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benedictus2
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It could be said that you are a dissenter BECAUSE you are ignorant and if you were to gain a true appreciation and knowledge of your faith you won’t be a dissenter.
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benedictus2
Guest
If someone’s conscience tells them it is okay to kill their babies, shock horror, it is totally objectionable that they should follow the party line and let the baby live and recognize the baby’s right to life.I don’t think they do. They reject what they honestly believe is an incorrect teaching - and they act according to their conscience. As it was pointed out in the thread before, Catholics are supposed to follow their own conscience, as long it it does not conflict with the “party line”. If their conscience differs, then they are required to abandon it for meek and blind obedience. And that is what I find objectionable.
What absolute dingbats they must be.Here’s a more correct example. You can choose to drink cool aid or arsenic.
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benedictus2
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Tantum ergo is correct. Jesus was destined to die because that is the way He was meant to conquer death.
The Son of Man was meant to suffer and die and rise again on the third day. This is all part of the plan.
That the Roman and Jewish authorities were culpable does not detract from the pact that Jesus was destined to die at their hands.
Christ came to the world precisely for this.
That is the most absurd analysis I have ever heard. It may not be the Jews and the Roman’s plan to save us from sin, but it was God’s plan.
Ultimately, it is God’s plan that matters but we do in one way or another participate in that plan.
Tantum was not conflating anything. He was just putting it in its proper order and perspective.With respect, you’re conflating human motivations with the divine will. I don’t agree with Spock’s conclusions, but he is correct regarding the proximate (as opposed to divine) causes underlying Jesus’s passion. Since it was the former that he was referencing, I don’t think you can refute his arguments by referencing the latter alone; that’s moving the goalposts, as we say here in the UK.
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ahs
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It’s better to be ignorant of a Truth, as long as you are striving to continually seek the Truth. Dissenting from a Truth means that you have full knowledge of it, yet reject it because you have placed your own opinions above those of the Church, and consequently above those of God who has instructed His Church on what opinions to have.
The Catholic Church isn’t telling you that you have to believe “x” just because they want to force “x” on you, lest you become a dissenter. It teaches “x” because accepting “x” can lead you closer to Christ, can help protect your soul from damnation, and is in conformity with God’s desires for us who are His Creation.
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ahs
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This thread is intended bring awareness to those Catholics who profess the Catholic Faith, yet place their own desires, thoughts, opinions, or feelings, etc… above those of the Church.Well then you are one of the lowly “so called Catholics” this whole thread is about.
Really makes ya feel good, doesn’t it?
The reason this is important is because the Church has it’s desires, thoughts, teachings, etc… from Christ Himself. The things that the Church teaches are intended to bring us toward Christ, toward salvation. When we reject one of those teachings, we are rejecting an aspect of salvation. (I’m talking about Doctrine, Dogmas of the Faith. )
There are many who know full well, and have studied in depth certain Doctrines (such as contraception…that being the most prevalent issue that I have seen in my life) yet still reject it for any number of reasons. They know the Church says it is grave matter, they know the Canon requires their assent to this Doctrine, they know the Catechism has been handed to us by the Pope as a work containing Doctrines to which Catholics must give assent, yet they persist in their rejection of the teaching.
There are others who may not even know that its a sin. Yet the Church is clear that every Catholic has an obligation to seek Truth and know the Faith which they profess.
Things get further complicated when those who didn’t know run across a statement on a public forum by a Catholic that suggests to them that contraceptionis okay, is a matter for personal discernment. That now places them is a potential spot of accepting that statement as truth without further questioning it. Then it potentially becomes scandal.
These are serious matters because we are talking about the difference between committing grave sin or not. And grave sin is not so very far from becoming a mortal sin. My concern is genuine. I have the deepest love for my brothers and sisters in Christ and it pains me to see a teaching of the Church being rejected outright. And it’s not just that a teaching is being rejected, dissented from; it’s the fact that that teaching is meant to keep us from possible damnation, and it is being dismissed at the possible detriment of souls.
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Rence
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I understand your concern and I think your concern for others is admirable. Your concern for the next person to inherit the promises of Christ appears very genuine. I think that’s very commendable.
But I think that in order for people to give up their own desires, thoughts, opinions or feels and hold the Church’s above their own, they have to trust the Church. I really think it boils down to trust. I know you wish that people would cast aside their better judgment and bite the bullet and just follow all the Church’s teaching. But that won’t happen until that trust is given. It’s through trust that one open themselves up and gives themselves over. If people don’t believe the Church is right, they have no reason to live against their conscience. They’re not going to surrender their obedience in favor of Church teachings if they don’t trust the Church.
