Did Fr. James Martin just commit heresy?

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Elf01 said:
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Weserthy:
I agree with this. We should be praying for George Floyd, not asking him to pray for us. Whatever the tragic circumstances of his death were, he had his own problems earlier in his life and it would not be best to assume he is in heaven.
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I pray for the repose of my grandparents. I also pray for their intercession.
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I do the very same thing.
 
Steeevyo said:
So in conclusion for me: James Martin is a liberal Jesuit and knows how to push my buttons while staying within the legal framework of the Church if only by a hair.
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I would offer you one suggestion:

Father Martin (let’s not forget, he is a priest and due our respect as such) probably doesn’t know you, so it’s likely he’s not pushing your buttons, as you say, but rather you’re allowing your buttons to be pushed by the way you perceive things. As another poster above suggested, you might find more peace and happiness in life by changing your mindset.

And for what it’s worth, I have no idea what your “by a hair” comment is supposed to mean. There’s nothing close to dancing a fine line in this discussion.
 
Cor_ad_Cor said:
And for what it’s worth, I have no idea what your “by a hair” comment is supposed to mean. There’s nothing close to dancing a fine line in this discussion.
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Probably referring to Fr. Martin’s other discussions of gay people and such.
I agree with you that he’s well within Church teaching bounds here.
 
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The question was not whether is was prudent or proper (and here, we visibly disagree), the question was, is it heretical, which is a different kind of assessment.
porthos11 said:
From all I have seen, his life was not one of heroic Christian virtue
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Neither were the lives of the two bandits who were crucified with Jesus. And yet he told one of them, “today you shall be with me in paradise”.
 
Tis_Bearself said:
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porthos11:
I would say that invoking a dead someone for intercession before even being declared Servant of God (and I would personally say not before Venerable, the first declaration made by the Holy See) is imprudent at the very least, and highly inappropriate at worst.
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I ask my deceased relatives to pray for me all the time. I doubt they will ever have a sainthood process, especially the ones who died Protestant. Of course I also pray for them, including having Gregorian Masses said for them. I don’t think God thinks my prayers are imprudent or inappropriate at all, why would he think that about a sincere prayer? And if God doesn’t object to my prayers, and the Church also doesn’t object to my prayers, then your opinion matters not.
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Okay.
 
sealabeag said:
we should pray for the dead, not ask them to pray for us.
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These are not mutually-exclusive possibilities. It would be a disservice to a person who has not been canonized to fail to pray for them after they die, though.

There is also no reason that the death of someone who died by abuse of governmental power couldn’t be likened to Our Lord’s Passion.
 
I think this ties in with the “dare to hope” thread. I’ve been at catholic funerals where the priest says “I know he/she is watching down upon us from Heaven.” Or “We can all be comforted by the fact he/she is now enjoying the happiness of Heaven.”

You could make the argument this priest is “assuming their sainthood” but you could also say he is being hopeful since we are a people of hope.

Same story here. George Floyd was innocently murdered. How is he any different from a Christian killed in the Middle East by isis? And yet we seem to view these two cases very differently…
 
Dolphin said:
Same story here. George Floyd was innocently murdered. How is he any different from a Christian killed in the Middle East by isis? And yet we seem to view these two cases very differently…
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Who’s this “we” of whom you speak? I certainly don’t view them differently. They are both deceased people, I pray for their souls, I hope they will pray for me when and if they are able, whether I make a big point of asking them in a post or not.

I don’t think you should assume that because “we” pay some attention to George Floyd, “we” are ignoring everyone else.
 
@Steeevyo: No. James Martin did not commit heresy. We are permitted to ask for the intercession of anyone we reasonably think is in heaven. And ‘private prayer’ does not mean prayer that nobody else hears. It means personal prayer.
 
Cor_ad_Cor said:
rget, he is a priest and due our respect as such) probably doesn’t know you, so it’s likely he’s not pushing your buttons, as you say, but rather you’re allowing your buttons to be pushed by the way you perceive things. As another poster above suggested, you might find more peace and happiness in life by changing your mindset.
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I definitely don’t need my mindeset changed and even less I need to find happiness because I already found it in Jesus my Lord and Saviour.

I saw the James Martin tweets and out of interest shared it here and got informed responses that convinced me that his tweets don’t constitute heresy.
That does not change anything about the fact that I don’t agree with James Martin’s leftist politics. At no point have I denied him any respect whatsoever. But thank you for your concern.
 
Maybe I don’t understand the comment but: Why have laws then if we can’t ask whether a person’s words or actions are within said framework?
I specfically raised this question because a priest is a figure of authority. I would not spend my time questioning publicly every lapse of lowly parishioners such as myself.
 
Steeevyo said:
I specfically raised this question because a priest is a figure of authority. I would not spend my time questioning publicly every lapse of lowly parishioners such as myself.
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I’m not sure it’s our job to question either one. I’m sure that Cardinal Dolan and other Church leaders have at least one eyeball on Fr. Martin and, at present, he is in good standing.
 
James Martin wrote My Life with the Saints if you are interested in understanding how he thinks about the saints. I enjoyed it, though it is a number of years since I read it.
 
I am not saying it is my job to question I am saying I have the right to question.
Do you think I don’t?
 
I couldn’t stop you if I tried. 🙂 I just wonder why you feel compelled to take on a role regularly designated to our Church leaders.
 
Steeevyo said:
That does not change anything about the fact that I don’t agree with James Martin’s leftist politics. At no point have I denied him any respect whatsoever.
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As someone pointed out earlier, it’s Father Martin. That’s where you’re failing to respect him.
 
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