Did JP2 abolish anathema spiritual death Church punishments?

[BlindSheep]

Don’t you know that a protestant who *knows *the Catholic Church is the true Christian church, and does not convert, will be damned anyway?
Furthermore, one is not damned for doubting the Real Presence. The belief called for is not a doubt-free certainty, but an act of the will, a choice to put one’s trust in the authority of the Church in spite of one’s doubts. We don’t have to understand the doctrine of Real Presence, only choose to accept it.
You seem to be playing games with your salvation. Remember, God can see what’s in your heart, and knows the difference between what you will and what you can’t control.
Again, I would like to point out that the anathema is for *saying *the doctrine of the Real Presence is false.

 

[AlanFromWichita]

BlindSheep:

Again, I would like to point out that the anathema is for *saying *the doctrine of the Real Presence is false.

Amen. It took me forty years of trying to make sense of things and going certifiably crazy to know enough to make these sorts of distinctions.

Now I teach my children that doing the right thing and not getting caught under any particular discipline system, are two separate things.

In other words, under any worldly discipline system, punishment never applies to breaking the rules, but to have been perceived as breaking the rules.

I guess I can think whatever I like, but if I dare mention that I don’t believe in the Real Presence, then by definition and under the authority of the Church under binding and loosing, I am going to hell.

This is the exact type of thing that prevents me from Fully Assenting. It’s more of “play the game convincingly and you don’t get hurt” attitude that seems all too pervasive in Catholicism. I will go so far to say that by the time most kids I know are in high school they are completely aware of the “play the game” theory of Catholicism, except for a very few kids who are bold enough to actually ask challenging questions in their religion class.

I teach my own kids that they disagree with their teachers at their own risk. I teach them how to play the game and go along with the teachers, and I teach them how to articulate objections without necessarily drawing a fight – except even that doesn’t work with particularly high strung teachers. Therefore, they can decide. Do they want a life of comfort and agreeing and playing the game, or do they want to Stand Up Against things they think are wrong or fuzzy and risk becoming a hero or an example? Now I train my kids in both techniques. The first boy was non-confrontational although he asked an occasional interesting question, and the second was very challenging during class and often met with the priest outside of class to discuss things. Both made excellent grades, and both were loved by their teachers.

Alan

 

[Rosalinda]

Alan, Any Catholic who is merely playing the game convincingly so he won’t get hurt as you put it rather sounds like a hypocrite. Catholics have the faculties of intelligence and reasoning and it is an insult to God and the Church He established to suggest we have been deprived of the right to ask questions. By baptism our relationship with God is one of a child with his father. Children asks questions of their parents all the time and as a father I suspect if one of your children was upset and confused about an issue and refused to bring it to you you would be hurt if he was too fearful to broach the subject with you.

As a father you have enough experience to know whether your son or daughter is asking a sincere question because he/she is searching for truth or is merely challenging your authority and mocking you. Luke 1 dramatically illustrates this point where we see Zechariah challenge the archangel Gabriel when the birth of his son John is proclaimed. He was rendered speechless because he did not believe the good news. Contrast his attitude with Mary’s who was also described as perturbed with the announcement she would have a son and who likewise posed a question. She wasn’t punished for her lack of understanding and asking a point of clarification. Why not? It was the disposition of her heart and her assent of the will even though there were many times she didn’t completely understand. When Mary visited Elizabeth we read, “Blessed are you who believed that what was spoken to you by the Lord would be fulfilled.”

Likewise, when Catholics receive the Eucharist we believe the words spoken by our Lord in John 6 and we are blessed to become living tabernacles- as was Mary the first living tabernacle in the flesh - for those few precious minutes after communion. How sad it would be if we were only playing along, as you suggested, acting the part of the Pharisees who honored God with their lips when their hearts were far from Him.

 

[Rosalinda]

May I share with you a quote from Pope Benedict delivered to the World Youth in Cologne on Sunday on this very topic.

" Bread and wine becomes his Body and Blood. But it must not stop there, on the contrary, the process of transformation must now gather momentum. The Body and Blood of Christ are given to us so that we ourselves will be transformed in our turn. We are to become the Body of Christ, his own flesh and blood. We all eat the one bread, and this means that we ourselves become one. In this way, adoration, as we said earlier, becomes union. God no longer simply stands before us, as the one who is totally Other. He is within us, and we are in him. His dynamic enters into us and then seeks to spread outwards to others until it fills the world, so that his love can truly become the dominant measure of the world.

I like to illustrate this new step urged upon us by the Last Supper by drawing out the different nuances of the word “adoration” in Greek and in Latin. The Greek word is “proskynesis.” It refers to the gesture of submission, the recognition of God as our true measure, supplying the norm that we choose to follow. It means that freedom is not simply about enjoying life in total autonomy, but rather about living by the measure of truth and goodness, so that we ourselves can become true and good. This gesture is necessary even if initially our yearning for freedom makes us inclined to resist it. We can only fully accept it when we take the second step that the Last Supper proposes to us. The Latin word for adoration is “ad-oratio” – mouth-to-mouth contact, a kiss, an embrace, and hence ultimately love. Submission becomes union, because he to whom we submit is Love. In this way submission acquires a meaning, because it does not impose anything on us from the outside, but liberates us deep within."