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CWBetts
Guest
Right. Acceptance of abortion is right around the corner. THere are no words…
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FAB
Guest
I recently heard a comment, asked the vatican a question on Wednesday and they will get back to you in 300 years.
The Church in the Northern Hemisphere is much more liberal than in the south which holds to more traditional norms on these issues,
Although this seemed like a quick change, a study of church history is that the changes came about in a period of over 100 years.
Part of what always needs to be kept in mind is that that eh American and Euopean church only make up 6-10% of the total.
The Church in the Northern Hemisphere is much more liberal than in the south which holds to more traditional norms on these issues,
If you point is that we are to reach out to each other and care for our neighbor then your on the right track.
Changes in pratice have’nt change doctrine. Our mission is to reach out to the sinner and find forgivenss, this is the work of Christ.
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tcm22
Guest
Layman, I’m not entirely sure where you are coming from, but I do want to comment. I think the Church makes a big distinction (as do most Catholics) between issues like abortion, contraception, and homosexuality and issues like CITH, EMCH’s, music selection, and other aspects of the Mass which give the so-called “traditionalists” fits.
I can certainly understand the desire and sense of reverence expressed by those who receive Communion on the tongue. I support them 100%, however CITH is a valid why to receive our Lord. I’ve done both and prefer to receive in the hand. Does that make me a “modernist?” If so, does that make me less of a Catholic, or less of a Christian? The difference is that I’m willing to accept either method as a discipline in the Church, subject to change.
I also understand the traditionalist concern over alter girls and EMCH’s. Are those symptoms or primary causes of the problems facing the church today? That’s for our Church leaders to figure out, and I trust them to do so. Jesus promised us that! In my Parish without alter girls (my daughter is one btw, as was my son) or EMCH’s, I’m not sure we would be able to have a Mass and distribute Communion in under 2 hours. Are these issues worth putting one’s eternal soul at risk?
Music: My heavans! This is taking personal preference to the extreme! As far as I know, and I’ve never been able to find otherwise, there is no doctrinal basis for the type of music that should be played at Mass. It’s all well and good if you find Gregorian chant to be more reverent, but it’s certainly not something that defines the Mass, unless you totally miss the point. What did Catholics do for the first 500 years? I’ve heard the hypberbole about “rock bands” and “folk music” but those are all exaggerations in my experience. And frankly, what if they aren’t? Does the essential Truth of Jesus rely on the type of music played at Mass? Let’s face it, when Gregorian music was first implemented, it too was “modern.” For every traditionalist turned off by guitars (playing liturgically approved music, often quite reverently and well), there are others turned off by attempts at off-key chanting that grate on the ears and one’s sens of rhythm. Catholics shouldn’t confuse preference and personal taste with valid Mass. At my very poor and very small Parish, we’re lucky to have musicians. Some of them are pretty bad, but I’m thankful they are there.
Shaking hands/Sign of Peace. I’ll be honest, I don’t care for this aspect of the OF Mass. I understand the basis for it but, as others have mentioned, it’s placement in the Mass is somewhat disruptive. However, we are called to worship as a community, not as individuals and that is what the Sign of Peace is there to establish. If the Church decided to do away with it, I wouldn’t lose any sleep, but I accept it none the less.
My pet peeve is the singing of the Our Father. I don’t believe that was how Our Lord intended it, nor does it appear that is how it was offered in Scripture. Frankly, in English it doesn’t make for a a good song lyric. I recognize that as personal preference. I don’t see using that as some sort of justification to reject the authority of the Holy Father or the teaching of the Magisterium.
The notion that Catholicism or the Church should conform to one’s individual preference or understanding is just wrong-headed at best. Christ instituted his Church with a promise of divine guidance. Over the centuries fallible men have made many mistakes inside and outside the Church, but the solution has never been to engage in schismatic acts. To do so puts one at odds with the basic foundations of the Church, and without any legitimate standing to change current practice.
