Split: If you are addicted, is it a sin?

[CopticChristian]

.

You’re backed into a corner repeatedly and refuse to face the posts that stare you in the face. Can’t do your work for you. Ffind some courage. So how about Veritatis Splendor? Does it support your view of willpower?

I don’t claim to be an addict, I am one. In don’t do 1/2 measures or enjoy in moderation any more. Tried that. No 1/2 measures. YOU DO NOT KNOW WHAT YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT. Don’t know me, don’t treat addicts, haven’t been one. And worse, have posted dubioous and biased research harmful to addicts. You could do the forum a service by admitting that and stepping out. That would be the right thing to do.

I don’t “believe in” 12 steps. I and several other posters have told you that. You cannot hear it. 12 steps are a valuable tool…I don’t “believe in them”. I believe in surrender to Jesus Christ, as do most other Christian addicts. (the ones that recover anyway). 12 steps fits nicely with that faith for many many people.

**
You don’t even begin to understand lust addiction. Sorry. wouldn’t even know where to begin with you.** Abstinence is idiocy? comparing overeating to alcoholism? I need food to live, I do not need alcohol to live.

Please stop posting for the good of the forum…

Clem,

Now let me think about that. Men, very few women attend Sex Addicts Anonymous, Love Addiction, and others like it. Hummmm Masturbation, Bestiality, Sex with men met online by men, Pornography, Incest, Adultery, and there were probably more of the ongoing sins that were confessed, that I cannot recall. I understand that we are all subject to Lust, some more than others. Some find Lust to gratify the need for a relationship that is filled by a dysfunctional relationship. One of the 7 deadly sins is it not? I agree, the confessional, coming to Christ, using your human effort to strengthen your virtues as the Catechism teaches, forming your conscience so that you can properly learn right from wrong by reason and recognizing the law written on your heart…pretty much what Veritatis Splendor says and the Catechism says…I think I understand this Ok…

 

[johnnyjones]

Johnny,

It appears that you found something that agrees with you. I like the Collegeville commentary that says there are us and there is them. Them is the fools and those fools are described in proverbs by similes. Stay away from the fools. That is how I read it. You can read it anyway you like.

Niether reading is de fide. I may look at my ECF collection to see how it is read. That will take some time. I will get back to you…

I anticipated your response,that you would find some way of saying “this idea of returning to sin can’t be right”. You originally thought I was a lone voice yelling in the wind about a dog returning to vomit being equated to “any” sin.

You see others in the Catholic world agreeing with me and have devised a clever answer. Now I will go into more intense bible commentary supporting my view that sacred scripture says do not return to sin (as if I actually have to show you that). If alcohol addiction is sin, why return to a pattern of sin that caused problems? Anyway, keep reading on and dwell specifically on number 20. veritasbible.com/drb/compare/haydock/2_Peter_2

20 For if, flying from the pollutions of the world, through the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, they be again entangled in them and overcome: their latter state is become unto them worse than the former. For if flying, and been happily freed from the pollutions, the abominations, and corruptions of a wicked world, be upon your guard, and take great care* not to be entangled again* in these dangerous snares and nets, lest your latter condition (as Christ said, Matt. xii. 45.) be worse than the former, lest you be like a dog that returns to his vomit, or like a sow that is washed and wallows again in the mire. Wi.

 

[Christmastwin]

I anticipated your response,that you would find some way of saying “this idea of returning to sin can’t be right”. You originally thought I was a lone voice yelling in the wind about a dog returning to vomit being equated to “any” sin.

You see others in the Catholic world agreeing with me and have devised a clever answer. Now I will go into more intense bible commentary supporting my view that sacred scripture says do not return to sin (as if I actually have to show you that). If alcohol addiction is sin, why return to a pattern of sin that caused problems? Anyway, keep reading on and dwell specifically on number 20. veritasbible.com/drb/compare/haydock/2_Peter_2

20 For if, flying from the pollutions of the world, through the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, they be again entangled in them and overcome: their latter state is become unto them worse than the former. For if flying, and been happily freed from the pollutions, the abominations, and corruptions of a wicked world, be upon your guard, and take great care* not to be entangled again* in these dangerous snares and nets, lest your latter condition (as Christ said, Matt. xii. 45.) be worse than the former, lest you be like a dog that returns to his vomit, or like a sow that is washed and wallows again in the mire. Wi.

:clapping: Well done, Johnny.

 

[CopticChristian]

I anticipated your response,that you would find some way of saying “this idea of returning to sin can’t be right”. You originally thought I was a lone voice yelling in the wind about a dog returning to vomit being equated to “any” sin.

You see others in the Catholic world agreeing with me and have devised a clever answer. Now I will go into more intense bible commentary supporting my view that sacred scripture says do not return to sin (as if I actually have to show you that). If alcohol addiction is sin, why return to a pattern of sin that caused problems? Anyway, keep reading on and dwell specifically on number 20. veritasbible.com/drb/compare/haydock/2_Peter_2

20 For if, flying from the pollutions of the world, through the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, they be again entangled in them and overcome: their latter state is become unto them worse than the former. For if flying, and been happily freed from the pollutions, the abominations, and corruptions of a wicked world, be upon your guard, and take great care* not to be entangled again* in these dangerous snares and nets, lest your latter condition (as Christ said, Matt. xii. 45.) be worse than the former, lest you be like a dog that returns to his vomit, or like a sow that is washed and wallows again in the mire. Wi.

