How to settle disagreements on doctrine?

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mathematoons

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This is as issue that has been coming up a lot for me lately. If I disagree with another Catholic about a matter of faith or morals that is not addressed in Scripture or Church teaching, how is the matter to be settled?

For example, when I quoted Fr. Serpa about how you can have anything you need to be happy in Heaven (in the context of pets going to Heaven with people) to another Catholic, she said, with shock, “Who went and told you that?!?” Her position was that we’ll all be so busy looking at God that we won’t care whether our loved ones (human or animal) are in Heaven with us or not. As far as I know, the Church has not defined it one way or the other. So how do I know which one of us is right? I don’t just mean about this specific example, but in general.

I don’t really like the idea of having to decide these things for myself, because if I wanted to be my own god, I would have stayed an atheist. But I don’t want to treat another human (other than the Pope) as infallible, either. I made that mistake when I was an atheist, too.

Am I really free to make up my own stuff when it isn’t defined by the Church? That sounds too much like the relativism I left. If I’m free to make it up, then so is everyone else.
 
If God has chosen not to reveal a thing to us, then we should not claim knowledge regarding that thing. All we can do is speculate, and we must be very clear that all we are doing is speculating. So in that sense such disagreements can never be settled in this life.

I’m inclined to agree with you and not with her. Jesus talks about mansions and feasts in heaven. Revelation about a new heaven and a new earth and a new Jerusalem, and of making all things new. This is very much in accord with my belief that everything about our humanity will be fulfilled and perfected in heaven, not abandoned. I think we will be fully alive in heaven in some way that is, however imperfectly, mirrored here on earth. And I think we will take infinite delight not just in God but in all of his new and perfected creation. I can’t wait!!
 
I agree that when God does not state exactly what will be, we can speculate based on what is reveled. What do the ‘mansions and feasts in heaven, a new heaven and a new earth and a new Jerusalem’ really mean. Are they human delights that will be presented in a more heavenly manner, or are we just trying to equate Heaven with the pleasures we know?

I also agree with the other point; Her position was that we’ll all be so busy looking at God that we won’t care whether our loved ones (human or animal) are in Heaven with us or not. This has been a way that I have seen the issue, since we leave all the problems and disapointments and sorrows of the world behind.
 
If you want to understand Church doctrine then obey the Church.

The way we may be sure that we know him is to keep his commandments. (1 John 2:3)

Do first, then understand. That is the essence of faith. Obedience comes first, then God will shed light on his teaching and help us to understand.

-Tim-
 
mathematoons said:
This is as issue that has been coming up a lot for me lately. If I disagree with another Catholic about a matter of faith or morals that is not addressed in Scripture or Church teaching, how is the matter to be settled?

For example, when I quoted Fr. Serpa about how you can have anything you need to be happy in Heaven (in the context of pets going to Heaven with people) to another Catholic, she said, with shock, “Who went and told you that?!?” Her position was that we’ll all be so busy looking at God that we won’t care whether our loved ones (human or animal) are in Heaven with us or not. As far as I know, the Church has not defined it one way or the other. So how do I know which one of us is right? I don’t just mean about this specific example, but in general.

I don’t really like the idea of having to decide these things for myself, because if I wanted to be my own god, I would have stayed an atheist. But I don’t want to treat another human (other than the Pope) as infallible, either. I made that mistake when I was an atheist, too.

Am I really free to make up my own stuff when it isn’t defined by the Church? That sounds too much like the relativism I left. If I’m free to make it up, then so is everyone else.
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You can’t decide those kinds of things for yourself because nobody has the answer on those questions-and that’s exactly why the Church has no official teaching pertaining to them. Fr Serpa is just speculating and so is your friend.

**“No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has in store for those who love him” **1 Cor 2:29
 
To answer you main question - about resolving doctrinal differences. The essence for how this is done is found in Mt 18:15-18 and an example for it is set out in Acts 15.

From these two things have evolved our present system of priests, bishops, theologians, etc all of whom act in some form or another as elements within “The Church”. So, when a doctrinal issue comes up that we cannot resolve among ourselves, we are to “tell it to the Church”. If the matter is felt important enough (touches on salvation or could adversely effect the peace of the Church or Truth as revealed) then The Church, usually through various offices, then kicks the matter around awhile and comes up with some ruling.

Now - In the case of things like you and your friend were discussing, the Church tends to leave such matters outside of the realm of dogmatic or doctrinal teaching.
One can find among the great saints and even among the Doctors of the Church various descriptions of heaven and/or hell. These the Church treats as “Private revelation”. As such an individual is free to accept it or not.

