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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Pope Francis' Extraordinary Synod Oct 2014
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Jon in the Nati
Shipmate
# 15849
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Erroneous Monk:
But this is indeed how contract law works. If we have a contract for services, you under-deliver and I *routinely accept your under-delivery* a court is very unlikely to uphold my later claim against you for breach of contract.
But the contract would still exist. A contract that does not exist cannot be breached. So when a contract is validly formed, but breached, the conclusion is just that: it existed, was valid, but was then breached. The conclusion was not that the contract never existed.
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Homer: Aww, this isn't about Jesus, is it?
Lovejoy: All things are about Jesus, Homer. Except this.
Posts: 773 | From: Region formerly known as the Biretta Belt | Registered: Aug 2010
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Horseman Bree
Shipmate
# 5290
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Posted
The sin of Sodom was that they were “arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy.” (Ezekiel 16:49.)
Are you saying that Ezekiel was stupid, or that the person quoting Ezekiel was stupid, or that the quote from Ezekiel was stupidly used?
Or are you so far up the GOP rabbit-hole that you think that the Bible has nothing to say about the poor and the needy, so any discussion of this is stupid?
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It's Not That Simple
Posts: 5372 | From: more herring choker than bluenose | Registered: Dec 2003
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Beeswax Altar
Shipmate
# 11644
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Posted
quote:
originally posted by Leo:
It seems to be you who is not engaging because I asked why my comment was 'stupid' and you haven't answered.
The bishops voted against welcoming gays - so that they means they are not welcome.
According to scripture, the sin of Sodom was not sex nor even rape but refusal to welcome the stranger.
The bishops voted against welcoming the 'stranger'.
You are quoting Horseman Bree not me.
Oddly enough Horseman Bree responded.
quote:
originally posted by Horseman Bree:
The sin of Sodom was that they were “arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy.” (Ezekiel 16:49.)
Are you saying that Ezekiel was stupid, or that the person quoting Ezekiel was stupid, or that the quote from Ezekiel was stupidly used?
Or are you so far up the GOP rabbit-hole that you think that the Bible has nothing to say about the poor and the needy, so any discussion of this is stupid?
Leo is a Republican!?! ![[Eek!]](eek.gif)
My work here is done.
![[Killing me]](graemlins/killingme.gif)
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Losing sleep is something you want to avoid, if possible.
-Og: King of Bashan
Posts: 8411 | From: By a large lake | Registered: Jul 2006
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Arethosemyfeet
Shipmate
# 17047
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Chesterbelloc:
quote:
Originally posted by Arethosemyfeet:
Something has gone drastically and sinfully wrong when marriage is dissolved, but dissolved it is nonetheless.
You're begging the question. The question is: when a marriage breaks down irretrievably does the matrimonial bond automatically dissolve? If you conflate "dissolved" with "broken down" then you are right by definition. Otherwise, not.
It's not begging the question, it's simply that I consider it self-evident that a marriage that no longer has any of the characteristics of a marriage has ceased to exist.
Posts: 2933 | From: Hebrides | Registered: Apr 2012
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Enoch
Shipmate
# 14322
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Posted
I've said much of this before.
Though a child of the Reformation, I've an immense regard for large areas of modern Catholic teaching and a great respect for the 1992 Catechism. However, I think the way the RCC handles marriage and its breakdown is based on an approach to theology and ethics that is seriously in error. I sometimes wonder if this is a downside of having a wholly celibate clergy. I am aware that IngoB will disagree with everything I say and think on this, and I'm not expecting the entire synod of bishops suddenly to agree with me but here goes.
When I was in my twenties, had I thought about it, I might have admired the RC position. It has the strength of being logical, and of being determined to remain so, irrespective of the consequences.
However, do we serve principles, doctrines or God? I no longer think that is the way to do either theology or ethics. It seems to be constructing an intellectual structure, an ideal, as a shield that protects oneself from the discomfort of engaging either with God or one's neighbour. One of the things that follows from constructing an ideal, and then imposing it on the faithful, as I've expressed earlier in the thread, is that one is ceasing to engage fully in what the incarnation actually involved for Jesus Christ.
I can see that lowering one's standards on divorce and remarriage might encourage people to be slacker in keeping their marital vows. It might be better if divorce were treated with some of the shocked horror with which it was regarded before 1914. However, though the RCC may forbid divorce, I don't get the impression that adultery is less prevalent in countries like France and Italy than it is here in decadent England. I even get the impression that in the past, adultery was treated as less serious, rather than more, in some Latin countries as in the cicisbeo. The belief that it did not break marriages because they could not be broken might have contributed to this.
What I'm getting at, is that it is quite clear, from the Old Testament (e.g. Mal 2:16) and the New (Matt 5 etc. - we all know the passages) that God does not want us to break our marriages. Breaking a marriage involves breaking faith, and inflicting pain on a big scale. However, I do not think any of the conclusions below follow on from this, all of which would be consistent with RCC teaching:-
1. That where two people have divorced and one of them has married again, the other one remains in some strange abstract way still married to someone who has meanwhile married someone else. That is not an illusion. It is a delusion.
2. That where people have married new spouses, it would be a good thing to encourage one of them to break their new bond and either live singly or try to return to their original spouse.
3. That irrespective of what effect it may have on the feelings of the other party to the union, where it is a second marriage for one or both of the couple, it is a good thing to tell one of them that it is their duty unilaterally to stop sleeping with the other.
4. That where a spouse has been betrayed or abandoned, one should tell them they are still bound to the person who has broken faith with them, and obliged to wait for them or support them either emotionally or financially.
