How the Catholic religion got started…

The history of the Catholic Church begins with the teachings of Jesus Christ (c. 4 BC – c. AD 30), who lived in Galilee (later conquered by the Roman Empire).[1] The Catholic Church instructs that it is the continuation of the early Christian community established by Jesus Christ,[2] that its bishops are the successors to Jesus’s apostles, and the Bishop of Rome, also known as the Pope, is the sole successor to Saint Peter[3] who was appointed by Jesus in the New Testament as head of the church and ministered in Rome.[3] [4] By the end of the 2nd century, bishops began congregating in regional synods to resolve doctrinal and policy issues.[5] By the 3rd century, the bishop of Rome began to act as a court of appeals for problems that other bishops could not resolve.[6]

Christianity spread throughout the early Roman Empire, despite persecutions due to conflicts with the pagan state religion. In 313, the legislation of Christianity by the Emperor Constantine I. lessened the struggles of the Early Church In 380, under Emperor Theodosius I, Christianity became the state religion of the Roman Empire by the decree of the Emperor, which would persist until the fall of the Western Empire, and later, with the Eastern Roman Empire, until the Fall of Constantinople. During this time, the period of the Seven Ecumenical Councils) there were considered five primary sees (jurisdictions within the Catholic Church) according to Eusebius: Rome, Constantinople, Antioch, Jerusalem, and Alexandria, known as the Pentarchy.

The whole period of the next five centuries was dominated by the struggle between Christianity and Islam throughout the Mediterranean Basin. The battles of Poitiers, and Toulouse preserved the Catholic west, even though Rome itself was ravaged in 850, and Constantinople besieged. In the 11th century, already strained relations between the primarily Greek church in the East, and the Latin church in the West, developed into the East-West Schism, partially due to conflicts over Papal Authority. The fourth crusade, and the sacking of Constantinople by renegade crusaders proved the final breach. In the 16th century, in response to the Protestant Reformation, the Church engaged in a process of substantial reform and renewal known as the Counter-Reformation.[7] In subsequent centuries, Catholicism spread widely across the world despite experiencing a reduction in its hold on European populations due to the growth of Protestantism and because of religious skepticism during and after the Enlightenment. The Second Vatican Council in the 1960s introduced the most significant changes to Catholic practices since the Council of Trent four centuries before.

[1] Smith, David (September 6, 2015). “From Bethlehem to Egypt to Nazareth, Jesus’s family accepted changes around them”.

[2] “Vatican congregation reaffirms truth, oneness of Catholic Church”, Catholic News Service. Retrieved 17-Mar-2012.

[3] Paragraph 862, Catechism of the Catholic Church, Second Edition, Liberia Editrice Vaticana 2012.

[4] Hitchcock, Geography of Religion (2004), p. 281, quote “Some (Christian communities) had been founded by Peter, the disciple Jesus designated as the founder of his church.

[5] Norman, The Roman Catholic Church an Illustrated History (2007), pp 11, 14, quote: “The Church was founded by Jesus himself in his earthly lifetime”.

[6] Chadwick, Henry, p 37

[7] Duffy p 18

Parents…

Parents (and divorced parents) talk to your children, find out what makes them tick, what the like, dislike, and how they feel about things.

When I say talk to your children, I mean talk to them, don’t talk at them, as if you’re telling them how to be extension of you. When you talk to your children, believe me, you both learn.

Children learn how to listen and how to speak to others. Parents learn about their children, how much they are learning in school, if words are important to them. Because, if words aren’t important to your children, it possibly means that they are having trouble in school.

When I was young, the only time my father and stepmother spoke to me (actually at me), was when they wanted to badmouth my mother. They didn’t do that to my sister for two reasons, first they didn’t have to, she joined in the mom bashing even though she didn’t know the first thing about her, and second, she was their favorite child. Even after my half-sister was born, my sister was still the favorite.

Because of the fact that my sister hated our mother, my father and stepmother used to pit us against each other. It was almost like a game to them, and the result, my sister and I don’t to this day speak to each other, though I have tried.

The only other time they spoke to me, they were hurting and humiliating me.

Parents, if you hurt and humiliate your children, the only lesson they will learn is to hurt and humiliate, that’s why there is a cycle of violence in the country, because some parents either shouldn’t be parents in the first place or once they are they should take parenting classes to end the cycle of violence.

Between my mother giving up custody of myself and my sister, and the fact that my father was always threatening to throw me out of the house, I didn’t fight hard enough when my father and ex-husband had my children taken from me and given to them.