Personally, I find such things to be largely a matter of “imagery”. A way for us as humans to visualize heaven. What would make us the most happy and content. For example, my dad loved gardening as his mom did before him. When he passed away, I commented to my mom that Grandma probably sent him right out to pull some corn for supper. Whether my statement is accurate or not is irrelevant to the reality of heaven. The same thing is true for your image or the image of your friend.

I don’t say this to belittle you or your friend…far from it. The important thing is that we recognize that in heaven we will be completely content and fulfilled. From that understanding we choose to do all that we can to become worthy of heaven by becoming “perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect” (Mt 5:48).

and believe me - THAT is enough to keep me busy without worrying over the particulars of heaven…😃

Peace
James
 
Let me see if I understand. The Church teaches the deposit of faith, which we must believe, and then individual believers come up with details which the rest of us are free to believe or not.

If this is the case, then how do I know whether to believe something? Ultimately, I have to decide that. Not just with the example I gave, but everything that is not part of the deposit of faith. My fear is that I might end up creating God in my own image. I don’t want to do that.

So if one Catholic teaches A and another teaches B, how do I know which one to go with when neither A nor B have been explicitly revealed or explicitly denied? I have a friend who believes in evolution, and I believe in 6-day creation. My priest thinks polygamy and contraception are not covered under natural law to the degree that non-Catholics who do these are in a state of mortal sin, but I don’t know if this is true or not. And so on. The list goes on and on.
 
And you thought being Catholic was going to be easy…bwaaahaahaahaa…😃

You ask good questions and for some I guess I can see how they might be troubling.

The only solution I can offer to you is this. Keep your Faith Simple.
Cling to the fundamental tenets of the faith and how they apply to everyday living. That should keep any Christian plenty busy.

As for how to choose which thing to believe…Well in Christianity we have the Holy Spirit of God who comes to us and guides us. So we listen, we read and most especially, we pray, we meditate and contemplate. We listen for God to reveal to us what he wants us to know. Then, if necessary, we might check some revelation against what the church HAS taught on a given matter, and/or talk to our priest about the matter…
All the time this goes on we are continuing to grow in holiness and slowly but less important things become less important as we draw nearer and nearer to God.
Eventually (hopefully) we are so in Love with God that nothing else matters and all that we are, all that we hope for and all that we do is from through and for His Love.

Peace
James
 
mathematoons said:
Let me see if I understand. The Church teaches the deposit of faith, which we must believe, and then individual believers come up with details which the rest of us are free to believe or not.

If this is the case, then how do I know whether to believe something? Ultimately, I have to decide that. Not just with the example I gave, but everything that is not part of the deposit of faith. My fear is that I might end up creating God in my own image. I don’t want to do that.

So if one Catholic teaches A and another teaches B, how do I know which one to go with when neither A nor B have been explicitly revealed or explicitly denied? I have a friend who believes in evolution, and I believe in 6-day creation. My priest thinks polygamy and contraception are not covered under natural law to the degree that non-Catholics who do these are in a state of mortal sin, but I don’t know if this is true or not. And so on. The list goes on and on.
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You just need to listen to the Church-not individual Catholics. Individuals can be all over the board, believing in anything they want. I have no idea why you’d think otherwise, even though it’d be great if every priest-or every Catholic for that matter-knew and related the faith perfectly in all instances. If you don’t have one already, get a copy of the Catechism of the Catholic Church and read what the Church teaches.
 
Mathematoons #8
I have a friend who believes in evolution, and I believe in 6-day creation. My priest thinks polygamy and contraception are not covered under natural law to the degree that non-Catholics who do these are in a state of mortal sin, but I don’t know if this is true or not. And so on. The list goes on and on.
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You’ve been given good advice – obviously people have different ideas and prejudices on all sorts of things because they haven’t taken the trouble to study and learn about them – such as on the arguments for and against Creation and Evolution – they are not matters of faith or morals unless the point at issue denies or doubts a doctrine or dogma of the Church on faith or morals, or is against the natural moral law.