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Layman
Guest
Note: I don’t personally think sweeping changes are around the corner. I am saying that: **if practices can change so drastically, and doctrine is played down, or simply not taught, then yer average pew warmer gets the idea that change to doctrine is just around the corner. Or has already happened. Or it doesn’t matter any more. **
Thus, it doesn’t matter what the doctrines are, if, in practice, people think what was previously sinful is OK now.
Hence: ‘stopping having sex before your wedding day’, ‘do we really have to fast a whole hour before Communion?’, ‘I don’t think we should bring more children into the world unless they’re wanted’ , confession at Easter and Christmas and ‘Johnny, you put that host in your mouth right this instant!’
[Small point: Where would you go to get a good, straightforward Cathecism these days? Didn’t it used to be: the bookshelf in any Catholic household or the schoolbag of any Catholic child? Dunno what it’s like now.]
Thus, it doesn’t matter what the doctrines are, if, in practice, people think what was previously sinful is OK now.
Hence: ‘stopping having sex before your wedding day’, ‘do we really have to fast a whole hour before Communion?’, ‘I don’t think we should bring more children into the world unless they’re wanted’ , confession at Easter and Christmas and ‘Johnny, you put that host in your mouth right this instant!’
[Small point: Where would you go to get a good, straightforward Cathecism these days? Didn’t it used to be: the bookshelf in any Catholic household or the schoolbag of any Catholic child? Dunno what it’s like now.]
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Lisa44
Guest
Here they sing the Our Father while holding hands.
Nooooo thank you.
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tcm22
Guest
For straightforward Catechism I reach for one of several volumes on my bookshelf, to include the Catechism of the Catholic Church. My children, in their backpacks and school lockers, have similar materials that are part of their daily education. What gets my blood pressure boiling is the SSPX-supported notion that some of what’s contained in those volumes is some how invalid because it’s not “traditional.” My Catechism shows a copyright of 1994. Should I defer to the SSPX and/or the writing of AB Lefebvre to decide what’s valid in their or what’s not? That’s certainly not a slippery slope I want to tread up.
Layman, your points are certainly well taken. Few would disagree the state of the Church certainly is what it ought to be. Was it ever? I suspect many “traditionalists” suffer from rose-colored glasses syndrome. I would argue that trends are improving as Bishops, Priests, and the laity begin to understand the excesses and undoctrinal practices that crept into the Church after VII were harmful to the Church. I’m no scholar of Church history, but I doubt it is the first time something like this has happened.
I think we could certainly agree that our Bishops could have done a better job executing their teaching authority. I guess what we all OUGHT to agree on is the fundamentals of our Faith, and supporting our leaders as they attempt to keep the course true. Schismatic pronouncements and defiance of Church authority certainly aren’t
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I_Believe
Guest
Wow, a thread complaining, and rightly so, about liberalism, and we have those bashing the SSPX. Crazy. The SSPX chapels are the last place you’d find liberals.
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Renko
Guest
I am with you all the way, I too am sick and tired of liberalism. I am a staunch traditionalist and am sick of liberlal churches.
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brigid12
Guest
I’m sick of it, too, however it’s always been with the Church. Look at the reform of the monasteries in the 16th cent., look at how lax they had become for a couple hundred years before that, etc.
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Onegin
Guest
I’ll keep this brief since it’s already flamboyantly off-topic but I would generally disagree that most Catholics can clearly and distinctly differentiate between practice and doctrine. The last time I checked the numbers, a startling majority of professed Catholics do not believe (or at least seriously question) the Real Presence. And given the lax attitude that teaching on the Eucharist has received, who can blame them? After all, who has been there to correct them, to catechize them and to correct this error?
The doctrine may be mostly intact, but the practices have changed so much as to obfuscate doctrinal teaching. And from this, much confusion has ensued.
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m134e5
Guest
On ordaining women- the women who want to be priests either simply don’t understand the Faith, or they’re power-hungry feminists who can’t get through their heads that the vocation to the priesthood is one of sacrifice and service- not of power.