If dissenters believed that the Church always got it’s desires, thoughts and teachings from Christ Himself, I think they would be more compliant. The problem is, they don’t believe this to be always true. There’s a difference between 1) believing that the Holy Spirit will guide the Church, and 2) believing that the recipient of this guidance receive it without tainting it with their own thoughts, values, beliefs, biases, even fears.
I do think everyone believes that. At least I do. But the problem stems from the disbelief that the Church always has it right all the time.
Well you’re talking about something a bit different. It’s one thing to know these things. It’s another matter when one has difficulty accepting these things as the truth. To be honest, I don’t know anyone in real life who knows these things to be fact, yet still rejects the teachings. I don’t understand why they would. The problem is they don’t know. They have doubts.
Right…but if they don’t know something, they don’t know to seek it out. For example, my mom went on for years and years about how contraception is a matter of conscience and is between a husband and wife…because her priest told her so. So she had no reason, in her mind, to go any further. She had her answer. Why would she seek out more answers when she already had one? People usually seek for answers when they have questions, not the reverse.
Yes, but such a post is usually followed by a correction post and usually, on CAF, with reference material to back it up.
But what do you do about people who lose their way along their way? My brother went to a high school seminary preparatory. On his own. It was his choice. Supported loosely by our father, but supported totally by our mother. The priests really liked him, and he liked them. He hates the Church and thinks it’s total bolognie. He said it was because of what he learned about the Church in seminary. He says the history of the Church proves there is no God because if there was, He would have never let evils to be committed in his name. He says he doesn’t believe in God, but in reality, I think it’s mad at God. He blames God for not having more control of His Church. He has completely lost faith in the Church and wants nothing to do with the Church. From bits and pieces gleaned from him, I think he leans toward Eastern Orthodox, but doesn’t want to separate himself with the family’s identification as Roman Catholic. So he just does nothing. Whatever happened to him in seminary ruined him. And it’s genuine. How does one fix that?
I really do believe you are genuine. It is MOHO that it may be your calling to educate people. I wonder if you have considered teaching Catechism to grammar, middle or high schoolers. Because they really need it…
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Rence
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Someone correct me if I’m wrong (and with backup references) but Jesus’ death was predestined and was the Will of God. God sent Jesus, His Only Son, to fulfull his Plan. Everything Jesus did was in accordance to His Father’s Plan. Remember, he is wholly human, but he is wholly Divine as well. Predestination doesn’t apply to him because He is God. He was working His plan.
Again, someone correct me if I’m wrong (and with backup references) but I was always taught that yes, the Roman and Jewish authorities, and Judas, had free will. They were not puppets on a string. However, because God is omniscient, he knew their decisions, before they did, and used them as tools to fulfull his Will. Just because God knew everything before it was going to happen, didn’t change their free will. In other words, everything they did, was allowed by God to fulfill His Plan. He sent Jesus to earth in human form with one goal, and one goal only, to save us from our sins. The intentions of the Roman and Jewish authorities doesn’t change this. Their intentions and God’s plan can be different, without changing the outcome or without changing the fulfillment of His Plan.
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ahs
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@ Rence: I understand what you are saying (I know…I sound like a parrot 
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Yes, that’s why I’m putting alot of effort into this thread to not come off as judgemental, yet still fulfill my requirement to admonish. There’s a fine line there that is difficult to walk wihtout stepping over either side.
Truly, prayer is the only thing I can do to effect change in someone. My thread here, I hope it plants some seeds and I hope I am able to even fertilize some potential “new growth” a bit through this. My heart aches to see Catholics reject teachings that are intended to bring us closer to God.
It’s funny you mention a calling to educate. My first “attempt” at college, I went in having taken a personality test that basically said I should be a teacher. After a lengthy college experience, I ended up with a Horticulture degree and left the Education field completely. My wife does homeschool our children, and I get to teach math and science to them…and of coarse catechisis is something my wife and I both workon with them.
In the meantime, I’ll let this forum be my “teaching outlet”. Please, (everyone, not just Rence) do keep me on my toes about crossing that line from admonishing to uncharitible chastisement. And I’ll do my best to speak Truth without compromise, even if I have only a few to speak it to.
Our Faith is full of wonderful Truths that can bring us ever closer to our Lord. All we have to do is seek them out and accept them. And because I know it’s difficult to seek out a Truth that we aren’t aware of, I’ll refrain from accusing anyone of rejecting a teaching that they are not aware of. For those who are aware and still reject, I’ll humbly and dutifully admonish you within the boundaries that our Lord has set.
