Time to leave?

[manualman]

I assume you meant “person of the same sex”, as that is the context of this thread.

Good catch. Nothing like a typing blunder utterly screwing up the basis of a statement!

 

[PutresOmega]

To the Heathcliff:

I am sorry you feel you need to leave the Church but I hope you don’t use this exit as an opportunity to throw out all the good you and your partner found within it. The tree maybe covered in a tangle of poisonous vines but there is still salvageable fruit and healthy tree underneath the tangle of thorns and fungus. The truth of things will eventually break through it and reveal itself. It always eventually does. Try to have faith.

How much of a basis … on-point statements in Scripture?

Not as much as you would think. Direct prohibition without extensive eisegesis or reading into the text what isn’t there (as with Genesis or the story of Jesus addressing the man concerning how marriage will work in heaven) or if it came from someone that evidence doesn’t strongly indicate is a false teacher (as is the case with “Saint” Paul) I feel I could accept it. You maybe working uphill due to the evidence against you but I am still willing to admit I might be wrong if given a good enough argument. I was once pro death penalty and now I am not due to listening to Catholics discuss. I am not unreasonable.

I might once again ask what… heal from the harm done to you.

I believe that my perspective on this matter comes from inspiration from the Holy Spirit. I see myself as correcting error in the hopes that when the secular world eventually does win this battle against you that they don’t discard the Good and Truth along with all of the politics, pride, and legalism. Any time I have had doubt of myself on this matter, the good arguments of the LGBT side paired with the poor or sometimes demonstrably false arguments of the more traditional side have only reaffirmed that I am in the right and you are in the wrong.

I just want to say that, although … my wife’s pregnancy. Yeah, that’s it.

I do apologize for the distress the post about the orthodox view of God may have caused but I feel the same way about that very view. I feel it makes God less than He is. I appreciate the appreciation. I maybe in rebellion on this point and I may strongly feel I am right, but in the event that I am not, I don’t want to accidentally lead other people down the wrong path with me. The only moral option is to leave.

Let’s say God created … LOVE me, not threaten me!"

Fire is clearly harmful while being romantically attracted to other men is not. At least not by any objective scientific measure. Morally, I have been given forty thousand differing view points on whether or not God is okay with it with arguments ranging from the protestant “The Bible Says So” to the Church’s “That is What We Have Always Done” neither of which is very convincing. The lack of convincing argument is actually why I began following my conscience on the matter.

The funny thing is that we … also carry sometimes heavier crosses.

I don’t consider my romantic attraction to other men a cross any more than heterosexuality is a cross though. For me, it has actually been a blessing. Why would I need special treatment for what your Church in it’s fifteen hundred years of wisdom has yet to prove is a problem?

Then you feel the church is in error in spite of an infallible statement.

This is correct, partially. I believe them to be in error. I also believe claims of infallibility for anyone but Peter and those he specifically taught while alive to be uninspired human contrivance and blasphemy against God. As such, I reject them.

I suggest that you should no … divinity at all if this is what you believe.

I respectfully decline this suggestion.

In this case, what makes the Catholic church different from any other Christian church?

The Catholic Church and Christ contain much more truth in them than any other Faith I have looked into and I have looked into a lot of them. While the Catholic Church has an issue with idolatry of tradition and worship of flesh, it also has the potential to move beyond that sort of stuff. Many of the Saints are good examples of this, I wouldn’t cast it all down any more than I would cut the apple tree in my backyard down for producing a few rotten apples here and there. Human beings are untrustworthy by our very nature. The Truth will always survive the tampering, though. I do have faith in that.

The way to hell is paved with good intentions. You’re intentions are certainly noble, but your concept of divine reality is way off. God isn’t there to torture us, even if life is often hard.

When I refer to torturing us over petty things I am referring to Eternal Damnation, not the struggles of this life. Struggles that teach us are fine. Struggles that exist solely to punish are man made contrivance. A pagan holdover I reject. I reject a lot of things and hold a lot of heretical/disturbing views. This is what happens when the entity you trusted to teach you breaks that trust with you leaving you stranded to make your way on your own. I strongly believe you are wrong. I strongly believe the Church is wrong on this and other key points. The only way to be sure is to test it by rebelling.

Until such a time that God sends one among you that can answer my concerns and convict me of my supposed wrongdoing or deigns to tell me Himself, I will continue to believe you are wrong. If I go to hell it will not be for lack of effort on my part.

 

[Rau]

… I reject a lot of things and hold a lot of heretical/disturbing views.

