Are you in love with your Catholic faith and why or did you banish it from your life?

Never was a Catholic. I was a Christian until I realized the whole thing is ridiculous. The philosophies are good but seem to be mostly ignored now.
I do miss it from time to time.

I was a good little Catholic boy who believed blindly, because my strict Irish Catholic mother raised us that way. But when I learned about the “Big Bang” theory, I began to think that somebody was lying to me. I began extensive research of the subject and soon determined that the Catholic church, and all other religions, must be the liar.

Most of them don’t think they’re lying @kritiper. They really belive the nonsense.

@Dutchess_III Hell, I know that! And it blows my mind!

They are terrified not to believe. That’s the worst part of this whole “God loves you sooooo much” scheme.

Fun fact: the big bang theory was formulated by a Catholic priest.

love isn’t exactly the correct emotion or reaction. Having been reared in the faith, there are powerful feelings of “home” to the rituals and mumbo jumbo. And it’s something you never really escape. Anyone indoctrinated in the faith from childhood knows exactly what I’m talking about. You walk into any Catholic church and the smell of decades of incense permeates the walls, pews, carpets, whatever. You can sleepwalk your way through that Church in a coma. If your right arm fell off, it would still reach for that holy water font, then make the sign of the cross on your forehead, chest and shoulders while your knee genuflects in the center aisle. The drill is imprinted, whether you practice it or not. The Church for me is like Santa. I have fond and warm memories from the days when I didn’t know any better, but he’s never coming down that chimney, and no prayer is going to change that.

I’m not Catholic, but I have many Catholic friends who love being Catholic. It’s part of their identity, not just their religious belief. They like the rituals, and the familiarmess of being in their church. For my MIL I think it brings her sanity, order, and peace to her life. She is very religious, she listens to the rosary and mass daily on TV, and goes to church on Sundays, and goes to church when she unhappy. Her religion is like a friend in a way. She leans on it.

I’m an ex-Catholic. I don’t agree with the church, how the church is run, the ethos of the church, their attitude towards women and LGBT. There is also no proof or evidence to back up the belief system of any form of Christianity (Catholicism included). So being an atheist just makes more sense for me.

I was brought up catholic. My sisters told me that Santa wasn’t real when I was about 7 or 8. I was shocked that my parents had lied to me. I then thought – what else have they lied about? Well that god and jesus stuff is pretty unbelievable. And so the atheist emerged. I think the catholic church has a lot to answer for as @NerdyKeith says. And what is all that celibacy about? Fine if you choose to not have sex but to say it’s against the religion? So damaging.

Mom was born and raised Catholic in a predominantly Irish family. However, when she married my father the church ostracized her because he was a “Bleedin’ C of E” so my association with the church was spotty at best. We attended services with family but Mom says it was always uncomfortable for her so we only did it on High Holy Days (or whatever the Catholic equivalent to that is). Things like Easter, Lent and Midnight Mass. After we moved to Texas I can probably count on one hand the number of times I attended a Catholic church with her.
My wife was a cradle Catholic and remained so for many years. Both our kids were christened in the Catholic church, my son over the objections of an Irish Priest who was the head of that particular church (actually his objections were with me but that is a story for another time) and they both attended church almost every Sunday. I was guilted into attending about once a month.
About two decades ago she was sitting in church when she realized she completely disagreed with what the priest was espousing and the more she thought about it, the more found she disagreed with. Finally she decided that she could no longer attend and pretend. To her is was a very misogynistic and exclusionary religion.
She thought about going with the Episcopalian church but after a couple of services decided they were for all intents and purposes just the same. (“Same Great Religion with only Half The Guilt!”)
After that she made noises about trying out the Unitarian Church because several friends who were members were very happy with the inclusiveness of their church and they were much more compatible in thought, temperment and ideals than the people we knew through the Catholic church. But, she never made a serious effort and I had no interest so here we are today: Religionless.

I found singing and kneeling embarrassing . I only turn to priests for advice .

I was raised in a Fundy Protestant family. But my folks weren’t the in your face Bible thumping type. I realized from early adolescence that none of the Bible stuff had ever made sense to me. When I finally admitted to my parents that, if not atheist, I was at minimum an agnostic, to their great credit, they gave me no grief about it. For my own part, I decided that the least I could do was return the tolerance and respect I had been shown, by never openly critiquing the Bible or religion, at any rate not in front of my parents and their churchy friends. As I entered adulthood, I learned from this, and adopted a live and let live attitude towards things spiritual. Just don’t preach to me or thump a Bible in my face, and I will alow you to indulge In your religious fantasies unmolested.

I haven’t completely banished it from my life because it ties me to my family and my upbringing, so I don’t desire to completely banish it, even if I don’t consider myself to necessarily be “a Catholic” anymore. As I grew up, my religious beliefs became more idiosyncratic. I found that I can’t just be a member of a religion and follow a set of stringent rules and customs; I have my own spiritual beliefs that sometimes mesh with organized religion, and sometimes don’t.

My Mom was raised Catholic. However, when I was about 7, and my sisters were 4 and 3, she received a letter from the Catholic church saying they did not recognize her marriage to my father because he’d been married before, briefly, right after high school. It lasted about 6 months. I think she was excommunicated….and somebody must have told on her her, the asshole.
I remember her ranting, “I’ve been married to the man for 10 years, have had 3 of his children and they don’t recognize it??” It was so ludicrous that she just washed her hands of The Church, although she remained a Christian. She attended four-square churches in the Pacific Northwest after she left us all.

After she slipped in to dementia she took a great deal of comfort from the Catholic rituals of her childhood, even started going to a Catholic church again, for the reasons @stanleybmanly said. It was familiar and comfortable.

When she died my sister took over the funeral preparations, rejecting all offers of help from me. She converted to Catholicism when she married her husband. She had the funeral in a Catholic church. It had all the warmth of reading a recipe for fried chicken. It was so cold and impersonal.
At one point the priest was walking around, mumbling to himself in Latin, swinging some sort of incense lamp about, streaming smoke behind him.
THEN he offered Mass! I turned to my cousin in a bit of panic asking if we were allowed to take Mass. She whispered back, with wide eyes, that she didn’t know either. Man. We didn’t want to screw up at my mother’s funeral!
The whole thing sucked. It was sooo medieval and magical and weird. I expected to hear demons groaning.
Afterward my cousins and I were talking and asking, “What the hell was that all about?”