The Church is limiting my growth!!!

With over 2000 years of history behind it's back, Catholicism in particular and Christianity in general can easily be mistaken as faith of the old. With its doctrines and moral guidelines, it seems to enslave its members, determining what they must believe and how they need to practice their faith. Many Christian denominations realized this and moved significantly away from the doctrines of early Church, with tailor made belief systems for the communities they target. But Catholicism resisted any significant changes in its belief system over the course of time. This has caused people of other faith, even other Christian denominations, to label Catholics as culturally narrow by refusing to have an open mind to different lifestyles, practices, and perspectives. Catholics are being bombarded with questions everyday from peers regarding the reasons behind many of the teachings of the Church - homosexuality, divorce, pro-choice and treatment of women are among some of today's hot topics. The following is a common question from many youngsters who grew up as  Catholics, but now think that it is not right for any religion to claim that they are the "true religion". 

I was brought up as a Catholic. Now that I am old enough to think for myself, it seems like Catholicism doesn't allow me the freedom to think for myself. By being a Catholic, I am allowing somebody to limit my personal growth and thinking because it constraints my freedom to choose or formulate my own beliefs and practices.

Many of young Catholics, even some older ones, believe it is important for Catholicism to expand its view on how it sees the world, and better adapt to todays lifestyle rather than asking people to conform to the lifestyle and teachings that are thousands of years old. In today's world, people like to trust in their own power to think and make decisions based on it, rather than blindly following authority and tradition. The standards of freedom are set so high, many even believe that if you cannot make your own decisions, then you are not a free human being. 

The problem with freedom is that it is often defined in a negative term; freedom is the absence of constraints, rather than the liberty to do whatever one wishes. We don't think ourselves as free unless somebody or something put some limitations over what we do. What we often tend to overlook is how humans have always used constraints and boundaries as means of being free. Throughout the history of humanity, we have always lived in groups or communities. Rules and regulations in the form of laws are deemed an essential part of any community. These laws, evolved from the needs of that community itself, are often constraining in nature. They restrict its members from doing certain things, thus enabling the whole community to enjoy the benefits being members of that group. These constraints allows the members to explore and experiment with their abilities to grow and accomplish things - a school or a physical training facility can be examples for such communities. What we often realize is that the laws of that community has helped us in our accomplishments by keeping ourselves focussed. The restrictions also prevents us from any unnecessary risk taken that would jeopardize integrity of the community as a whole. So if we can use judicious restrictions to grow - to free ourselves from restraints -  in our physical and intellectual fields, why couldn't we use constraints to grow in spirituality? Instead of insisting on freedom to determine our own own spirituality and morality, shouldn't we be looking to seek and discover the spirituality that was handed down to us from our families, and learn ways to discipline ourselves to live according to it? We don't leave school every time when we are faced with difficulty to adjust to certain limitations, rather we look for ways to work with it and find ways to assimilate it into our life. So why do we tend to walk away from our faith because of disagreement over certain constraints?

Another thing people often forget about is the basis of morality itself. For everybody, good moral values includes living a descent life by being good to oneself and also to others. This makes LOVE the center of morality, and love is always restrictive. In the real world, any form of love requires that we give up some of our independence - to enjoy the many fruits of love, we will have to sacrifice some of our freedom. You cannot expect to become a morally sound person by making unilateral decisions all the time, for love demands freedom from personal autonomy. 

Also, for a love relationship to work, the loss must be mutual, both parties must be willing to sacrifice. At first sight, Catholicism seems inherently demanding - without any willingness to negotiate or compensate. To understand, what seems like, the stubbornness of the Church, it is important to understand what the Church is. The Church is the Body of Christ, any changes made to the Church is changes made to Christ Himself. So what's the big deal about changing Christ's body? Changing Christ's body is making changes to a God who love us so much so that He took the human form, "it was our infirmities that he bore, our sufferings that he endured" (Isaiah 53:4). Changing the teachings of the Catholic Church to fit to our needs means changing a God who nullified Himself for the sake of Love, a God who not only said but also practiced, "No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends" (John 15:13). God has already adjusted to us in the most radical way - by becoming a limited human being, by suffering and dying on a cross - because He loves us. Have we amended our ways enough in return for His love? Why do we keep insisting that Him and the Catholic Church, His body, be changed again and again? What is it that we want it to be changed to - a God who refuses to die for our sins, a God whose love has reservations?

Love is not limiting and constraining when it is true love - love that is willing to sacrifice everything without expecting anything in return. The Catholic Church teaches that message of love to its followers through the Doctrines of the Church. The Church cannot change the love of Christ because there is no better love out there that it can replace it with. If the love of Christ seems too much and too constraining, and if you want to walk away from it, then I can't help but wonder about the  basis of your thought process and sense of morality. Could your love be selfish? Could your actions be self-serving? Could your moral values be self-centered?

"Love is patient, love is kind. It is not jealous, love is not pompous, it is not inflated, it is not rude, it does not seek its own interests, it is not quick-tempered, it does not brood over injury, it does not rejoice over wrongdoing but rejoices with the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails..."       

(1 Corinthians 13:4-8)