The power to bind and loose

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PatK63

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If a priest tells a divorced person living with someone he is not married to that he can receive communion, doesn’t he have the power to do that?
I am not asking if you approve. I am talking about authority. Not whether it is wise or correct. If the priest doesn’t have the authority and he does it anyway, and the penitent follows the Advice does he sin?
 
Of course not. A priest can give sinful advice. I’m sure some do often. Those who do, partake in the culpability of the sin. A priest is not someone who can “change the rules or write God’s law”
 
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Pope Francis has encouraged bishops and priests to be more active in such decisions, thus somewhat decentralizing authority. Same stance dealing with the LGBT community for those who are considering readmission into the Church.
 
@Mrchatsworth
Just to be clear; so it is not sin for the penitent because he is acting in good faith?
 
It isn’t that simple. For instance let’s say a priest tells someone that artificial birth control is ok to use for contraception, the person is still responsible for forming their conscience. So if the person knows that it is against the Church, or God, or sinful then thinks the priests “ok” will give them permission then they are culpable. But, so is the priest. A priest cannot loose what the Church binds.
 
@Mrchatsworth
If not a priest, how about a bishop or the bishop of Rome. If no one has the authority what did Jesus give to the apostles when he gave the power to loose and bind?
 
I am not @Mrchatsworth, but I would say that priests and bishops were given the power to bind and loose in accordance with the moral law Jesus gave us and the Church keeps, not to make decisions that discard it.

In a case, for example, of adultery, it would hardly make sense were a priest to condone what Christ clearly condemned, but forgave, along with the exhortation : “Go and sin no more”.

The power to bind and loose isn’t a licence to arbitrarily decree what is right and what is wrong.
 
A priest gets his authority (power) from his Bishop, so yes he does have the power to do that.
Only by talking to the Bishop can you know if the priest is in line with the Bishop’s teaching (without mentioning the priest’s name).
Whether the person sins or not would depend on their conscience. (CCC 1777)
 
Mrchatsworth said:
It isn’t that simple. For instance let’s say a priest tells someone that artificial birth control is ok to use for contraception, the person is still responsible for forming their conscience. So if the person knows that it is against the Church, or God, or sinful then thinks the priests “ok” will give them permission then they are culpable. But, so is the priest. A priest cannot loose what the Church binds.
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In Canada for decades Catholics were taught that it wasn’t sinful to use contraception as long as you had a good reason to. I was taught that back in 1971. It wasn’t until long afterwards that I became aware of the controversy of “The Winnipeg Statement”.
 
@PatK63 could you define “living with someone” - the wording is not clear enough. Having said that …

I did find these two articles if your concern is related to sexual relations of unmarried couples:



You may need to do further reading perhaps the Vatican Website under Amoris Laetita. Best of Luck
 
@TheHolyTrinity
Living as a married couple. Not really interested in the morality but rather what authority does a confessor have to deal with these issues and can the penetrant faithfully follow the advice received in confession?
 
@PatK63 as I said in my recent post read Amoris Laetita, if in doubt sent a letter to your local bishop. Other than what I have placed in my post (thank you for the clarification) I will not get into any other discussion on your issues. Best of luck - THT
 
PatK63 said:
rather what authority does a confessor have to deal with these issues and can the penetrant faithfully follow the advice received in confession?
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The priest (or bishop, cardinal etc) does not have the authority to tell someone that it’s okay to commit a sin or that it’s okay to receive the Eucharist while in a state of mortal sin.

The “binding and loosing power” refers to the Church’s power, through its priests, to choose to absolve or not absolve people from their sins, and also the Church’s power to grant indulgences.

A person goes to confession, confesses their sins to the priest, the priest decides based on the conversation whether the person is truly repentant and can receive absolution for the sin. He will usually decide the person is repentant and give absolution (“loosing” them from their sins). If the person says they aren’t sorry for their sin, or they plan to keep on committing the sin going forward, then the priest can decide the person isn’t repentant and refuse to give absolution (their sins are “held bound”).

The priest doesn’t have any power to tell the person that it’s okay if they keep right on sinning. That doesn’t fall under binding and loosing power. It may be a case of the priest deciding, rightly or wrongly, that the person isn’t actually committing a sin and thus telling him it’s okay to keep doing the action because it’s not sinful. But in that case he’s not binding or loosing the person from the sin, he’s deciding that no sin was committed.
 
Tis_Bearself said:
A person goes to confession, confesses their sins to the priest, the priest decides based on the conversation whether the person is truly repentant and can receive absolution for the sin. He will usually decide the person is repentant and give absolution (“loosing” them from their sins). If the person says they aren’t sorry for their sin, or they plan to keep on committing the sin going forward, then the priest can decide the person isn’t repentant and refuse to give absolution (their sins are “held bound”).
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However if the priest was mistaken e.g. the person isn’t contrite and he thought they were, or they were contrite and he thought they weren’t I’d assume the opposite i.e. a contrite persons sins would be forgiven, even if not absolved, and a person who was not contrite would not have their sins forgiven, even if the priest absolved them.
 
If the person basically lies to the priest and claims to be sorry when in fact he isn’t sorry and is planning to go right back to committing the sin when he leaves the confessional, then the absolution is not effective, but the fault is entirely with the penitent, not with the priest, who did the best he could with the information he was given.

And the penitent then has the additional sin of having lied to the priest and made a bad confession.
 
@Elf01. @Tis_Bearself
My question was not about absolution but advice the priest gives. Does the church have the power to make exceptions? Certainly yes when it comes to something like attending mass on Sunday. My. Uncle was a priest and he said it was okay for a women to take birth control pills after giving birth to get the cycle regulated. There are times when stealing and lying are permitted.
 
No, it is not okay for the priest to “make exceptions”. “Making exceptions” does not fall under the binding and loosing power or any other power a priest might have.

Regarding the priest telling someone it is all right to miss Mass on Sunday if they absolutely can’t get there (for example due to their work schedule), the person would have to ask the priest in advance of missing the Mass and the priest would give them a dispensation from their Sunday obligation. A dispensation is a relaxation of a purely ecclesiastical law. It’s not an exception allowing someone to commit sin, because no sin is committed if the person gets the dispensation properly. The priest is allowed to grant certain dispensations and the bishop is allowed to grant others. (There are also situations where the Church teaches that you don’t have to speak to the priest in advance in order to miss Mass, such as when you are too sick to attend Mass. In that case you are automatically excused.)

A priest giving advice on things like birth control or living with someone after divorce does NOT fall in the same category as dispensations, because those things don’t involve purely ecclesiastical laws. The priest is not allowed to give somebody a “dispensation” to use birth control.

When a priest gives advice on birth control or divorce that seems to run contrary to the teachings of the Church, it’s usually because that priest has decided himself that he doesn’t think using birth control, living (as in having sexual relations) with a new partner after a divorce, or whatever is a sin, and therefore he gives other people advice based on his own opinion, not on Church teaching. I personally have not experienced this situation, but I know others who have. This is why it’s important to be educated about what the Church teaches, so you can know when your priest is telling you something that seems really wrong. If you suspect you got wrong advice from a priest, then you should ask him for a full explanation, and maybe consider talking to a different priest about the same issue.
 
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PatK63 said:
If no one has the authority what did Jesus give to the apostles when he gave the power to loose and bind?
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CCC 553 The power to “bind and loose” connotes the authority to absolve sins, to pronounce doctrinal judgements, and to make disciplinary decisions in the Church.
 
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