The Act of Loosening

[Guardian]

Seems to me everyone tries to defend the Catholic Church’s teachings as always consistent throughout history. However, I don’t believe the Catholic Church has been consistent necessarily, and I don’t see why it need be.

With the authority to bind teachings, it also has the power to loosen teachings, yet I never hear of doctrines being loosened, only binded.

Yet, when I look at the history of the Church, it seems they have loosened certain doctrines, for example:

1. “Salvation outside the church” has been loosened in many senses
2. Unbaptized infants may in fact go to Heaven and not Hell.

Is there anything else anyone can think of where the Church has “loosened” a once “binding” doctrine? Or has simply changed doctrine?

 

[Verbum]

Hi Guardian,

Loosen means to forgive. Doctrine cannot be loosened. It can only be clarified, and this is what happened in many cases.

Verbum

 

[dal11]

The church still teaches there is no salvation outside the church. It has no teaching on what happens to unbaptised infants. We leave them in God’s hands.

 

[kleary]

Seems to me everyone tries to defend the Catholic Church’s teachings as always consistent throughout history. However, I don’t believe the Catholic Church has been consistent necessarily, and I don’t see why it need be.

With the authority to bind teachings, it also has the power to loosen teachings, yet I never hear of doctrines being loosened, only binded.

Yet, when I look at the history of the Church, it seems they have loosened certain doctrines, for example:

1. “Salvation outside the church” has been loosened in many senses
2. Unbaptized infants may in fact go to Heaven and not Hell.

Is there anything else anyone can think of where the Church has “loosened” a once “binding” doctrine? Or has simply changed doctrine?

The numbers you mentioned above have NEVER been “modified” or “changed”. If someone tells you otherwise then they are not faithful to Church teaching. And if anuone read the documents of Vatican II and the new Catechism and comes up with different interpretations than those prior to the Council then their interpretations are wrong.

The Church has never taught that those through no fault of their own who are “outside the church” shall not get into heaven. The Church has also never taught that unbaptized babies go to Hell.

Ken

 

[Victorious]

Seems to me everyone tries to defend the Catholic Church’s teachings as always consistent throughout history. However, I don’t believe the Catholic Church has been consistent necessarily, and I don’t see why it need be.

With the authority to bind teachings, it also has the power to loosen teachings, yet I never hear of doctrines being loosened, only binded.

Yet, when I look at the history of the Church, it seems they have loosened certain doctrines, for example:

1. “Salvation outside the church” has been loosened in many senses
2. Unbaptized infants may in fact go to Heaven and not Hell.

Is there anything else anyone can think of where the Church has “loosened” a once “binding” doctrine? Or has simply changed doctrine?

The Church doesn’t get to dictate what the truth is. And the “power to loosen teachings” doesn’t exist.

 

[thistle]

Seems to me everyone tries to defend the Catholic Church’s teachings as always consistent throughout history. However, I don’t believe the Catholic Church has been consistent necessarily, and I don’t see why it need be.

With the authority to bind teachings, it also has the power to loosen teachings, yet I never hear of doctrines being loosened, only binded.

Yet, when I look at the history of the Church, it seems they have loosened certain doctrines, for example:

1. “Salvation outside the church” has been loosened in many senses
2. Unbaptized infants may in fact go to Heaven and not Hell.

Is there anything else anyone can think of where the Church has “loosened” a once “binding” doctrine? Or has simply changed doctrine?

You are badly informed. Doctrines cannot be “loosened” or “changed” and none of them have been.

 

[Mannyfit75]

Seems to me everyone tries to defend the Catholic Church’s teachings as always consistent throughout history. However, I don’t believe the Catholic Church has been consistent necessarily, and I don’t see why it need be.

With the authority to bind teachings, it also has the power to loosen teachings, yet I never hear of doctrines being loosened, only binded.

Yet, when I look at the history of the Church, it seems they have loosened certain doctrines, for example:

1. “Salvation outside the church” has been loosened in many senses
2. Unbaptized infants may in fact go to Heaven and not Hell.

Is there anything else anyone can think of where the Church has “loosened” a once “binding” doctrine? Or has simply changed doctrine?

You sound like a Protestant; yet your profile say you are Catholic.

 

[LilyM]

Unbaptised infants go to hell? I’d love to see where in any catechism or church document it says as much. On this particular teaching you have indeed been badly informed. Limbo isn’t heaven but neither is it hell at all.

 

[Guardian]

You are badly informed. Doctrines cannot be “loosened” or “changed” and none of them have been.

Sure they can, only doctrines that have been defined infallible are not reversible.

The Church has changed certain doctrines throughout the years, even conservative apologists (like Jimmy Akin) believe this.

 

[thistle]

Sure they can, only doctrines that have been defined infallible are not reversible.

The Church has changed certain doctrines throughout the years, even conservative apologists (like Jimmy Akin) believe this.

