German Bishops: Catholics Who Formally Leave Church Cannot Receive Sacraments

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austenbosten said:
I agree with the Conservative Catholics that it’s hypocritical to refuse the Sacraments to those who don’t pay the tax, but heretics can receive them as long as they have the dough. 😦

I understand economically and sociologically why the bishops are doing this, they can’t just opt-out of the system in favor of collecting tithes on their own and not expect a critical drop in revenues because Germans are just not used to dumping dough into the basket…but surely there is a better way than this.
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Actually, I don’t even think that being able to afford the taxes enters into it much. Germany has a very robust welfare state, and low income people don’t pay the taxes I believe, because like here they don’t pay any taxes.

It doesn’t seem like a very productive way to handle this, I would agree with that. But I believe the whole thing is really interesting, for a couple of reasons. And it could really invite disaster on a couple of levels too.

In some ways, it’s rather like keeping a lot of large Catholic things open here using government money when physical & economic resources from the normal channels are flagging. But in some ways, it’s decidedly different.

The difference of course is that, in Germany, this policy is very old. It stems from a time when Church property was nationalized and this was one of the things given in reparation for that, under entirely different historical, religious and cultural conditions. This happened a long time ago.
 
iloveangels said:
Actually, I don’t even think that being able to afford the taxes enters into it much. Germany has a very robust welfare state, and low income people don’t pay the taxes I believe, because like here they don’t pay any taxes.

It doesn’t seem like a very productive way to handle this, I would agree with that. But I believe the whole thing is really interesting, for a couple of reasons. And it could really invite disaster on a couple of levels too.

Rather like keeping a lot of large Catholic things open here using government money when physical & economic resources from the normal channels are flagging.

The difference of course is that, in Germany, this policy is very old. It stems from a time when Church property was nationalized and this was one of the things given in reparation for that, under entirely different historical, religious and cultural conditions. This happened a long time ago.
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I would say that it wouldn’t matter whether one is able to pay the tax or not, nor whether every single German Catholic is actually willing to go along with it, nor whether the redistribution is necessary due to low attendance, nor if it is an old policy stemming from nationalization or cultural norm, nor if refusing to pay only subjects one to civil penalties, nor whether the exit hatch from this policy is a formal declaration of apostasy. The fact that it exists even in potential that some faithful are required to pay a certain amount no matter what under threat of force, completely outside of the assessment of financial duty to God made privately with one’s spiritual father, with the only way out being the pain of excommunication, is straight-up simony and a monstrously sinful practice. The German bishops ought to either petition the government to remove this policy or get defrocked.

Out of curiosity, what happens if a person who has declared himself away from the Church wants to return? Would he or she need to repay back taxes?
 
pdstor said:
I would say that it wouldn’t matter whether one is able to pay the tax or not, nor whether every single German Catholic is actually willing to go along with it, nor whether the redistribution is necessary due to low attendance, nor if it is an old policy stemming from nationalization or cultural norm, nor if refusing to pay only subjects one to civil penalties, nor whether the exit hatch from this policy is a formal declaration of apostasy. The fact that it exists even in potential that some faithful are required to pay a certain amount no matter what under threat of force, completely outside of the assessment of financial duty to God made privately with one’s spiritual father, with the only way out being the pain of excommunication, is straight-up simony and a monstrously sinful practice. The German bishops ought to either petition the government to remove this policy or get defrocked.
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No comment except to say that I’ve been glad for some time that I’m not Catholic in Germany and this latest has not changed my opinion of that scenario.
pdstor said:
Out of curiosity, what happens if a person who has declared himself away from the Church wants to return? Would he or she need to repay back taxes?
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No idea. Except that I have done some reading on the net and it seems that on some occasions but not all, if an error has been made on the paperwork, refunds have been made in the other direction. Not sure what might happen in the reverse, that is, leaving and then coming back.

If it is the case that you can do this, if this were in the US, there’d be people running in an out like little boys on a summer afternoon, to get through the landmarks of life while paying minimum taxes. In Germany, I’m not sure if one can declare belief to get married, then leave, and then declare re-belief to get a kid baptized, for example. 😉

Germans aren’t like Americans in a lot of ways. And I don’t know if they post the opt outs anyplace. If they’re going to restrict sacraments, then priests and parish employees certainly have to know who’s in and who’s out. Maybe a lot of people end up knowing. Not sure. Again, it has a different meaning here than there.