Johnny,

This is a commentary. You may want to know that John Calvin says the same thing. That does not mean I agree. If you look up the Ethereal Classics concerning Proverbs 26:11 Calvin says exactly the same thing.

I believe you confuse taking a drink with addiction. Addiction occurs in the head. Your choice to drink if you drink and you find you are unable to tolerate drinking occurs in the head. I have had a drink or two in my day. Recently I bought a beer. I put it in the freezer, did not drink it and then put it in the refrigerator. My daugher asked me about the beer. She had seen it in the freezer.

I told her that I bought it with the intention to drink it the night she saw it in the freezer but decided not to that night. I then drank it the next day. She said “dad you know that it makes you hungry, makes you thirsty, and you don’t feel good the next day”…I said I know. I know that just one beer makes me feel hungry, thirsty, actually screws up my sleep and then the next day I wake up felling fatigued. So for me, I like the taste, the buzz is not that big of a deal but the side effects are not that great.

I would rather swim a mile every night, run or walk 2.5 miles every morning, eat healthy, sleep well and lift weights to keep my body healthy and beer does not fit into that paradigm on a regular basis.

There is no sin in drinking. The sin is drinking to excess. If you want to believe that everyone that ever had a drink that binged, drank too much, drank in excess, was a drunk for a period is like what you say that they can never return and have a drink then that is your perogative. It is true for some but not all. So to return to drink is not a sin unless you are someone that finds your mind unwilling to accept just one, then for you don’t drink.

 

[CopticChristian]

I anticipated your response,that you would find some way of saying “this idea of returning to sin can’t be right”. You originally thought I was a lone voice yelling in the wind about a dog returning to vomit being equated to “any” sin.

You see others in the Catholic world agreeing with me and have devised a clever answer. Now I will go into more intense bible commentary supporting my view that sacred scripture says do not return to sin (as if I actually have to show you that). If alcohol addiction is sin, why return to a pattern of sin that caused problems? Anyway, keep reading on and dwell specifically on number 20. veritasbible.com/drb/compare/haydock/2_Peter_2

20 For if, flying from the pollutions of the world, through the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, they be again entangled in them and overcome: their latter state is become unto them worse than the former. For if flying, and been happily freed from the pollutions, the abominations, and corruptions of a wicked world, be upon your guard, and take great care* not to be entangled again* in these dangerous snares and nets, lest your latter condition (as Christ said, Matt. xii. 45.) be worse than the former, lest you be like a dog that returns to his vomit, or like a sow that is washed and wallows again in the mire. Wi.

Johnny,

Now here is what Hippolytus…Refutation of all heresies says about peter…

CHAP. II. — SOURCE OF THE HERESY OF NOETUS J CLEOMENES HIS DISCIPLE J ITS APPEARANCE AT ROME DURING THE EPISCOPATES OF ZEPHYRINUS AND CALLISTUS; NOETIANISM OPPOSED AT ROME BY HIPPOLYTUS.
There has appeared one, Noetus 5 by name, and by birth a native of Smyrna. This person introduced a heresy from the tenets of Hera-clitus.6 Now a certain man called Epigonus becomes his minister and pupil, and this person during his sojourn at Rome disseminated his godless opinion. But Cleomenes, who had be¬come his disciple, an alien both in way of life and habits from the Church, was wont to corroborate the (Noetian) doctrine. At that time, Zephy-rinus imagines that he administers the affairs of the Church7 — an uninformed and shamefully corrupt man. And he, being persuaded by prof¬fered gain, was accustomed to connive at those who were present for the purpose of becoming disciples of Cleomenes. **But (Zephyrinus) him¬self, being in process of time enticed away, hur¬ried headlong 8 into the same opinions; and he had Callistus as his adviser, and a fellow-champion of these wicked tenets.8 But the life of this (Cal¬listus), and the heresy invented by him, I shall after a little explain. **The school of these heretics during the succession of such bishops, continued to acquire strength and augmentation, from the fact that Zephyrinus and Callistus helped them to prevail.9 Never at any time, however, have we been guilty of collusion with them ; but we have frequently offered them opposition,10 and have refuted them, and have forced them reluc¬tantly to acknowledge the truth. And they, abashed and constrained by the truth, have con¬fessed their errors for a short period, but after a little, wallow once again in the same mire.11

5 See Fragments of Hippolytus’ Works (p 235 et seq.), edited
byFabricius; Theodoret,Har. Fab , iii 3; Epiphanius, Hter, Ivii.;
and Philastrius, Hteret., liv. Theodoret mentions Epigonus and
Cleomenes, and his account is obviously adopted by Hippolytus.
6 [See Tatian, vol. ii. p. 66, this series.]
7 [See note 2, cap. iii. infra., and Elucidation V.]
» [See Elucidation VI.]
9 [Note the emphasis and repeated statement with which our
author dwells on this painful charge.]
10 [Elucidation VI.]
11 2 Pet. ii. 22. [See book x. cap xxiii., p. 148, infra.]