5. That because marriage is a sacrament, that means it cannot be broken rather than that it should not be. I see no reason why indissolubility has to follow from marriage being a sacrament. To me, it follows much more obviously that this makes breaking the bond a more serious and heinous thing than it would otherwise be. I have used the term before 'apostasy on a marriage'. It seems to me that arguing for indissolubility is somehow evading this.
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Brexit wrexit - Sir Graham Watson
Posts: 7610 | From: Bristol UK(was European Green Capital 2015, now Ljubljana) | Registered: Nov 2008
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IngoB
Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Enoch:
One of the things that follows from constructing an ideal, and then imposing it on the faithful, as I've expressed earlier in the thread, is that one is ceasing to engage fully in what the incarnation actually involved for Jesus Christ.
To the contrary, indeed, precisely to the contrary... But a more qualified pen than mine has written about that:
"Paganism and Puritanism, Enemies of the Church's Immutable Standards of Moral Perfection" by Monsignor Robert Hugh Benson.
(By the way, this is hosted on a fairly "rad trad" Catholic website, and the text by Monsignor Benson starts three paragraphs down, set apart in a different font colour. Faint non-trad hearts should perhaps avoid the rest of the website... but they provide a full electronic transcript of this excellent text. Note that the "bold" emphasis of some parts of the text is by the owner's of the website, not by the original author.)
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They’ll have me whipp’d for speaking true; thou’lt have me whipp’d for lying; and sometimes I am whipp’d for holding my peace. - The Fool in King Lear
Posts: 12010 | From: Gone fishing | Registered: Oct 2004
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Arethosemyfeet
Shipmate
# 17047
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Posted
I skimmed through the pile of strawmen and then finally gave up at the accusation, stated as fact, of unchastity on the part of Elizabeth I. Since when did spreading gossip and bearing false witness against your neighbour become part of Catholic teaching?
I see little purpose in picking through the entire morass to find what you may have intended to be the point. Perhaps you could highlight what you consider to be the key points that refute the arguments put forward.
[ 23. October 2014, 21:54: Message edited by: Arethosemyfeet ]
Posts: 2933 | From: Hebrides | Registered: Apr 2012
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PaulTH*
Shipmate
# 320
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Posted
The linked article by IngoB shows a terrible lack of charity. There's no known evidence of unchastity on the part of Elizabeth I. And without wishing to piss on anyone's parade, Henry VIII, bloated tyrant that he was, was in the right over his dispute with the Pope.
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Yours in Christ
Paul
Posts: 6387 | From: White Cliffs Country | Registered: May 2001
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Barnabas62
Shipmate
# 9110
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
... this excellent text ...
I found this a strange use of the word "excellent".
Yes, it does indeed explain precisely what IngoB intended it to explain, but in the process it traduces the character of its critics.
Doesn't that make it ad hominem?. No need to "play the man" if your intention is to "play the ball"? That would seem to be evidence of a lack of charity, regardless of whatever virtues it may be seen to have (from a conservative Catholic perspective) of clarity.
[Not intending to elevate the Ship's 10Cs to the level of Holy Writ, but if the author were a Shipmate commenting on other Shipmates, I'd give him a Commandment 3 warning.]
Incidentally, I do not have a problem with the proposition that Christianity proposes and promotes a morality which is impossible to attain by human beings without help. It seems perfectly in accord with Niebuhr's "impossible possibilities" observation about the Sermon on the Mount. It takes us to the place where we become aware of being saved by grace. It is the way in which grace is perceived and seen to be applied which seems to be the real point of departure.
To borrow from Philip Yancey's "What's so Amazing about Grace?", I thought the link demonstrated "ungrace" to a significant degree.
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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
Posts: 21397 | From: Norfolk UK | Registered: Feb 2005
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IngoB
Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
Of course, as long as the critics explain at great length how the Catholic teaching and practice are horrible, unrealistic and hurt people, there is not a bit of "ungrace" in sight. That does not imply anything bad about the character of the Catholics imposing such dreadful and inhumane rules - or if it does, then it is most clearly the Lord Himself who is holding them to account by virtue of a righteous admonishment.
Only when a Catholic turns the very words of this critique around, and makes them a judgement of those that speak them, then it all becomes an ungraceful attack on persons. This, after all, is supposed to be a one way street of stinging critique, how dare anyone run it the other way?
But yes, there are labels being used here. We must not forget that in modern times the only allowed use of labelling is to label oneself (but then such a label cannot be challenged). Well, this text comes from an age where people still named things by their prominent features, and had few qualms about highlighting clear similarities by applying the same label. This uncouth attitude of calling a shovel a spade, even if it rather be known as spoon, should be considered a sign of the age of that text.
And so we come to the question whether a side remark about how Catholics have been horrible in history unfairly implied that some past British royalty have been horrible. This deep critique reveals a thorough understanding and engagement with the argument which would be difficult to improve upon. Perhaps an even more profound approach would be an in-depth investigation of the punctuation used here. For where, a man, puts a comma falsely, he unravels all rhyme and reason of his argument.
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They’ll have me whipp’d for speaking true; thou’lt have me whipp’d for lying; and sometimes I am whipp’d for holding my peace. - The Fool in King Lear
Posts: 12010 | From: Gone fishing | Registered: Oct 2004
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Barnabas62
Shipmate
# 9110
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Posted
A critique of some aspects of the theology of Catholicism is not a critique of the character of Catholics.
It's perfectly proper to point to the viciousness of e,g some of Martin Luther's writing re Catholics and Jews and cry stinking fish. We just do better not to imitate the fault.
