Something Amazing About Grace

Are we hypocrites?

Do we willingly dish out advice without taking a dose of it ourselves?

It is very easy to opine and tell the people of Israel to make peace with a terrorist organization like Hamas even though Hamas makes no secret that it wishes to destroy Israel.

Yet when have we Christians lived and embraced real peace?

Sure we may not throw rockets at each other or strap bombs to our bodies because someone is from a different denomination. We instead throw words around with never a thought that we will be held accountable for what comes out of our mouths or face the fact that we too can hate with a smile.

How can we preach peace and yet in our hearts we may detest our Seperated Brethren? Whatever denomination they may be?

Whenever the song Amazing Grace is sung there are many Catholics who cringe away from singing this particular hymn as it is simply 'too protestant' for them. This word is spoken as if it were a disease with a 'oh you mustn't say this prayer or sing that hymn lest you be thought Protestant.'

I can remember attending a seminar where a Baptist Minister stated that the Catholic Church is a cult and that Catholics were the real heretics. He went on in a most hateful manner, I stood up and spoke up and asked where in the Bible is it correct to hate another merely for their difference of religious belief? The Minister thought I was a Catholic. No! I was a Lutheran at that time, but after speaking my mind and telling him that I would not sit and listen to him insulting our brothers and sisters in Christ I then left the auditorium.

A few followed me. The majority stayed.

How can we talk peace if it is not in our own hearts? If a Catholic dislikes a person because they may be a Lutheran, or a Baptist hates a person because they are Catholic. Then where are we different?

We slay each other with words and wound the Heart of Christ.

The Reformation tore the Heart of the Church asunder but did not destroy it therefore we must show some responsibility in reaching out to each other in mutual respect, where love is essential.

Is the Catholic Church perfect? No but it is the Church that Christ handed down to the Apostle Peter and now to Pope Benedict XVI. The first Christian Church was the Catholic Church, the Universal Church meant for All and not for the elite.

We cannot speak peace until we are at peace with one another, lest we be considered hypocrites who hate with a smile.

In many Christian hearts there is a great winter. I pray the Son will be able to shatter the icy shards and turn what was once an immovable obstacle into a still lake of Divine Grace and inner peace.

Written by Marie