I say that the Proverb 26 is about fools and Peter points out false teachers are fools and Hippolytus here points out false teachers are heretics.

You can say that error is sin and say that it is the way you believe it and that works for you…but it does not change the fact that this is your interpretation, as the Church has no interpretation and we are left to argue among ourselves what it means.

We agree that Gluttony is sin
We agree that we are called to form our conscience
We agree that we have within us the law written on our heart
We agree that Faith and Reason are our guide
We agree that God created us with dignity to find what is wrong and right with our formed conscience, with Faith and Reason, and when we do to constantly seek what is right and good.

We agree that virtues are strengthened by human effort and that is the tool needed to overcome sin with grace and none of this is on our own…

We agree that we are to avoid sin and if for you that is taking one drink then don’t do it…
We agree that the world is not you and if someone can take a drink and not sin then they can do it
We can agree that the world does not view addiction as disease
We can agree that the world does not view addiction as habit
We can agree that if someone believes that they have a disease and they are addicts then they have to abstain
We can agree that if someone believes that addiction is a bad habit and that they don’t have a disease and that with values they can resolve that habit and they may or may not have to abstain…who knows…
We can agree that if someone believes that addiction is the sin of Gluttony and they realize it then they can resolve that sin and forget that they were ever an addict because their sin is forgiven. They may choose to abstain or not…who knows.

And that is Veritatis Splendor…

and for this thread addiction is sin…

 

[Edmundus1581]

…
So to return to drink is not a sin unless you are someone that finds your mind unwilling to accept just one, then for you don’t drink.
…

The following is a **response **to this, not an argument, (in other words, you may argue if you so choose, but I won’t).

The A.A viewpoint, and the experience of addicts, is that we agree 100% with what you wrote here - that we must not have the first drink. However, our experience has also taught us that without the program we will always have the first drink… usually the next day, but, however else we try to quit or use will-power or other means, we will have it… after a week, or a month, or after 10 years…and then, having had it, will go right back to where we left off. This is the the first step.

Fr Martin, here, explains that this is what the second step means by “sanity” - it is a reference to the “insanity” of having the first drink when we know the consequences.

I heard someone explain this in a meeting…

I will have the second drink, and the tenth drink, because of the first one. I will have the first drink because I’m an alcoholic.

 

[CopticChristian]

The following is a **response **to this, not an argument, (in other words, you may argue if you so choose, but I won’t).

The A.A viewpoint, and the experience of addicts, is that we agree 100% with what you wrote here - that we must not have the first drink. However, our experience has also taught us that without the program we will always have the first drink… usually the next day, but, however else we try to quit or use will-power or other means, we will have it… after a week, or a month, or after 10 years…and then, having had it, will go right back to where we left off. This is the the first step.

Fr Martin, here, explains that this is what the second step means by “sanity” - it is a reference to the “insanity” of having the first drink when we know the consequences.

I heard someone explain this in a meeting…

I will have the second drink, and the tenth drink, because of the first one. I will have the first drink because I’m an alcoholic.

Edmundus,

And to this I would add it only is true for those that accept what

The religion of AA teaches
The notion that addiction is a disease

and it is true for those that accept that paradigm but that does not make it true for all

You are correct that what you say is true for you and the religion of AA/12 steps and the disease model…but it is not a universal truism because unless you accept the disease model it does not apply

The problem is that the proponents of the disease model and the religion of AA is that they believe that they speak truth that is applicable to all and it is not…

just understand that…

There is no argument…just reality of what it is…

This works for you because you came to believe and it worked because you worked it…

 

[johnnyjones]

Johnny,

This is a commentary. You may want to know that John Calvin says the same thing. That does not mean I agree. If you look up the Ethereal Classics concerning Proverbs 26:11 Calvin says exactly the same thing.

I believe you confuse taking a drink with addiction. Addiction occurs in the head. Your choice to drink if you drink and you find you are unable to tolerate drinking occurs in the head. I have had a drink or two in my day. Recently I bought a beer. I put it in the freezer, did not drink it and then put it in the refrigerator. My daugher asked me about the beer. She had seen it in the freezer.

I told her that I bought it with the intention to drink it the night she saw it in the freezer but decided not to that night. I then drank it the next day. She said “dad you know that it makes you hungry, makes you thirsty, and you don’t feel good the next day”…I said I know. I know that just one beer makes me feel hungry, thirsty, actually screws up my sleep and then the next day I wake up felling fatigued. So for me, I like the taste, the buzz is not that big of a deal but the side effects are not that great.

I would rather swim a mile every night, run or walk 2.5 miles every morning, eat healthy, sleep well and lift weights to keep my body healthy and beer does not fit into that paradigm on a regular basis.

