The Catholic Church and religious coercion- the smoking gun 2

[dmar198]

Hey, it looks like we’re southeast PA neighbors.

Actually I’m from northcentral Ohio. What made you think I’m from southeast PA?

I read the link–thanks. I read section 3, too, of the Twelfth Ecumenical Council: “On Heretics”. It seems to me that it spells out in greater detail the sort of penalties which might be pertinent to the topic

That’s very observant, good job. And thank you for the contribution to this thread.

 

[AbideWithMe]

Actually I’m from northcentral Ohio. What made you think I’m from southeast PA?

Oh, sorry. I thought that was your web site. I saw an area code and town number that I recognized as belonging to the county next to mine.

 

[dmar198]

It was standard practice ever since the fourth century to employ the civil arm to impose penalties on heretics. Until the 12th century the Church urged the civil rulers to use only non-lethal methods–after that time the Church endorsed and encouraged the execution of heretics if they refused to repent or repeatedly returned to their heresy.

It is my understanding that the justification of the death penalty in regard to heresy remained unchanged from at least from the fourth century to the twelfth, and remains the same in modern times as it was then. The Donatists come to mind on this point as an early example where heretics were killed because they were a persistent threat to the community (source), and the Catechism’s doctrine on the death penalty comes to mind as acknowledging the theoretical possibility that a heretic could be killed if he or she was a persistent threat to the community (source). I don’t think the ecclesiastical legislation between 1100 and 1700 was any different.

(The Church, in fact, could impose non-lethal temporal penalties such as imprisonment on its own behalf, but did not execute heretics directly.)

I think it’s very important to acknowledge that, because I think the Church is referring to those penalties, not to penalties applied by civil authorities.

To be fair, one of the penalties imposed on heretics, which the Council no doubt has in mind here, was public penance, which I suppose is technically as “spiritual” punishment. But because this was a coercive penance involving public shaming, it was effectively a temporal punishment as well (very much like putting someone in the pillory or the stocks). It was coercive and if people refused to do it they could be executed, because refusal to do penance would mark you as impenitent (obviously).

The State might execute someone for impenitence under certain circumstances, but I don’t think it’s fair to treat that as the standard punishment for impenitence. I think it depended on heresy you were impenitent about.

 

[dmar198]

Oh, sorry. I thought that was your web site. I saw an area code and town number that I recognized as belonging to the county next to mine.

Ah, I understand better now. The website is mine, the phone number is from Pennsylvania. I know, it’s confusing. But that confirms you are very observant, because I didn’t even think someone could try to p(name removed by moderator)oint my location based on my phone number.

 

[Reuben_J]

You don’t understand the late medieval/early modern system of cooperation between Church and state. The canon is condemning those who oppose the system by which both Church and state worked together to coerce people, with the Church establishing right doctrine and imposing lesser penalties, and the state taking over with the “sword” if the Church was unable to get the heretic to repent.

Much have been covered, I will not go through them again at the risk of being repetitive and more mud-slinging.

I do not intend to whitewash Church history, and if you suggest that, you are wrong.

Our differences here, you are interpreting the canon (XIV on baptism) through what happened in history. You said the ‘penalty’ was civil in nature, and I said spiritual.

That canon, as been said (1) opposed teaching not approved by the church. The penalty is excommunication, and (2) those who do not ratify their baptismal vows. The penalty is being barred from receiving the sacrament which is stated and other penalty (the specific is not stated as to how it is to be applied).

To mete out civil punishment on people based on this canon is wrongful application of it.

Explain how this works. The Church makes people sin as a punishment for the sins they have already committed?

This is just crazy.

If you simply mean “by refusing to repent they will be left in their sins,” that would be the 'leaving them to their own will" that the Council explicitly condemns. You are desperately trying to make the Council say the exact opposite of what it says.

I did try to explain that in another post. The other penalty for one who did not ratify his baptismal vow is sin. It is a sin not living the Christian life but it is not a sin if he lives it even though he is barred from receiving the sacraments.

I would not say but perhaps this canon addressed the reformers who left the Church. In any case, they still have to live the Christian life and if not, they sinned. The Church could declare this which is not something strange for her to do so.

 

[dmar198]

the Church did impose penalties such as public penance, which were coercive and had civil effects (i.e., people were publicly shamed and their social standing was affected, etc.). For another, the text doesn’t speak specifically of what the Church does but of what should be done. The implication is that it’s including the civil authorities, who directly imposed the death penalty on the impenitent. It was an entire system, and the Council is affirming its basic principles (without specifying the details) and condemning those who attack it.