BTW, I think there is a filing cost in most places, except maybe Berlin, but it’s not usually really cheap.
 
iloveangels said:
Yup, especially since many people in Germany regard religion to be social structure and the money to be a nice family thing to do. It’s an old attitude in Germany. They also have the old “what will the neighbors think” thing going on. I don’t know how everyone knows, including the priests though, if you’ve opted out. I’m checking on that.
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Post that if you find out, please. I am curious. 🙂 Perhaps the government supplies to the bishops a list of names of those who paid and in what amount, or perhaps they supply a list of those who opt out. With modern computers and communication, most any sort of tracking and information distribution is possible.
 
pdstor said:
I would say that it wouldn’t matter whether one is able to pay the tax or not, nor whether every single German Catholic is actually willing to go along with it, nor whether the redistribution is necessary due to low attendance, nor if it is an old policy stemming from nationalization or cultural norm, nor if refusing to pay only subjects one to civil penalties, nor whether the exit hatch from this policy is a formal declaration of apostasy. The fact that it exists even in potential that some faithful are required to pay a certain amount no matter what under threat of force, completely outside of the assessment of financial duty to God made privately with one’s spiritual father, with the only way out being the pain of excommunication, is straight-up simony and a monstrously sinful practice. The German bishops ought to either petition the government to remove this policy or get defrocked.

Out of curiosity, what happens if a person who has declared himself away from the Church wants to return? Would he or she need to repay back taxes?
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Are you outraged that people who formally excommunnicate themselves are denied sacrements.
I must of missed something. somewhere.
 
gus said:
Are you outraged that people who formally excommunnicate themselves are denied sacrements.
I must of missed something. somewhere.
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I’m outraged that the only way out of the sinful simony in place there is committing the sin of apostasy. However, if one leaves with the thought that sin is in place, rather than not wanting to have anything to do with the Church, one is not in fact excommunicated no matter what the Bishop says, and his orders could be trampled for being sinful (he’d be under latae sentinae suspension for simony anyway, as well as anyone else patting him on the back).
 
gus said:
Are you outraged that people who formally excommunnicate themselves are denied sacrements.
I must of missed something. somewhere.
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No, no. But it is so closely tied to paying money. That’s the problem. Particularly in Germany, where there are cultural memories of money for faith, which are problematic. Far more than here, where we don’t have that sort of history in our commonsense frameworks.

pdstor,
Not sure about any of that. I wonder if there will be some sort of genuine clarification. The whole scenario is pretty weird. And it’s not going to do them any good in Europe which is already in bad shape for the Church.
 
Pug said:
Post that if you find out, please. I am curious. 🙂 Perhaps the government supplies to the bishops a list of names of those who paid and in what amount, or perhaps they supply a list of those who opt out. With modern computers and communication, most any sort of tracking and information distribution is possible.
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It appears that there is communication between the bishop’s office and the local government offices. There’s a forum in English with expats in it, who talk about this and other issues called “toytowngermany.” Not sure what the bishops’ offices do with the list after that. It seems that the Church pays the government a fee to collect the taxes but both parties are happy with that. The current system of doing things appears to date from at least the 30s and is well-established and then some.

The bishops in Germany have been threatening excommunication for some time for those who didn’t pay their church taxes. I guess they decided to make good on it, except they stopped short of actual excommunication. It’s sort of excommunication lite. No sacraments, no services.
 
austenbosten said:
You mean American Catholic, don’t you? 😉
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No! I’m a Catholic first and American second. I can prove my loyalty to the United States. I served over twenty plus years in the United States Cavalry—hence my name Cavman.:cool: God first, Country second—May the Lord be with you.

I understand where you’re coming. 👍
 
Honestly, though, how can it be that nobody sees how absolutely horrible and dangerous this is?? You can’t require money from church members. That is straight up sin. There’s no way to cut around it. Maybe I should submit a question to the CA people, but I just don’t get it.
 
pdstor said:
Honestly, though, how can it be that nobody sees how absolutely horrible and dangerous this is?? You can’t require money from church members. That is straight up sin. There’s no way to cut around it. Maybe I should submit a question to the CA people, but I just don’t get it.
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I’d be interested to see what they say, pdstor.
 