Is it really such an ungenerous response, an overreaction, to point that out? It's rather more than a critique of punctuation.
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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
Posts: 21397 | From: Norfolk UK | Registered: Feb 2005
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Enoch
Shipmate
# 14322
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Posted
It would be hard for IngoB and tedious for everyone else if I were to go through all the ways in which Monsignor Benson does not persuade unless you already agree with him.
One should allow for some of its features as belonging to its time, such as its inflated oratory and its irritating personification of the institution as 'she' as in, to cite but one sentence as an example,
quote:
For not only is she the Majesty of God dwelling on earth, she is also His Love; and therefore its limitations, and they only, are hers.
.
The article, though, to me, does demonstrate a serious shortfall in humility. I am also not clear what it contributes to the actual debate on this thread, unless it's intended to persuade us that the only answer to every question is to accept that the RCC is always right. Here is a Monsignor praising it to the skies, so you had better bow down and abandon your reservations. They are merely a mark of your spiritual blindness, that you cannot see things as I see them.
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Brexit wrexit - Sir Graham Watson
Posts: 7610 | From: Bristol UK(was European Green Capital 2015, now Ljubljana) | Registered: Nov 2008
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Ad Orientem
Shipmate
# 17574
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
By the way, this is hosted on a fairly "rad trad" Catholic website
Wow! I never thought of the Rorate Caeli blog as "rad trad", but there you go. Perhaps that says more about me than anything else. I always thought that the RC traditionalist movement was never quite radical enough.
Posts: 2606 | From: Finland | Registered: Feb 2013
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IngoB
Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Enoch:
I am also not clear what it contributes to the actual debate on this thread, unless it's intended to persuade us that the only answer to every question is to accept that the RCC is always right.
Wow. OK, here's a hint. You said something about how the Incarnation supports your take on marriage, and I said no, it's just the other way around, and linked to a text. Now, what could I possibly think that text is arguing about? The role of what in relationship to marriage? It starts with an "I..."?
No, no, not "Superiority" though the RCC indeed enjoys that. That starts with an "S...".
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They’ll have me whipp’d for speaking true; thou’lt have me whipp’d for lying; and sometimes I am whipp’d for holding my peace. - The Fool in King Lear
Posts: 12010 | From: Gone fishing | Registered: Oct 2004
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IngoB
Sentire cum Ecclesia
# 8700
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Ad Orientem:
Wow! I never thought of the Rorate Caeli blog as "rad trad", but there you go. Perhaps that says more about me than anything else. I always thought that the RC traditionalist movement was never quite radical enough.
So the actual Eastern Orthodoxy one finds in the West meets the standards of somebody who finds the traditionalist movement in Catholicism not radical enough? I find that rather amazing. It's not exactly Mt Athos or the Royal Court of Putin around here... Is it all about the liturgy for you then?
Anyway, as a general rule I call Catholic traditionalists "radical" if they consider Catholic conservatives more as an enemy than as an ally.
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They’ll have me whipp’d for speaking true; thou’lt have me whipp’d for lying; and sometimes I am whipp’d for holding my peace. - The Fool in King Lear
Posts: 12010 | From: Gone fishing | Registered: Oct 2004
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Ad Orientem
Shipmate
# 17574
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
So the actual Eastern Orthodoxy one finds in the West meets the standards of somebody who finds the traditionalist movement in Catholicism not radical enough? I find that rather amazing. It's not exactly Mt Athos or the Royal Court of Putin around here... Is it all about the liturgy for you then?
Anyway, as a general rule I call Catholic traditionalists "radical" if they consider Catholic conservatives more as an enemy than as an ally.
When I say "not radical enough" I'm referring to their conclusions concerning the problems in the RCC. The traditionalists usually blame Vatican II for everything. I don't. Vatican II is only a symptom of a greater problem in the RCC, and that problem was set in stone at Vatican I.
Posts: 2606 | From: Finland | Registered: Feb 2013
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Jon in the Nati
Shipmate
# 15849
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Posted
quote:
What does 'gop' mean?.
The Google-fu is strong with this one.
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Homer: Aww, this isn't about Jesus, is it?
Lovejoy: All things are about Jesus, Homer. Except this.
Posts: 773 | From: Region formerly known as the Biretta Belt | Registered: Aug 2010
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Horseman Bree
Shipmate
# 5290
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
quote:
Originally posted by leo:
quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
No, according to the RCC, the person in mortal sin first needs the sacrament of reconciliation.
Te sin of Sodom was inhospitality. So maybe the bishops need to confess this mortal sin to gays.
Your comment is stupid on so many levels.
Seems to me that you were the one who said that "the post was stupid". Or are you incapable of reading your own post?
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It's Not That Simple
Posts: 5372 | From: more herring choker than bluenose | Registered: Dec 2003
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
hosting/
Could everyone please take a deep breath, read, mark, learn and inwardly digest the 10Cs once more, and if all that doesn't do the job, take interpersonal ire to Hell?
Thank you ![[Cool]](cool.gif)
/hosting
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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Steve Langton
Shipmate
# 17601
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Posted
I hope I just about avoid DH territory here, but it's quite tricky if I'm to respond to the recent posts here.
The 'sin of Sodom' was indeed inhospitality (though clearly 'among others' over quite a period). But I think it is generally agreed that the way they chose to express that lack of hospitality was indeed by a homosexual rape of Lot's guests.
However it should be clearly said that this would not be a 'gay' act as we currently understand that. This would actually be a rape carried out by 'straight' people as an act of humiliation, a statement in the most emphatic way that those foreigners were not 'real men' but rather to be considered like slave women.