There is no sin in drinking. The sin is drinking to excess. If you want to believe that everyone that ever had a drink that binged, drank too much, drank in excess, was a drunk for a period is like what you say that they can never return and have a drink then that is your perogative. It is true for some but not all. So to return to drink is not a sin unless you are someone that finds your mind unwilling to accept just one, then for you don’t drink.

Why site John Calvin? No Protestant sources were provided to you. In my first source the average studying Catholic who sets up a web site agrees with my view.
I then provided a Haydock commentary from the Douay Rheims which is purely Catholic. Jesus also says in Matt. 12:25 which was referenced in the Haydock commentary, when an evil (unclean) spirit comes out of a man, it seeks a place to rest. It (the spirit) then says “I will return to the house I left”. The final condition becomes worse than the first.

Now, if I provide more Catholic sources that say a dog returning to his vomit means do not return to the sins what is your new response going to be?

And no, I don’t want to believe that everyone that ever got drunk or drank too much can’t return to a drink. We are talking about people who recognize they have a problem, possibly after continual trial and error. People who feel an addiction grab a hold of them when they mess with alcohol or drugs. Yes, in the mind. They don’t want to reignite the mental obsession that long term use of chemicals can cause.

Your responses are the same tired mantra. I can post more catholic viewpoints, but it changes nothing for you. Even if you can’t stand AA, just use logic. You shouldn’t return to sins if you can help it, period, most especially if a particular sin has caused much damage in your life.

 

[clem456]

Clem,

A formed conscience guided by reason and strengthened by virute…recall that this is by human effort…starting to sound familiar…

You cherry pick two quotes out of context and use them to support your opinion, which you have been doing the entire thread. How are your two quotes informed by the passages I posted from Veritatis Splendor? You conveneintly ignore those to your own advantage. Stanton would be so proud of you.

Section 21: Being a follower of Christ means becoming conformed to him…Christ dwells by faith in the heart of the believer and thus the disciple is conformed to the Lord. This is the effect of Grace, of the active presence of the Holy Spirit in us.

Section 19The way and at the same time the content of perfection consist in the following of Jesus…once one has given up one’s own wealth and self…Following Christ is the essential and primordial foudnation of Christian morality…It involves holding fast to the very person of Jesus…sharing in his free and loving obedience to the will of the Father.

Section 54: In the depths of his conscience man detects a law which he does not impose upon himself, but wich holds him to obedience…For man has in his heart a law written by God…The cultural tendencies… in which freedom and law are set in opposition to one another…and freedom is exalted to the point of idolatry-lead to a “creative” understanding of the moral conscience, which diverges from the Church’s tradition and her Magisterium.

The whole point of Veritatis Splendor is that man has no freedom or power of his own apart from submission and obedicence to the truth…to God. It’s made clear repeatedly throughout the book that self willed freedom is an illusion. This is Christianity 101. The word obedience must be used like 300 times in Veritatis Splendor. Man’s will and power are nothing without them being surrendered to God. To say otherwise is misrepresenting the teaching.

The passages you refer to assume a well formed conscience and will aligned in obedience to God’s will, certainly not the conscience and will deformed by addiction.
You take them grossly out of context to support your view.

 

[CopticChristian]

Why site John Calvin? No Protestant sources were provided to you. In my first source the average studying Catholic who sets up a web site agrees with my view.
I then provided a Haydock commentary from the Douay Rheims which is purely Catholic. Jesus also says in Matt. 12:25 which was referenced in the Haydock commentary, when an evil (unclean) spirit comes out of a man, it seeks a place to rest. It (the spirit) then says “I will return to the house I left”. The final condition becomes worse than the first.

Now, if I provide more Catholic sources that say a dog returning to his vomit means do not return to the sins what is your new response going to be?

And no, I don’t want to believe that everyone that ever got drunk or drank too much can’t return to a drink. We are talking about people who recognize they have a problem, possibly after continual trial and error. People who feel an addiction grab a hold of them when they mess with alcohol or drugs. Yes, in the mind. They don’t want to reignite the mental obsession that long term use of chemicals can cause.

Your responses are the same tired mantra. I can post more catholic viewpoints, but it changes nothing for you. Even if you can’t stand AA, just use logic. You shouldn’t return to sins if you can help it, period, most especially if a particular sin has caused much damage in your life.

Johnny,

You can cite anything you want. I pointed out two sources that include Collegville Bible commentary and ECF. We are not Protestants. We can believe it to be anything we want as long as we don’t deny Church teaching.

A dog eating its vomit is an animal that has no sense. Do humans eat their vomit? I cannot recall that this is possible or even happens. Humans have the ability to se;f reflective think and animals do not.

You want to say that Peter is saying that a drunk who drinks is like a dog eating vomit. Great.

Do you want to be correct? Ok. You are correct. Now lets move on.

The notion that you present is from an empirical testimonial perspective. Tell me this. What is the absolute test, the absolute certainty, the quantifiable standard that someone is an addict? You and I both know there is none. The person you describe can be anywhere on the spectrum.

