No True Scotsman Fallacy

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inocente said:
Is that a climbdown? You now seem to agree you are not part of the immune system and it’s nothing to do with you. (Incidentally, not sure why you keep using scientific analogies for everything, as if the body of the church had no meaning before the discovery of the immune system).

So does the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (once called the Inquisition I think) talk about true and not true Catholics?

If it doesn’t, when it’s where the expertise and responsibility is, then lay people should follow its example, and my work here is done.
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It is interesting how “portraying” something as something else suffices, at least for you, as a “knock-down” argument and as a cue to “take leave.”

Even assuming the Inquisition overstepped its authority or acted injudiciously does not entail its task has been lifted from it.

Peter, as you recall, denied Jesus three times but still was tasked with correcting that failure three times (Do you love me?) and doing his job despite the failure.

Are you claiming Peter’s failure made him unfit to lead the Church? Jesus didn’t think so.

Are you claiming a failure by the Church’s immune system leaves the Church without proper defences? Jesus said it wouldn’t: “The gates of hell…” and all that.
 
Winterwolf00 said:
I find it amusing how many posters in the first page use the NTS fallacy to exclude immoral Catholics.

Being an immoral Catholic makes you no less a Catholic then a bad Muslim is no less a Muslim.

Some bad people were Muslims as well as some good, Malcolm X comes to mind as he was a member of the Nation of Islam.
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I would suggest you are using the word “Catholic” in a tenuous and, even, irrelevant sense. The fact that any adjective at all can be added to the word “Catholic” means there is some degree of divergence from what it means to be authentically a “Catholic.”

The question, which the NTS fallacy does not address and is not helpful in addressing, is what it means to be a “Catholic” in the first place. If that is an undefinable or irrevocable term, then it is about as meaningless as “being saved,” since merely to believe you are saved is sufficient to ensure that you are - entirely a subjective thing. So apparently, merely believing you are “Catholic” makes it so. Is that correct?

To anticipate those who claim Baptism is sufficient to make one a Catholic, I would argue it may be a necessary condition, but not sufficient. Baptism may be one aspect of what it means to be Apostolic or One, but certainly not sufficient to make one permanently Holy. Again, I would follow the CCC in terms of defining the identity of “Catholic” as inherently tied to the identity of the Church; that is: One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic. A “true” Catholic would be all of those, inclusive and, thus, a “member" of the Church.

Immoral Catholics would be, to some degree or other, lacking in Holiness and TO THAT DEGREE not Catholic.

In my mind, being “Catholic” is something to strive for in harmony with the gift of grace, not something one can merely “claim” to be or not.

This is where the NTS fallacy is not applicable since the Scotsman making the original claim about other Scotsmen in the fallacy had an ill-defined understanding of what “Scotsman” means to begin with and was relying solely on his authority to endorse claimants as being authentic to that indefinite meaning or not.

I would argue the fallacious thinking in the NTS fallacy is not as obvious as it is made out to be, since it appears to be a combination of moving the goalposts and ambiguity of terms.
 
schaeffer said:
For Charlemagne

catholicdoors.com/faq/qu76.htm

🙂

Here is another one. icl.nd.edu/assets/39497/report12.pdf

good reading!
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THANK YOU FOR THE REFERENCES. 👍

My own take is that a true Catholic is one who is true to the teachings of the Catholic Church and does not repudiate any of them unless they are not teachings that are set in stone. A true Catholic does not have to be a sinless Catholic, but does have to be one who is conscious of his sins and resolves regularly to overcome them, rather than one who claims to be a Catholic while celebrating his sins. As to that point, Pope Francis recently went out of his way to excommunicate members of the Mafia for claiming to be Catholic while living a lifestyle that was openly opposed to Christ’s teachings.
 
Charlemagne_III said:
Well now it’s painfully obvious that you are grasping at straws.

Post # 73 begins with a quotation from Jesus. Are you now disputing what Jesus says?