As such it is not entirely irrelevant to modern discussion of homosexuality, but certainly of limited relevance. I would assume most modern gay people would be horrified by such a rape. I have seen reports of such rapes in modern times; in one, a few years ago, a man was raped by people who suspected him of being a paedophile - in their eyes sex by rape with such a person would not compromise their straightness but if anything emphasise it. In the particular case they were in fact wrong in their suspicions.
Posts: 2245 | From: Stockport UK | Registered: Mar 2013
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Beeswax Altar
Shipmate
# 11644
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Posted
The whole issue is totally irrelevant (though more relevant than the GOP's position on the welfare state) to the thread. Even if it doesn't raise a Dead Horse, which it does, responding to the original assertion in any detail would derail the actual discussion on the Synod. That coupled with the obvious circular reasoning is why I called the response stupid.
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Losing sleep is something you want to avoid, if possible.
-Og: King of Bashan
Posts: 8411 | From: By a large lake | Registered: Jul 2006
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Enoch
Shipmate
# 14322
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
I hope I just about avoid DH territory here, but it's quite tricky if I'm to respond to the recent posts here.
The 'sin of Sodom' was indeed inhospitality (though clearly 'among others' over quite a period). But I think it is generally agreed that the way they chose to express that lack of hospitality was indeed by a homosexual rape of Lot's guests.
However it should be clearly said that this would not be a 'gay' act as we currently understand that. This would actually be a rape carried out by 'straight' people as an act of humiliation, a statement in the most emphatic way that those foreigners were not 'real men' but rather to be considered like slave women.
It is impossible to single out one iniquity as being the way the people of Sodom were bad, as though the other things they did were OK. What was wrong with them was just about everything. That's the point.
quote:
As such it is not entirely irrelevant to modern discussion of homosexuality, but certainly of limited relevance. I would assume most modern gay people would be horrified by such a rape. I have seen reports of such rapes in modern times; in one, a few years ago, a man was raped by people who suspected him of being a paedophile - in their eyes sex by rape with such a person would not compromise their straightness but if anything emphasise it. In the particular case they were in fact wrong in their suspicions.
I believe this is also very prevalent in some prison systems, and indeed can be regarded as a tell-tale mark of a badly run one.
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Brexit wrexit - Sir Graham Watson
Posts: 7610 | From: Bristol UK(was European Green Capital 2015, now Ljubljana) | Registered: Nov 2008
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Chesterbelloc
Tremendous trifler
# 3128
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Arethosemyfeet:
quote:
Originally posted by Chesterbelloc:
quote:
Originally posted by Arethosemyfeet:
Something has gone drastically and sinfully wrong when marriage is dissolved, but dissolved it is nonetheless.
You're begging the question. The question is: when a marriage breaks down irretrievably does the matrimonial bond automatically dissolve? If you conflate "dissolved" with "broken down" then you are right by definition. Otherwise, not.
It's not begging the question, it's simply that I consider it self-evident that a marriage that no longer has any of the characteristics of a marriage has ceased to exist.
(Emphasis mine.)
I'm sorry to have to point this out, but this is textbook question-begging. Seriously. Look it up.
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"[A] moral, intellectual, and social step below Mudfrog."
Posts: 4199 | From: Athens Borealis | Registered: Aug 2002
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Arethosemyfeet
Shipmate
# 17047
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Chesterbelloc:
I'm sorry to have to point this out, but this is textbook question-begging. Seriously. Look it up.
I'm not attempting to disprove the indissolubility of marriage so how can I be begging a question that I am not asking? I'm challenging an assumption and replacing it with a different one. If you and IngoB want to prove that current RC teaching is the only valid approach then you need to demonstrate that your assumption is more valid than mine.
Posts: 2933 | From: Hebrides | Registered: Apr 2012
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Chesterbelloc
Tremendous trifler
# 3128
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Arethosemyfeet:
quote:
Originally posted by Chesterbelloc:
I'm sorry to have to point this out, but this is textbook question-begging. Seriously. Look it up.
I'm not attempting to disprove the indissolubility of marriage so how can I be begging a question that I am not asking? I'm challenging an assumption and replacing it with a different one. If you and IngoB want to prove that current RC teaching is the only valid approach then you need to demonstrate that your assumption is more valid than mine.
OK. Let's just have another look your last but one statement (with my emphasis visible this time): quote:
It's not begging the question, it's simply that I consider it self-evident that a marriage that no longer has any of the characteristics of a marriage has ceased to exist.
"The Question" is whether there remains an obligatory bond between the partners even after the complete breakdown of the marriage such that it would be wrong to (attempt to) enter into another such spousal contract/covenant with another person while both spouses still lived. Such a bond would certainly constitute a "characteristic" of the marriage.
If you consider it self-evident that no trace of a marriage remains - including the obligation to refrain from marrying (or attempting to marry) another person - then you are calling upon the truth of very premiss which is being called into question to support your conclusion. Indeed, you are treating this premiss as the conclusion of your argument.
If that is not "begging the question" then the term is completely meaningless.
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"[A] moral, intellectual, and social step below Mudfrog."
Posts: 4199 | From: Athens Borealis | Registered: Aug 2002
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Arethosemyfeet
Shipmate
# 17047
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Posted
I thought the question under discussion was whether the RCC should change how it dealt with couples who had had a civil divorce and remarriage. I was saying that changing an underlying assumption would permit, and indeed necessitate, that. I think that is the source of the confusion.
Posts: 2933 | From: Hebrides | Registered: Apr 2012
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Chesterbelloc
Tremendous trifler
# 3128
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Posted
Well, that more general issue is not what you've been specifically arguing though. I was addressing your actual argument here. But I've got to go to work now - laters, maybe.