The people that show up asking for help or forced to get help in the disease model are a particular group. There are people like you describe that never get caught up in this clap trap, stop on their own, find other means to resolve their prolbem…just like Clem says he stumbled through something…but not all people come to the notion that the religion of AA or the disease model is where they find help. One poster says because it is anonymous there is no study available. There is no science behind anything that the disease model produces.

So, we are left to “in my experience”…and that experience does not equate to ALL, EVERYONE, or any other absolute. The problem I have with the disciples of AA is that everything that is touted is never understood as…Ok, that is the way you see it…no…they say that is the way it is…there can be no dialogue when someone cannot recognize their own limits of what they have been taught and what they know…because they have been taught experience not science…and then you have no measure of comparison…

How many Catholics that go to AA are “I am a recovering Catholic” and are now attending Protestant churches. I don’t know. I wouldn’t say that it is absolute. I would say I spoke to too many. Are there statistics. I don’t know. I would just say it happens and from my perspective this is my experience. I would also say I saw too many Evangelicals talking to Catholics trying to dissuade them from returning to being Catholic…in these places.

You like this stuff, you believe in this stuff…but it is not the only way, a way, and there is no data to prove that it has better than a 10% success rate. If you can live with that…then great…

You can be correct on your bible study, you can be correct on your notion of who should and who should not drink, just realize that the effectiveness of the 12 step religion is lacking substance…I cannot suggest to anyone that this disease model/12 step religion has value…if they go, if they like it…great…however anyone searching should know what they are getting in to…

Here, hope this makes you and the other disciples happy…

hooray for the 12 step religion of AA:clapping:

 

[CopticChristian]

**clem456:
QUOTE]You cherry pick two quotes out of context and use them to support your opinion, which you have been doing the entire thread.

The passages you refer to assume a well formed conscience and will aligned in obedience to God’s will, certainly not the conscience and will deformed by addiction.
QUOTE]
Clem,

I cherry picked. You cherry picked. Read the entire manuscript. You are correct with what you say. I am correct with what I say…You point out the action…the Church provides the reasoning as to what it is and how you do it. I suggest you read this document again…

“Genuine freedom is an outstanding manifestation of the divine image in man. For God willed to leave man “in the power of his own counsel” (cf. Sir 15:14), so that he would seek his Creator of his own accord and would freely arrive at full and blessed perfection by cleaving to God”.57 Although each individual has a right to be respected in his own journey in search of the truth, there exists a prior moral obligation, and a grave one at that, to seek the truth and to adhere to it once it is known.58 As Cardinal John Henry Newman, that outstanding defender of the rights of conscience, forcefully put it: “**Conscience has rights because it has duties”.**59

1. Man’s genuine moral autonomy in no way means the rejection but rather the acceptance of the moral law, of God’s command: “The Lord God gave this command to the man…” (Gen 2:16). Human freedom and God’s law meet and are called to intersect, in the sense of man’s free obedience to God and of God’s completely gratuitous benevolence towards man. Hence obedience to God is not, as some would believe, a heteronomy, as if the moral life were subject to the will of something all-powerful, absolute, ex- traneous to man and intolerant of his freedom. If in fact a heteronomy of morality were to mean a denial of man’s self-determination or the imposition of norms unrelated to his good, this would be in contradiction to the Revelation of the Covenant and of the redemptive Incarnation. Such a heteronomy would be nothing but a form of alienation, contrary to divine wisdom and to the dignity of the human person.

**Others speak, and rightly so, of theonomy, or participated theonomy, since man’s free obedience to God’s law effectively implies that human reason and human will participate in God’s wisdom and providence. **

1. Patterned on God’s freedom, man’s freedom is not negated by his obedience to the divine law; indeed, only through this obedience does it abide in the truth and conform to human dignity. This is clearly stated by the Council: **“Human dignity requires man to act through conscious and free choice, as motivated and prompted personally from within, and not through blind internal impulse or merely external pressure. Man achieves such dignity when he frees himself from all subservience to his feelings, and in a free choice of the good, pursues his own end by effectively and assiduously marshalling the appropriate means”.75 **

**In his journey towards God, the One who “alone is good”, man must freely do good and avoid evil. But in order to accomplish this he must be able to distinguish good from evil. And this takes place above all thanks to the light of natural reason, the reflection in man of the splendour of God’s countenance. **Thus Saint Thomas, commenting on a verse of Psalm 4, writes: “After saying: Offer right sacrifices (Ps 4:5), as if some had then asked him what right works were, the Psalmist adds: There are many who say: Who will make us see good? And in reply to the question he says: The light of your face, Lord, is signed upon us, thereby implying that the light of natural reason whereby we discern good from evil, which is the function of the natural law, is nothing else but an imprint on us of the divine light”.76 It also becomes clear why this law is called the natural law: it receives this name not because it refers to the nature of irrational beings but because the reason which promulgates it is proper to human nature.77

Man is able to recognize good and evil thanks to that discernment of good from evil which he himself carries out by his reason, in particular by his reason enlightened by Divine Revelation and by faith, through the law which God gave to the Chosen People, beginning with the commandments on Sinai.