On contraception some priests are malformed and misinformed, so also go to EWTN and learn for instance:
As Fr Stephen Torraco lucidly explains: re assisting nature in healing:
Assisting nature for mankind
Answer by Fr.Stephen F. Torraco (EWTN) on July 10 2007:
The art of healing is the art of assisting nature in attaining its goal of health. This is perfectly morally legitimate. Assisting nature in attaining its goal is a wonderful thing. Human beings do it in many different ways. For example, the plumbing in your house assists nature in quenching your thirst. **The moral problem arises when we oppose nature, as in the case, for example, of in vitro fertilization, so called “gay marriage,” and contraception. **

“Pope Sixtus, in the late 1500’s, condemned simultaneously contraception and abortion.[10] **The Holy Office under Pope Pius IX **(1846-1878) handed down several decisions condemning contraception, noting that the wrongness of contraception is a wrong against human nature. That is, it is not a “situational” wrong, but is a universal wrong against the nature of man, as is abortion and infanticide.[11]
[W. E. May, *Catholic Bioethics and the Gift of Human Life, Our Sunday Visitor Publishing Division, Our Sunday Visitor, Inc., 2000.
[10] pg 144
[11] pg. 371.”
 
fhansen said:
You just need to listen to the Church-not individual Catholics. Individuals can be all over the board, believing in anything they want. I have no idea why you’d think otherwise, even though it’d be great if every priest-or every Catholic for that matter-knew and related the faith perfectly in all instances. If you don’t have one already, get a copy of the Catechism of the Catholic Church and read what the Church teaches.
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What I’m asking is, what if something isnt covered in the Catechism? What if it’s left unanswered?
 
fhansen said:
If it’s left unanswered then God didn’t deem it relevant enough right now to answer it. 🙂
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Or something that simply should be obvious to others. For instance, in her example above (everyone would be so absorbed in God that no one would notice if someone wasn’t there or whatever.) We are going to a wedding feast! The Wedding of the Lamb! How many weddings have you been to where everyone there is so absorbed in the bride and groom that they don’t even make conversation with one another? We are a COMMUNITY of believers! We are the body of Christ! When we get there we are going to be worshiping together, not in our own separate galaxy.
 
mathematoons said:
Let me see if I understand. The Church teaches the deposit of faith, which we must believe, and then individual believers come up with details which the rest of us are free to believe or not.

If this is the case, then how do I know whether to believe something? Ultimately, I have to decide that. Not just with the example I gave, but everything that is not part of the deposit of faith. My fear is that I might end up creating God in my own image. I don’t want to do that.

So if one Catholic teaches A and another teaches B, how do I know which one to go with when neither A nor B have been explicitly revealed or explicitly denied? I have a friend who believes in evolution, and I believe in 6-day creation. My priest thinks polygamy and contraception are not covered under natural law to the degree that non-Catholics who do these are in a state of mortal sin, but I don’t know if this is true or not. And so on. The list goes on and on.
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Perhaps the key here is recognizing you don’t know?. First of all in the concept of mortal sins of non Catholics, that is between them and God, and we should do our best to point them to Christ and his teachings Period… Same with our Protestant brother and sisters who practice contraception.

The apostle of Paul said now I see through a glass darkly, then face to face, now I know in part and prophecy in part, but when the perfect is come, the part will be done away. This is in 1 Corinthians 13. (and I learned this in Protestant version so bare with me.)

The point? We don’t know all the answers because we can only see these things through a small perspective. The longer we as a Church grow in our understanding of Christ the more we will see things, but we really probably only understand the clear picture when we are with them. And even then we will probably spend our enternity getting a more clear picture!

How the Lord created earth, I suspect is beyond our mere human understanding. What is 6 days to God? Is it necessary though to completely understand everything for salvation? I think its perfectly okay to have an opinion on this, as long as you and your brother can be charitable and understand your not God, and don’t really know anything.

One of the things I love about being Catholic is there is room for different opinions, as long as we are willing to agree on the main things and embrace each other as brothers/sisters and Christ. We have a means of solving our disagreements on the big things.

I think part of the problem that leads to divisions is that people sometimes want absolutely clarity and absolutely have to be right. And fail to recognize that we are human beings trying to understand someone who is far greater than us. As such we need to be willing to trust the Lord in who HE has chosen to put in charge of the Church, and who HE will guide to give us the answers on the things we need. So many times we throughout history have gotten into fights over the meanings of words and semantics.
 
mathematoons said:
What I’m asking is, what if something isnt covered in the Catechism? What if it’s left unanswered?
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If it is not explicitly defined, then we are free to formulate whatever opinions or conclusions we desire, as long as it does not conflict with what has been declared as revealed Truth.

An example would be Purgatory. We are bound to believe that Purgatory exists, that in Purgatory, a soul is cleansed and made completely holy as Scripture states is necessary to be in God’s presence, and that prayers offered for those in Purgatory are beneficial. Those are the three truths about Purgatory we must accept, in the understanding that ll souls in Purgatory have achieved Salvation, and are ultimately destined for heaven. The Church has declared nothing else definitively about Purgatory, and we are free to hold whatever views we with on the subject outside of those three tenets.

