Amoris laetitia chapter 8 is so confusing!

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None of that, as difficult as their situation may be, changes the fact that as long as they are avoiding sex with a spouse which is not theirs, in the Lord, they are free to receive. Though it may be privately, if they request.
 
rcwitness said:
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Phillip_Rolfes:
Pope Francis doesn’t really talk about that in the document itself. He simply points out that it’s up to the couple to work together with a priest who knows their situation in order to determine their level of culpability for their current situation. He also points out that the couple must be actively working towards living out the fullness of the “gospel of the family,” and not flaunting the irregular situation as though it’s normal. Finally he points out that, while working to live out the fullness of the gospel of the family, a couple may fail from time to time. The Sacrament of Reconciliation is there for them whenever they should fail to meet the ideal.
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Ok, that sounds like nothing new then. It’s just Pope Francis trying to encourage couples in irregular marriages to work on turning to God.

As to the bolded, well that sounds like most of our struggle! 😉
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Precisely. It isn’t new. He is just presenting the same information with a different focus, and in particular calling priests to actively guide these couples.

It’s fitting with his themes of mercy and going to the margins.
 
You just had to get that last dig in, huh? Why couldn’t it have ended on a positive note of understanding and charitability?
 
If AL does not permit the scandal we allege why are all of Francis’ cronies running around claiming it does? These are all “his” allies and “his” appointees saying the doors are open to the divorced and remarried. Even talk of a new commission to “reinterpret” Humane vitae in light if the ground shattering insights of Amoris. But I thought Amoris has changed nothing? If it supposedly calls for no Henry VIII changes then why reinterpret Humane vitae? It is tragically hilarious in that my good priest friend after reading this a week after it came out stated, " They are going to push for sacrilegious Communion for divorced and remarried and go after Humane Vitae!" Like a prophet! I found the document, other than chapter 8, to be rather vanilla and lackluster in light of the hype. So why the dissent using this doc to justify all of it? Why will the Holy Father not reaffirm Church doctrine when asked by his fellow brother cardinals? Why ignore a lay correction asking the same? All asking clarification from this, to put it mildly, problematic and poorly written document. I would never give this document to a young couple. We are giving out Familiaris consortio to the young couples we see in marriage prep because we want them to have a clear, unambiguous, faithful presentation of marriage.
 
Because the thread is about the ambiguity of the document. It intentionally avoids the issue of sex.
 
rcwitness said:
Ok. Does that mean they must refrain from SEX, in order to receive, according to Pope Francis?
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Yes, because remarriage without a decree of nullity is adultery. The couple is living in mortal sin.
 
rcwitness said:
Because the thread is about the ambiguity of the document. It intentionally avoids the issue of sex.
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I don’t think it’s that ambiguous, but I studied it in college with my theology professors.
 
God’s will is never sin. Sin is what we do in deviating from God’s truth. We pursue our own desires and passions and reject God’s. That is why all the great saints and theologians leaned more to the truth that more people go to Hell than Heaven. A great sermon you should listen to called “The New Jansenism” in which the priest says there is a new movement going around today about salvation. It is not rigor based like the old rigor based Jansen ism but the opposite. Everyone gets to Heaven through theological loopholes and fancy philosophical exceptions.

 
And if the original spouse withheld the fact that they had issues with rage when they married, it invalidates the marriage and is grounds for annulment. Full disclosure is required for a valid marriage. So if an annulment could be filed for the marriage and be completed, the marriage was not valid in the first place. While it cannot officially happen, I have heard rumors that some dioceses process the annulments but do not officially file the paperwork. They find that the original marriage is invalid but they cannot officially declare it without reprisals from the government.
 
Some divorced and remarried Catholics are permitted to take Communion. Pope Francis, in AL never stated that all divorced and remarried Catholics could receive Reconciliation and Communion. AL has been very controversial, but it’s not ambiguous.

Cardinal Francesco Coccopalmerio, the president of the Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts, said remarried people can be admitted to the sacraments of reconciliation and the Eucharist when they have a sincere desire to change their marital situation but cannot without causing harm, particularly to their children.


Since it calls for “pastoral discernment” some in the Church still will not permit divorced and remarried Catholics to receive the sacraments:

 
I had an interesting conversation last night with two priests at dinner about this whole Amoris debacle. I asked about the practical experience of couples wanting to “regularize” their lives with Christ and His Church. They said, in their personal experience, when such a couple (divorced and remarried) come to them most ask in their first meeting if they should continue approaching the Sacraments. My priest friends will instruct them to refrain as they are, as of now, not in a state to receive them but are cmmitting the sin a sacrilege. Of course they nuance all this out. They say only 1 in 5 couples continue in this “process of discernment” because they realize (1) it is not going to be a quick turnover process, (2) many just don’t want to go through the hard work of reconciling their lives with Christ and the Church. It is a walk of faith and will require virtue (a prerequisite of holiness) which many in our modern day in age just don’t want to strive for. That is a sad testamony. I could see that my two friends really regretted the reality of the matter.
 
A question. Say a couple come to a priest for the “internal forum” and “process of accompaniment” and are made aware of the situation that their union is not “regular” and that they have violated God’s law, are they then culpable if they persist in unworthy receiving the sacraments? The matter is grave. Full knowledge is now present (if the priest is doing his job). Malicious intent is their in acting contrary to God’s law. It would seem if the Amoris path is followed it would imply that the divorced and remarried will be denied the Sacraments at least for a period, if not indefinitely provided their second union cannot be reconciled?
 
Your priest friends seem to be in the vast majority in my experience. Every priest I have talked to on this issue have had similar experiences in which their drive for their pastoral ministry drives them through compassion and the canon law holds them back by the definitions surround the marriage issue. Theirs is the correct response to this issue as the current canon law stands. I am not advocating otherwise. I am just pointing out that there are situations like those your priest friends have encountered and other more extreme ones which are driving some to advocate reassessing the Code of Canon Law with regards to marriage so that modern needs can be addressed.
 
Yes, in a very round about way.

Everyone who wanted clarification that an irregularly married couple must live in continence in order to receive Sacraments, were not given that clarity.

I just kept assuming AL was just attempting to lure irregular marriage couples in.

But in the end, I don’t think it will change the amount of couples who decide to live in continence.
 
AUGUSTINE1102 said:
A question. Say a couple come to a priest for the “internal forum” and “process of accompaniment” and are made aware of the situation that their union is not “regular” and that they have violated God’s law, are they then culpable if they persist in unworthy receiving the sacraments? The matter is grave. Full knowledge is now present (if the priest is doing his job). Malicious intent is their in acting contrary to God’s law. It would seem if the Amoris path is followed it would imply that the divorced and remarried will be denied the Sacraments at least for a period, if not indefinitely provided their second union cannot be reconciled?
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Full knowledge is only present if they understood what the priest told them. If they left the meeting just as confused as they were before and therefore just as convinced as they were before that their marriage is OK, then culpability is still in question.

If they leave the meeting with full knowledge, but show no interest in living according to the marital ideal, then AL and every previous church document says they may not be admitted to the sacraments.
 
AUGUSTINE1102 said:
are they then culpable if they persist in unworthy receiving the sacraments?
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Certainly.

What is the point of discernment if the result is already known?

There is a possibility that every discernment will result in the couple recognizing that they have sinned. This would be no different than the istuation reached by the too easy process that says everyone is sinning, without a discernment process.

But there is also a possibility that the discernment will discover there was no sin involved. In those cases, the Church has been identifying marriage with sin, an error that needs to be corrected. This is the true scandal, which has been driving people away from the Church for years. People offended by AL are a blip who will be soon forgotten, not a scandal.
 
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