Yes, you do!

…if it came from someone that evidence doesn’t strongly indicate is a false teacher (as is the case with “Saint” Paul) I feel I could accept it…

I was interested to ‘hear’ you say that you would accept the immorality of same sex sexual relationships were there just a little more said of it in the Bible. Given your mistrust of the Catholic Church, I am really surprised that you are NOT surprised that the Church failed to fabricate a few more quotes to put the question beyond any debate (for those who think it is not)!

But, in all seriousness, I guess the next question is…if the evidence you refer to were available, would it change the way you live your life? Would you simply acknowledge that you now knowingly choose sin, or would you change the relationship with you beloved to give up sexual actst?

 

[Prodigal_Son]

Not as much as you would think. Direct prohibition without extensive eisegesis or reading into the text what isn’t there (as with Genesis or the story of Jesus addressing the man concerning how marriage will work in heaven) or if it came from someone that evidence doesn’t strongly indicate is a false teacher (as is the case with “Saint” Paul) I feel I could accept it. You maybe working uphill due to the evidence against you but I am still willing to admit I might be wrong if given a good enough argument. I was once pro death penalty and now I am not due to listening to Catholics discuss. I am not unreasonable.

What evidence have you used to conclude that Paul was a false teacher?

 

[PutresOmega]

But, in all seriousness, I guess the next question is…if the evidence you refer to were available, would it change the way you live your life? Would you simply acknowledge that you now knowingly choose sin, or would you change the relationship with you beloved to give up sexual actst?

I have no beloved. I am challenging this now before I wind up in Heathcliff’s situation. And to answer your questions, It would. I already do abide sexual morality as I understand and believe in it. Despite sometimes really wanting to not do that, If I thought I was doing real harm to a loved one then I would cut the harmful components out of the relationship. I could easily find sexual partners if I so chose but I avoid hanging out in places where I would be tempted to do that. I do not use hook-up apps on my phone. Grindr is one of the more famous that straight folks likely have heard of but not the only one. There is a cornucopia of apps out there beyond Grindr catering to almost any legal craving a gay guy might have. There are dating websites that let you hook up with married people too that I am sure you avoid as a Catholic person because you realize the harm it can do not merely to your spirit but to the relationship you are hooking into.

What evidence have you used to conclude that Paul was a false teacher?

For me personally, I find that Paul doesn’t really add anything of value that Christ didn’t say or explain better in His own teaching on earth.The teaching of Christ is easy to understand and hard to follow. The teaching of Paul is easy to follow and hard to understand. For example, the protestant theology of Saved by Sloth (Grace) is born of the teaching of Paul. If one can be saved by faith alone, I find the fact that Christ would wander and do good works to be at odds with this truth - clearly His only value lies in His death so why bother teaching at all? So as not to go too far off topic, the best collection of reasoning against Paul I have found comes from Davis D. Danizier “Paul vs Jesus (and James” which is available on the guy’s blog for free. There are others ranging from a smattering of Bible scholars and various books to Thomas Jefferson to some small degree but most tent to push a specific agenda (eg pushing Islam as an alternative to Christianity for example). I like this article as it doesn’t seem to push a religious angle. I also appreciate that the author allows comments/email and actually answers critiques and clarifies his work: danizier.wordpress.com/2011/04/22/paul-vs-jesus-and-james/

 

[Rau]

I have no beloved. I am challenging this now before I wind up in Heathcliff’s situation. And to answer your questions, It would. I already do abide sexual morality as I understand and believe in it. Despite sometimes really wanting to not do that, If I thought I was doing real harm to a loved one then I would cut the harmful components out of the relationship. I could easily find sexual partners if I so chose but I avoid hanging out in places where I would be tempted to do that. I do not use hook-up apps on my phone. Grindr is one of the more famous that straight folks likely have heard of but not the only one. There is a cornucopia of apps out there beyond Grindr catering to almost any legal craving a gay guy might have. There are dating websites that let you hook up with married people too that I am sure you avoid as a Catholic person because you realize the harm it can do not merely to your spirit but to the relationship you are hooking into.

Sounds as though you agree that as a single (and “unattached”) person you should remain chaste. What then are the pre-conditions for a sexual relationship to be in conformance with you moral code?

 

[aTraditionalist]

It sounds like your choice is either Our Lord or your temporal needs? Tough cross to bear.

Posted from Catholic.com App for Android

 

[PutresOmega]

Sounds as though you agree that as a single (and “unattached”) person you should remain chaste. What then are the pre-conditions for a sexual relationship to be in conformance with you moral code?

