Starting a Catholic thread here as the other Christian forum is too generic and more towards Protestantism.

Welcome Catholics and whoever is interested in Catholic Christianity.

Since it is the penitential season of Lent, here's a video on the chant to Our Lady for compline during this season (simple tone):



Hope everyone have a holy and blessed Lent!

Perhaps some introduction and which parish you belong to and which one you frequent. Belonging actually refers to the territorial parish (TP) which you are residing in, which might not be the same one you frequent for Mass (FL - frequent location).

I'll start with myself.

yeeck - TP: Our Lady of Guadalupe Puchong. FL: Sacred Heart, KL.
pkh - TP/FL : Saint Thomas More, SJ. Most likely can see me during weddings. Have assited over a hundred of them.
rayng18 - TP: Our Lady of Guadalupe Puchong. FL: Assumption, PJ.
khool - TP/FL : St. Ignatius Church, PJ. Occassionally Kristus Aman Chapel TTDI, Our Lady of Guadalupe Puchong.
acam2812 - TP : St. Joseph Sentul. FL: St Joseph Sentul, St. John Cathedral, St. Anthony, St. Ignatius, Holy Rosary, Divine Mercy Shah Alam.
solder_joint - TP : St Henry Batu Pahat. FL: St Henry Batu Pahat, Stella Maris Tg Aru, St Joseph Victoria St Singapore.
Jared Leto - FL: Church of the Assumption, PJ. Serving as a musician for every Sunday mass. (yet to be baptized)
sp6068 - TP/FL: Divine Mercy Shah Alam.
isildur88 - TP: Holy Trinity, Tawau. FL: Our Lady of Guadalupe, Puchong.
Marcus- TP/FL : St. Francis Xavier, PJ. For Silent Adoration, I often go to St. Thomas More, Subang Jaya.
mindslicer81- TP: Immaculate Conception, Pulau Tikus. FL: Immaculate Conception, Assumption, Holy Spirit (Penang)
roscha - TP/FL: Sacred Heart Cathedral, Kota Kinabalu

This post has been edited by yeeck: Jul 11 2016, 11:58 PM

The so-called extra books (not chapters) are called the Deuterocanonical books that are used not only in the Catholic Church but also in the Eastern Churches. Too bad most Protestants reject it, because some of it contains or talks about things not believed by Protestants, such as praying for the repose of the dead and Purgatory.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deuterocanonical_books

We pray to the saints and Mary, because we believe they are spiritually alive and enjoying the beatific vision of God in Heaven, and can intercede for us to God, just like any other humans who prays for us, but even better because the saints are special friends of God Himself. Just to be certain, we do not worship Mary or the saints in the same manner as we worship God, for even worship have varying degrees expressed in the following Greek terms:

Latria - the supreme worship due only to God.
Dulia - veneration due to the other saints
Hyperdulia - veneration due to the Blessed Virgin Mary (thus the addition of hyper because Mary is the most perfect model of all the saints)

Hope this helps.

Can't resist in posting this beautiful image of Confession since it is the penitential season of Lent. Remember to make a good and sincere confession, yo!

Abstinence (besides fasting) is a form of penance in honor of the death of Jesus Christ on the Cross on the first Good Friday.

We have statues, and images of holy things, but that doesn't make it an idol. They help to remind us about the eternal things. Also to many it helps to focus our prayers. Catholics are not supposed to worship the statues as if the statues have any power in itself. Unlike idols which people of some religions say if broken, it means their god is broken (sic), if a Catholic accidentally breaks a holy statue or image, no big deal, just get another replacement. We don't believe things like bad luck if that happens, because that would be a sin of superstition, against the First Commandment.

Many articles have been written to refute this. One of it here: Do Catholics Worship Statues?

To many, out of sight is out of mind. Anyway, let the pictures do the talking to show my point:





This post has been edited by yeeck: Mar 5 2015, 12:41 AM

According to Wikipedia:

As of 2010, there are 1,007,643[4] Catholics in Malaysia - approximately 3.56% of the total population.

Roman Catholicism in Malaysia

As for Methodists:

The Methodist Church in Malaysia is a body within the Methodist tradition in Malaysia. With approximately 200,000 members in more than 1034 congregations (local and preaching points), it is the largest Protestant denomination in the country.

Methodist Church in Malaysia

Sunday Mass at OLG lengthy? Like what? 3 hours? LOL....

If it's Sunday I don't mind 1.5 hrs since we are to dedicate Sundays to the Lord. Did you know that an average Divine Liturgy of the Byzantine Rite is between 2-4 hours?

Are you in charge or flowers or music or serving??

IC, I went to STM once several months ago for the Kevin Allen workshop afternoon session. There was a wedding before that and I was observing Kevin conducting a choir singing Gabrieli's Missa Brevis. Beautiful singing. Probably you were there for that wedding...lol.

Similarly, the Chinese words for Christianity 基督教 (jidujiao) is normally used here to refer to Protestant Christianity rather than Christianity as a whole, while Catholicism is called 天主教 (tianzhujiao - literally translated to "Teaching of the Master of Heaven"). By right a Catholic is a Christian and a Christian is a Catholic.

The word catholic (with lowercase c; derived via Late Latin catholicus, from the Greek adjective καθολικός (katholikos), meaning "universal"[1][2]) comes from the Greek phrase καθόλου (katholou), meaning "on the whole", "according to the whole" or "in general", and is a combination of the Greek words κατά meaning "about" and ὅλος meaning "whole".[3][4] The word in English can mean either "including a wide variety of things; all-embracing" or "of the Roman Catholic faith" as "relating to the historic doctrine and practice of the Western Church.".[5] ("Catholicos, the title used for the head of some churches in Eastern Christian traditions, is derived from the same linguistic origin.)

