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JimG
Guest
It was public opinion that supported easy divorce, condoms for kids, rampant fornication and the sexual revolution.
Walter Kasper: "A lot of the doctrine is very far from reality, there is a practical schism"
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franklinstower
Guest
None of that applies to me-- I am not in support of any of those positions.
Lets stop here. There is no need to demonize one another. I have already said and meant that I am sorry if I have offended anyone. It is not my intent. Can you let it go?
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Landon_Caeli
Guest
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franklinstower
Guest
^^^^^^^
Statements just seem vain at last.
Statements just seem vain at last.
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pnewton
Guest
Did he use that term? All we have is an informal translation, if you re-read the first post. There is nothing in the rest of the article to indicate that he was speaking of any sort of ecclesial schism.
I do not mean to say Cardinal Kasper “gets” to set the terms of the debate, as you put it. He just acknowledge the limit that is doctrine.
I admit the term “more traditional belief” is vague, though I do think there is such a thing, whether you do or not. There are those in the Church that are resistant to any change in disciplinary matters that might make it easier for some people to receive communion. Not all have expressed joy at the Pope Francis’ call to mercy and pastoral openness. Use whatever term you find more appropriate.
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Ridgerunner
Guest
I have expressed this in other threads, so maybe people are tired of seeing it, but I have a lot of difficulty understanding the whole issue.
Nobody could reasonably doubt that contraception has some severely negative aspects to it, or can. I have read the book cited earlier in the thread, and it is disturbing. The author makes a good case for the proposition that a contraceptive mentality has carried a lot of baggage with it.
But one can say, and I suspect most do, that since I am not a seducer or a rapist or an adulterer and have raised as many children as I feel I can, any kinds of restrictions should not apply to me in my use of contraceptives.
And, subjectively, a person might be right in saying it, given the assumptions people ordinarily make about it. But objectively, if the authority of the Church means anything, and if morality is not simply up to me, then in defying the Church’s judgment about it, I am committing an objective evil.
Is one’s utilizing artificial contraceptives (ignoring for the moment that they do contain abortifacients or induce abortion mechanically…a whole other moral issue) the worst thing a person can possibly commit? Is it the unforgiveable sin against the Holy Spirit?
No. But Jesus Himself told us that even the just man falls seven times a day, and he didn’t say it was okay. And if we’re honest with ourselves, we can at least count five, possibly 17 times 7, depending on how finely attuned we are with objective morality and Jesus commands to us how many times we sinned in a day.
That’s what penance is for. We are encouraged to confess things we don’t often think of as sins, exactly, but that are. How often do we confess a lack of charity in this exchange or in that act of giving or not giving? How often do we confess failing to acknowledge a just claim of another on our sympathy? How often do we fail in all of the ways a human being can fail? When did I last fail to admonish the sinner? When did I visit the imprisoned? When did I spend more for this stylish blazer than one “off the rack” when nothing in my life other than my vanity compelled the purchase of the former? Did I even try to fast during Lent? What was my last act of self-mortification? When, indeed, did I accept an unpleasantness, consciously saying to God that I offer it to Him who loved me enough to create me?
We sin all the time. What amazes me is not that people resort to contraception or even so much that they find reasons to rationalize it. What amazes me is that people will not allow of even the possibility that it really is sinful to do it. Most of us will admit our lack of charity in not giving more than we do, but we are adamant in not admitting to doing anything wrong when we use contraceptives.
Is it so difficult to be penitent in that one thing? If so, then quite possibly we might need to ask ourselves whether we are impenitent in others of the array of things for which we should be…those seven times/day.
Oh, but true penitence requires at least some level of acknowledgment, and it does call for at least a weak resolve to amend.
Perhaps I shouldn’t say this, but I will. Many years ago when I was in my callow youth I had a fairly major “girl problem”. A young man who knows his way around at all could then (and can now) how shall I say it, get a lot out of young women, especially if he has prospects in life and seems to some women to be prime marriage material. It was hard, very hard, not to take advantage of it. It’s probably even harder now, in the “hookup society” in which we live.
I told a priest in confession that I just couldn’t resist. He told me that at very least I could “retrain” myself gradually by letting it go at least one time out of ten, then perhaps seven, then perhaps five…assuming I really had as little resistance as I thought I did. And so on. “Tell yourself…‘I’ll treat this one as God’s favorite daughter this one time’ even if you can’t sustain it with the next one.” It actually did work. I think it was St. Thomas Aquinas who asserted that most of the good and bad things we do are actually matters of habits we have formed.
I think it was Mark Twain who said that nobody can successfully throw a bad habit out of the upstairs window; one has to walk it downstairs one step at a time.
And so, one who finds himself unable to say “I’m done with contraceptives” and mean it, can at least resolve to investigate NFP; to really study it, to talk it over with one’s spouse, and so on.
The risk is what? Possibly (but not probably) having a child “out of plan”? Would that truly be a life wrecker? After all, we’re all dead in the long run anyway; the ultimate earthly plan wrecker.
Most of us, I think, have read “Macbeth”. What did we take from it? At the very end, you know, Macbeth was offered mercy, but at the cost of penitence. Macduff told him (as I best remember, and it could be faulty) he had to admit to his deeds. He had to give up his gain from his deeds. He had to undergo penitential acts.