I don’t think it’s fair to interpret the canon that way, for the following reasons. The canon is a legal document, and then as now, legal texts are intended to mean only what they say. In this case, I think the canon is intended to deny the proposition it refers to. The proposition it refers to does not explicitly refer to the government or the political situation of the time. I don’t think the canon should be interpreted as if it does.

To me, the canon seems to imply at most that it is okay to exercise coercive authority by imposing penalties other than excommunication on a heretic. That does not imply anything about whether or not the government should coerce, not to me anyway.

Here’s another thing: the canon does not appear to specify what it means by compel. I think it refers to coercive authority, and I think coercive authority refers to the right to impose penalties. I think the canon itself implies that excommunication fits that definition, and yet everyone acknowledges that being excommunicated doesn’t force you to do anything. In light of that, I don’t think we can extend the meaning of the word to refer to other, really forcible things.

The canon says other penalties can be used. It doesn’t say by whom or how forcible those penalties can be, and therefore I don’t think the OP should use this canon to imply that the Church requires us to believe that physical coercion can be used by secular authorities.

I also think your interlocutor is correct that the documentary context is ecclesiastical, not civil, and therefore if we had to guess who the wielder of coercive power was supposed to be in the council fathers’ minds, I think the safe guess would be that the Church wields the coercive power.

You don’t understand the late medieval/early modern system of cooperation between Church and state. The canon is condemning those who oppose the system by which both Church and state worked together to coerce people

It doesn’t say that, and I don’t think we should impose the political situation of the time into the meaning of the canon. As a legal document, I think it only means what it says.

I hope that helps. God bless.

 

[Isaiah45_9]

Catholic rulers who took seriously their task of repressing heresy in order to promote the common good and the welfare (spiritual as well as temporal) of their subjects.

It is an insult. And it’s remarkably silly and irrelevant. Perhaps you should read a little early modern history, while we’re making recommendations:shrug:.

Yes, but the Church isn’t imposing sin as a penalty. You aren’t making any sense.

That just isn’t true. For one thing, the Church did impose penalties such as public penance, which were coercive and had civil effects (i.e., people were publicly shamed and their social standing was affected, etc.). For another, the text doesn’t speak specifically of what the Church does but of what should be done. The implication is that it’s including the civil authorities, who directly imposed the death penalty on the impenitent. It was an entire system, and the Council is affirming its basic principles (without specifying the details) and condemning those who attack it.

I know you need to believe that. But the evidence here is clear: the Church is defending the use of penalties other than excommunication, and indeed condemning those who criticize the coercive system that was in place. These were not “abuses” committed despite the Church’s teaching (of course the system might be applied with unnecessary cruelty and that would be an abuse–the purpose was always to bring people to repentance and if that was impossible to punish them so as to deter others). When Michael Sattler asked for a priest to talk to him and try to convince him he was wrong and the [civil] judge said, “The hangman will dispute with you, you heretic!” that was an abuse. That was against the Church’s teaching. But executing an impenitent heretic, when all reasonable attempts had been made to get him to repent, was not an abuse by the standards of the time.

You don’t understand the late medieval/early modern system of cooperation between Church and state. The canon is condemning those who oppose the system by which both Church and state worked together to coerce people, with the Church establishing right doctrine and imposing lesser penalties, and the state taking over with the “sword” if the Church was unable to get the heretic to repent.

I think my arguments speak for themselves to everyone who is not blindly determined to whitewash the record. You have made a number of statements that show that you haven’t got a clue as to how things worked in the sixteenth century. Perhaps less reliance on Catholicism for Dummies and more on historical accounts of the period would be a good idea! (I’d recommend the chapter called “The Willingness to Kill” in Brad Gregory’s Salvation at Stake as a good starting point.)

Edwin

:bowdown2:

The moment we try to pretend that things that happened did not happen, we become a fanatic and abandon reason and impartiality.

 

[Thomas1981]

:bowdown2:

The moment we try to pretend that things that happened did not happen, we become a fanatic and abandon reason and impartiality.

Who is trying to pretend things that happened did not happen. What poster denied that the people of the Church have abused their power? What people are denying is that somehow this canon law on baptism is a license to go out and burn people at the stake. The argument seems to be that: in the history of the Catholic Church people were killed for heresy, all killings for heresy must have their roots in canon law, therefore this canon law must have some relationship to things like burning people at the stake. Ergo, this canon law, regardless of what the text actually says, must be about severe punishment for heretics. One does not have to be a Catholic fanatic to dispute this “logic,” rather one must have a prejudiced mind to hold it.