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).Yes, that’s why I’m putting alot of effort into this thread to not come off as judgemental, yet still fulfill my requirement to admonish. There’s a fine line there that is difficult to walk wihtout stepping over either side.
Truly, prayer is the only thing I can do to effect change in someone. My thread here, I hope it plants some seeds and I hope I am able to even fertilize some potential “new growth” a bit through this. My heart aches to see Catholics reject teachings that are intended to bring us closer to God.
It’s funny you mention a calling to educate. My first “attempt” at college, I went in having taken a personality test that basically said I should be a teacher. After a lengthy college experience, I ended up with a Horticulture degree and left the Education field completely. My wife does homeschool our children, and I get to teach math and science to them…and of coarse catechisis is something my wife and I both workon with them.
In the meantime, I’ll let this forum be my “teaching outlet”. Please, (everyone, not just Rence) do keep me on my toes about crossing that line from admonishing to uncharitible chastisement. And I’ll do my best to speak Truth without compromise, even if I have only a few to speak it to.
Our Faith is full of wonderful Truths that can bring us ever closer to our Lord. All we have to do is seek them out and accept them. And because I know it’s difficult to seek out a Truth that we aren’t aware of, I’ll refrain from accusing anyone of rejecting a teaching that they are not aware of. For those who are aware and still reject, I’ll humbly and dutifully admonish you within the boundaries that our Lord has set.
-ahs
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Ocarm
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That was entirely my point, and I believed it was what I had said (other people will have to judge whether it’s what came across or not, but that’s the limitations of the written form - or of my eloquence, anyways
. The fact that you didn’t read it that way suggests I didn’t get my message across very well. Mea culpa, if that’s so).The initial statement was that Jesus was not crucified because he offended the Roman and Jewish authorities. This is untrue - he was crucified because he offended the authorities. However, God permitted this, because it fulfilled His salvific plan for humanity.
There is a conflation here between God’s plan and human motivation; to imply that the fulfilment of His plan was the reason why the Jewish and Roman authorities chose to crucify Jesus - as opposed to the reason why they were permitted to crucify Jesus - *would *be to make them into puppets, and to make the whole passion into a piece of theatre where people could not act any way other than how they did. They were unaware of the consequences of their actions, and did not perform them so as to fit in with God’s plans, nor because they were robotically following a script written for them by God. They could have acted differently; but God, existing outside of time, saw that they did not, and so gave to the prophets the insight to foretell this centuries before the events occurred.
This latter scenario is entirely different to suggesting that the Roman and Jewish authorites were simply acting as they did because they were predestined to do so, which removes the human elements of co-operation - and even negative co-operation, as in the crucifixion - from the divine plan. It is not dissenting from Church teaching (I thought it was time I referred to the thread title at least once!) - to say that the motivation of individuals in bringing about the events that God foresees is not always because they wish to see His plan brought to fruition. Nor is it reasonable to discount these motivations when examining the details of Jesus’s public life: it is signficant that he was seen as a political and religious demagogue, and tells us something about his ministry; and we would lose something if we relegated his death to a mere result of the actions of helpless puppets rather than being a consequence of the sins of all of humanity.
That’s why I responded in the first instance, because I thought that the human element was being discounted in favour of rigid predestination; or to be more precise, because I thought that the post I commented upon might have been giving that impression, intentional or otherwise. The proximate cause of Jesus’s death is key to understanding the passion, because if we lose that, we lose a sense of how the passion was the result of human sinfulness. Or so I believe.
I apologise if I wasn’t clear before. If clarity isn’t the issue, and it’s merely a disagreement, fair enough. I won’t continue the discussion, because the boundary between God’s perfect knowledge, prophecy and pre-destination is another topic, and this is off-topic enough, for which further apologies. Actually, I don’t think we do disagree, but I may be wrong. It won’t be the first or the last time, obviously enough.
Best wishes to you.
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Spock
Guest
Contraception is not “killing” them “baybees”. Emotionalism will not earn you brownie points.If someone’s conscience tells them it is okay to kill their babies, shock horror, it is totally objectionable that they should follow the party line and let the baby live and recognize the baby’s right to life.
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Ocarm
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We seem to agree that:
a. God had a plan.
b. That the Roman and Jewish authorities did not crucify Jesus because they were desirous of fulfilling this plan - indeed, they were not even aware of it, or that they were playing a role within it.
So, as I said - the fulfilment of the plan was incidental to their motivation for killing Jesus; but not, of course, incidental to God’s plan itself.