Macbeth’s response was “…then lay on Macduff, and damned be him who first cries ‘hold, enough’”. And so, Macbeth perished. Shakespeare was no fool, and that’s why we still read him. He knew what we ought to be, and what we actually are.
Nobody could reasonably doubt that contraception has some severely negative aspects to it, or can. I have read the book cited earlier in the thread, and it is disturbing. The author makes a good case for the proposition that a contraceptive mentality has carried a lot of baggage with it.
But one can say, and I suspect most do, that since I am not a seducer or a rapist or an adulterer and have raised as many children as I feel I can, any kinds of restrictions should not apply to me in my use of contraceptives.
And, subjectively, a person might be right in saying it, given the assumptions people ordinarily make about it. But objectively, if the authority of the Church means anything, and if morality is not simply up to me, then in defying the Church’s judgment about it, I am committing an objective evil.
Is one’s utilizing artificial contraceptives (ignoring for the moment that they do contain abortifacients or induce abortion mechanically…a whole other moral issue) the worst thing a person can possibly commit? Is it the unforgiveable sin against the Holy Spirit?
No. But Jesus Himself told us that even the just man falls seven times a day, and he didn’t say it was okay. And if we’re honest with ourselves, we can at least count five, possibly 17 times 7, depending on how finely attuned we are with objective morality and Jesus commands to us how many times we sinned in a day.
That’s what penance is for. We are encouraged to confess things we don’t often think of as sins, exactly, but that are. How often do we confess a lack of charity in this exchange or in that act of giving or not giving? How often do we confess failing to acknowledge a just claim of another on our sympathy? How often do we fail in all of the ways a human being can fail? When did I last fail to admonish the sinner? When did I visit the imprisoned? When did I spend more for this stylish blazer than one “off the rack” when nothing in my life other than my vanity compelled the purchase of the former? Did I even try to fast during Lent? What was my last act of self-mortification? When, indeed, did I accept an unpleasantness, consciously saying to God that I offer it to Him who loved me enough to create me?
We sin all the time. What amazes me is not that people resort to contraception or even so much that they find reasons to rationalize it. What amazes me is that people will not allow of even the possibility that it really is sinful to do it. Most of us will admit our lack of charity in not giving more than we do, but we are adamant in not admitting to doing anything wrong when we use contraceptives.
Is it so difficult to be penitent in that one thing? If so, then quite possibly we might need to ask ourselves whether we are impenitent in others of the array of things for which we should be…those seven times/day.
Oh, but true penitence requires at least some level of acknowledgment, and it does call for at least a weak resolve to amend.
Perhaps I shouldn’t say this, but I will. Many years ago when I was in my callow youth I had a fairly major “girl problem”. A young man who knows his way around at all could then (and can now) how shall I say it, get a lot out of young women, especially if he has prospects in life and seems to some women to be prime marriage material. It was hard, very hard, not to take advantage of it. It’s probably even harder now, in the “hookup society” in which we live.
I told a priest in confession that I just couldn’t resist. He told me that at very least I could “retrain” myself gradually by letting it go at least one time out of ten, then perhaps seven, then perhaps five…assuming I really had as little resistance as I thought I did. And so on. “Tell yourself…‘I’ll treat this one as God’s favorite daughter this one time’ even if you can’t sustain it with the next one.” It actually did work. I think it was St. Thomas Aquinas who asserted that most of the good and bad things we do are actually matters of habits we have formed.
I think it was Mark Twain who said that nobody can successfully throw a bad habit out of the upstairs window; one has to walk it downstairs one step at a time.
And so, one who finds himself unable to say “I’m done with contraceptives” and mean it, can at least resolve to investigate NFP; to really study it, to talk it over with one’s spouse, and so on.
The risk is what? Possibly (but not probably) having a child “out of plan”? Would that truly be a life wrecker? After all, we’re all dead in the long run anyway; the ultimate earthly plan wrecker.
Most of us, I think, have read “Macbeth”. What did we take from it? At the very end, you know, Macbeth was offered mercy, but at the cost of penitence. Macduff told him (as I best remember, and it could be faulty) he had to admit to his deeds. He had to give up his gain from his deeds. He had to undergo penitential acts.
Macbeth’s response was “…then lay on Macduff, and damned be him who first cries ‘hold, enough’”. And so, Macbeth perished. Shakespeare was no fool, and that’s why we still read him. He knew what we ought to be, and what we actually are.
J
JimG
Guest
In the interview Cardinal Kasper says: “There is a kind of practical schism. Very committed Christian couples to the Church, for example, do not live the teachings of the encyclical Humanae Vitae about contraception. It is a problem to think about.”
Certainly it’s a problem to think about. It is not a problem that could or should lead to a change in doctrine. Just as the fact that great numbers of people practice fornication or cohabitation dismissively of doctrine does not mean that there must be a change in doctrine. There must be a change in the human heart. It is called conversion of life–metanoia.
Certainly it’s a problem to think about. It is not a problem that could or should lead to a change in doctrine. Just as the fact that great numbers of people practice fornication or cohabitation dismissively of doctrine does not mean that there must be a change in doctrine. There must be a change in the human heart. It is called conversion of life–metanoia.
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