What is the Second Biggest Mistake Made by Christian Evangelists ?

or

Confessing  One’s  Sins  Directly  to  God

Now some might point out the spiritual mistake of not believing or living the Gospel before trying to share it. Or they might point out the spiritual mistake of not preparing by frequent reception of the Sacraments and by offering prayer and sacrifice (to make holy) beforehand. Or they might point out the sin of omission of not even bothering to try to share the faith. However, in this article I am limiting my discussion to just linguistic mistakes of how one expresses oneself.

Some - “Catholics” and Protestants - will ignore a Catholic priest and claim that they confess their sins “directly to God” or “straight to God.” This I believe is the second biggest linguistic mistake.  The only one that I know of that is bigger is the following.

Most Catholic apologists (all that I know of)  make the HUGE mistake of assuming that these phrases of going “directly to God” or “straight to God”  appropriately describe what the Protestant is doing.

How straight or direct can I go to God using only my own abilities ?  
What can I do perfectly ?  
Should I arrogantly assume that my understanding of how I am to receive God’s forgiveness is God’s way, or do I search out to discover His Way and what He has Instituted and come to know what He has revealed ?

If I want to excel at anything I need all the help of God’s grace that I can get.  The more grace I get the more “direct”  and the “straighter” my path to Him can become.

The Protestant response, “that I go directly to God” is an answer to the question of “What do I do?”  A more humble question is to ask, “What does God do?”  The second question is much more important because what God does is always more important than what we do. 

God comes to us in many ways and through many different people.  So the question is, “Do I want to receive all the grace that He wishes to share and give to me through others?”

It would be arrogant or at least foolish for a person to assume that his way is God’s way.  We need to search out and discover the Super Highways that He has built to aid us in our journey to go to Him and to grow closer to Him.  The Sacraments are these highways.  The Sacrament of Confession includes an Act of Contrition prayed to God as part of the Sacrament.

How can a person truly claim that he is going directly to God if he is rejecting the help that God died to give to him ?

The more of His grace that I receive - through the Sacrament of Confession and through the Priest that has been validly ordained - the more directly I can direct my steps toward God.

The Sacrament of Confession is the most direct way of taking our sins to God and receiving His forgiveness and His healing power because He instituted that Sacrament.  If we ignore it we are ignoring His will and His way.  And that would be a much less direct way of going to Him.

Often a Protestant - who while rejecting the Sacrament of Confession, or praying to Mary - justifies himself with the claim that he is going “directly to God” or “straight to God.”  It is a huge mistake for the Catholic evangelist to fail to explicitly correct this mistaken claim.

Why is this error on the Catholic’s part so huge ?

There are several reasons why this mistake is so huge.

1. It wrongly confirms, at least in the mind of the Protestant (or non-Catholic), that the he is accurately describing his actions.  He needs to hear the Catholic emphatically declare that he, the Protestant, is not going as direct or as straight as he thinks, and for the sake of his salvation he needs to investigate this further.

2. The Protestant is likely to think :  Since I am going “directly to God” or “straight to God” there is no reason why I should even consider the Catholic position which is (sic)  “obviously less direct and less expedient.”

3. It misses the opportunity to point out to the Protestant that he is making an assumption about what going “directly to God” or “straight to God” means.  And consequently, he is unable to consider the possibility that his assumption might be wrong.  A person cannot evaluate the validity of an assumption if He Does Not Even Know That He is Making an Assumption.

Read more on the Sacrament at Catholic Answers   The Forgiveness of Sins

Also see more on Going “directly to God” as it relates to Mary

Free Pamphlet for Catholics detailing official teaching on how Mary leads us directly to God.

Free Pamphlet for Protestants explaining how Mary leads us directly to God.  Also see additional diagrams.  This is specifically designed for Protestants since many are not inclined to read Catholic literature.