comparison between teaching children road safety and providing them with healthy food etc. and passing on the faith.

I remember when our children were born, hearing some friends say, 'we're not going to have our child baptised, we want him/her to have the freedom to choose whether or not to be a Catholic (or anything else) and be baptised when they are older.

Call me dense, but I can't understand how anyone can make an informed decision about anything if they have no prior experience or knowledge about it.

I put these sort of remarks in the same category as, 'We don't believe in taking children to Mass until they're old enough to know how to behave in church.'

What amazing children they must be, I think, if they are suddenly able to understand what's happening in the liturgy and respond appropriately on their first visit to church when they're about five years old.

Religious doctors may allow their faith to influence care of terminally ill - I should hope so! . . .

Some days, or weeks even, I don't seem to do, hear or see anything that I particularly want to blog about but today, I seem to be spoilt for choice. To mention just a few of the items that I thought I might comment on; we have the 100th birthday celebrations of Mother Teresa, the memorial of the Passionist Priest, Blessed Dominic of the Mother of God, the birth of David and Samantha Cameron's daughter, and even the fantastic result in the Spurs Champions League match last night!

But, no, what caught my attention primarily was an item on the BBC News website about the possible influence of faith on doctors in their care of the terminally ill. I would have expected it to be a factor and was surprised that it should be considered 'news' or a surprise to many people.

"Doctors with religious beliefs are less likely to take decisions which could hasten the death of those who are terminally ill . . ." according to a study of nearly 4,000 doctors by London University. Well, good for them!

The article contains some interesting statistics too such as;

"More than 12% of the doctors surveyed described themselves as very or extremely religious, compared with just over 6% of the UK general population . . . However one in five described themselves as very or extremely non-religious, slightly higher than the general population."

"Specialists in the care of the elderly were more likely to be Hindu or Muslim than other doctors, while palliative care doctors were slightly more likely to be white and Christian."

An interesting article and worth a further look here.

One of the plus-es of being a convert . . .

Something I read today on Dominic Mary's blog 'Libera Me' really struck a chord with me and made so much sense.

He, like me, is a convert and also a former Anglican. He refers to a comment made my Ann Widdecombe in her foreword to 'The Path to Rome' about the statement of faith made by converts at their reception into the Church.

As an adult convert, when I was received into Full Communion with the Catholic Church, I had to make a profession of faith, not only by reciting the Creed as we all do every Sunday but also by stating my belief that what the Church teaches is revealed truth.

That is quite different to those who have always been Catholics, the so-called 'Cradle Catholics', and may explain in part why some Catholics don't seem to have a problem with disregarding or not accepting certain parts of Catholic teaching. They may not have looked at their faith in this way and have never had to confirm their acceptance of the truth of the Church's teaching.

I've never thought of it in this way before, but of course they have never had to actually stand up and state their belief in the Church's teaching in the same way as I had to as an adult.

We probably all find certain aspects of the Church's teaching difficult at times and there are things that we don't like or even disagree with BUT I am reminded of that Easter Vigil more than 20 years ago when I had to stand up in front of everyone and make my profession of faith including my assent to the teachings of the Church and I personally find that very helpful.

How did that happen? . . .

I have somehow managed to get my blog listed on the Catholic Blog Directory. Not to be confused with British Catholic Blogs. Now, I don't know how this happened but I have to admit to being quite flattered that somebody would consider including this little blog.

I'm curious to know how this happens. Do they have someone who keeps on an eye on all new blogs looking out for Catholic ones? I can't imagine that, somehow. Or, is it just a case of someone spotting your blog on someone else's blogroll or a reference on another blog to yours.

As I've mentioned before, I didn't set out to make this a particularly 'Catholic ' blog but as I am a practising Catholic, from time to time I do comment on aspects of my faith and I hope also that sometimes my faith is apparent in some of the other things I comment on. We shouldn't after all 'compartmentalise' our faith so it should be apparent in everything we do, shouldn't it?

Thanks to whoever is responsible. Why not go and have a look at the list and investigate some of the blogs that might be new to you too.

Wow, I'm a sidebar 'non-ebrity' !

I think it's a shame when a blog just disappears into the ether. I noticed the other day that Fr John Boyle has resurrected his blog, 'South Ashford Priest', or at least, was considering doing just that so I decided to post what I saw as an encouraging comment.

Lo and behold, the next time I looked to see if he'd taken the plunge or not, he'd very kindly added this little blog to his sidebar. Now I'm sure I don't deserve to be up there with the 'great and the good' and the likes of Fr Tim Finigan himself, but thank you, Fr John, for the thought.

I'm new to this blogging lark and whilst I enjoy it immensely, I'm never quite sure where blogs like mine 'fit in.' Yes, I'm a practising Catholic but I only refer to my faith from time to time on the blog and it originally started out as more of an online family newsletter.

I suppose that if you're trying to live your Catholic faith, it should and does permeate all aspects of your life so it's almost inevitable that references to your faith will 'creep' into your blog. I've certainly noticed it happening to me more and more, this blog seems to be developing a life of its own!

Could be worse ....

It could be worse, I suppose - at least it only says 'There's probably no God'! Mind you, this is known as the Atheist's bus advert and I would have thought this is more of the Agnostic's bus advert.

The other thing is - why does not believing in God mean that you don't need to worry? I think that my belief in God means that I don't need to worry. After all, if we believe in God, we trust him to look after us and that whatever is put before us in life comes from Him, don't we?

Anyway, with one son an atheist and two brothers who are keen bus enthusiasts at least this post will appeal to almost all my readers!!