Sorry but you are talking rubbish. What you say is totally untrue.
I agree with one of the other posters. You sound more like a Protestant than a Catholic.

 

[Texas_Roofer]

I think the OP is mixing dogma, doctrine, and discipline. Disciplines are “loose” over time for examples the celibacy of clergy has changed in the bible the OT lists acceptable standards for the clergy’s wife, while in the NT Paul explicitly says be either celibate or married not in between. That is important because the married status, not celibacy was the standard. Similarly the church clearly discouraged evolution and geocentrism (earth is center of universe) teachings in the past but now acknowledges both. Some other examples are the definition of fasting, eating fish on Friday, and salvation outside the church. Another example Canon Law specifically states a Catholic can not have a sacramental marriage to a non-baptized spouse, but that is not the current practice, it was changed in 1983. So teaching on diciplines can be loosened

 

[Guardian]

Look, all official teachings by the Magisterium are binding. Certain binding teachings are infallible (like “Dogma” or “Catholic Truths”), and certain ones are not. If you disbelieve an infallible binding doctrine, you commit the sin of heresy. If you disbelieve a noninfallible binding doctrine, you commit the sin of disobedience and humility.

With that said, I am speaking of noninfallible binding doctrines that are official Church teaching, and yes they can and have changed.

For example, the doctrine on an infant’s soul if the infant dies prior to baptism has changed. This is a quote from Jimmy Akin’s blog:

**This represents a clear shift in doctrine. **In Pius XII’s day and before, private speculation had been permitted that there might be a way of salvation for such children, but official teaching was that this was not the case, as documented above. (The situation then was similar to the situation with respect to Feeneyites now: Official teaching is that it is possible for non-Catholics to be saved, but the Church still allows private speculation that this is not the case.) With the Catechism, we have a clear shift in what the magisterial texts are saying, so that now–instead of denying the possibility of salvation without baptism for such children–they are affirming at least the hope of it.

This doesn’t mean that limbo doesn’t exist, but it does mean that the Church is now actively pointing toward an alternative to limbo.

It also means that the Church’s official teaching has already changed on this point, so if you are encountering a press story that seems to imply that the Church still actively proclaims limbo and is considering whether to shift its position on limbo, the article is misleading. It has already shifted its position, as the above documents show.

jimmyakin.typepad.com/defensor_fidei/2006/10/limbo_in_limbo.html

Read it for yourself.

 

[thistle]

Look, all official teachings by the Magisterium are binding. Certain binding teachings are infallible (like “Dogma” or “Catholic Truths”), and certain ones are not. If you disbelieve an infallible binding doctrine, you commit the sin of heresy. If you disbelieve a noninfallible binding doctrine, you commit the sin of disobedience and humility.

With that said, I am speaking of noninfallible binding doctrines that are official Church teaching, and yes they can and have changed.

For example, the doctrine on an infant’s soul if the infant dies prior to baptism has changed. This is a quote from Jimmy Akin’s blog:

jimmyakin.typepad.com/defensor_fidei/2006/10/limbo_in_limbo.html

Read it for yourself.

Limbo has NEVER been a Church doctrine. It has only ever been theological speculation and Catholics have never had to believe in it. You are wrong again!
If you are going to quote a source to allegedly support your opinion then you should use an official Church source!!

 

[Guardian]

Limbo has NEVER been a Church doctrine. It has only ever been theological speculation and Catholics have never had to believe in it. You are wrong again!
If you are going to quote a source to allegedly support your opinion then you should use an official Church source!!

First off, I believe Jimmy Akin is a pretty orthodox source of Catholic teaching who knows the Faith probably better than you and I put together.

Secondly, this is not really about “limbo” but about infants being able to see the beatific vision (or have salvation) without baptism.
Pope Pius XII:

If what We have said up to now concerns the protection and care of natural life, much more so must it concern the supernatural life, which the newly born receives with Baptism. In the present economy there is no other way to communicate that life to the child who has not attained the use of reason. Above all, the state of grace is absolutely necessary at the moment of death. Without it salvation and supernatural happiness—the beatific vision of God—are impossible. An act of love is sufficient for the adult to obtain sanctifying grace and to supply the lack of baptism; to the still unborn or newly born this way is not open. . . . so it is easy to understand the great importance of providing for the baptism of the child deprived of complete reason who finds himself in grave danger or at death’s threshold.

link
CCC 1261:

As regards children who have died without Baptism, the Church can only entrust them to the mercy of God, as she does in her funeral rites for them. Indeed, the great mercy of God who desires that all men should be saved, and Jesus’ tenderness toward children which caused him to say: “Let the children come to me, do not hinder them,” allow us to hope that there is a way of salvation for children who have died without Baptism. All the more urgent is the Church’s call not to prevent little children coming to Christ through the gift of holy Baptism.

This has been a change in doctrine. And yes, this was and is official teaching.