The response to dissent on this website and in this forum is “leave.” My underlying question is, is this the response of Rome?
No. Or at least, it’s not that straightforward.
A little canon law here - not because its usually the best place to start when answering complex theological questions, but because it provides a good summary of how this works:
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Can. 750 §1. A person must believe with divine and Catholic faith all those things contained in the word of God, written or handed on, that is, in the one deposit of faith entrusted to the Church, and at the same time proposed as divinely revealed either by the solemn magisterium of the Church or by its ordinary and universal magisterium which is manifested by the common adherence of the Christian faithful under the leadership of the sacred magisterium; therefore all are bound to avoid any doctrines whatsoever contrary to them.
§2. Each and every thing which is proposed definitively by the magisterium of the Church concerning the doctrine of faith and morals, that is, each and every thing which is required to safeguard reverently and to expound faithfully the same deposit of faith, is also to be firmly embraced and retained; therefore, one who rejects those propositions which are to be held definitively is opposed to the doctrine of the Catholic Church.
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.
Can. 752 Although not an assent of faith, a religious submission of the intellect and will must be given to a doctrine which the Supreme Pontiff or the college of bishops declares concerning faith or morals when they exercise the authentic magisterium, even if they do not intend to proclaim it by definitive act; therefore, the Christian faithful are to take care to avoid those things which do not agree with it.*
See:
vatican.va/archive/ENG1104/__P2H.HTM
What this means is that we must submit our will to the authority of church teaching. In other words, if the church teaches something and we struggle to believe it, it is our responsibility to try to understand the teaching, and at the very least, to accept that it is validly taught even though we find that difficult. This kind of struggle does not in and of itself equal heresy or apostasy, or require a response of ‘Leave!’.
Note that in canon 751 it specifies
‘truth which is to be believed by divine and Catholic faith’. This suggests that heresy and apostasy only apply to the denial of dogmatic teachings, inasmuch as only dogma is held to be a teaching that is divinely revealed.
Without prejudice to that - and note I said ‘suggests,’ because I’m not a theologian, let alone a specialist in this area - canon 752 then goes on to say that we must submit our wills to the authority of all church teaching, an act which
‘Although not an assent of faith’ is nevertheless a requirement of Catholic living. The ‘not an assent of faith’ point is an admission that the struggle to accept something does not *ipso facto *make one a bad Catholic.
So the key here is: what is the trade-off between accepting the existence of a teaching that we do not fully believe, and how do we dissent from a teaching that is not infallible but to which the church does require submission of will? At different times in the history of the church, it may have been fully permissible to discuss these kind of doubts, or it may have meant a death sentence to even raise them. No death sentence these days, but you may receive less than charitable responses sometimes at least.
Like I said in my last post, misunderstandings on church teaching create a great deal of unnecessary tension and unhappiness. But the corollary of that is not that its OK to ignore church teachings, and dissent obstinately on key teachings. It isn’t OK. You are allowed to have doubts, however, so long as you work with them sincerely and acknowledge the authority of the church at the different levels at which that authority functions.