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"[A] moral, intellectual, and social step below Mudfrog."
Posts: 4199 | From: Athens Borealis | Registered: Aug 2002
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Barnabas62
Shipmate
# 9110
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Posted
(Obvious cross-post)
Chesterbelloc
It's an important question. Is the marriage bond indissoluble regardless of the state of the marriage?
If that is to questioned, rather than simply asserted to be wrong, (for example on the basis that it offends against common sense that a bond remains when the human participants have broken it), then I suppose one has to look at something like this, or this, possibly in conjunction with this.
I think a number of us have done work like this earlier in the thread, for example looking at the underlying scriptures by use of historical-critical methods. That didn't do a lot of good, as I recall (I can still feel my bruises) but at least such processes illustrate the differences and the reasons for them.
Trying to put myself within the Catholic world view, I don't see much scope for change on the doctrine of indissolubility. It seems clear that you can't go down the Orthodox "Economia" route.
Personally, I wish you could do that. Here's a brief quote from an Orthodox online article.
quote:
The Orthodox Church allows remarriage out of mercy and for the salvation of its faithful whose first marriage has died. Alexander Schmemann - a prominent Orthodox theologian - speaks of the "condescending" of the Church "to the unfathomable tragedies of human existence" when speaking about remarriage and divorce. As such, pastoral economia take into account the fact that Christian people are surrounded with erotic propaganda, urbanization, uprooted ness and a culture that is at odds with Christian values.
Of course that is pragmatic, seeking to make the best of a bad job. Doesn't mean it isn't wise.
Here's the link.
[ 25. October 2014, 09:03: Message edited by: Barnabas62 ]
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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
Posts: 21397 | From: Norfolk UK | Registered: Feb 2005
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
Talking about erotic propaganda seems a bit insulting to me. I have worked with a lot of divorcing couples, and usually they have just taken different paths through life. In other words, they are now very different people from when they married. To carry on, would be torture for many of them. Thus, the possibility of remarriage offers a fresh start and an awakening of new life.
Of course, this is a secular outlook, but it's a compassionate one.
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
Posts: 9878 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2011
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leo
Shipmate
# 1458
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
The whole issue is totally irrelevant (though more relevant than the GOP's position on the welfare state) to the thread. Even if it doesn't raise a Dead Horse, which it does, responding to the original assertion in any detail would derail the actual discussion on the Synod. That coupled with the obvious circular reasoning is why I called the response stupid.
How? The synod addressed homosexuality so it is surely relevant.
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My Jewish-positive lectionary blog is at http://recognisingjewishrootsinthelectionary.wordpress.com/
My reviews at http://layreadersbookreviews.wordpress.com
Posts: 23198 | From: Bristol | Registered: Oct 2001
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LeRoc
Famous Dutch pirate
# 3216
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Posted
GOP = the Grand Old Party, a nickname for the Republican Party in the US.
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I know why God made the rhinoceros, it's because He couldn't see the rhinoceros, so He made the rhinoceros to be able to see it. (Clarice Lispector)
Posts: 9474 | From: Brazil / Africa | Registered: Aug 2002
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leo
Shipmate
# 1458
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
quote:
Originally posted by leo:
quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
No, according to the RCC, the person in mortal sin first needs the sacrament of reconciliation.
Te sin of Sodom was inhospitality. So maybe the bishops need to confess this mortal sin to gays.
Your comment is stupid on so many levels.
Horseman Bree seems to think this was addressed to him and was about Ezekiel - so i quote the above to put the record straight.
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My Jewish-positive lectionary blog is at http://recognisingjewishrootsinthelectionary.wordpress.com/
My reviews at http://layreadersbookreviews.wordpress.com
Posts: 23198 | From: Bristol | Registered: Oct 2001
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Russ
Old salt
# 120
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Chesterbelloc:
"The Question" is whether there remains an obligatory bond between the partners even after the complete breakdown of the marriage...
... Such a bond would certainly constitute a "characteristic" of the marriage.
I think the question is rather whether those who believe in such a bond should Shylock-like insist on it regardless of the human cost.
Best wishes,
Russ
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Wish everyone well; the enemy is not people, the enemy is wrong ideas
Posts: 3169 | From: rural Ireland | Registered: May 2001
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Alan Cresswell
Mad Scientist 先生
# 31
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Posted
[ADMIN MODE]
Here's a portion of an official post by one of your hosts here
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
There's scope in DH for discussing Catholicism and attitudes to homosexuality and there's plenty of room in Hell for you to be as ad hominem as you like.
Barely a day had passed before leo was on about homosexuality again. The rest of you who responded to him on that subject should also know better.
We've also had a follow up post from the hosts telling you to cut out the personal comments.
Any more examples of ignoring the hosts is going to get our unwelcome attention.
And, just for leo. You've repeatedly demonstrated an inability to avoid talking about homosexuality on various threads in Purgatory, even after hostly posts telling you to take it to Dead Horses. If we see another post from you on homosexuality anywhere other than the Dead Horses board you'll find yourself enjoying some shore leave.
Alan
Ship of Fools Admin
[/ADMIN MODE]
Posts: 32413 | From: East Kilbride (Scotland) or 福島 | Registered: May 2001
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Beeswax Altar
Shipmate
# 11644
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Posted
The Roman Catholic Church would allow divorce and remarriage if the RCC thought divorce was possible and subsequent remarriage was possible. Because the RCC does not think divorce and remarriage is possible all subsequent marriages are adultery. Adultery is a mortal sin. From the church's perspective, the human cost of living in mortal sin is greater than the human cost of not being allowed to physically receive communion. In fact, being allowed to receive communion in a state of mortal sin would potentially make the problem worse.