I don’t consider it all that different from the Church in the spirit of the rule: I consider sexual contact to be a good when done in the context of unifying yourself spiritually to the person you have sworn to spend you life with. Outside of discussing it in places like this, I don’t tend to think of sex much. Maybe it is because I have a medical issue or maybe it is because I didn’t have sex with young so I never made it such a primary part of my existence. I largely consider it a side effect of the meat.

I understand why there are so many rules about it (all the rape and lust based issues most have trouble with) but I attribute no more good or bad to sex than I would attribute to a table saw. I can use that saw to make beds for homeless orphans or I could use the table saw to cut up homeless orphans. Intent can be good or bad but the table saw itself is neutral.

 

[Rau]

I don’t consider it all that different from the Church in the spirit of the rule: I consider sexual contact to be a good when done in the context of unifying yourself spiritually to the person you have sworn to spend you life with. Outside of discussing it in places like this, I don’t tend to think of sex much. Maybe it is because I have a medical issue or maybe it is because I didn’t have sex with young so I never made it such a primary part of my existence. I largely consider it a side effect of the meat.

You are obviously a thinking person, but I am not sure how you reached a decision that the Church is right on certain issues (eg. the chastity obligations of the single/unattached person - I’m pretty sure you are in a minority here!) and wrong on the other (marital partners must be opposite sex).

The fact that the male sexual act is intrinsically bound up with procreation (by the emission of a gamete-bearing fluid) always strikes me as an intellectual (never-mind the Scriptures, Church teaching, etc.) road-block to viewing same-sex sexual relations as making sense. Clearly the body desires the pleasure of sexual release, the heart desires to give pleasure to one’s beloved, but in the final analysis, the act seems to me to be ‘broken’ and discordant on the objective facts.

 

[Personanongrata]

Best advice:

Follow your heart. If you truly love that person and they truly love you, stay with them, love them, be with them. Life is too short and

all you need Is love.

Ditto!!!

Stay!!

 

[manualman]

For me personally, I find that Paul doesn’t really add anything of value that Christ didn’t say or explain better in His own teaching on earth.The teaching of Christ is easy to understand and hard to follow. The teaching of Paul is easy to follow and hard to understand. For example, the protestant theology of Saved by Sloth (Grace) is born of the teaching of Paul. If one can be saved by faith alone, I find the fact that Christ would wander and do good works to be at odds with this truth - clearly His only value lies in His death so why bother teaching at all? …

So you reject St. Paul and all that he taught because of the protestants who misunderstood him and misapplied his teaching? How’d you get such a high opinion of your own reasoning skills with examples like THAT one??

Certain types of protestants (one simply cannot generalize much with that word) drastically misinterpret St. Paul simply because they aren’t hearing him like he intended to be heard. People far removed from first century Judaism simply can’t comprehend the magnitude of Paul’s task of laboring to prevent obsolete or outright false cultural vestiges of Judaism from being assumed to be part of “The Way” (later to be called Christianity). At the time Paul preached there WAS no distinction between Judaism and Jesus. Paul spent his life straining to figure out how the gospel applied to those not already Jews and did it magnificently. Even if they intellectually know better, people centuries removed and not personally steeped in the Mosaic Law simply tend not to recognize Paul’s admonitions against reliance on works of the Mosaic Law and instead think he was speaking of physically manifest actions of any kind.

Quite simply, those sorts of protestants illustrate why God established a Church with authority and charism for interpreting Scripture and Tradition. The ease with which so many sincere protestants screwed up that interpretation ought to give you pause when considering your own self so superior in discerning the REAL Holy Spirit at work. Luther and Clavin and a lot of guys since then were quite intelligent men who clearly desired with all their hearts to be faithful to Christ. If they can screw up apart from the Church, maybe you could to? Something to consider.

 

[Prodigal_Son]

For me personally, I find that Paul doesn’t really add anything of value that Christ didn’t say or explain better in His own teaching on earth.The teaching of Christ is easy to understand and hard to follow. The teaching of Paul is easy to follow and hard to understand. For example, the protestant theology of Saved by Sloth (Grace) is born of the teaching of Paul. If one can be saved by faith alone, I find the fact that Christ would wander and do good works to be at odds with this truth - clearly His only value lies in His death so why bother teaching at all? So as not to go too far off topic, the best collection of reasoning against Paul I have found comes from Davis D. Danizier “Paul vs Jesus (and James” which is available on the guy’s blog for free. There are others ranging from a smattering of Bible scholars and various books to Thomas Jefferson to some small degree but most tent to push a specific agenda (eg pushing Islam as an alternative to Christianity for example). I like this article as it doesn’t seem to push a religious angle. I also appreciate that the author allows comments/email and actually answers critiques and clarifies his work: danizier.wordpress.com/2011/04/22/paul-vs-jesus-and-james/

I didn’t get a chance to read through the whole site, but I’m familiar with the criticisms. And I think the faith v. works controversy is VERY important.

