Changing church teaching?

[annejohno]

I heard Mario Cuomo say on Meet the Press this morning that the Church can change it’s teachings, that this has happened before, and -specifically referring to when life begins, he said that now the Church teaches that life begins at conception, but did not always teach that and may some day teach something different. He said that for example St Thomas Aquinas and St. Augustine both taught something different that that life begins at conceptions. Will someone please enlighten me? Thanks

 

[Brendan]

It the the Pope who speaks authoritatively on Church teaching.

While great theologians, neither St. Thomas or St. Augustine were Pope.

The Church has, at NO POINT, delared their opinion on the beginning of life as Binding on the Church and Authoriative…

Therefore, the Church has NOT changed it teaching on this subject.

 

[BlestOne]

ummm pardon my replying with a question but really…Did anyone even think about when life begins before ABC and abortion? I don’t think it was ever an issue until abortion or modern ABC. I don’t think there was ever a mandate about when life begins when folks didn’t consider that pregnancy was a disease or that there were options to end a pregnancy, which of course is not really an option for anyone who believes that murder is wrong.

 

[legeorge]

I believe he was referring to these theologians’ ideas on the “seating of the soul” or when God puts the soul into the new child. Of course Brendan is right in that these saints were not Popes and their theories are not infallible Church teaching on this matter.

 

[StCsDavid]

annejohno:

I heard Mario Cuomo say on Meet the Press this morning that the Church can change it’s teachings, that this has happened before, and -specifically referring to when life begins, he said that now the Church teaches that life begins at conception, but did not always teach that and may some day teach something different. He said that for example St Thomas Aquinas and St. Augustine both taught something different that that life begins at conceptions. Will someone please enlighten me? Thanks

Mr. Cuomo neglected to mention that neither Thomas Aquinas nor St. Augustine had access to the scientific data we have, today. Though they knew that man and woman having intercourse was necessary to make babies, they didn’t know the science of sperm and egg. Somehow I don’t think they had the same kinds of microscopes we have, today. For Mr. Cuomo to suggest that the church will one day slap its foreheads and say, “today life begins at 12 weeks” or some other arbitrary number is simply rediculous. Additioanlly, in their day, abortion was not an option or in the realm of public discourse the way it is today. This is why we may thank God that Mr. Cuomo will never be considered for Pope, and why I personally would work very hard to make sure he is never elected President.

 

[Steven_Merten]

Below is what I found on the internet about the issue.

On another catholic forum thread it is discussed as to why the Church needed “scientific knowledge” to make “infallible” papal proclimations on the faith and morals issue of when life begins. Many Catholics would think that God would somehow would intervien and guide the Church without human “scientific knowledge” on issues of faith and morals.
**
forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=38663

********The Roman Catholic Church and Abortion: An Historical Perspective **
It is of interest that the Eastern (Orthodox) Fathers did not subscribe to the pro-abortion Western (Catholic) teaching which was based on the belief that a foetus “quickened” and became alive roughly 17 weeks after conception… The Eastern Fathers knew of this Western argumentation but they dismissed it and insisted that a foetus was human and “quickened” from the first moment of conception.

St. Augustine (AD 354-430) said, “There cannot yet be said to be a live soul in a body that lacks sensation”, and held that abortion required penance only for the sexual aspect of the sin.

He and other early Christian theologians believed, as had Aristotle centuries before, that “animation”, or the coming alive of the fetus, occurred forty days after conception for a boy and eighty days after conception for a girl. The conclusion that early abortion is not homicide is contained in the first authoritative collection of canon law accepted by the [Catholic] church in 1140. As this collection was used as an instruction manual for priests until the new Code of Canon Law of 1917, its view of abortion has had great influence.

At the beginning of the 13th century, Pope Innocent III wrote that “quickening” “the time when a woman first feels the fetus move within her” was the moment at which abortion became homicide; prior to quickening, abortion was a less serious sin.

Pope Gregory XIV agreed, designating quickening as occurring after a period of 116 days (about 17 weeks). His declaration in 1591 that early abortion was not grounds for excommunication continued to be the abortion policy of the Catholic Church until 1869.

The tolerant approach to abortion which had prevailed in the Roman Catholic Church for centuries ended at the end of the nineteenth century. In 1869, Pope Pius IX officially eliminated the Catholic distinction between an animated and a nonanimated fetus and required excommunication for abortions at any stage of pregnancy.

The Orthodox Churches of the East never went through any period when abortion was considered less than a very grave sin, right from the moment of conception.
“A woman who deliberately destroys a fetus is answerable for murder. And any fine distinction as to its being completely formed or unformed is not admissible among us.”

St. Basil the Great, Three Canonical Letters

This was then incorporated into the Canons of an Ecumenical Council, and additionally:

The 91st canon of the Quinisext Ecumenical Council (691 A.D.):

“Those who furnish drugs for the purpose of procuring abortion, and those who take fetus-killing poisons are subject to the penalty prescribed for murderers.”