You don't believe that. I don't believe that. Most Christian denominations don't believe that. Most Roman Catholics in the West probably don't believe that.
Doesn't matter.
The Roman Catholic Church isn't a democracy. Never claimed to be. At this point, any compromise position will only upset both progressives and traditionalists while undermining the claims the RCC makes about itself. Most outside the Roman Catholic hierarchy already shake their heads at how annulments are granted. My council to the Synod is you've dug this ditch now be willing to die in it. Else, I expect the Pope to issue an apology to all other Christians for the disunity Rome has caused for the past 1,000 years.
I've said a hundred times that Christianity needs a realignment. A majority of Roman Catholics agree more with the positions of TEC than Rome. Instead of wringing their hands about how horrible the RCC is and how they will never change, the people should simply leave and join TEC. Why complain the RCC isn't like TEC when TEC already exists? Roman Catholics in Europe have the Old Catholic and Anglican churches to attend. Likewise, TEC has plenty of people who are Unitarian in their theology and Congregationalist in their polity (except when serving on vestry when some of them become Presbyterian). Why they can't just be honest and join the UU or UCC instead of trying to change TEC into the UU or UCC, I'll never know. Best I can tell, they've grown accustomed to coming to the front of church to receive a morsel of bread and sip of wine every single Sunday as opposed to a few times a year. This seems like an important difference until you consider that their Eucharistic theology is identical to their theology of coffee hour.
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Losing sleep is something you want to avoid, if possible.
-Og: King of Bashan
Posts: 8411 | From: By a large lake | Registered: Jul 2006
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PaulTH*
Shipmate
# 320
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
At this point, any compromise position will only upset both progressives and traditionalists while undermining the claims the RCC makes about itself.
This is the point, and it's the point I think they've got wrong. The arguement should be about what proposals best preserve the integrity of the indissolubility of marriage. On his now famous flight from Brasil last year, Pope Francis said:
quote:
Cardinal Quarracino, my predecessor, said that for him half of all marriages are null. Why did he say this? Because they get married without maturity, they marry without remembering that it’s for the whole of life, or they marry because socially they must marry. And the matrimonial ministry also comes into this. And also the judicial problem of the nullity of marriages, this must be reviewed, because the Ecclesiastical Tribunals are not enough for this. The problem of the matrimonial ministry is complex. Thank you .
Could this half of all marriges which are null conveniently include almost all marriages which end in divorce? Pope Francis has now set up a commission, and I have little doubt that the annulment procedure will become so elastic as to take in most divorcees. Even Cardinal Mueller. a serious opponent of communion for the remarried, said in his October 2013 letter to L'Osservatore Romano, that many more marriges today, due to the apostasy of the age, are likely to be invalid. It has been obvious for more than a year that the Church is trying to solve the pastoral problem of divorce in Western society by the airbrushing numerous marriages out of existence. This is appalling hypocricy.
Take the case of a married man with children who falls for a colleague at work. An all too common scenario. He starts an affair which gets out of control. He leaves his wife and subsequently divorces her and remarries, perhaps having more children. In answer to his seiously sinful behaviour, all he may need to do in furure, is convince a bishop's appointee that he or his wife were too immature when they got married, and he can get his "get out of jail" card, validate his new union and go on being a good Catholic. All this without any remorse, contrition or any admission that he'd been a rotten bastard in what he did to his family. Where is the fig leaf of a belief in the indissolubility of marriage. It's just a back up for divorce.
Contrast that with the so called liberal sggestions of Cardinal Kasper, so much villified by several other Cardinals, who proposed looking at something similar, but not necessarily identical, to what the Orthodox Church has practiced for more than a thousand years. Not all remarried divorcees can walk back into communion. A trained priest can examine their conscience possibly over several years. Is the person sorry for the part they played in ruining the previous marriage? In some cases their culpability may be low or non-existent. Do they now lead a holy life? Fulfill their resposibilities as parents? Try to bring their children up in the faith? Only someone who can rigourously prove all this, according to Kasper, could be led on a penitential path back to communion.
The latter option preserves the indissolubility of marriage, but recognises human weakness. The path the Church has is following completely trashes its own principles.
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Yours in Christ
Paul
Posts: 6387 | From: White Cliffs Country | Registered: May 2001
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John Holding
Coffee and Cognac
# 158
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
I've said a hundred times that Christianity needs a realignment. A majority of Roman Catholics agree more with the positions of TEC than Rome. Instead of wringing their hands about how horrible the RCC is and how they will never change, the people should simply leave and join TEC. Why complain the RCC isn't like TEC when TEC already exists? Roman Catholics in Europe have the Old Catholic and Anglican churches to attend. Likewise, TEC has plenty of people who are Unitarian in their theology and Congregationalist in their polity (except when serving on vestry when some of them become Presbyterian). Why they can't just be honest and join the UU or UCC instead of trying to change TEC into the UU or UCC, I'll never know. Best I can tell, they've grown accustomed to coming to the front of church to receive a morsel of bread and sip of wine every single Sunday as opposed to a few times a year. This seems like an important difference until you consider that their Eucharistic theology is identical to their theology of coffee hour.