The claim that we can turn to God on our own is heresy. Simple as that. James never says we can turn to God on our own. Jesus never says we can turn to God on our own. And Paul never says we can have faith without works. Where is the controversy?

Paul’s letters are not a repudiation of Jesus, but a blossoming of Jesus’s teachings into the context of a Gentile world. Christ did good works, yes, but He did these because they flowed from His faith. He did not earn anything by His good works.

In the end, you’re not buying into Catholic theology at all. This is Pelagianism, pure and simple. ALL that is good comes from God. We have no goodness on our own. Look, you and I (I gather) resist the same sorts of sins. But if we buy into Pelagianism and say that our works save us, we will focus more on our own goodness and less on the goodness and grace of God. Grace is not sloth! Grace is that power that can even forgive the worst sinner, so that I am NOT any better than the worst sinner; no, indeed, but I have been washed by the blood of the Lamb.

If we do not believe in salvation by faith (manifested in works), then Jesus’s teachings about forgiveness make no sense. Why should I forgive my brother, if my brother is evil and I am good? That would make no sense. But the book of Romans tells me – praise God! – that I am not good, that I cannot be good by trying, that nothing I do can possibly make me worthy to be righteous. What a glorious truth! I need no longer live in terror of my sin, because Christ is victor over my sin. I don’t need to worry about being a “good person” anymore. I simply need to let Christ live in me, and let myself die.

The entire New Testament is summarized in one little phrase, by the Virgin Mary: “Let it be unto me according to Thy will.” Mary did not “work” or “attempt” anything there. She accepted. And she did so because God gave her the grace to accept.

In short, I don’t understand your objections to Saint Paul. I’m very interested in a discussion about them, though.

 

[Tigg]

I have followed these forums for quite some time. The username I’m under is a new one. Having prayed and searched for guidance I’m still not sure what to do. Looking at what most responses have been on here to the issue I’m going to bring up I feel I know the answer.

I am a gay catholic and have a non-catholic partner. We are monogamous. Both of us contribute as much as we can to charitable causes and the parish, take in stray animals, help our parish out when needed (various things e.g. Transport of other members). Yet more and more I’m being told that I cannot be a Catholic unless I give up my partner.

In good conscience I can not break the heart of someone I deeply love and respect just because the CCC tells me too. When I had a breakdown due to employment difficulties the parish did not support. He did.

He has always respected my faith; if I follow what is being told I will now throw all that respect back because our life is not in line with church teaching. There is no other church than the Catholic Church, however, I am truly torn and I think it’s time for me to go. Has anyone else been in this situation?

I have not read this thread, but what I do know is that you are going to get lots of very bad advice from well meaning people on an internet forum.

Please go and discuss your situation with a priest you trust.

 

[PutresOmega]

You are obviously a thinking person, but I am not sure how you reached a decision that the Church is right on certain issues (eg. the chastity obligations of the single/unattached person - I’m pretty sure you are in a minority here!) and wrong on the other (marital partners must be opposite sex).

A long-ish story.

I have been Catholic since I was young and strongly believe in and still pray for the intercession of Saints. I try to live the truth at the core of Catholic teaching as I understand it. In my late twenties, upon realizing I was gay, I looked into the theology of the Church on this point and read encyclicals from Bishops discussing it and found that what they were discussing and what I am had a disconnect. It was sort of like a parent you always trusted and who never lied to you suddenly insisting the sky was green; I didn’t and don’t know how to react to it still.

Initially, I left the Church in search of another faith tradition. I looked into more progressive Christian groups but felt they didn’t scrutinize what is good and evil as well as they should. Some have an alarming tendency to view good and evil as if they exist on a sliding spectrum. I was also turned off of Bon, Buhhdism, and a few other pagan spiritual traditions like Asatru over various things. Much of it was the focus on self. I don’t see the wisdom in throwing away others or the world to save yourself or buy yourself prizes in the next life yet many spiritual traditions, while close to the truth, often have a degree of human contrivance mixed in.