I pray that if you’re in that boat that you fight to the death, the way I was too afraid to do.

In conclusion, get to know your children, you may find that you like as well as love them.

 

Reincarnation, who believes…

Hinduism…

 In Hinduism, they believe that the enduring soul survives death, then spends some time, in the spirit world, and only then is brought back to earth in the form of a new body.

They believe that we are reborn into maybe the opposite sex, different life circumstances, or come back to a nonhuman body, like an animal form. They believe that all these are possible. Hinduism includes the entire belief in karma, the belief that the reason one is because of one’s behavior in their past lives. In the spirit world, earth life is undesirable and in order to avoid it, one must practice the religion in their daily lives and then eventually they will be released from the cycle of rebirth.

Buddhism…

 Buddhists share some beliefs with the Hindus, but also have some beliefs of their own. Specifically, in Buddhism found in the Southern parts of Asia, their belief comes from anatta, which means substanceless, or now soul, which claims that there is no surviving entity that goes from one life to the next. Upon the death of the one personality, a new personality comes into being, like when the flame of one candle begins to die, it can still light another candle. When a person dies, another personality comes into being, basically it isn’t the same personality, but an entirely new one.

Shiite Muslims…

 A number of the congregations of Shiite Muslims in the Western Asia, in particular the Druses of Lebanon and Syria, believe in reincarnation, but their belief doesn’t include karma. But rather, they believe that God assigns souls to several lives in various situations that are disconnected from each other, until judgment day, when they are either sent to heaven or hell depending on the moral quality of their actions through all their lifetimes.  Another group to have this belief is the Alevis of Turkey.

Judaism and Christianity…

 While reincarnation is not a mainstream belief in Judaism and Christianity, it is the belief of some of their groups. In Judaism, the Kabbalah teaches that based on an esoteric reading of the Hebrew scriptures they do believe in reincarnation. Hasidic Jews  also include it in their teachings. In Christianity, some congregations, specifically, the Gnostic Christians, believe in reincarnation, and that some Christians in southern Europe did believe in it until the Council of Constantinople in 533 C.E. There is some support for reincarnation found in the passages of the New Testament book of Matthew, in which Jesus is seemed to say that John the Baptist is the prophet Elijah, reincarnated.

Ancient Greece…

 There were Greek philosophers that wrote much about the belief in reincarnation, beginning with Orpheus and with Pythagoras. After that there were Socrates, and Plato, whose beliefs regarding reincarnation became very influential, they taught that one’s soul is in fact, immortal and that the soul exists well before birth. They also believe that the soul is reborn many times. That each soul chooses its next life, guided by the experiences of the previous lives.

Aristotle, accepted the ideas of the teacher Plato, in the beginning, but later rejected the concept of reincarnation and immortality, becoming the father of materialism.

Native Americans and Inuit…

Many Native American tribes, along with the Inuit, specifically those in the most northern and northwestern regions of North America, believe in reincarnation. The detail have varied across various groups. Many don’t believe that all souls will be reborn, that it’s manly those who have had a premature death, such as children being reincarnated into the same family, or warriors reborn with birthmarks that correspond to their wounds.

Some believe in reincarnating from a human into a nonhuman, and cross-sex reincarnation. They also believe that a person can be reincarnated into several different people at the same time.

West Africa…

The belief in reincarnation is wide-spread among the assorted peoples of West Africa. Unlike Hindus and Buddhists, their general belief is that reincarnation is desirable and that earth life is better than a state of limbo. The difference is that they believe that people are reborn in to the same family and that their soul can split and be reborn in to several lives at the same time. A lot of people believe that a soul can harass a family by dying as an infant only to be reborn into that same family again and again.

The analyze this…Cookbook!

Well, friends I’ve done it. My books, “The analyze this…Cookbook”, and “Reincarnation…There is hope!” can now be purchased in both eBook format and Paperback on Amazon.com.

The price, of The analyze this…Cookbook, is set at $15.99 for eBook, and $19.99 for paperback. The price for Reincarnation…There is hope!” is $8.99 for eBook, and $14.99 for paperback.  For a mere $16 or $20, you can own a cookbook so chock full of Italian and Italian American recipes that you would be the best cook among your family and friends, and a book of hope that this isn’t the only life we get. Pretty cool huh?

So, buy your copy today, at http://www.Amazon.com.

Thank you,

Laura Zambuto