On the whole I agree with you (a fairly rare event) but I can explain, I think, those quasi-unitarians and so on who stay in TEC (and the ACC, and a number of mainline churches). Based on comments from friends who are heavily involved in their local United CHurch, they honestly think that, like themselves, no-one else actually believes the creeds and formularies and so on. THey approach church as something all ood people should attend (i.e., spiritually they're living in the mythical 1950s). But as they are intelligent (they are, in truth) and donn't believe any of the CHristian stuff -- because it's so clearly either untrue or irrelevent, they can't believe (perhaps allow themselves to believe) that anyone else does either.
So they live in a world in which everyone is going through motions they know to be false or irrelevent because it's what good citizens do.
Apart from simply describing this, words fail me.
But it does suggest that the church itself (through all who have had teaching roles) for many, many decades, has failed dismally to teach its people. Clergy, lay teachers and parents have signally failed, in many many cases to articulate their beliefs and to pass those beliefs along.
John
Posts: 5929 | From: Ottawa, Canada | Registered: May 2001
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Beeswax Altar
Shipmate
# 11644
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Posted
But that doesn't preserve the indissolubility of marriage. Recognizing the new marriage admits the old marriage dissolved. The other option is teaching that adultery or polygamy is acceptable in some instances.
The RCC may be to figure out a credible way of allowing the remarried to receive communion. I don't know. The RCC doesn't permit those not in a state of grace to receive communion. Adultery is a mortal sin. The RCC would have to find a coherent reason for allowing Catholics it believes to be continually engaged in mortal sin with no intention of changing to receive communion without their receiving communion making them guilty of a subsequent mortal sin. I can't see how the RCC does that without changing it's teaching.
How the Orthodox do it is as irrelevant as how Protestants do it.
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Losing sleep is something you want to avoid, if possible.
-Og: King of Bashan
Posts: 8411 | From: By a large lake | Registered: Jul 2006
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Doublethink.
Ship's Foolwise Unperson
# 1984
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Posted
I believe that if a Roman Catholic murders someone and later genuinely repents, they can again enter into commuminion.
I don't see why that can not also be true of a marriage.
God created humanity, it doesn't make people incapable of destroying each other.
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All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George Orwell
Posts: 19219 | From: Erehwon | Registered: Aug 2005
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Planeta Plicata
Shipmate
# 17543
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink.:
I believe that if a Roman Catholic murders someone and later genuinely repents, they can again enter into commuminion.
I don't see why that can not also be true of a marriage.
Because genuine repentance or contrition includes the intention of not sinning again (propositum de cetero non peccandi, as it was put at Trent). In other words, it is also true of marriage, but just as the murderer has to resolve not to murder again, the civilly-remarried penitent must intend to break off (what the RCC sees as) their adulterous relationship.
Posts: 53 | Registered: Feb 2013
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Doublethink.
Ship's Foolwise Unperson
# 1984
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Posted
I suppose my analogy to murder was chosen because I believe a marriage can die, or possibly be killed, by the action of one or both partners.
ITSM that the sin lies in the killing, or sundering of the marriage. Divorce being akin to burying a thing that is already dead.
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All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George Orwell
Posts: 19219 | From: Erehwon | Registered: Aug 2005
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Barnabas62
Shipmate
# 9110
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Posted
Doublethink.
It's pretty clear why the analogy doesn't work for Catholics. Given the current doctrines, having sex with a second civil marriage partner is akin to recidivism i.e. no true repentance. That can only be achieved by accepting the teaching of the Church that you can only marry once - with all that follows.
Regretting the terrible mistake that the first marriage turned out to be doesn't get you off the indissoluble hook. But as PaulTH* observes, there may be a kind of solution in declaring many failed marriages as invalid at the start "due to the apostasy of the age". An interesting phrase, not too far removed from the Orthodox observations about the sexualisation and social fragmentation of the current age.
[I agree with quetzalcoatl about the condescension of this approach; "poor confused souls, they knew no better you know" but if something a bit similar gets Catholicism out of its present logjam, I'm not about to knock it.]
I still prefer Jimmy Dunn's view that Jesus' recorded fateful observations were more likely to be intended, primarily, as critical commentary on the parlous state of marriage/divorce arrangements in first century Judaism. And that the hermeneutical error I see (an understandable one) is the universalisation of this critique into a stern unbending doctrine. Jesus was generally generous to those who failed; unless their failure was self-righteousness or indifference. Then look out!
But that view of the scripture isn't likely to change very many minds, particularly those who sit under Holy Tradition. Too easy to write it off as a glib Protestant rationalisation. Rather than the more tortuous ones required over annulment reforms.
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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
Posts: 21397 | From: Norfolk UK | Registered: Feb 2005
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Doublethink.
Ship's Foolwise Unperson
# 1984
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Posted
If marriage does not die with the death of affection, it raises the question of a marriage actually is.
If your spouse tries to kill you, what is the remenant of the marriage bond ?
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All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George Orwell
Posts: 19219 | From: Erehwon | Registered: Aug 2005
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Planeta Plicata
Shipmate
# 17543
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink.:
If marriage does not die with the death of affection, it raises the question of a marriage actually is.
If your spouse tries to kill you, what is the remenant of the marriage bond ?
Let's say that after your spouse tries to kill you, or your marriage otherwise "dies" by whatever criteria you choose, the couple -- against all odds -- reunites. Would you insist that they solemnize a new marriage, since their last one ceased to exist?
(It's worth noting the analogy with baptism. Obviously a baptized person can convert to another religion, or abandon religion altogether, and thus in some sense cease to be a Christian. But it's pretty uncontroversial that the "one baptism for the remission of sins" acknowledged in the Nicene Creed is "so far indelible, that it would always qualify the man that had received it, to be admitted to communion again after the greatest apostasy, only by a true repentance and reconciliatory imposition of hands, without re-baptizing." Even when all the baptismal vows are broken, the effects of the baptism remain.)