I returned to the teachings of Christ from the trip but had found that there were even more things I didn’t like about the Church traditions. Mistrust plus being exposed to so many other faiths over a two year span of intense study had gotten me no closer to knowing what is real but gave me an intense dislike for what I felt was false. I eventually began to consider that the Church and the various traditions whether right or wrong, have served to protect the truth from tampering through the ages. This was/is the only real way I could/can reconcile how the Church can be correct about things like sexual morality but incorrect in the application. In this way, I can test the teachings against my conscience and the evidence, parsing it all out. Try and get to the seeds (truth) beneath the meat of the apple (traditions, legal stuff, etc), so to speak.

Because I can be wrong, I test my ideas in various squares like this one and in email correspondence here and there. I use various methods in my correspondence to get to the heart of what people believe. I use kindness, aggression, sadness, sarcasm, and sometimes subterfuge to elicit a willingness (or anger) in others that will drive them to prove me wrong. Contrary to what many of them might think, I read these responses and meditate fully on them.

If I am wrong, then I do this in the hopes of being convicted. If I am not, then I hope I can parse out the truth of things. If I have to play as Satan on this stage then I will play the most positive role I can in that capacity by testing Job, as it were.

I appreciate the praise(?), but I doubt I am in the minority. I am not special, I don’t think, but I am a published author so I have a skill set fit for this sort of work. If my correspondences here and elsewhere teach me something, perhaps I can someday write and publish a book or blog about it and help others in my situation whose gifts are not writing and who are left scrambling in the dark on their own.

The fact that the male sexual act is intrinsically bound up with procreation (by the emission of a gamete-bearing fluid) always strikes me as an intellectual (never-mind the Scriptures, Church teaching, etc.) road-block to viewing same-sex sexual relations as making sense. Clearly the body desires the pleasure of sexual release, the heart desires to give pleasure to one’s beloved, but in the final analysis, the act seems to me to be ‘broken’ and discordant on the objective facts.

Only insofar as the act is bound to that specific activity. I would call procreation secondary to fostering spiritual unity in a relationship as one can do the latter without the former under certain circumstances, even in Church teaching, and be in the right (a couple sterile from the wife’s menopause, for example) but one cannot do the former without the latter and be in the right (since that would be violating someone to use them for their seed/egg). That said, I do feel you are somewhat right and have a point. This is one I am on the fence with. As such, I am ready to swear off sex with a significant other if the person I eventually meet (if it happens) wants to keep it chaste.

I will respond to the others here later as this post took much longer than I anticipated.

 

[manualman]

Because I can be wrong, I test my ideas in various squares like this one and in email correspondence here and there. I use various methods in my correspondence to get to the heart of what people believe. I use kindness, aggression, sadness, sarcasm, and sometimes subterfuge to elicit a willingness (or anger) in others that will drive them to prove me wrong. Contrary to what many of them might think, I read these responses and meditate fully on them.

Ah, that helps. You’re goading when you present ridiculous strawman representations of church teaching, hoping to provoke a reaction. Such a tactic is more likely to provoke an angry reaction than a thoughtful reasoned one. If you recognize this, then you’re just a troll. If you don’t recognize it, you’re not as clever as you believe. The best way to elicit thoughtful responses from people of good will is to project sincerity in asking for it. Which you’re doing now, thanks!

Your characterization of church teaching on the subject so far is so oversimplified as to be deceptive. Even a short summary can’t be allowed to distort, even if it doesn’t fully explain. It makes us wonder if you’ve really done the reading you claim or if you are just trolling. The procreative aspect of sexual intimacy isn’t an appendage to human sexuality that can be examined apart from the whole. Human beings are a union of body and soul. We are designed such that when man and woman unite in marriage and express that love physically, the human community flourishes and grows (literally!). When we attempt to modify the human sexual ecosystem, we always end up harming ourselves. You seem to get some of that, but refuse to accept that it limits the potential for sexual union to opposite sexes (and then only within marriage). What you may be missing is your own assumption that the babies part is incidental to the larger whole. It’s not. It’s a manifestation of the deeper complimentarity of man and woman. It’s just the physically observable part. Like an iceberg, there’s lots more substance. This is why the infertile and post menopausal couple has no moral obstacles to sexual union. The man doesn’t stop being a man if his sperm aren’t viable. The woman doesn’t stop being a woman if her ovaries or uterus are damaged or aged. The couple still remains the union of a man and woman, which has a deeper meaning than we comprehend in our artificially androgynous society.

 

[PutresOmega]

So you reject St. Paul and all … with examples like THAT one??

