I hope that you stick around, Eliza. You seem to think that you already know it all (I'm like that too), but that approach isn't going to work well here. There's a lot you can learn here, if you decide to develop a thicker skin. The Catholic Faith isn't all about peace and love, as you have perhaps been led to believe.
Perhaps you should try to understand why you have downvotes. I know why I have a lot of them, but it's okay. I don't mind.
Thanks, Meg. I really don't know it all, I just know what I know, and say it. When I do there is openness to correction but "You're wrong I'm right" isn't enough to convince me of anything. I don't mind other people saying they see it another way. I just don't like rudeness. And I am willing to be corrected in my wrong thinking but not just because someone says so - it have to understand it and know it to be true. God gives us discernment if we seek it. But I believe that corrections and information given to the uninformed should be given in a kind, Christlike way, or at least a neutral, not condemning way. (Unless it is some kind of urgent situation). So I think it better to ignore rude folk until they can find some decent way to say what is on their mind. If they know something I need to know, I trust God to will bring it to me another way, through a kind, or at least normal person. People should not treat other people like everyone needs a thick skin all the time. So if they do they are unlikely to get my attention.
Hmm, the Catholic faith isn't about peace and love. Well, I work with children, and they aren't all from Christian homes, and I need to be peaceful and loving even under high stress situations. It is something I cannot maintain on my own but need to be walking with our Lord, offering up my day and also things as they happen, and evaluating how I did that day, and I need to receive the Sacraments as often as possible and sit before the Lord in the Eucharist regularly and also be strict about my disciplines. This is what I try to do and I know I can do more but this is what I am doing now. I often meditate on the sorrowful mysteries and that isn't much peace and love. Well it is love. I often think of the children at Fatima and their very, very serious faces. They of course are an example to us. Maybe that is what you mean by it not being about peace and love?
I have watched a bunch of TnT with my husband, though not lately, as we both happened, for whatever reason, to take a lot less interest this summer. But we often watch CM (which is nice and short), because I want to understand the reality we are living in. Also because I became Catholic in a very liberal diocese, and so much was off in so many ways, CM's reporting 9also Taylor's Infiltration) explains to me WHY, and puts so many stray pieces of the puzzle together for me. However in order to still have peace after watching it, I find that I need to pray my rosary before I watch it... (I mean already have prayed it that day).
I know I can be doing more, but doing that to help me maintain the peace of God in me, and being loving to the people in my life, and including a new sort of "hard case" person God has put in my life, is my vocation right now. And my career with children. It's not a Christian environment, but I exist "in the world but not of the world"...
When I change on a thing, it can sometimes be a sudden turn around, because of sudden clarity and conviction, but more often it is by degrees that Gods leads me, bringing me to understanding of every change I make in my life that He has pointed me to. And I need to have understanding and peace about a thing - peace and conviction that it
is God's way, before I jump in (at which point I am all in). Which is why I said I was wary here of being the object of concerted conversion attempts.
It's interesting because I came here to fellowship with other TradCaths with no interest in learning about SSPX at all. Then in and looking around, I find I am in a conclave of sorts, which is not what I expected. So if people can show a modicuм of tolerance for someone who does not know all about something they know all about and are committed to, I might end up learning about what I never thought i was too interested in learning about. And maybe it will turn out that God had a reason for that.