I would like to think that every week starts on Sunday instead of Monday. That way, I can avoid the proverbial ‘Monday blues’ by celebrating the start of a brand new week every Sunday. It’s obvious why Sunday is a day worth giving praise for.
I have often wondered how many people are crazy enough to attend 2 churches in a single day. The answer is quite a lot, apparently. The lot of us. Anyway, this Roman Catholic church in Bukit Batok was certainly an eye-opening experience for me. The worshipping of Mary as a saint was one thing I couldn’t understand. Coming from 10 years of Catholic schooling, I have grown accustomed to being ignorant about the practices of the catholic faith. In fact, I found them annoying to a large degree, partly due to the school making the students stand through 10 repetitions of the rosary dedicated to Mary during morning assembly. As a result, I was already extremely prejudiced towards the catholic faith, even before I stepped into the church.
However, over the course of the service, I found it hard to remain antagonistic as there were many parallels I could draw to Christianity. There were several practices that were questionably different in general, but apart from that, the Word that was preached was surprisingly sound. This was more that I could say for certain churches that claim to preach the Gospel but end up drawing hordes of people with their focus on abundant blessings related to material gains.
As Christians, we must be able to discern the truth from false teachings to some degree. Despite my disapproval of catholic methods, I went home feeling significantly less enmity towards my catholic friends. While we may not share the same views on certain subjects, in the end, I am heartened by the realisation that the spread of God’s Word was more than what I previously imagined it to be.
As Romans 10:9, Romans 10:12-13 and Ephesians 2:8-9 mentions, the criteria for salvation is simple (but not easy!). As long as we acknowledge that there is only one God (and that He is the same for both Christianity and Catholicism), everything else that we do differently is trivial and shouldn’t prevent us from ostracising and judging one another, just like I did.
I have often wondered how many people are crazy enough to attend 2 churches in a single day. The answer is quite a lot, apparently. The lot of us. Anyway, this Roman Catholic church in Bukit Batok was certainly an eye-opening experience for me. The worshipping of Mary as a saint was one thing I couldn’t understand. Coming from 10 years of Catholic schooling, I have grown accustomed to being ignorant about the practices of the catholic faith. In fact, I found them annoying to a large degree, partly due to the school making the students stand through 10 repetitions of the rosary dedicated to Mary during morning assembly. As a result, I was already extremely prejudiced towards the catholic faith, even before I stepped into the church.
However, over the course of the service, I found it hard to remain antagonistic as there were many parallels I could draw to Christianity. There were several practices that were questionably different in general, but apart from that, the Word that was preached was surprisingly sound. This was more that I could say for certain churches that claim to preach the Gospel but end up drawing hordes of people with their focus on abundant blessings related to material gains.
As Christians, we must be able to discern the truth from false teachings to some degree. Despite my disapproval of catholic methods, I went home feeling significantly less enmity towards my catholic friends. While we may not share the same views on certain subjects, in the end, I am heartened by the realisation that the spread of God’s Word was more than what I previously imagined it to be.
As Romans 10:9, Romans 10:12-13 and Ephesians 2:8-9 mentions, the criteria for salvation is simple (but not easy!). As long as we acknowledge that there is only one God (and that He is the same for both Christianity and Catholicism), everything else that we do differently is trivial and shouldn’t prevent us from ostracising and judging one another, just like I did.
Benedict Cheong
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