Cavman said:
No! I’m a Catholic first and American second. I can prove my loyalty to the United States. I served over twenty plus years in the United States Cavalry—hence my name Cavman.:cool: God first, Country second—May the Lord be with you.

I understand where you’re coming. 👍
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Hehe not meant to be a grammar Nazi Cavman but if that’s how you described yourself (as I assumed from the get-go) then you would describe yourself as an American Catholic.

You see the adjective always comes before the noun. 👍

You wouldn’t describe the Pope as Father Holy. 😉
 
austenbosten said:
Hehe not meant to be a grammar Nazi Cavman but if that’s how you described yourself (as I assumed from the get-go) then you would describe yourself as an American Catholic.

You see the adjective always comes before the noun. 👍
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This is kind of off-topic, but since you’re new and you asked, I’m not going to let you go wondering. Certain groups of dissidents try to create a distinctively American version of Catholicism by being “American Catholic” and throwing that term all over. They typically have “interesting” viewpoints about Catholic teaching and authority.

I don’t pretend to be Cavman’s interpreter, but maybe this is why you got the response from Cavman that you did. You could ask him later.

Every time you see “American Catholic” written that way it doesn’t necessarily mean that’s what you’re looking at, but some people are sensitive to it. And for good reason. The Catholic Church is universal.

Back to the topic at hand: German Bishops: Catholics Who Formally Leave Church Cannot Receive Sacraments
 
iloveangels said:
This is kind of off-topic, but since you’re new and you asked, I’m not going to let you go wondering. Certain groups of dissidents try to create a distinctively American version of Catholicism by being “American Catholic” and throwing that term all over. They typically have “interesting” viewpoints about Catholic teaching and authority.

I don’t pretend to be Cavman’s interpreter, but maybe this is why you got the response from Cavman that you did. You could ask him later.

Every time you see “American Catholic” written that way it doesn’t necessarily mean that’s what you’re looking at, but some people are sensitive to it. And for good reason. The Catholic Church is universal.

Back to the topic at hand: German Bishops: Catholics Who Formally Leave Church Cannot Receive Sacraments
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Once again being a grammar-shnazi that I am. If you believe the Church is universal, then you should use Catholic as the noun and not let some yaddy-hoot insignificant church ruin your choice in defining yourself as a Catholic first and a what-ever second. 🙂
 
austenbosten said:
Once again being a grammar-shnazi that I am. If you believe the Church is universal, then you should use Catholic as the noun and not let some yaddy-hoot insignificant church ruin your choice in defining yourself as a Catholic first and a what-ever second. 🙂
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The problem is that it’s not another Church. It’s a small but loud bunch of people inside this one. 🤷

PS I like grammar schnazis… I’m a “give me the numbers and the quotes” schnazi myself. I don’t like wild and hysterical hand-waving. 😃

Again, back to the real topic. 😛
 
pdstor said:
I’m outraged that the only way out of the sinful simony in place there is committing the sin of apostasy. However, if one leaves with the thought that sin is in place, rather than not wanting to have anything to do with the Church, one is not in fact excommunicated no matter what the Bishop says, and his orders could be trampled for being sinful (he’d be under latae sentinae suspension for simony anyway, as well as anyone else patting him on the back).
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So the atheist who make a formal declaration of this fact are doing it to protest what you perceive to be a sin?
Athesist don’t believe in sin.
So your alleged simony couldn’t possibly a reason.
Oh the’re not really athesist the’re just liars who have a greater view of right and wrong. Oh wait their liars so dishonesty couln’t be part of this pristine world view…
Don’t get me wrong the Church should not accept anything from the state. But Please don’t sanctify tax dodgers whose mot8ves I suspect run a wide spectrum.
I would
Shut down any church and School that can 't pay its own way.If a wealth country like Germany can’t support their own state they don’t deserve to have a Church.

let the the Germans decide what if any faith to follow.
Exempt Catholics from the tax
Just tax the Protestants they don’t seem to have proplems getting money from the state

Whatever position we take it will be critized
The headlines will read THE VATICAN gets tax exemptions for German Catholics.
Its the price for membership in Christ’s Church
Its a price I gladly pay.
 
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