My primary problems with Paul have less to do with Grace than you think, though Grace is definitely one of my biggest issues since it is essentially an excuse to not actually care about other people in my view. I believe in God but I do good for others or try to because I love them (or try to, admittedly). My problems with Paul extend beyond that to the fact that he clarified nothing, added nothing, and really did nothing novel or important. Everything you claim he did here in your response to me Christ already did first. I will show you what I mean.

Certain types of protestants (one … to be called Christianity).

Christ already did this in his actual teachings and He did it better, I might add. Eventually, these vestiges would have washed away on their own. Christ didn’t need a human editor to make The Way more easy to understand. If He did, He could have picked someone better than a violent, hypocritical braggart who consistently butted heads with the real Apostles. He would also not be much of a deity.

At the time Paul preached there … Jews and did it magnificently.

This is the common defense but Jesus already established this many times by both teaching and His actions. When he healed the Samaritan woman at the well despite Jewish tradition teaching that even touching these people was unclean or the whole parable of the Good Samaritan that still exists in secular society today. The core of his teaching saw neither gender, race, creed, chosen people, or not. His teachings already broke down the barriers between Jew and Gentile.

Even if they intellectually know … manifest actions of any kind.

This is a big issue I will agree with, though perhaps not in the way you mean. I will extrapolate on it in my rebuttal to Prodigal Son after this one. Needless to say “Good Works” means something much different to the Jews than it does to us today and this bastardization is where the whole Grace thing gets carried away.

Quite simply, those sorts of protestants … could to? Something to consider.

I called Christ’s message easy to understand and hard to execute before and Paul presenting the hard to understand and easy to execute. I think that there is truth in the Church still - more than exists in the Protestants I have found. That said, there is also a tendency to bog everything down in this Pauline legalism which we are now arguing about. Christ said that heaven is made for children or ones with hearts as children. This means I will always give my conscience priority over any teaching of any faith tradition. In the end, it is the only thing human beings can’t tamper with and obfuscate.

Ah, that helps. You’re goading when you present ridiculous … done the reading you claim or if you are just trolling.

Sorry if I have caused you or anyone distress. That said, you are wrong. When I started this journey nearly five years ago now, I initially approached with simple questions and sincerity but often only got canned, easy responses. I began to find on places like disqus, email, debate sites, and other forums that the only time I was getting people getting serious with me was when they were mad at me. Human beings are basically good and will fight to protect the things that are dear to them, especially from some interloper who simplifies them down unfairly. I am not dishonest in my frustration or my simplifications, however. Often, the anger is very real and directed at what I do feel is in error or false. I’d be lying if I claimed it was all me being manipulative or just a big jerk.

I will drop this approach now, though, since it is late in a thread soon to wrap up.

The procreative aspect of sexual … comprehend in our artificially androgynous society.

I don’t agree with this. Human beings are dirt animated by the breath of God. The flesh is slime/ash/dirt (depending on how much historicity you treat Genesis with). Even if you don’t believe Genesis is historical, I have opened up human cadavars in training for my work and I know there is no magic to be found within. Nothing beautiful or perfect - it is just meat and bone, same as any lowly beast of the field or bird of the sky. To raise up flesh to the same level as the soul is serious error in my view. At some point, Cartesian dualism became married to this concept of amorality where one had to view body and soul through the lens of Aristotelian philosophical monism to see morality as something fixed. I have yet to see the Church make a compelling case for this supposed union beyond arbitrarily choosing one human philosopher over another.

Additionally, if the souls of the Saints are married inexorably to their bodies then praying for their intercessions would be pointless as their souls would surely still be in the ground with their bodies, unified. As I have been helped by this intercession more times than I can count, I know this is not the case from personal experience as well. What of deformity. If one is born with a deformed arm, does the soul also have a deformed arm in the same spirit as certain Native American tribes gouging eyes from their dead enemies so the souls would be blind? What is in charge - the body or the soul? What Scripture establishes this?

I don’t subscribe to human complimentary as a result of these problems in it. To me it really does come dangerously close to if not crossing the threshold of making the flesh and the human body into a graven idol and placing it as equal to God.

 

[PutresOmega]

I didn’t get a chance to read … aith v. works controversy is VERY important.

The criticisms are quite valid and stand but I agree with the latter.

The claim that we can turn… works. Where is the controversy?

