Rigid, or modernism? Judge me, please!

[njlisa]

@DeSales111:

The Church isn’t separate from us. All of us make up the Body of Christ. Each of us has a different role. As successors to the Apostles, the bishops are guardians, interpreters, and teachers of the sacred deposit of faith. The magisterium is not separate from our lives. I was received into the church 30 years ago. I made a conscious decision to accept the Church and its teachings.

I encourage you to to read 1 Corinthians 12.

Verse 12 sums up the passage. “There are many parts, yet one body.”

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@angell1

I’m glad you mentioned Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI. I’m sorry he wasn’t 20 years younger when he became pope. He is a beacon of hope, clarity, and love. And he brought back tradition.

 

[VanitasVanitatum]

Now our Pope warns against being rigid, as though striving for holiness is offensive to the rest of the world. Should we be the light, or should we dim the light as to not offend the world? The way I see it, Jesus was not passive and did not regret offending folks. As he said, He did not come to bring peace, He came to bring the Truth!

You don’t have to be rigid to tell the truth in its fullness.

 

[OraLabora]

The Pope is right. Do not confuse « rigid » and « rigorous »

Be rigorous with your own faith, but flexible in accepting others’ foibles.

 

[BornInMarch]

I think what the Pope meant was not to be a legalist. While Jesus wasn’t afraid to offend people or make enemies, the group of people he most often quarreled with were the Pharisees - a group of religious officials in the community who are depicted as being self-righteous and rigid to the point of not wanting to bring in any outsiders. In Matthew 23:13 Jesus says this much:
Matthew 23:13:

But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. For you neither enter yourselves nor allow those who would enter to go in.

There’s nothing wrong with being faithful, but be careful to avoid swinging too far in the other direction and turning into a Pharisee.

 

[Bill6]

Greetings in Christ. Strive to be holy, but don’t be scrupulous and don’t ony focus on doctrinal truth. Make sure to be charitable and humble. That is what the Holy Father means. The Holy Father was not saying do not strive for holiness.
Also, when we approach those who are wrong, we should do so with love and charity. Refuting error should be so that those who believe in error can come to the knowledge of the truth. We shouldn’t promote doctrinal truth and condemn error so we can look down on others and think about how great we are. Remember that Jesus condemned the Pharisees, even though much of their doctirne was true. Jesus condemned them for their hypocracy. Jesus says he desires mercy, not sacrafice.
God bless and Mary keep you

 

[angell1]

completely agree, everytime I hear something the pope supposedly said, it involves an in depth research of “is that relaly what he said?”

I don’t doubt that it happened with Benedict as wel, but it seems to be a lot worse with Francis

 

[Dan_Defender]

I think what the Pope is getting at is the type of rigidity that only focuses on calling people heretics and apostates. For example, St Francis de Sales was orthodox in his Catholic faith but notoriously patient and gentle. That’s a better approach.

 

[Dovekin]

I will sprinkle clean water over you to make you clean; from all your impurities and from all your idols I will cleanse you.
I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.
I will put my spirit within you so that you walk in my statutes, observe my ordinances, and keep them.
Ezekiel 36:25-27

This prophecy of baptism is one of the sources for the critique of rigidity. Pope Francis even carried it further, by suggesting that rigidity comes from an encumbered heart.

The Pope was addressing the Cardinals with this speech. With changes to the Vatican’s structures imminent, the jobs, careers, preofessions, ambitions, and committments of these men are in delicate positions. Flexibility is important in this situation. He was not criticizing traditionalists, but encouraging those whose lives will change because of his efforts.

And yes, Benedict was often misrepresented just as Francis is. Benedict spoke about a hermeneutic of reform and it got turned into a hermeneutic of continuity by those who oppose reform.

 

[DeSales111]

It’s not one thing the Pope has said, it’s a pattern, and it’s the people he surrounds himself with, his appointed ones. It’s very easy to say he is “misunderstood” or “misrepresented” but if you listen and observe what’s going on, the over all picture painted seems to want to water down the faith. Instead of ending speculation he leaves the door open so to say. Just listen to the things coming out of his mouth and their mouths. The Amazon Synod is a perfect example.

His comments about being rigid was not about Church structure, it was about how the Church appears to the rest of the world and that the Church does not hold the same influence as in the past. So tell me, are those he appoints not reflecting his views and direction for the Church? His ideas for reform, the things being promoted and the doors being opened are out of line with traditional Catholics.

When I say judge me, I only mean how do I appear if I oppose things such as women deacons, letting the divorced and remarried receive the Holy Eucharist, and pagan worship? Maybe I’m wrong, won’t be the first time, but I think it boils down to this, the world around us is changing rapidly, it rejects our Catholic teachings on about everything when it comes to morals. It is why the Church has lost influence in the world, modernism. It’s traditional Catholicism VS modernism. I just flat out do not want to see bad modern ideas slowly creep into the Church, that’s all. Going with the flow, look less Catholic, that’s the message im seeing.

 

[DeSales111]

And that’s one reason St. Francis de Sales is my fav Saint, kind and gentle but very orthodox. Tell the truth but be kind when you do, that was his way, and it worked.

 

[paperwight]

Sure, striving for holiness IS considered rigid in the eyes of the world. I tell others birth control is a sin and against the will of God. Even if I say it in a loving way I’m considered rigid in my beliefs. I don’t believe in divorce, to those who do, I’m rigid for not caving in to compromise. I oppose homosexuality, if I speak against it I’m considered rigid. I show no hatred, I’m a sinner too, but the truth is the truth.