**On homosexual marriages- **it should be obvious that men and women, not men and men or women and women, were meant to be married to each other.
**On contraceptives- **those who disregard the Church’s teaching on this are the ones with small families whose kids (if they have any) lose the faith. They will, because of the contraceptives they believe in, disappear. Even when I was agnostic, I didn’t believe in contraception. I never understood why people would you want to avoid participating in the creation of another human being- of one who looks like them, who reminds them of themselves and their family. That’s priceless! Also, each one is unique, and has the potential to change the world- why prevent them from being conceived? I’m sure glad my great-grandmother didn’t decide that 12 was enough- my grandmother was number 13.
This part of the liberalism in the Church is not as prevalent as it once was- or at least there are more clergy and religious who speak against it. The Church just needs some more time to adjust to the cultural turbulence of the 60’s and 70’s, but it is as timeless as ever- and it will prevail.
**On homosexual marriages- **it should be obvious that men and women, not men and men or women and women, were meant to be married to each other.
**On contraceptives- **those who disregard the Church’s teaching on this are the ones with small families whose kids (if they have any) lose the faith. They will, because of the contraceptives they believe in, disappear. Even when I was agnostic, I didn’t believe in contraception. I never understood why people would you want to avoid participating in the creation of another human being- of one who looks like them, who reminds them of themselves and their family. That’s priceless! Also, each one is unique, and has the potential to change the world- why prevent them from being conceived? I’m sure glad my great-grandmother didn’t decide that 12 was enough- my grandmother was number 13.
This part of the liberalism in the Church is not as prevalent as it once was- or at least there are more clergy and religious who speak against it. The Church just needs some more time to adjust to the cultural turbulence of the 60’s and 70’s, but it is as timeless as ever- and it will prevail.
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Layman
Guest
Give 'em a hellfire sermon once a month, I say! It’d cut through all their cosy ideas. If there’s the slightest possibility you could go to Hell, wouldn’t you make every effort to avoid it?
Probably why the old preachers did it. It ‘covered their ***es’ with the Lord (“But I told them straight, my King!”) and reaches people theological niceties wouldn’t.
Probably why the old preachers did it. It ‘covered their ***es’ with the Lord (“But I told them straight, my King!”) and reaches people theological niceties wouldn’t.
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tcm22
Guest
I can certainly agree with everything you’ve said here. I just wonder how we got there. It’s very easy to point to VII, but that strikes me as too simplistic. The outcomes of Vatican II obviously drove some changes in practice (rightly and wrongly), but what changed so dramatically that the Bishops allowed so much silliness to creep in? I don’t thing that’s a global issue is it, or is it something unique to the West? I contrast the poor catechesis (my own included as an RCIA convert in 1991) with the incredible charisma, pastoral impact, and voice of JPII. I wouldn’t consider JP II a “liberal” or “modernist”, and he certainly did more to preach the Gospel than any Pope in the 20th Century.
It just seems to me that the Church is a complicated enterprise with competing issues, factions, and fallible men leading large unweildy segments of the organization. To classify the entire thing as “liberal” or “modernist” ( whatever that means…) is just too simplistic. I just thankful for the guidance of the Holy Spirit, because without that, it certainly wouldn’t work.
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yablabo
Guest
Code of Canon Law:
Can. 751 Heresy is the obstinate denial or obstinate doubt after the reception of baptism of some truth which is to be believed by divine and Catholic faith; apostasy is the total repudiation of the Christian faith; schism is the refusal of submission to the Supreme Pontiff or of communion with the members of the Church subject to him.
If you’re saying that Archbishop Lefebvre did evil…such as “refusal of submission to the Supreme Pontiff or of communion with members of the Church subject to him”…in order for some good to come of it, then you’re calling him an immoral person, since it is a basic moral teaching that one cannot do evil that good may come of it.
Or…are you simply saying that God could not fulfill his plans for the human race without Archbishop Lefebvre…? Like…if the Latin Mass was necessary for the salvation of souls, then if Archbishop Lefebvre had not been there, God would not have been able to keep the Latin Mass from becoming extinct? So, God can’t get it done on His own?