Mainly my issue is that Paul adds nothing of value to the Bible that Christ didn’t already teach. A point that as far as I am concerned still stands. He took a simple teaching and convoluted it with legalisms. Refer to my points above about the Good Samaritan story. We still use that term today. Even non-Christians throw that term around. That is how powerful Christ’s teachings are.

Paul’s letters are not a repudiation … anything by His good works.

Christ did good works because He loved us. That is the heart of Faith. That is the heart of His Teaching. That is why the two Greatest Commandments were what they were.

In the end, you’re not buying into Catholic theology at all. This is Pelagianism, pure and simple.

I mentioned harboring heretical views before. Pelagianism isn’t one of them, however.

ALL that is good comes from God. We have no goodness on our own.

I have not claimed any different. Our love comes from our spirit and that comes from God. Evil comes from the mind and the flesh (or the “Heart” in the Old Testament but the “Heart” was the place of reason in the Jewish dialect thus this references rationalization more than emotion, I suspect).

Look, you and I (I gather) resist the … less on the goodness and grace of God.

Good works as the modern world understands them and Good Works as the Bible speaks of them are two different things. The Jewish word for Good is Tov or Tovah. In my reading of their dialect, this translates to “functional”. Attempting to blanket moral good with this term is dangerous and gives people an excuse to simply not care. That is where the doctrine of Grace has become poison for so many protestant sects. Works done out of love for another come from God. The Bible is clear about this (if pressed, I will find Scripture passages to back them up for you). Only evil proceeds from the heart (mind).

As such, if you follow in Christ’s footsteps then you follow Christ. This is not Pelagianism because Pelagianism is saving yourself through good works. My view is that morally good works as we understand them are signs of being “saved” as it were because one cannot be good unless they walk in the Spirit of God. We are not capable of it on our own.

Grace is not sloth! Grace is… washed by the blood of the Lamb.

True grace is not sloth. Grace as many today have understood it absolutely is. I walked away from many pagan faiths in my spiritual journey precisely because it was all about you. The three fold thing, karma, all about avoiding punishment or getting in better with the universe. Christ taught to love other people and do good for them because you love them. That love proceeds from God. Without the Spirit there would be no love - we’d just be another kind of ape.

If we do not believe in salvation by… good? That would make no sense.

For the same reason God forgives you. Because you love your brother. Because you have strived to understand why he is evil and transform your anger and thirst for revenge against him into profound sorrow for what led him to that path so that you can help lead him away from it.

But the book of Romans tells … let Christ live in me, and let myself die.

I have a hard time believing you care so little about your fellow man or being a good person. Seeing your posts, you seem to genuinely want to help people, especially those like you. You tend to be very charitable. Yet here you claim you don’t care about doing good or being a good person and only care about your salvation and God. No offense, but I am not buying it. You seem like too good a guy to actually think what you say here.

Please help me understand where the disconnect in my understanding is. I am not trying to be mean or sarcastic here. Why do you care about anyone but yourself in your view? I sincerely do not understand. My understanding of this theology makes my conscience bristle.

In short, I don’t understand your objections to Saint Paul. I’m very interested in a discussion about them, though.

I have reconciled Paul and even accepted him as an important part in God’s plan. While I may not grant him the title of inspired or apostle,I don’t hate him. His legalism and his arrogance were exactly what was needed to protect the actual truth, in my view. God only knows what the kings and rulers would have done with the stories and teachings of Christ had Paul not been there to plant honey pots that appeal to the opulent, the lazy, and the spiritually dead. That is not a reference to you, the Church, or anyone who defends him, mind you. What I mean is, his influences simply added an easily tampered with degree of complication to the teaching of Christ that has proven very good at baffling the wisest and the smartest. In effect, if I am right it has functioned as a sort of immune system for the Truth, keeping the grubby minds of philosophers from confounding it through the ages. As such, I attribute a high honor to Paul. The same I would offer to Alexander the Great for paving the way for Christianity into Asia.

 

[KindredSoul]

As such, if you follow in Christ’s footsteps then you follow Christ. This is not Pelagianism because Pelagianism is saving yourself through good works. My view is that morally good works as we understand them are signs of being “saved” as it were because one cannot be good unless they walk in the Spirit of God. We are not capable of it on our own.

