Primate opposes local decision making power on Church teaching

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Ireland’s most senior Churchman has rejected calls for more decision-making power about Church teaching to be given to local bishops’ conferences.
Archbishop Eamon Martin also said he struggles to envisage how the Church could lift its ban on Communion for divorced and remarried Catholics while remaining faithful to its teachings on marriage and the Eucharist.
Speaking to The Irish Catholic from Rome where he is participating in the Synod of Bishops on the theme of the family, Archbishop Eamon insisted that he did not support “the idea that somehow it’s up to individual bishops’ conferences to interpret the teaching of the Church”.
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That is why they are holding this synod; to come together on what is doctrine, and what is not. The question I would want to know would be if the synod decides there is not doctrinal contradiction that would absolutely prohibit communion for a remarried person, would he still want the decision making power to act in accordance with his conscience on the matter, or is it only local decision making power he does not agree with that he opposes.
 
I am afraid that this proposal is what happened in the Anglican Church. Give authority to local bishops to accept or reject Gospel teachings. It cannot turn out well.
 
PaulfromIowa said:
I am afraid that this proposal is what happened in the Anglican Church. Give authority to local bishops to accept or reject Gospel teachings. It cannot turn out well.
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If local authority is given to do anything, it will be because what is doctrine (Gospel teaching, as you put it), allows it. I do not know that this synod will expand the doctrine of the insoluability of marriage to include re-married people can never receive communion, whether it will exclude this as a matter of doctrine, or whether it will refrain from addressing this specific issue. Whatever happens to this issue thought will limit what can be allowed and what is not.
 
pnewton said:
If local authority is given to do anything, it will be because what is doctrine (Gospel teaching, as you put it), allows it. I do not know that this synod will expand the doctrine of the insoluability of marriage to include re-married people can never receive communion, whether it will exclude this as a matter of doctrine, or whether it will refrain from addressing this specific issue. Whatever happens to this issue thought will limit what can be allowed and what is not.
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I’m not entirely sure I understand how it’s not already excluded as a matter of doctrine. I mean, we may not have an authoritative doctrinal source that says explicitly, using these words, “the divorced and invalidly remarried cannot receive communion.” But we do have one that says “(valid, sacramental, consummated) marriage is indissoluble,” another that says “sexual relations outside of marriage are gravely sinful,” a third that says “forgiveness requires repentance,” a fourth that says"repentance requires the resolution to sin no more (even if it’s not actually carried, out, we must plan on trying to stop sinning)," and a fifth that says “one cannot receive communion while in a state of mortal sin.”

I agree with the Archbishop - there seems no sane way to say that those who are willfully persisting in a sexual relationship with someone who is not their valid spouse (divorced or not) can receive communion while still saying the above.
 
Iron_Donkey said:
I’m not entirely sure I understand how it’s not already excluded as a matter of doctrine. I mean, we may not have an authoritative doctrinal source that says explicitly, using these words, “the divorced and invalidly remarried cannot receive communion.” But we do have one that says “(valid, sacramental, consummated) marriage is indissoluble,” another that says “sexual relations outside of marriage are gravely sinful,” a third that says “forgiveness requires repentance,” a fourth that says"repentance requires the resolution to sin no more (even if it’s not actually carried, out, we must plan on trying to stop sinning)," and a fifth that says “one cannot receive communion while in a state of mortal sin.”

I agree with the Archbishop - there seems no sane way to say that those who are willfully persisting in a sexual relationship with someone who is not their valid spouse (divorced or not) can receive communion while still saying the above.
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Agree - to allow this locally or generally to me is to turn the Church’s administering of the sacrament into a card house. On what grounds do we deny the sacrament to anyone else. Who determines who is more or less off limits once we start down this road? Is it fair just to administer to the worthy and the divorced and remarried? Of course not. And this direction is just so painfully obvious. I mean, I am not a theologian but I get it. Are we not supposed to?

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Look what Cardinal Arinze said in response to the following question:
Some at the synod have talked about allowing decisions on the divorced and remarried or on homosexuality to be decentralized, made at the level of regional or national bishops’ conferences or by individual bishops. How do you feel about that?
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Are you going to tell me that we can have a national bishops’ conference in one country that would approve something which, in another conference, would be seen as sin? Is sin going to change according to national borders? We’d become national churches. Have there not been other religious affiliations in the world that came dangerously near to that?
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National bishops’ conferences are important and should have a clear role, but I don’t think it should include these areas. It looks dangerously like nationalizing right and wrong.
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cruxnow.com/church/2015/10/16/a-synod-conversation-with-catholic-africas-lion-in-winter/