– Nicole
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iluvburpees
Guest
No, it is stated in canon law that one may disobey if there is necessity. Therefore, the one “disobeying” is the one who is “obeying God rather than men.” Perhaps you should read these two articles: sspx.org/miscellaneous/state_of_necessity_sisinono.htm
That’s just ridiculous. It’s like saying that trying to convert non-Catholics is wrong, since it makes it look like we don’t believe that “God could fulfill his plans for the human race without” us.
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tcm22
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This seems to be the crux of the SSPX justification, unfortunately it is entirely self-serving. It was Lefebvre himself who defined “necessity.” He defied the specific request of the Pontiff after lengthy consultation and correspondence with the Pope and officials in Rome. He had more than enough opportunity to plead his cause directly to the Pope. Arguably he tried and failed. He was warned of the pending excommunication and went ahead and went ahead and consecrated the SSPX Bishops anyway. His actions were definitively labled schismatic.
This was not a decision Lefebvre made in defiance of one man or a group of men who made some bad decisions. He was defying the full authority of the Church and the Throne of Peter. The “necessity” argument just doesn’t stand up to the man’s actions. One doesn’t define justify “necessity” when it conflicts with essential Church Doctrine. By that logic, Luther was justified out of necessity.
Remarkably, the SSPX is such proponent of tradition, yet I thought obediance to the Holy Father and the need for Papal authorization to consecrate Bishops were pretty well established traditions.
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yablabo
Guest
Thanks for the links to the articles.
The bishops converting people to Catholicism and baptizing is a divine commandment and not the point. The point was to ask whether you were saying that Archbishop Lefebvre was necessary for God’s plans to be fulfilled.
– Nicole
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iluvburpees
Guest
If I sounded harsh towards you, I’m sorry. I tend to be sharp with people when I’m trying to convert them.
To answer your question, I do believe that Archbishop Lefebvre was necessary for God’s plans to be fulfilled. Now, I don’t say this in the sense that he is greater than God; I’m saying it in the same sense as the Blessed Virgin’s role: God technically didn’t need Our Lady, but His plans to save mankind made her necessary. I feel the same way with Archbishop Lefebvre.
God Bless
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CWBetts
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Pleas tell me that you don’t mean that Archbishop Lefebvre deserves the same level of attention as Our Lady!
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Onegin
Guest
To be honest, I think most Catholics who are able to be at least moderately intellectually honest with themselves (I hate that phrase, but I couldn’t think of anything else) will admit that there are problems in the Church that - for whatever reason - have gotten a bit out of hand.
What bothers me is that on the Traditional forum, there are always a bunch of threads about the “root causes” of these problems where people battle it out over whether VII was the cause, blah blah blah. At this point, I wouldn’t go so far as to say that it doesn’t matter but I think the time for debating over the origins has passed. There is a problem, that problem is that Catholics do not know their faith, and we need to fix it. Desperately.
So what are some concrete actions that can be taken in Churches where clergy and laity recognize this problem? Restructuring the youth catechism classes? Refocusing the homilies to address substantive doctrinal issues? Adult catechism classes? Brining back Parish libraries? What?
Edit: Also, regarding the seeming simplicity of attacking certain modernist elements in the Church, I think that we need to be careful not to look for complexity where it does not exist. In some cases, things really ARE that simple. I think that, within reason, we can apply this principle to a number of things that have happened to the Church (Occam’s razor, if you will). I recall having a discussion with some college friends about a piece of Catholic doctrine some time back. The issue being discussed was not something of unusual complexity, but by the time the discussion was completed, the students had so obfuscated the issue with talk about hermeneutics and epistemology and philosophy, that the original issue was lost.
I firmly believe that you don’t need a PhD in Theology to understand these issues. You don’t even need to minor in it in College - much of the beauty of the Faith is it’s simplicity and I think we’re losing that by over - complicating issues that, honestly, aren’t that complex.
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