We are still free to believe it is either a physical place or a process. Private revelation has led to the understanding that souls in Purgatory can be there for a very long time and undergo unimaginable suffering, but we are not bound by private revelation, and we are free to believe it to be instantaneous and “painless” if we wish.
 
bmullins said:
Or something that simply should be obvious to others. For instance, in her example above (everyone would be so absorbed in God that no one would notice if someone wasn’t there or whatever.) We are going to a wedding feast! The Wedding of the Lamb! How many weddings have you been to where everyone there is so absorbed in the bride and groom that they don’t even make conversation with one another? We are a COMMUNITY of believers! We are the body of Christ! When we get there we are going to be worshiping together, not in our own separate galaxy.
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Yes, this does seem rather obvious to me as well. Are we not to love our neighbors in heaven as well? Are we not to pray for those in need of prayers? Hard to love anybody or pray for anybody you’re ignoring. In fact, the very act of praying to angels and saints would be pointless, and yet the Church calls on us to undertake such prayer, both personally and in the liturgy.
 
joshua_b said:
If it is not explicitly defined, then we are free to formulate whatever opinions or conclusions we desire, as long as it does not conflict with what has been declared as revealed Truth.

An example would be Purgatory. We are bound to believe that Purgatory exists, that in Purgatory, a soul is cleansed and made completely holy as Scripture states is necessary to be in God’s presence, and that prayers offered for those in Purgatory are beneficial. Those are the three truths about Purgatory we must accept, in the understanding that ll souls in Purgatory have achieved Salvation, and are ultimately destined for heaven. The Church has declared nothing else definitively about Purgatory, and we are free to hold whatever views we with on the subject outside of those three tenets.

We are still free to believe it is either a physical place or a process. Private revelation has led to the understanding that souls in Purgatory can be there for a very long time and undergo unimaginable suffering, but we are not bound by private revelation, and we are free to believe it to be instantaneous and “painless” if we wish.
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So my original question remains. How do we know what to believe in those areas? It sounds like we get to make up our own stuff and create God in our image, because when I decide what to believe, I am giving myself the authority to define doctrine. Of course I submit to Church teaching where it exists, but where something is not defined, when it comes to my beliefs on the faith, I am the arbiter of truth. That’s too much like how I thought when I was an atheist. I thought the way I saw things was the truth, and anyone who disagreed was just being a stubborn jerk.

Plus, how do I decide what to believe when it’s not covered by Church teaching? What to believe depends on who I believe, which itself depends on who I believe, and so on, and ultimately, I’m believing in myself. We’re supposed to want God’s will, not our own.

Does no one else see the problem with this? This is one of the things that drives me crazy about being around other Catholics. We’re supposed to be one holy Catholic and apostolic Church, but we sure can’t seem to get the “one” part down.
 
mathematoons said:
So my original question remains. How do we know what to believe in those areas? It sounds like we get to make up our own stuff and create God in our image, because when I decide what to believe, I am giving myself the authority to define doctrine. Of course I submit to Church teaching where it exists, but where something is not defined, when it comes to my beliefs on the faith, I am the arbiter of truth. That’s too much like how I thought when I was an atheist. I thought the way I saw things was the truth, and anyone who disagreed was just being a stubborn jerk.

Plus, how do I decide what to believe when it’s not covered by Church teaching? What to believe depends on who I believe, which itself depends on who I believe, and so on, and ultimately, I’m believing in myself. We’re supposed to want God’s will, not our own.

Does no one else see the problem with this? This is one of the things that drives me crazy about being around other Catholics. We’re supposed to be one holy Catholic and apostolic Church, but we sure can’t seem to get the “one” part down.
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Why do you need to believe “more” that what has been revealed? Why can’t you accept that God has decided we don’t need to know this and that particular detail? Take purgatory for instance. What difference would it make in your life and in your salvation if the Church taught more details than it does? There is such a thing as interesting but not particularly useful knowledge.
 
snarflemike said:
Why do you need to believe “more” that what has been revealed? Why can’t you accept that God has decided we don’t need to know this and that particular detail? Take purgatory for instance. What difference would it make in your life and in your salvation if the Church taught more details than it does? There is such a thing as interesting but not particularly useful knowledge.
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Two reasons. First, I’m through with deciding for myself what reality is. Second, I’m sick of people criticizing me for the conclusions I come to based on revealed doctrine, which don’t contradict any other doctrine. Other Catholics I meet aren’t interested in hearing what I think, but only in hearing what they think, in another person’s voice.
 
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