It seems to me that people are trying to take a single canon law as a toe-hold for a bigger agenda and a different argument. If you dispute is with Church history, make an argument about Church history. If your question is about the interpretation of canon law then ask about that. I’ve read this canon law several times and I cannot read in all of the claims that are being made against it.

I hear this sort of historical fallacy levelled against the Bible itself. People used the Bible to justify slavery, therefore the Bible justifies slavery. And, if you dispute this you are just blinded by your religious faith and whitewashing history.

 

[Telstar]

This is the entire list of beliefs about Baptism that were condemned by the Council of Trent as heretical. They are entirely false. No part of any of these statements is valid under any circumstances. Anyone who follows any of these beliefs or practices is to be considered a heretic (anathema).

[(from New Advent)***The negative document: “De Baptismo” *** (http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/02258b.htm)

"The negative document we call the canons on baptism decreed by the Council of Trent (Sess. VII, De Baptismo), in which the following doctrines are anathematized (declared heretical):

• The baptism of John (the Precursor) had the same efficacy as the baptism of Christ,

• True and natural water is not necessary for baptism, and therefore the words of Our Lord Jesus Christ "Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Ghost" are metaphorical.

• The true doctrine of the sacrament of baptism is not taught by the Roman Church,

• Baptism given by heretics in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost with the intention of performing what the Church performs, is not true baptism,

• Baptism is free, that is, not necessary for salvation.

• A baptized person, even if he wishes it, can not lose grace, no matter how much he sins, unless he refuses to believe.

• Those who are baptized are obliged only to have faith, but not to observe the whole law of Christ.

• Baptized persons are not obliged to observe all the precepts of the Church, written and traditional, unless of their own accord they wish to submit to them.

• All vows made after baptism are void by reason of the promises made in baptism itself; because by these vows injury is done to the faith which has been professed in baptism and to the sacrament itself.

• All sins committed after baptism are either forgiven or rendered venial by the sole remembrance and faith of the baptism that has been received.

• Baptism although truly and properly administered, must be repeated in the case of a person who has denied the faith of Christ before infidels and has been brought again to repentance.

• No one is to be baptized except at the age at which Christ was baptized or at the moment of death.

*** ** Infants, not being able to make an act of faith, are not to be reckoned among the faithful after their baptism, and therefore when they come to the age of discretion they are to be rebaptized; or it is better to omit their baptism entirely than to baptize them as believing on the sole faith of the Church, when they themselves can not make a proper act of faith.
*** ** Those baptized as infants are to be asked when they have grown up, whether they wish to ratify what their sponsors had promised for them at their baptism, and if they reply that they do not wish to do so, they are to be left to their own will in the matter and not to be forced by penalties to lead a Christian life, except to be deprived of the reception of the Eucharist and of the other sacraments, until they reform.

The doctrines here condemned by the Council of Trent, are those of various leaders among the early reformers. The contradictory of all these statements is to be held as the dogmatic teaching of the Church."
(all emphasis is mine)

The last two statements are the ones we have been discussing, here. They are both clearly referring to the validity (or it’s lack) of Infant Baptism. They are considered to be completely condemned as heretical, because they would call into question the validity of Infant Baptism and require those who were Baptized as children, to either be rebaptized, or to be forced to restate their Baptismal vows when they reach the age of reason. Neither of those is necessary, because the permanent effects of Baptism have already been invoked on the recipient. There is no need to ever repeat it.

 

[joe371]

This is the entire list of beliefs about Baptism that were condemned by the Council of Trent as heretical. They are entirely false. No part of any of these statements is valid under any circumstances. Anyone who follows any of these beliefs or practices is to be considered a heretic (anathema).

The negative document: “De Baptismo” (from New Advent)

"The negative document we call the canons on baptism decreed by the Council of Trent (Sess. VII, De Baptismo), in which the following doctrines are anathematized (declared heretical):

• The baptism of John (the Precursor) had the same efficacy as the baptism of Christ,

• True and natural water is not necessary for baptism, and therefore the words of Our Lord Jesus Christ "Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Ghost" are metaphorical.

• The true doctrine of the sacrament of baptism is not taught by the Roman Church,

• Baptism given by heretics in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost with the intention of performing what the Church performs, is not true baptism,

• Baptism is free, that is, not necessary for salvation.

• A baptized person, even if he wishes it, can not lose grace, no matter how much he sins, unless he refuses to believe.