[ 25. October 2014, 20:59: Message edited by: Planeta Plicata ]
Posts: 53 | Registered: Feb 2013
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Arethosemyfeet
Shipmate
# 17047
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Planeta Plicata:
quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink.:
If marriage does not die with the death of affection, it raises the question of a marriage actually is.
If your spouse tries to kill you, what is the remenant of the marriage bond ?
Let's say that after your spouse tries to kill you, or your marriage otherwise "dies" by whatever criteria you choose, the couple -- against all odds -- reunites. Would you insist that they solemnize a new marriage, since their last one ceased to exist?
I would presume, if they have been able to be reconciled, that the marriage had not ceased to exist.
Posts: 2933 | From: Hebrides | Registered: Apr 2012
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PaulTH*
Shipmate
# 320
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Planeta Plicata:
Because genuine repentance or contrition includes the intention of not sinning again (propositum de cetero non peccandi, as it was put at Trent). In other words, it is also true of marriage, but just as the murderer has to resolve not to murder again, the civilly-remarried penitent must intend to break off (what the RCC sees as) their adulterous relationship.
I read an interesting story last year about a woman who had been an abused wife, frequently beaten and sexually abused by her husband, she had two children. One night when her husband was comatose with drink on the settee, she took a knife and stood over him, and her temptation to kill him was very strong. But she thought better of it and left him. He failed to provide for her and their children, and after 8 years of poverty, despair and depression, she met a nice, kind man.
They later married and had a child of their own. her second husband was a role model and example of love to all of her children and they grew into a very close and loving family. The parents did the right thing and brought up all the children in the Catholic faith, but were never able to take communion with their children. At the time or writing, this lady had gone for 33 years excluded from communion, and had seen children and grandchildren welcomed into the Church.
She wryly commented that, if on that fateful night, she's plunged the knife into her husband and killed him, she'd have been reconciled with the Church many years ago, but by living a life of love, she is unable to do so.
In Familiaris Consortio, Pope St John Paul II wrote:
quote:
However, the Church reaffirms her practice, which is based upon Sacred Scripture, of not admitting to Eucharistic Communion divorced persons who have remarried. They are unable to be admitted thereto from the fact that their state and condition of life objectively contradict that union of love between Christ and the Church which is signified and effected by the Eucharist.
It's only during the last year while this debate has been current that I've realised how profoundly I disagree with this. What I disagree with is the use of the word "objectively." What is objective sin? And what of subjective sin? An Orthodox Christian who has been absolved of the sin of a divorce is subjectively (ie to him or her) in a state of grace and in good standing with God and his church. That FC says his life is in an objective state of sin won't nor shouldn't matter to him. There are Anglican bishops, clergy and laity who are divorced and remarried, who are leading good Christian lives. Again FC's claim that they are in an objective state of sin is irrelevant to their witness to the gospel.
If we are living our lives, as far as possible, according to the golden rule, in love of God and neighbour, we can't be held to be in an objective state of sin whatever rules are imposed on us.
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Yours in Christ
Paul
Posts: 6387 | From: White Cliffs Country | Registered: May 2001
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Doublethink.
Ship's Foolwise Unperson
# 1984
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Planeta Plicata:
quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink.:
If marriage does not die with the death of affection, it raises the question of a marriage actually is.
If your spouse tries to kill you, what is the remenant of the marriage bond ?
Let's say that after your spouse tries to kill you, or your marriage otherwise "dies" by whatever criteria you choose, the couple -- against all odds -- reunites. Would you insist that they solemnize a new marriage, since their last one ceased to exist?
(It's worth noting the analogy with baptism. Obviously a baptized person can convert to another religion, or abandon religion altogether, and thus in some sense cease to be a Christian. But it's pretty uncontroversial that the "one baptism for the remission of sins" acknowledged in the Nicene Creed is "so far indelible, that it would always qualify the man that had received it, to be admitted to communion again after the greatest apostasy, only by a true repentance and reconciliatory imposition of hands, without re-baptizing." Even when all the baptismal vows are broken, the effects of the baptism remain.)
On average, in a domestic violence situation, a woman will have been hurt about 20 times before she calls the police. Even after that a cycle of trying to leave and being persuaded or threatened back is common. So i would be deeply suspicious of the resurrection of the marriage.
[ 25. October 2014, 22:05: Message edited by: Doublethink. ]
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All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George Orwell
Posts: 19219 | From: Erehwon | Registered: Aug 2005
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Russ
Old salt
# 120
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink.:
If marriage does not die with the death of affection, it raises the question of a marriage actually is.
If your spouse tries to kill you, what is the remenant of the marriage bond ?
If I've understood correctly, then the Catholic doctrine is that there is a metaphysical Thing which we might call the sacramental bond of marriage, which is the bit that is indissoluble. So that when the human relationship is dead, the humans have released each other from their promises to have sex with each other and no-one else, the contract has been voided in a civil court (the mechanism that deals with issues of contract law), the marital household has been broken up, when all the other aspects of the marriage no longer exist, the sacramental bond remains.
I'm not sure whether this sacramental bond is deemed to exist in non-Catholic marriages. In atheist marriages where neither party intends anything sacramental ? In cultures or sub-cultures where it is understood that divorce is possible ?
Whether reasonably or otherwise, a logically-consistent position always seems more convincing.
Best wishes,
Russ
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Wish everyone well; the enemy is not people, the enemy is wrong ideas
Posts: 3169 | From: rural Ireland | Registered: May 2001
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