The Basics of the Catholic Faith

On this page we will go into a little bit of detail on the basics of the Catholic Church, or the "Precepts - those things that you must do as a Catholic, or the minimum membership requirements!  The theory is that doing these things will guarantee the necessary minimum in the spirit of prayer and moral effort, in growing in your love of God and your neighbour.

The Precepts of the Catholic Church were designed to help members of the church to have as close to a Christian life as possible. 

There are five of these (taken from the Catechism of the Catholic Church II, 2041-2043)
  1. Attending Mass on Sundays and holy days of obligation, and rest from "servile labour" (that's work to you and me!)  
  2. Go to confession at least once a year.  Receiving communion should be done when you are in a state of grace, so going to confession to repair your relationship with God is a fairly good way of being in this state when you receive communion. Receiving communion is, after all, the source and summit of our faith.
  3. Receive the sacrament of the Eucharist at least during the Easter season.  Easter is the high point of the Catholic liturgical year - no, Christmas isn't actually the  high point of the church year!  Without the death and resurrection of Jesus, our entire faith would be meaningless (remember, He died for us) so commemorating Jesus' resurrection is really quite important.
  4. Fast and Abstain on days that are established by the Church.  Fasting and abstaining, for those who are physically able, is designed to help you grow in faith and to help you to be truly free within your heart.  Fasting helps us to detach from material things (even food!) so that we will grow in love of God by forcing us to  make room for Him.  If you would like to learn more about fasting then please visit the www.catholic.org guide to fasting.
  5. Help provide for the needs of the Church.  No, this doesn't mean giving a percentage of your income to the church!  This means giving something, whatever you are able to give, whether you give of your time in volunteering for the many roles necessary to keep the work of the church going, or whether you give money to help the church pay for the many things it needs (altar breads, wine, albs, etc.).