• Those who are baptized are obliged only to have faith, but not to observe the whole law of Christ.

• Baptized persons are not obliged to observe all the precepts of the Church, written and traditional, unless of their own accord they wish to submit to them.

• All vows made after baptism are void by reason of the promises made in baptism itself; because by these vows injury is done to the faith which has been professed in baptism and to the sacrament itself.

• All sins committed after baptism are either forgiven or rendered venial by the sole remembrance and faith of the baptism that has been received.

• Baptism although truly and properly administered, must be repeated in the case of a person who has denied the faith of Christ before infidels and has been brought again to repentance.

• No one is to be baptized except at the age at which Christ was baptized or at the moment of death.

*** ** Infants, not being able to make an act of faith, are not to be reckoned among the faithful after their baptism, and therefore when they come to the age of discretion they are to be rebaptized; or it is better to omit their baptism entirely than to baptize them as believing on the sole faith of the Church, when they themselves can not make a proper act of faith.
*** ** Those baptized as infants are to be asked when they have grown up, whether they wish to ratify what their sponsors had promised for them at their baptism, and if they reply that they do not wish to do so, they are to be left to their own will in the matter and not to be forced by penalties to lead a Christian life, except to be deprived of the reception of the Eucharist and of the other sacraments, until they reform.

The doctrines here condemned by the Council of Trent, are those of various leaders among the early reformers. The contradictory of all these statements is to be held as the dogmatic teaching of the Church."
(all emphasis is mine)

The last two statements are the ones we have been discussing, here. They are both clearly referring to the validity (or it’s lack) of Infant Baptism. They are considered to be completely condemned as heretical, because they would call into question the validity of Infant Baptism and require those who were Baptized as children, to either be rebaptized, or to be forced to restate their Baptismal vows when they reach the age of reason. Neither of those is necessary, because the permanent effects of Baptism have already been invoked on the recipient. There is no need to ever repeat it.

Thanks for the context, Telstar…

 

[Telstar]

Thanks for the context, Telstar…

You’re very welcome. It seems that no matter how many times we try to tell people that each of those statements is condemned in it’s entirety as being heretical, they keep insisting that at least part of it must still be actually valid. I just don’t get it. What part of “this whole statement is a bold faced lie” don’t they understand?

 

[Reuben_J]

Good work there Telstar.

 

[Reuben_J]

It seems to me that people are trying to take a single canon law as a toe-hold for a bigger agenda and a different argument. If you dispute is with Church history, make an argument about Church history. If your question is about the interpretation of canon law then ask about that. I’ve read this canon law several times and I cannot read in all of the claims that are being made against it.

Thanks. And rightly. We are discussing canon law, not history. At least what is being commented on is canon law, specifically canon XIV on baptism of the Council of Trent (1546).

It is rather frustrating to suffer ad hominem, like downright belittling ‘you do not have a clue about history’ while the subject is on canon law.

At least there must be willingness to read a legal text faithfully according to its content instead of how people had abused it.

I hear this sort of historical fallacy levelled against the Bible itself. People used the Bible to justify slavery, therefore the Bible justifies slavery. And, if you dispute this you are just blinded by your religious faith and whitewashing history.

Those with Protestant background should know better. Catholics are often accused of inserting or adding things that are not in the Bible. Similarly and more so in a legal document like the canon, we should not add things that are not there.

The fact that canon law is regarded as ‘divine law’ where word like anathema is understood as separation from the body of Christ instead of the body of the brethren (society) and therefore bears religious context, it simply does not make sense to apply civil punishment to it. True, history might show us that there were indeed abuses where people of authority might refer to it to justify civil punishment, and if that really happened, then they were wrongful application of the canon; not what the canon specified.

God bless.

Reuben

 

[Mystophilus]

I think he is just trying to say that the civil authorities could fine people for stealing civilian property, and the Church could fine people for stealing Church property: the penalties issued by the civil authorities for civil crimes, other than the death penalty, were also issuable by Church authorities for ecclesiastical crimes.

Precisely: someone who broke church law could be arrested, fined, tortured, or imprisoned just as if s/he had broken civil law, the one difference being that the state still reserved to itself the power of execution. Thus, such secular penalties remained available to the church against anyone who broke that canon.

BTW I do think the line between Church and State was clear enough that the authorities could easily determine whether someone was banished from Church property or from State property. Does that explanation ring true to you?