Well, it all depends what yo mean by these statements, and whether you admit to any nuances.
To take them one at a time. What do you mean by ‘birth control’? Presumably you accept that the Pill can be taken for medical reasons? And birth control in the sense of being prudent is accepted by the church. You wold be more accurate if you specified ‘artificial means’.
Divorce? The Church does not forbid divorce. It’s marrying again when the other person is still alive that’s the problem, not divorce per se.
Homosexuality? It’s vital that we separate the two facets i.e. that some people have SSA, but not all take action on it.

 

[DeSales111]

Very good point BornInMarch. That kind of rigidity is not good at all. The Pharisees were very rigid and lived by the Law. That’s what Jesus was condemning. Maybe that’s what the Pope was trying to say, how do we appear to the world? But to me it seemed like a jab at traditionalists that do not want to embrace the changes his papacy has been flirting with.

 

[MagdalenaRita]

Be rigorous with your own faith, but flexible in accepting others’ foibles

Is that what we do? Foible?

Yes we are to be merciful and understanding of all but we are also to pray for and guide one another to the truths of the Catholic faith because we have all sinned and need the Church and its sacraments to attain eternal life.

 

[OraLabora]

Foible. Sin. Faults. Whatever

Use the language you prefer, I’ll use the language I feel like using.

As a monk once told me: be doctrinally rigorous, be pastorally merciful.

 

[Dovekin]

This is part of how the Pope addressed your concerns in this speech:

( parrhesía is speaking boldly; hypomoné is patient endurance)

The more healthy approach is to let oneself be challenged by the questions of the day and to approach them with the virtues of discernment, parrhesía and hypomoné . Seen in this light, change takes on a very different aspect: from something marginal, incidental or merely external, it would become something more human and more Christian . Change would still take place, but beginning with man as its centre: an anthropological conversion .

We need to initiate processes and not just occupy spaces: “God manifests himself in historical revelation, in history. Time initiates processes and space crystalizes them. God is in history, in the processes. We must not focus on occupying the spaces where power is exercised, but rather on starting long-run historical processes. We must initiate processes rather than occupy spaces. God manifests himself in time and is present in the processes of history. This gives priority to actions that give birth to new historical dynamics. And it requires patience, waiting”. In this sense, we are urged to read the signs of the times with the eyes of faith, so that the direction of this change should “raise new and old questions which it is right that we should face”.

 

[JimR-OCDS]

What Pope Francis is addressing is those Catholics who follow the letter of the law, but have no clue about the spirit of the law.

 

[TheLittleLady]

There is a big difference from being faithful and loving vs being rigid.

Let’s say your adult daughter comes home and tells you that she has moved in to live with her boyfriend.

You have two choices. You can tell your daughter that you love her, you can still treat her as your daughter OR you can tell her “you will burn in hell for this grave sin. Get out of my house and do not come back until you have repented!”

 

[MagdalenaRita]

You have two choices

Couldn’t there be an in between choice. Love her, let her know she always is your daughter but also speak to her about the danger of her choices and help her to understand there are better choices that don’t have such grave consequences that put her soul in danger.

 

[TheLittleLady]

Unless the parents are brand new to Christianity and raised their child without Christian moral teachings, the daughter knows that the Church considers sex outside of marriage a sin.

 

[PetraG]

Pope Francis hasn’t come down against anybody being rigid with themselves. He hasn’t denounced anyone striving for holiness. He’s talking about people who get themselves in a knot that the sins of others aren’t renounced with enough vigor.

The way I see it, Jesus was not passive and did not regret offending folks. As he said, He did not come to bring peace, He came to bring the Truth!

Now there was a sinful woman in the city who learned that he was at table in the house of the Pharisee. Bringing an alabaster flask of ointment, she stood behind him at his feet weeping and began to bathe his feet with her tears. Then she wiped them with her hair, kissed them, and anointed them with the ointment. When the Pharisee who had invited him saw this he said to himself, “If this man were a prophet, he would know who and what sort of woman this is who is touching him, that she is a sinner.” Jesus said to him in reply, “Simon, I have something to say to you.” “Tell me, teacher,” he said. “Two people were in debt to a certain creditor; one owed five hundred days’ wages and the other owed fifty. Since they were unable to repay the debt, he forgave it for both. Which of them will love him more?” Simon said in reply, “The one, I suppose, whose larger debt was forgiven.” He said to him, “You have judged rightly.” Then he turned to the woman and said to Simon, “Do you see this woman? When I entered your house, you did not give me water for my feet, but she has bathed them with her tears and wiped them with her hair. You did not give me a kiss, but she has not ceased kissing my feet since the time I entered. You did not anoint my head with oil, but she anointed my feet with ointment. So I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven; hence, she has shown great love. But the one to whom little is forgiven, loves little.” He said to her, “Your sins are forgiven.” The others at table said to themselves, “Who is this who even forgives sins?” But he said to the woman, “Your faith has saved you; go in peace.”
Lk 7:37-50

The Pope is merely warning us that we have to be careful about criticizing mercy shown by the Church, lest we imitate the official who criticized Our Lord for allowing a public sinner to touch him. (Or feeling a need to point out where the money for that alabaster jar came from…)