I agree with you that many in the Protestant world (but certainly not all–I never did, when I was Protestant, and neither do my siblings, who are still Protestants) do interpret Paul as saying that works are not important; however, the Church seems to interpret Paul’s teachings as saying precisely what you are saying here: That good works are only enabled BY Grace, and therefore “no man can boast” (to quote Paul) of those works because they did not come from his own ability. Given that this same Paul speaks often about morality and avoiding sin–the avoiding of which in itself takes work and effort–it seems clear that he didn’t think behavior or morality had nothing to do with salvation. He seems, rather, to have believed that good works can only flow from Grace. He even said, for instance, “Does this mean we should sin that Grace should abound? Heaven forbid!” But at the same time, he emphasized God’s Grace where people fail. He walked a tightrope between laziness (which he emphatically discouraged) and hopelessness (which would arise out of thinking that you were hoplessly lost if you failed to conquer sin–and that includes sins of omission–in this life).

So Paul’s teachings are not really at odds with the notion that works and morality are an important part of Christian living. He just emphasizes where those works come from, and what really makes worth anything in the first place: Grace (without Grace, we would be incapable of doing works out of anything BUT selfish motives, for example). And he emphasizes hope for those who continually fail in this life, yet warning that this is NOT an excuse for laziness.

As far as Paul’s emphasis on how Grace comes through Faith, it’s important to note here that even Jesus said that the Greatest Commandment was “Love the Lord your God,” even ahead of “Love your neighbor.” So while Christ’s life, death, and resurrection, in a way, redeemed everyone throughout history–believer and unbeliever alike–so that ALL are capable of (and thus held responsible for) doing good works out of love for neighbor, it can’t be denied that only by Faith can someone do good works also out of love for God. Without faith, one might be able, by Christ’s universal redemption, to love other people and do good works out of selfless motives for people, but one cannot truly do anything out of love for God unless one first believes in Him. So one cannot keep that which Christ Himself called the first and greatest commandment without faith.

Blessings in Christ,
KindredSoul

 

[manualman]

I don’t agree with this. Human beings are dirt animated by the breath of God. The flesh is slime/ash/dirt (depending on how much historicity you treat Genesis with). Even if you don’t believe Genesis is historical, I have opened up human cadavars in training for my work and I know there is no magic to be found within. Nothing beautiful or perfect - it is just meat and bone, same as any lowly beast of the field or bird of the sky. To raise up flesh to the same level as the soul is serious error in my view. At some point, Cartesian dualism became married to this concept of amorality where one had to view body and soul through the lens of Aristotelian philosophical monism to see morality as something fixed. I have yet to see the Church make a compelling case for this supposed union beyond arbitrarily choosing one human philosopher over another.

Additionally, if the souls of the Saints are married inexorably to their bodies then praying for their intercessions would be pointless as their souls would surely still be in the ground with their bodies, unified. As I have been helped by this intercession more times than I can count, I know this is not the case from personal experience as well. What of deformity. If one is born with a deformed arm, does the soul also have a deformed arm in the same spirit as certain Native American tribes gouging eyes from their dead enemies so the souls would be blind? What is in charge - the body or the soul? What Scripture establishes this?

I don’t subscribe to human complimentary as a result of these problems in it. To me it really does come dangerously close to if not crossing the threshold of making the flesh and the human body into a graven idol and placing it as equal to God.

I’ll grant that you’ve not crossed the line into outright Manicheanism, but you’ve got one foot over the cliff. The church has always recognized the temporary nature of the separation of soul and body that occurs before the final judgment, which is why we’ve always protected the corpses of the deceased and insisted on the reality of corporeal resurrection. The charge of dualism actually applies more to you in this case than the church. You are arguing a separation between body and soul that doesn’t really exist at the deepest level. That’s the only way one can argue a total irrelevance of the flesh - you have to first internalize a belief that the spirit and flesh are actually different and separable things. In the long run, they’re not.

And physical deformity is no more than the result of the fall. Just like humans have moral and spiritual flaws that will be sanctified, the physical manifestations of the fall will be restored as well. I bear no guilt if my father was an abusive alcoholic (he wasn’t, just an example), but it sure causes spiritual wounds in the children. So with physical deformities. They are the result of sin in the world, not a direct reflection of guilt in the person having that deformity. In the resurrection, both our bodies and our souls will be healed to how they were originally intended to be.

I’m not sure how you got to the point of imagining the irrelevance of the flesh, but the church has long experience with where such philosophical error leads. If the flesh is irrelevant to who we really are, then logic inexorably demands that it is actual EVIL since it’s weakness is the source of so much of our temptations. Yours is a position in flux that will eventually lead to outright Manicheanism with all it’s weird outcomes.

 

[LaLaLa49]

It’s just your choice. If you feel that you’re very close to the Church, then, I think you should follow those teachings. But, as I don’t see any problem between gay couples, I guess I shouldn’t say too much .