My words in the rest of the post are as follows:

**When Christ says Beware of false prophets," is he not asking us to discern who is false and who is true?

“By their fruits you will know them.” Are we not asked to discern who is true and who is false? **

Where did I say anything about driving out individuals? I don’t recall Peter saying anything about driving out individuals either.

If you are going to start falsifying your references, any further discussion with you seems pointless. 🤷
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That’s bizarre. I’ve been sat here waiting for answers, and all you’ve done is duck and dive. I asked you questions first, which yet again you forgot to answer. The stickies say don’t answer questions with questions.

I’ve asked you the following a number of times:
inocente said:
You’ve said “We have been talking about true and false Christians in the generic sense” while you (and Peter) have also referred to driving out individuals (e.g. post #73).

But you’ve not cited any approved process or criteria for doing either of that.

I asked you what does your priest say, does he think it’s a good idea for you to tell someone she is not a true Catholic? (post #81). You forgot to answer.

You criticized all the things Baptists use to interpret scripture (my list included bible study groups, house groups, respecting the writers, not taking verses out of context, being objective, reading scholarship and commentaries).

But when I asked you to list the methods and aids available to you as a Catholic, you forgot to answer.
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And you keep forgetting to answer. Just as no one has cited anything in the CCC or any other Church document which gives you leave to say who is and isn’t a true Catholic. Just as no one has cited anything in the CCC or any other Church document which even gives you any criteria for judging who is and isn’t a true Catholic.
Charlemagne_III said:
The Church historically has always fought heresy from within. It is still doing so today, as you can see from Pope Francis excommunicating an Australian priest. Do you think Francis regards this priest as a Catholic true to the priesthood and the faith?

catholicherald.co.uk/news/2013/09/27/pope-francis-excommunicates-australian-priest/
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Everyone knows the Church can and does excommunicate. That’s a million miles away from you, mere laity, calling other laity not true Catholics.

You haven’t provided one shred of evidence that the Church gives you leave to say who is and isn’t a true Catholic. Just as no one has cited anything in the CCC or any other Church document which even gives you any criteria for judging who is and isn’t a true Catholic.

It’s been painfully obvious for several weeks that you are clutching at straws. Any further discussion with you seems pointless. 🤷
 
inocente said:
It’s been painfully obvious for several weeks that you are clutching at straws. Any further discussion with you seems pointless. 🤷
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So then why don’t you just retire from the field in triumph? 🤷
 
inocente said:
Everyone knows the Church can and does excommunicate. That’s a million miles away from you, mere laity, calling other laity not true Catholics.

You haven’t provided one shred of evidence that the Church gives you leave to say who is and isn’t a true Catholic. Just as no one has cited anything in the CCC or any other Church document which even gives you any criteria for judging who is and isn’t a true Catholic.

It’s been painfully obvious for several weeks that you are clutching at straws. Any further discussion with you seems pointless. 🤷
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If this were true then the Chuch gives us no “leave” to say whether we, ourselves, are even close with regard to living a truly “Catholic” life. We could not know or even have an inkling as to whether we were being true to Catholicism or not. That would imply a “your guess is as good as mine” with regard to all of the teachings of the Church. Why would the Church bother to teach at all since it is, according to you, completely beyond the reach of the laity to know anything at all with regard to what it means to be a “good” or “true” Catholic.

If we cannot make any sound judgement about that with regard to anyone, in general, then we couldn’t make a sound judgement about that with regard to ourselves. If it is within the realm of possibility to make sound judgements about whether we, ourselves, are acting true to or aligned to the teachings of the Church with regard to what it means to be a “good” or “true” Catholic, then those sound judgements can be, ceteris paribus, applied to anyone in general.

There is a difference between “judging others” in the sense of making sound judgements about their actions or dispositions and “judging” them in the sense of
  1. passing sentence on them for having those dispositions and carrying out those actions or
  2. writing them off as beyond help.
Making sound judgements about dispositions and actions is what is positively demanded of us to be morally or determinably “good” in any sense of the word. And those judgements must, logically, apply to every human being if they are determinably sound moral or spiritual judgements.