The person, by the light of reason and the support of virtue, discovers in the body the anticipatory signs, the expression and the promise of the gift of self, in conformity with the wise plan of the Creator. It is in the light of the dignity of the human person — a dignity which must be affirmed for its own sake — that reason grasps the specific moral value of certain goods towards which the person is naturally inclined. And since the human person cannot be reduced to a freedom which is self-designing, but entails a particular spiritual and bodily structure, the primordial moral requirement of loving and respecting the person as an end and never as a mere means also implies, by its very nature, respect for certain fundamental goods, without which one would fall into relativism and arbitrariness.

Certainly, in order to have a “good conscience” (1 Tim 1:5), man must seek the truth and must make judgments in accordance with that same truth. As the Apostle Paul says, the conscience must be “confirmed by the Holy Spirit” (cf. Rom 9:1); it must be “clear” (2 Tim 1:3); it must not “practise cunning and tamper with God’s word”, but “openly state the truth” (cf. 2 Cor 4:2). On the other hand, the Apostle also warns Christians**: “Do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may prove what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect” (Rom 12:2). Paul’s admonition urges us to be watchful, warning us that in the judgments of our conscience the possibility of error is always present.**

Conscience is not an infallible judge; it can make mistakes. However, error of conscience can be the result of an invincible ignorance, an ignorance of which the subject is not aware and which he is unable to overcome by himself.

**Conscience, as the ultimate concrete judgment, compromises its dignity when it is culpably erroneous, that is to say, “when man shows little concern for seeking what is true and good, and conscience gradually becomes almost blind from being accustomed to sin”.**109 Jesus alludes to the danger of the conscience being deformed when he warns: “The eye is the lamp of the body. So if your eye is sound, your whole body will be full of light; but if your eye is not sound, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!” (Mt 6:22-23).

64. The words of Jesus just quoted also represent a call to form our conscience, to make it the object of a continuous conversion to what is true and to what is good. In the same vein, Saint Paul exhorts us not to be conformed to the mentality of this world, but to be transformed by the renewal of our mind (cf. Rom 12:2).

Human acts are moral acts because they express and determine the goodness or evil of the individual who performs them.120 They do not produce a change merely in the state of affairs outside of man but, to the extent that they are deliberate choices, they give moral definition to the very person who performs them, determining his profound spiritual traits. This was perceptively noted by Saint Gregory of Nyssa: “All things subject to change and to becoming never remain constant, but continually pass from one state to another, for better or worse… **Now, human life is always subject to change; it needs to be born ever anew… But here birth does not come about by a foreign intervention, as is the case with bodily beings…; it is the result of a free choice. Thus we are in a certain way our own parents, creating ourselves as we will, by our decisions”.**121

This sounds like obedience, aligning my will and it certainly does not sound like surrender to me or the clap trap thinking of AA that says your will is what got you into trouble, like actors on a stage trying to direct your own play…it is time now to surrender your will to God…and in actuallity you are surrendering your will to the tenents of the Big Book, your will to the Group conscience, your will to whatever the Big Book or what anyone in the meeting tells you is the will of God…for if you read the Big Book and if you go to meetings…the God of AA is a one way God…not a trinity…somewhat Manicheistic and it is just this thing out there…

You need to spend some time understanding Veritiatis Splendor as it mirrors the Cathechism. Veritatis Splendor and My Church do not teach surrender as it is stated…concerning the dignity of man created in the image and likeness of God…we are to as Veritatis Splendor says become our own parents…SURRENDER is AA think speech…please do not believe your Church teaches this…

vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p3s1c1a6.htm

II. THE FORMATION OF CONSCIENCE

1783 Conscience must be informed and moral judgment enlightened. A well-formed conscience is upright and truthful. It formulates its judgments according to reason, in conformity with the true good willed by the wisdom of the Creator. The education of conscience is indispensable for human beings who are subjected to negative influences and tempted by sin to prefer their own judgment and to reject authoritative teachings.

1784 The education of the conscience is a lifelong task.

 

[Christmastwin]

Clem,

This sounds like obedience, aligning my will and it certainly does not sound like surrender to me or the clap trap thinking of AA that says your will is what got you into trouble, like actors on a stage trying to direct your own play…it is time now to surrender your will to God…and in actuallity you are surrendering your will to the tenents of the Big Book, your will to the Group conscience, your will to whatever the Big Book or what anyone in the meeting tells you is the will of God…for if you read the Big Book and if you go to meetings…the God of AA is a one way God…not a trinity…somewhat Manicheistic and it is just this thing out there…

LOL
You read a lot of the anti-AA stuff online, don’t you?

 

[CopticChristian]

LOL
You read a lot of the anti-AA stuff online, don’t you?

Christmas,

I read a lot online? LOL…hummm

I read online, books, e-books, audio books, if I could I would read braille…so you find reading something to LOL about…

Did you know that the Library has books that you have to read online…LOL
Did you know that the Library has audio books online to read…LOL
If you can’t go to the library or buy a book…many books are online…LOL

You have a strange sense of humor.