The term Catholic (usually written with uppercase C in English) was first used to describe the Christian Church in the early 2nd century to emphasize its universal scope. In the context of Christian ecclesiology, it has a rich history and several usages.

The earliest recorded evidence of the use of the term "Catholic Church" is the Letter to the Smyrnaeans that St Ignatius of Antioch wrote in about 107 to Christians in Smyrna. Exhorting Christians to remain closely united with their bishop, he wrote: "Wherever the bishop shall appear, there let the multitude [of the people] also be; even as, wherever Jesus Christ is, there is the Catholic Church."

Theodosius I, Emperor from 379 to 395, declared "Catholic" Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire, declaring in the Edict of Thessalonica of 27 February 380:

It is our desire that all the various nations which are subject to our clemency and moderation, should continue the profession of that religion which was delivered to the Romans by the divine Apostle Peter, as it has been preserved by faithful tradition and which is now professed by the Pontiff Damasus and by Peter, Bishop of Alexandria, a man of apostolic holiness. According to the apostolic teaching and the doctrine of the Gospel, let us believe in the one Deity of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, in equal majesty and in a holy Trinity. We authorize the followers of this law to assume the title Catholic Christians; but as for the others, since in our judgment they are foolish madmen, we decree that they shall be branded with the ignominious name of heretics, and shall not presume to give their conventicles the name of churches. They will suffer in the first place the chastisement of the divine condemnation, and in the second the punishment which our authority, in accordance with the will of heaven, will decide to inflict.[18] Theodosian Code XVI.i.2

Only slightly later, Saint Augustine of Hippo (354–430) also used the term "Catholic" to distinguish the "true" church from heretical groups:

In the Catholic Church, there are many other things which most justly keep me in her bosom. The consent of peoples and nations keeps me in the Church; so does her authority, inaugurated by miracles, nourished by hope, enlarged by love, established by age. The succession of priests keeps me, beginning from the very seat of the Apostle Peter, to whom the Lord, after His resurrection, gave it in charge to feed His sheep (Jn 21:15–19), down to the present episcopate.

And so, lastly, does the very name of Catholic, which, not without reason, amid so many heresies, the Church has thus retained; so that, though all heretics wish to be called Catholics, yet when a stranger asks where the Catholic Church meets, no heretic will venture to point to his own chapel or house.

Such then in number and importance are the precious ties belonging to the Christian name which keep a believer in the Catholic Church, as it is right they should ... With you, where there is none of these things to attract or keep me... No one shall move me from the faith which binds my mind with ties so many and so strong to the Christian religion... For my part, I should not believe the gospel except as moved by the authority of the Catholic Church. —St. Augustine (354–430): Against the Epistle of Manichaeus called Fundamental, chapter 4: Proofs of the Catholic Faith.

— St. Augustine (354–430): Against the Epistle of Manichaeus called Fundamental, chapter 4: Proofs of the Catholic Faith.[19]

A contemporary of Augustine, St. Vincent of Lerins, wrote in 434 (under the pseudonym Peregrinus) a work known as the Commonitoria ("Memoranda"). While insisting that, like the human body, church doctrine develops while truly keeping its identity (sections 54-59, chapter XXIII),[20] he stated:

"In the Catholic Church itself, all possible care must be taken, that we hold that faith which has been believed everywhere, always, by all. For that is truly and in the strictest sense 'catholic,' which, as the name itself and the reason of the thing declare, comprehends all universally. This rule we shall observe if we follow universality, antiquity, consent. We shall follow universality if we confess that one faith to be true, which the whole church throughout the world confesses; antiquity, if we in no wise depart from those interpretations which it is manifest were notoriously held by our holy ancestors and fathers; consent, in like manner, if in antiquity itself we adhere to the consentient definitions and determinations of all, or at the least of almost all priests and doctors" (section 6, end of chapter II).[21]

This post has been edited by yeeck: Mar 5 2015, 01:14 PM

I only saw their rehearsal, not their actual singing during the Mass itself.

Not only branched out but at least 1400+ years late to the scene..lol.

Interesting, I just noticed that KA Chapel is at a shoplot in TTDI. Never been there before. Is it a rented place?

Are you Catholic?

I don't know of any in Malaysia since there are no Byzantine Rite eparchies in this region. I do hear there's a Russian Orthodox chapel run either by Russian expats or by the Russian embassy in KL. On the other hand, there are Traditional Latin Masses (TLM or commonly called Tridentine) celebrated by the SSPX in Sg Buloh which uses the Missale Romanum 1962. On average a usual Sunday TLM depending on the length of the sermon could be somewhere between 1.5hrs to 2hrs.

This post has been edited by yeeck: Mar 6 2015, 11:20 PM

Window To Heaven (How to Create an Icon)

For those who have watched Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ, here's an appropriate video for this Lenten season which is a meditation on the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, with scenes from the movie interspersed with scenes from Holy Mass.



This post has been edited by yeeck: Mar 6 2015, 01:44 PM

But I think the figures might not be correct given the huge megachurches sprouting up (especially of the Charismatic/Evangelical type), some of which I don't even know are affiliated with which particular denomination.

This post has been edited by yeeck: Mar 6 2015, 09:27 PM