The line was not where it is now: church courts handled moral concerns as well as immediately religious ones, and thus punished not only blasphemy or sabbath-breaking, but also adultery and slander. It might also be worth noting that, from Gratian’s placing the Roman army at the call of the Church in the C4th through the Fourth Lateran Council’s directive (canon 3) to hand heretics over to secular authorities, the separation between church punishment and state punishment was less clear, except in that the church could not *order *an execution. This is where civil governments were involved, in the application of the unspecified “other penalties”, especially in an age when bishops and barons were schoolmates, neighbours, and guests at one another’s parties.

 

[Easter_Joey]

I think those who think the context involves no temporal consequences are missing the context, since I believe this canon was addressing a proposal that was associated with Erasmus.

Here’s the canon

“CANON XIV.-If any one saith, that those who have been thus baptized when children, are, when they have grown up, to be asked whether they will ratify what their sponsors promised in their names when they were baptized; and that, in case they answer that they will not, they are to be left to their own will; and are not to be compelled meanwhile to a Christian life by any other penalty, save that they be excluded from the participation of the Eucharist, and of the other sacraments, until they repent; let him be anathema.”

First, it’s worth noting the Church has explicitly condemned torture in her recent catechism . While torture had often been used in the past, it was never formally defined as licit but just assumed an ok thing to do .

Now to the heart of the matter, which is

and are not to be compelled meanwhile to a Christian life by any other penalty,

The penalty is never defined, so we can interpret that rather vaguely (although I think it would be necessary to assume the context concerns temporal matters). I would say the Church, if she had more control in society, would have as a penalty the inability to create laws or effect change in public life according to the desires of those who aren’t Christian or hold things contrary to Christianity, since it would be contrary to the common good. That would be a penalty, but it still wouldn’t have anything to do with forced conversions. :twocents:

 

[Telstar]

i2.photobucket.com/albums/y39/Telstars/1199667621423.jpg

 

[Contarini]

The last two statements are the ones we have been discussing, here. They are both clearly referring to the validity (or it’s lack) of Infant Baptism. They are considered to be completely condemned as heretical, because they would call into question the validity of Infant Baptism and require those who were Baptized as children, to either be rebaptized, or to be forced to restate their Baptismal vows when they reach the age of reason. Neither of those is necessary, because the permanent effects of Baptism have already been invoked on the recipient. There is no need to ever repeat it.

There’s no “forcing” here (in the condemned proposition) only giving people a chance to repudiate their baptismal vows without being punished in any way other than being deprived of the Sacraments.

Isn’t this what the Catholic Church does, today?

You are reading “forcing people to reaffirm” into the text in order to find something Trent is condemning that the Church would still condemn. But that’s “forced” ). There’s no indication that people are being forced to reaffirm, only that they would be given the freedom to reaffirm or not.

Edwin

 

[Contarini]

True, but it does refer explicitly to someone abandoning a “Christian life”, in a council which does elsewhere demonstrate concern for the wellbeing of Protestants. While this does not stop the canon in question for being religious coercion, it is coercion against recanting Christianity, not against switching denominations.

That’s anachronistic language. There was no “switching of denominations” in the sixteenth century. That’s not how anyone thought of it.

To sixteenth century Catholics, becoming Protestant was abandoning the Faith.

Edwin

 

[Contarini]

You are treading dangerous ground. You should not say things that are not there.

I’m not. I’m saying, over and over again, what is there, and you are desperately trying to deny it.

Also, I’m reading the texts in their historical context, which you refuse to do.

At best this is merely your conjecture.

No, it isn’t.

You are already prejudiced because of the existence of civil penalties and wrongly trying to fit that into the said canon. That is unfair and dishonest scholarly.

Your only alternative here is to suggest that the “penalty” is the sin itself, which makes absolutely no sense. The Church is not saying that people should be compelled to sin.

Even as a layman, not a canon lawyer, it is obvious to me that no physical penalty is being spoken of in this canon. You really have to read that again, point it out to me where you think it suggests it (physical or civil penalty).

It condemns the view that people who walk away from their vows should “not be compelled to a Christian life by any other penalty” than exclusion from the Sacraments.

Therefore, it is saying that they should (or at least may) be compelled to a Christian by some penalty other than exclusion from the Sacraments. This can’t mean sin, as you suggest, because that isn’t a penalty by which people are compelled to lead a Christian life. It also can’t be final damnation, for the same reason. It must be some kind of disciplinary penalty imposed in this life by some kind of authority structure that is trying to get the apostates to return to the practice of the Church faith. The authorities imposing the penalty might be civil or ecclesiastical, and the penalty might range from public penance to fines to exclusion from civil offices or some other kinds of loss of civil rights to imprisonment to confiscation of property to exclusion from civil office to death. There’s a very wide field. I have said over and over that the Council of course is not mandating any particular punishment.