You made a conclusion based on what may I ask? Are you saying that the Big Book does not have this language?

Here is a challenge for you and every other 12 step disciple.

Show where Surrender of your will is consitent with

Veritatis Splendor
Catechism of The Catholic Church

Veritatis Splendor uses the verbage of Obedient Faith and you know where that comes from…Paul and the letter to the Romans describes Obedient Faith…never surrender…big difference.

 

[Christmastwin]

Christmas,

You made a conclusion based on what may I ask? Are you saying that the Big Book does not have this language?

Here is a challenge for you and every other 12 step disciple.

Show where Surrender of your will is consitent with

Veritatis Splendor
Catechism of The Catholic Church

Veritatis Splendor uses the verbage of Obedient Faith and you know where that comes from…Paul and the letter to the Romans describes Obedient Faith…never surrender…big difference.

I am not familiar with the Veritatis Splendor nor the verbiage of Obedient Faith. If you recall way back when, I am brand spanking new to the Catholic faith and it was through AA that I was brought back to it. No. That probably passed you right by.

I AM very familiar with AA, though. Surrender is admitting that I am not God. That I can’t beat my drinking on my own. That I need to stop fighting and accept God’s help. That’s what surrender means to me.

Submitting to a Group Conscience? What is the Group Conscience and what is it used for? Do you even know?

I admit I know very little of the faith as a newcomer, but this thread is teaching me an awful lot thanks to Clem and Johnny. You on the other hand think you know an awful lot about something without even living it.

 

[Christmastwin]

Christmas,

I
You have a strange sense of humor.

.

I’ve been told that it’s my greatest asset. Thank you.

 

[clem456]

Clem,

I cherry picked. You cherry picked. Read the entire manuscript. You are correct with what you say. I am correct with what I say…

I actually own the book and have read it twice.

This is an important passage (you just quoted it)

Conscience is not an infallible judge; it can make mistakes. However, error of conscience can be the result of an invincible ignorance, an ignorance of which the subject is not aware and which he is unable to overcome by himself.

Conscience, as the ultimate concrete judgment, **compromises its dignity when it is culpably erroneous, **that is to say, “when man shows little concern for seeking what is true and good, and conscience gradually becomes almost blind from being accustomed to sin”.(addiction)

109 Jesus alludes to the danger of the conscience being deformed when he warns: “The eye is the lamp of the body. So if your eye is sound, your whole body will be full of light; but if your eye is not sound, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!” (Mt 6:22-23).

**64. The words of Jesus just quoted also represent a call to form our conscience, to make it the object of a continuous conversion **to what is true and to what is good. In the same vein, Saint Paul exhorts us not to be conformed to the mentality of this world, but to be transformed by the renewal of our mind (cf. Rom 12:2).

The erroneous conscience willfully employed without surrender to God is spiritual death.

12-step-review.org/about/index.html

1. Admit our powerlessness
2. Believe in a Greater Power
3. Turn our life to God
4. Take inventory
5. Admit our wrongs
6. Be willing to be healed
7. Humbly ask God’s healing
8. Make a list of people we harmed
9. Make direct amends
10. Continue our inventory
11. Prayer & Meditation
12. Share the message

This is my last post btw, it has become pointless.

 

[johnnyjones]

Johnny,

You can cite anything you want. I pointed out two sources that include Collegville Bible commentary and ECF. We are not Protestants. We can believe it to be anything we want as long as we don’t deny Church teaching.

A dog eating its vomit is an animal that has no sense. Do humans eat their vomit? I cannot recall that this is possible or even happens. Humans have the ability to se;f reflective think and animals do not.

You want to say that Peter is saying that a drunk who drinks is like a dog eating vomit. Great.

Do you want to be correct? Ok. You are correct. Now lets move on.

The notion that you present is from an empirical testimonial perspective. Tell me this. What is the absolute test, the absolute certainty, the quantifiable standard that someone is an addict? You and I both know there is none. The person you describe can be anywhere on the spectrum.

The people that show up asking for help or forced to get help in the disease model are a particular group. There are people like you describe that never get caught up in this clap trap, stop on their own, find other means to resolve their prolbem…just like Clem says he stumbled through something…but not all people come to the notion that the religion of AA or the disease model is where they find help. One poster says because it is anonymous there is no study available. There is no science behind anything that the disease model produces.

So, we are left to “in my experience”…and that experience does not equate to ALL, EVERYONE, or any other absolute. The problem I have with the disciples of AA is that everything that is touted is never understood as…Ok, that is the way you see it…no…they say that is the way it is…there can be no dialogue when someone cannot recognize their own limits of what they have been taught and what they know…because they have been taught experience not science…and then you have no measure of comparison…

How many Catholics that go to AA are “I am a recovering Catholic” and are now attending Protestant churches. I don’t know. I wouldn’t say that it is absolute. I would say I spoke to too many. Are there statistics. I don’t know. I would just say it happens and from my perspective this is my experience. I would also say I saw too many Evangelicals talking to Catholics trying to dissuade them from returning to being Catholic…in these places.

