Lessons Twelve, Thirteen, and Fourteen

Lesson Twelve
The Marks and Attributes of the Church
A. MARKS of the Church
155.  What are the chief marks of the Church?  The chief marks of the Church are four: It is one, holy, catholic or universal, and apostolic.
B. ATTRIBUTES (or Qualities) of the Church
161.  What are the chief attribute of the Church?  ...authority, infallibility, and indefectibility.  They are attributes because they are qualities perfecting the nature of the Church.
Blogger's spell check doesn't recognize indefectibility.  Apparently it's a made up word.  I find it amusing that a good portion of the results are related to the Catholic Church.  We make our own words, damnit!  (That was a joke)
166. Are all obliged to belong to the Catholic Church in order to be saved?
My instructor eased my mind about this particular statement by amending it in a way.  He stated that people who belong to other faiths can know God better than someone who belongs to Catholicism.  I can't recall exactly what he said on the subject but the point was (basically) that people could belong to the Catholic Church without realizing it.
I'm not sure how I feel about this.  It seems elitist, but I can't surmise if it truly is.  At this point I will say it is not, the logic behind the statement is sound: we should seek truth, Catholicism is true, we should be Catholic.  That's an extremely simplified version, but I think you get the idea.
What I can take away from lesson twelve is this; I have a problem with anything that hints at superiority.  In my mind, I am superior to no one and no one is superior to me.  As people we are all loved by God and to even hint that one group is more cherished feels wrong to me.  Yes, there are good people and bad people, but no one is better than anyone else.  Making better choices does not make you superior.

Lesson Thirteen
The Communion of Saints and Forgiveness of Sins
A short lesson on the connection between the blessed in heaven, the souls in purgatory, and the faithful on earth.  What we can do to help each other and to help the souls in purgatory.  It's much similar to what I talked about in my most recent post in that we help through prayer, charity, and penance.

Lesson Fourteen
The Resurrection and Life Everlasting
 This lesson covers the second coming, purgatory, hell, and heaven (in that order).

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Things I used to be (and what changed my mind):

• Pro-Choice.  Watch this and you'll understand the reasoning behind my switch.  Even though my views changed before watching this, it raises some good points.
• On Birth Control:  This was a case of being uninformed.  What eighteen year old girl is going to actually read the packet full of warnings they give you with drugs?  Not me, apparently.  I made the decision to stop taking the pill some time ago.  It's just not worth it.  Besides, there are perfectly natural forms of 'birth control' out there that no one tells you about.
• Anti-Organized Religion:  What I really am is anti-bigoted religion.  All it took was to experience first hand exactly how religion is practiced right.  Attending mass daily is really a joy.  It's unfortunate that my work schedule doesn't allow for it currently.
• Pro-Sex Before Marriage: I'm still a little bit on the fence about this one.  I used to say things like, "you wouldn't buy a cow without milking it, would you?"  But sex has never been an all-encompassing thing for me.  It seems to be that society is obsessed with hyper-sexuality.  The rate of women who disapprove of having a child outside of wedlock is declining, fairly steadily. 
  However, if you really love someone, and you know - absolutely know, without a doubt - that you are going to spend the rest of your lives together, the worst that could happen is you can get pregnant.  And even then, that's not so bad right?  Particularly if you're already engaged.  I do think that you should wait until marriage to have a child, and to have sex.  But I'm not sure it's such a terrible thing if you don't.