Quoted from catholicculture.org/docs…cfm?recnum=3361

 

[Genesis315]

The Church still does not say definitively when ensoulment occurs. The new being must be treated as a human person from conception (and I think we can all agree that we are 99.9% certain it happens at conception). It’s definitely a unique human being, but possibly not an entire person until the soul enters. Now, all this is really a moot point because abortion has ALWAYS been condemned as a grave sin at any stage.

I think defining ensoulment at conception would make for a good ex cathedra statement to clear up any shred of doubt or confusion.

 

[JimG]

Why is Mr. Cuomo so eager to make an issue of Medieval embryology, when modern embryology can answer the question of life’s origins so much better?

Medieval embryological knowledge–and that’s what’s being discussed–was not much better than other scientific knowledge of the time. If a mother couldn’t feel the baby kick, it probably wasn’t alive yet–it wasn’t “ensouled.”

That’s bad biology combined with a theological speculation–not Church doctrine. IF a pre-born child wasn’t really alive yet, according to medieval biology, then abortion wasn’t homicide at that point. We know better now.

When does a new and distinct individual of the human species have its beginning? Modern science can answer that: at conception. It’s a new human being.

From a theological standpoint, the Church says, OK, if it’s a new and distinct human individual, then it does have a soul, and its wrong to kill it.

That’s more precise than asking “when does life begin?” When does whose life begin? A new human being begins at conception.

If Thomas Aquinas were here today, I am sure he would apologize for his limited knowledge of biology. He shouldn’t have to, though; he did the best he could with the knowledge of the day.

 

[TOME]

The Principle of all Catholic Teachings (our Dogmas and Doctrines) don’t change. However, how these are applied can and does as we (humans) grow in our knowledge. I think I can best explain the point I’m trying to get accross by using Mr. Coumo’s
example - but I hope with a different outcome or conclusion. The basic doctrine of the Church is all human life is sacred. However, up until modern science, we really didn’t know when exactly human life began. Up to modern times,I believe men of good faith could (and did) argue about when Human life began, but there was never any debate about once there is Human Life (a corporal being with a human soul) that life was sacred.

As, science progressed, we became more aware of how conception and fetel devlopment progresses, so that now The Church really cannot take any other position. However, the underlying principle on which the Church has always taught never changed - All Human Life is sacred.

One last point, since I didn’t see the interview, was it brought up to Mr Coumo, that through out the ages the Church has taugh that
in cases of doubt, the doubt always must be in the favor of the most innocent? I think it was St Thomas Aquinas who emphasize
that in his teachings, but I’m sure it was not unique to St Thomas.

 

[Della]

The Roman Catholic Church and Abortion: An Historical Perspective
It is of interest that the Eastern (Orthodox) Fathers did not subscribe to the pro-abortion Western (Catholic) teaching which was based on the belief that a foetus “quickened” and became alive roughly 17 weeks after conception… The Eastern Fathers knew of this Western argumentation but they dismissed it and insisted that a foetus was human and “quickened” from the first moment of conception.

The author is misleading us here, making it seem that the Western Fathers were less astute/spiritually aware than the Eastern Fathers merely for speculating on when life begins based on the facts they had at hand. He forgets that the physical sciences began in the West and were a factor in the Church’s decisions on such issues. In the East people argued more from the spiritual side of things, but didn’t have to answer Western critics who even then thought that science, not faith, ought to answer such questions. It is to the Church’s credit that it didn’t make any pronouncement at the time when it could not be certain of when ensoulment took place, but simply stuck to the Judaic-Christian teaching that abortion is intrinsically evil and left it at that.

 

[Kay_Cee]

StCsDavid:

This is why we may thank God that Mr. Cuomo will never be considered for Pope, and why I personally would work very hard to make sure he is never elected President.

Actually, if Mr. Cuomo ever did become Pope, he would find it impossible to infallibly declare that the Church had changed its teachings.

Thank God we have the assurance if infallibility regardless of who is Pope!

 

[martino]

When life begins is not a doctrinal teaching of the Church. That you cannot kill human life once it begins is a doctrinal teaching of the Church.

Scientists during the time of St. Thomas Aquinas may have not known for sure when life began, maybe they did think it was sometime after fertilization. It doesnt really matter to us now what they thought then because we now have absolute scientific certainty that life begins at conception.

The Catholic Church may not have always taught that life begins at conception but she did teach that we cannot ever kill innocent life. St. Thomas applied that teaching the same as we do now accept now we know that life begins at conception. So it is wrong to say that Church teaching has changed when it hasn’t. The only thing that has changed is that scientists now have the ability to tell us when life begins.

Mr. Cuomo wants to justify the mass killing of innocent human beings on the basis that in the 12th century we didnt know that life began at conception…so if we ignore what we know to be true now and apply what we thought 800 years ago we can go on killing babies with immunity!! Mr. Cuomo is a genius I tell you!!