Also look what Archbishop Kurtz said in response to these questions:
ZENIT: Regarding the idea of whether it would be effective to look at certain items more locally and regionally, rather than universally, what do you think?
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Archbishop Kurtz: Well, I think it depends on the issue. Obviously, if there is a substantial issue of pastoral practice that affects our belief and our teaching, then to try to do something on a diocesan level, or even a regional level, it is going to fracture that unity.
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ZENIT: Could you explain further which issues you are referring to?
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Archbishop Kurtz: Well, let’s see, of the things that have been talked about – and I am glad you are asking about this – I would think, for example, the practice of the way in which there is the practice of Holy Communion. I think that that is something that has a universal basis to it.
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I think there are other situations such as the implementation of our Holy Father’s new work on the ‘gentle judge’ [new annulment procedures], in which there is more emphasis being given to the local bishop, having an opportunity to judge those areas of annulment, that might be very clear and very certain. I think that would be an example of where it’s been given to the local level. And we’re going to study that and I think it is going to be fruitful.
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zenit.org/en/articles/interview-us-bishops-leader-says-localizing-certain-pastoral-practices-could-fracture-unity
 
Iron_Donkey said:
I mean, we may not have an authoritative doctrinal source that says explicitly, …
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That is the point. There are more than one way to connect those five dots. For one thing, what separates us from God is subjective, actual, real mortal sin. What the Church uses as a criteria for denying communion is canonically objective mortal sin. I say canonically objective because if a later decree of nullity is granted, then that particular marriage was never valid. It does not become invalid. I know this is an issue that not all bishops and theologians agree with, but I think the majority hold the opinion that you do.

FYI - I have no horse in this fight (:confused:), but I find the issue compelling from a theological point of view.
 
pnewton said:
That is the point. There are more than one way to connect those five dots. For one thing, what separates us from God is subjective, actual, real mortal sin. What the Church uses as a criteria for denying communion is canonically objective mortal sin. I say canonically objective because if a later decree of nullity is granted, then that particular marriage was never valid. It does not become invalid. I know this is an issue that not all bishops and theologians agree with, but I think the majority hold the opinion that you do.

FYI - I have no horse in this fight (:confused:), but I find the issue compelling from a theological point of view.
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I understand that it is the actual sin rather than the objective gravity of our actions (which does not include full knowledge and full consent of will), but I don’t actually see how that changes anything. It may be that the first marriage was invalid, but just no one knew yet, however it is still objectively wrong to attempt a second marriage while in a presumably valid marriage. (And likely impossible for such an attempt to succeed, whether the first marriage was valid or not, at least for Catholics.) Even if the first marriage was invalid, acting as though the marriage is invalid before this is known with sufficient certainty is objectively wrong.

I mean, there may be enough ignorance and confusion that a particular action is not sinful, but it is the Church’s job to clear that confusion up so that the person knows what they should be doing, not pander to it. The objective standards of sin must be what are applied simply because if a person meets the objective standards but is ignorant of the fact, the Church has to tell him so that he is no longer ignorant and knows how to fix his situation.
 
Iron_Donkey said:
I understand that it is the actual sin rather than the objective gravity of our actions (which does not include full knowledge and full consent of will), but I don’t actually see how that changes anything. It may be that the first marriage was invalid, but just no one knew yet, however it is still objectively wrong to attempt a second marriage while in a presumably valid marriage…
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Yes it is objectively wrong while presuming the first marriage is valid. I have already been through this several times. For now let me say that a five point syllogism is dicey. I am of the opinion the terms are not identical in each doctrine on which this syllogism is based.
 
I’m not gonna lie; I thought this topic was going to be about an obstinate gorilla. As such, I have nothing to add.
 
pnewton said:
Yes it is objectively wrong while presuming the first marriage is valid. I have already been through this several times. For now let me say that a five point syllogism is dicey. I am of the opinion the terms are not identical in each doctrine on which this syllogism is based.
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Fair enough, but I don’t see how that is possible. For a non-Catholic, there might be a difference between sexual acts outside of actual marriage, and sexual acts that the Church has determined to be outside of marriage, but for a Catholic both are wrong since a Catholic is subject to the authority of the Church (and if he disagrees, then he should not receive communion for that reason).

Outside of renouncing its authority on such matters, which I don’t think it can do, I still see no difference. Don’t see any other wiggle room either, repentance, communion, and forgiveness all seem to be without even a possible distinction along these lines.
 
Iron_Donkey said:
Fair enough, but I don’t see how that is possible.
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Several Catholic Bishops have said the same thing in regards to Cardinal Kasper. Others have not agreed with him, but see what he is getting at.

Yes, non-Catholic marriage, in which the second one might be done with a clear conscience, and no sin are one example. Also, some Catholics who were baptized and never educated in their faith might be less culpable. I fear this is becoming more common.
 
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