I’m bemused by the vigour of your disagreement, since - to reference the thread’s subject matter - I have said nothing which dissents from church teaching (to say that the Roman and Jewish authorities acted as they did because God made them do so would be a denial of free will, which would be dissent) - and nothing with which you actually seem substantively to disagree, despite your sustained use of the language of disgreement.
This part of the thread is clearly off-topic now, for which I apologise, and for which reason I will discontinue any further comment.
Best wishes to you.
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Bookcat
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Forum rules:
DISCUSSION FORUMS
DISCUSSION FORUMS
- Messages posted to threads should be on-topic.
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Bookcat
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As Christians…as Catholics we profess our Catholic Faith.
We assent to the various teachings of the Catholic Church (with the assent fitting the kind of teaching…for example some things are the assent of Faith some things require the religious submission of intellect and will …).
Can there be times where perhaps a person may not understand something…or have difficulties that arise in understanding? Yes of course. The approach then to take is “Faith seeking understanding”…
As St. Augustine put it: “I believe, in order to understand; and I understand, the better to believe.”
We assent to the various teachings of the Catholic Church (with the assent fitting the kind of teaching…for example some things are the assent of Faith some things require the religious submission of intellect and will …).
Can there be times where perhaps a person may not understand something…or have difficulties that arise in understanding? Yes of course. The approach then to take is “Faith seeking understanding”…
As St. Augustine put it: “I believe, in order to understand; and I understand, the better to believe.”
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Nate13
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Great quote from Augustine
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Good_Daughter
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Rence, you make some good points (as always). Isn’t it possible though, that someone could be using their better judgement by assenting to a Church teaching they don’t completely understand? That would take trust, I agree. I just don’t think that assent and better judgement have to be mutually exclusive when understanding fails.
I’m not necessarily looking to you for an answer on this, Rence, but your post got me thinking about something: If people don’t believe the Church is right, to the point where they comfortably commit what She calls mortal sin, I have to wonder why they would still consider themselves to be in full communion with Her.
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Rence
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Thanks, but not everyone would agree with you.
Yes, of course it’s possible for someone to use their better judgement by assenting to a Church teaching that they don’t understand. You’re right, assent and better judgement don’t have to be mutually exclusive, at all. But not everyone’s better judgement will allow them to assent to something they don’t understand. It certainly would make things easier for many more people. But I would say they’re more open to doing so when trust is involved. It’s a leap of faith to assent to something you don’t understand, so you have to have faith I think.
Perhaps because other areas of teaching are easier for them to understand and/or accept, and compliance with those other areas are not difficult (or as difficult) for them. Even if one doesn’t trust the Church in everything, that doesn’t mean that they think the Church is wrong about everything either. I don’t know too many people who want a ‘free for all’ or ‘total anarchy’ or ‘no rules’. Most of the people I know believe in most of what the Church teaches but has a few stumbling blocks to work through.
Also, they might not consider themselves in communion with the Church if they found something else with which they were in full communion instead. But there’s hard to find a substitute for everything the Church teaches. I mean, we have an 1800+ rule book. That’s hard to duplicate
There’s always something missing in another religion. And then of course, there are religions that come very close.Who knows why they don’t just move on to that other religion, especially if they believe it’s more truthful than their own. But then, that would mean they’d be identifying with a religion differen than their family and friends, which could keep them from actually making that move. Maybe they’re afraid of moving on to another religons. After all, that new religion could disappoint them as well. Unfortunately, there are no easy answers to difficult questions.
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Nate13
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Haha the rule book wouldn’t be necessary if someone understood the reasoning behind it. The “rule book” is there so that we aren’t lost while we are struggling to understand all the reasoning. As Paul says the goal is for all of us to have mature faith, which implies not mindlessly following guidelines but rather achieving a point where we are able to understand the greater depths of scripture and gain insight in to God’s plan.
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Rence
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It doesn’t matter why the rule book is there. The context of my comment was, it would be difficult for another religion to not miss something important to a potential convert, because the Church covers so many areas in it’s teachings. I think everyone will agree with me that the CCC is very important to understand Church teachings, and a great reference for Catholics for many of their questions.
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fred_conty
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Hi,Well, usually newspapers are not the most reliable source of information. I was asking the poster of the OP, since he/she might have done the research already. But, you are right, the info is out there. Like 98%… wow very interesting, indeed. Maybe there is hope for the world yet
Is that 98% of Catholics? That sounds very skewed since the children and the old
would be more than 2% of the Catholic population.
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