What those judgements do not entail, however, is that we necessarily “write off” or damn individuals who are not aligned in their behaviour or disposition. That is God’s job. However, it is the loving thing to do to issue warnings when actions or dispositions could lead someone to a “hell” of their own making. It is determinably NOT the loving thing to do to enable them in their sin or to give the impression that whatever they are doing is “just fine and dandy.” That is no help to them at all. And neither is claiming it is NOT possible to know what the expectations of Catholicism are with regard to what makes someone a “good” or “true” Catholic.

By the way, I did give you appropriate CCC references to what it is that identifies anyone as “Catholic” and, therefore, have answered your query. You may not like or agree with the answer, but the answer is there.
 
inocente said:
That’s bizarre. I’ve been sat here waiting for answers, and all you’ve done is duck and dive. I asked you questions first, which yet again you forgot to answer. The stickies say don’t answer questions with questions.

I’ve asked you the following a number of times:

And you keep forgetting to answer. Just as no one has cited anything in the CCC or any other Church document which gives you leave to say who is and isn’t a true Catholic. Just as no one has cited anything in the CCC or any other Church document which even gives you any criteria for judging who is and isn’t a true Catholic.

Everyone knows the Church can and does excommunicate. That’s a million miles away from you, mere laity, calling other laity not true Catholics.

You haven’t provided one shred of evidence that the Church gives you leave to say who is and isn’t a true Catholic. Just as no one has cited anything in the CCC or any other Church document which even gives you any criteria for judging who is and isn’t a true Catholic.

It’s been painfully obvious for several weeks that you are clutching at straws. Any further discussion with you seems pointless. 🤷
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Apparently, Pope Francis thinks there is a distinction to be made between “true” Catholics and those who are not, but he refers to them as “Pagan” Catholics. Interesting.

catholicnewsagency.com/news/pope-francis-blasts-pagan-christians-as-enemies-of-the-cross-97757/
 
Peter_Plato said:
Apparently, Pope Francis thinks there is a distinction to be made between “true” Catholics and those who are not, but he refers to them as “Pagan” Catholics. Interesting.

catholicnewsagency.com/news/pope-francis-blasts-pagan-christians-as-enemies-of-the-cross-97757/
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I’m not too keen on calling untrue Catholics “pagan” Catholics, though I suppose you could think of them as pagans insofar as they have strayed from true Catholicism. It’s some Protestants who like to call us pagans even when we are true to our faith. At least Francis recognizes that some “Catholics” are not true Catholics. So I think every Catholic layman should be comfortable agreeing with him. And we are all free to spot them even as Francis is free to spot them. Some priests untrue to their priesthood have been spotted by laymen and reported to the bishop or to the Vatican for untrue preaching.

There is, of course, a big difference between a priest preaching falsehoods because he doesn’t know his theology, and a priest who does know his theology and preaches falsehoods in defiance of orthodoxy. One simply errs. The other sins against obedience to the faith he vowed to practice.
 
Charlemagne_III said:
I’m not too keen on calling untrue Catholics “pagan” Catholics, though I suppose you could think of them as pagans insofar as they have strayed from true Catholicism. It’s some Protestants who like to call us pagans even when we are true to our faith. At least Francis recognizes that some “Catholics” are not true Catholics. So I think every Catholic layman should be comfortable agreeing with him. And we are all free to spot them even as Francis is free to spot them. Some priests untrue to their priesthood have been spotted by laymen and reported to the bishop or to the Vatican for untrue preaching.

There is, of course, a big difference between a priest preaching falsehoods because he doesn’t know his theology, and a priest who does know his theology and preaches falsehoods in defiance of orthodoxy. One simply errs. The other sins against obedience to the faith he vowed to practice.
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Mia culpa. Pope Francis used the words “pagan Christian,” not Catholic. I think he meant it descriptively in the sense that many Christians have bought into determinably pagan belief systems merely because these are what the culture generally espouses, instead of knowing or even attempting to know the Christian perspective on key issues.
 
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