You like this stuff, you believe in this stuff…but it is not the only way, a way, and there is no data to prove that it has better than a 10% success rate. If you can live with that…then great…

You can be correct on your bible study, you can be correct on your notion of who should and who should not drink, just realize that the effectiveness of the 12 step religion is lacking substance…I cannot suggest to anyone that this disease model/12 step religion has value…if they go, if they like it…great…however anyone searching should know what they are getting in to…

Here, hope this makes you and the other disciples happy…

hooray for the 12 step religion of AA:clapping:

A sinner returning to their folly, and you know that.

The perverse joy you get out of repeating that those opposing you are rolling in AA has more than worn thin.

Stop telling sinners they can return to sin without consequences, you are reckless in this regard.

 

[CopticChristian]

I am not familiar with the Veritatis Splendor nor the verbiage of Obedient Faith. If you recall way back when, I am brand spanking new to the Catholic faith and it was through AA that I was brought back to it. No. That probably passed you right by.

I AM very familiar with AA, though. Surrender is admitting that I am not God. That I can’t beat my drinking on my own. That I need to stop fighting and accept God’s help. That’s what surrender means to me.

Submitting to a Group Conscience? What is the Group Conscience and what is it used for? Do you even know?

I admit I know very little of the faith as a newcomer, but this thread is teaching me an awful lot thanks to Clem and Johnny. You on the other hand think you know an awful lot about something without even living it.

Christmastwin,

I ask your forgiveness for not recognizing your newness. I am pleased that you are learning something valuable to you. Surrender is not consistent with Catholic Thought, the Catechism or Veritatis Splendor. If you have not read Veritatis Splendor…it is availalbe online here…LOL…

vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/encyclicals/documents/hf_jp-ii_enc_06081993_veritatis-splendor_en.html

It uses the notion of “obedient faith” and that is the central theme to the letter to the Romans. If you do not know and understand the letter to the Romans then I suggest you get hold of Scott Hahn’s bible study on the letter to the Romans…it will innoculate you and prepare you for any discussion with a Protestant bent…

I spent some time discussing this with an Orthodox on this thread who believed that Paul was disseminating “another gospel”…if you read my posts on this thread it will explain the synopsis of what Hahn points out and should set you on sound footing to understand the letter to the Romans…Hahn says that the letter to the Romans is the crown jewel in the writings of the Bible and the number one writing that Protestants rely on for discussion. Read and know it.

forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=615741&highlight=mystery+hidden+for+all+ages

Group conscience is the notion that if I cannot accept a higher power then the higher power is the group conscience of the AA members and meetings…sort of if I can’t believe in a higher power “God”…then to submit to the group is good enough. I don’t find this any more appealing than the entire notion of surrender and submitting and believe that the Cathechism and Veritatis Splendor say it better. You choose what you like.

Concerning AA…all I want is for any person viewing these posts see what the religion of AA has to offer, what the disease model has to offfer…why I oppose it and by reading what those that support it will be able to discern a proper path. I never tell anyone what to do…I just give information. People decide to do whatever they choose…I just want them to make an informed decision and for that I offer alternatives to the religion of AA and the disease model.

If anyone wants help get it. If anyone believes in sin and salvation, stop doing it and get it. If anyone wants to do something besides the religion of AA here are some alternatives that do not cause you to be diseased forever or forever obligated to attend…just another choice.

hamsnetwork.org/alternatives/

My experience in the field of medicine whenever there is not one way then it is an earmark that we just don’t unerdstand it well enough to say which way…and for that people need to know that there is not just one way…and unfortunately AA teaches one way for what I see to be

the sin of addiction

 

[Christmastwin]

The group conscience is simply a vote amongst the members of an AA group. That is all. If I suggested changing the meeting time from 7:00 to 7:30, it would have to be voted on by the AA group.

Do you see? You are making something much more than it really is.

 

[CopticChristian]

The group conscience is simply a vote amongst the members of an AA group. That is all. If I suggested changing the meeting time from 7:00 to 7:30, it would have to be voted on by the AA group.

Do you see? You are making something much more than it really is.

Christmastwin,

As you said you are a novice. You haven’t been to as many meetings as I have and heard that the group conscience can be your higher power. That is OK. You said you are a novice…

I read it online, witnessed it in person, and have heard others say that their higher power is the group conscience…LOL

everything2.com/title/Second+Tradition

**And then there is the idea that a higher power is involved in the group conscience. **They could have just said “There is but one ultimate authority, a vote of all the members present.” That would be simpler and clearer. But what they did agree upon is deep and mysterious. It suggests that the reason that everyone is equal and gets an equal vote is that this concept of a higher power - whatever any one of us may think that means - is expressed through our equality. The idea is that whatever we decide, when we listen to our hearts and our own higher power and the principles of the program, or even when we don’t, whatever we decide as a group is the right thing for us right then. It means that this higher power is present in everything we are doing as a group. One of the reasons that it is my favorite tradition is that this simple set of statements is at once eminently practical and deeply spiritual: we can explore it for years and not finish discovering new subtleties in how it works and what it means

.