You are confusing two things here:

Excommunication is for heretics and that is already a very severe penalty by the Church.

As for a person who does not ratify his baptismal promise, he is to still live the Christian life, the obvious one is to attend mass, otherwise the penalty is sin. That’s all what is contained in the said canon. One should not try to put things that are not there.

Well, if it comes to that, “the penalty is sin” is certainly not found in the text. For good reason. The Fathers of Trent did not talk nonsense. But alas, you seem determined to do so.

I repeat: does the Church compel people to sin? Does sin somehow compel people to live a Christian life? Your interpretation just makes no sense.

It’s talking about some kind of penalty that is imposed on people, against their will, to make them live the Christian life.

Therefore, one has to be legalistic and right when discussing a legal document.

When discussing how it’s binding on you today, fine. I’m really not interested in that question, frankly. I’m happy that Catholics no longer impose penalties on people who leave the Church other than exclusion from the Sacraments.

I suppose you could, just barely, argue that the Church still imposes other penalties. For instance, one of my friends who became Catholic while a Ph.D. theology student in grad school and then left the Church is not allowed to teach at a Catholic institution.

But if we are talking historically about what the text meant, then obviously we need to treat it as a historical document. You want to ignore history. But as Cardinal Newman said (about Protestants), if you reject the facts of history, they will judge you.

You guys base a good deal of your apologetics on history. Making an enemy of the historical evidence is not wise. Better acknowledge it and work with it.

Just imagine if you are to be burned at stake just because you do not ratify your baptismal vows, and your accusers say, “Canon XIV of the Baptism says so”. Would you not defend yourself and ask, “Where does it say so?” Would you allowed yourself to be killed for a law that is not there?

Well, I wouldn’t have a choice, would I?

But in fact, of course that’s not what I’m saying. Canon XIV isn’t civil law, but it upholds the validity of civil laws compelling heretics to recant.

If your government had such a law (and any country that didn’t would be regarded as falling down on its duty as a Catholic nation), and you were condemned as an impenitent heretic, and you said, “What you are doing is un-Christian and ungodly–you should just exclude me from the Sacraments and let me go my way as a non-Catholic” then indeed your judges could point to Canon XIV as evidence that what they were doing was sanctioned by the Church.

Of course, Canon XIV is simply reaffirming the established norms that had been in place for centuries. It’s nothing new.

Yes. It may be so. I would not dispute that such atrocities happened. But if people are burned on stakes because of this canon then it was wrong and an erroneous interpretation of the said canon. You surely are intelligent enough to know this.

I’m afraid I’m intelligent, or rather historically well-informed, enough to know that it was nothing of the sort. That is to say, there is no reason to think that any of the Fathers of Trent would have considered burning heretics at the stake to be an erroneous interpretation of the canon. It isn’t mandated by the canon, agreed. But the canon defends the entire system of coercion of which the burning of impenitent heretics was the most serious expression.

Edwin

 

[Contarini]

Perhaps this was not worded clearly enough before.

Why can’t sin be a deterrent from sinning? The Church has promulgated commandments which if transgressed, the penalty is sin. The Commandments, as they are, prevent people from sinning.

So if the Church imposes penalty, which is sin by doing something that she does not allow, then why not?

So what you mean by this is “calling something sin is the penalty”?

No, that still doesn’t make sense. If the Church just says “what you are doing is sin” that’s not a penalty. It doesn’t compel them to a Christian life. They are already excluded from the Sacraments. So such hypothetical people already know that they are sinning in the Church’s eyes.

The penalty being spoken of must be something that actually coerces people who are determined to reject the Church and who are not brought back to the fold by being excluded from the sacraments. If you are unmoved by being deprived of the Eucharist, why would you repent because the Church shakes her finger at you and says, “You are sinning, my child!”

Logically, the penalty must be something that actually compels people. It must be coercive. It doesn’t have to be lethal, though we know that historically it was and the Council utters no breath of disapproval of this practice. (You keep calling the death penalty for heresy an “abuse,” but that’s historically inaccurate–it was endorsed by great Doctors of the Church like Aquinas, and Pope Leo condemned Luther for saying it was against the will of the Spirit—it was a normal practice and was not considered an abuse at all.) But it must compel people who are not compelled by exclusion from the Sacraments. Otherwise the words of the Canon make no sense.

Edwin