What's the ONE Catholic Doctrine that you disagree with most?

[Contarini]

I share a number of these difficulties, but would say that in general, the biggest issue is how the Magesterium is defined. By the doctrine of the Communion of Saints, we are in historical and spiritual continuity with our ancestors in faith and with the Church Suffering and Church Triumphant. That means that “novelty” is impossible.

However, we need to use the tools of modern historiography to understand what earlier generations of Christians actually believed. To Traditional Catholics, that may make me a modernist, but I would say that even in the documents they cite, the historical context matters a great deal in interpreting the content.

I am very resistant to the notion put forward by Traditionalists that we must simply accept the Tridentine version of everything as more “valid,” and rely on all the writings of pre-Vatican II popes to show how far from our true tradition we have fallen.

I agree with that, although of course “Traditionalists” are not the Magisterium!

So I look on the modern priesthood as one that developed over time, and not without dispute. Prophets, mentioned in Acts, 1 Corinthians, Titus, and the Didache, were common in Jewish Christianity and Corinth. However, they were replaced with bishops and deacons (in the Didache), or opposed by presbyter-bishops (in Titus).

Yes, there are all kinds of theories about this–based on very fragmentary evidence. N. T. Wright has pointed out that a lot of Biblical scholarship rests on detailed theories about the late-first-century Church, which is actually the period we know the least about directly, since the writings from that era are focused on what happened in the early first century.

But certainly the priesthood as we know it developed over time, and that’s why I have difficulty with simple affirmations like “Jesus established the ministerial priesthood.” I believe that Jesus laid hands on certain people (and yes, as far as we know they were all men–certainly the Twelve were) whose authority eventually passed to the bishops and presbyters. And I believe that Jesus intended to give certain of his followers authority within the new Israel he was establishing. But “Jesus established the ministerial priesthood” is shorthand for a complex process of development.

Edwin

 

[Michael68]

I’m not sure about “doctrine”, but I think the Roman tradition of giving only the bread species is inferior to the Byzantine tradition of both.

I understand the reason for single-species. I do believe Christ is really and fully present in either, and that taking both does not bestow any additional grace - but after I’ve just heard the prayer of consecration, He says “take this, all of you, and eat of it” followed by “take this, all of you, and drink of it.” Not “take one of these, all of you.” It simply feels more like I’m doing what He commanded versus what small-tee tradition dictates.

Interestingly enough, my parish just announced that both will be served starting in 2017 to the laity.

I understand how you feel and I feel the same. Fortunately our church offers both!!!Congratulations on your parish doing the same!

“By your Body and Blood, by your Life and your Love, renew us!”

 

[Contarini]

So Jesus didn’t have the right to establish the ministerial priesthood based on your criteria? Jesus never consulted us or anyone else as to whom he would have as his ministers. The Church can only do and teach what Christ himself taught her.

Obviously Jesus had the “right” to do whatever He wanted. The question is: what did Jesus do, and why, and how do we know?

See my previous post for the difficulties I have with the affirmation “Jesus established the ministerial priesthood.” I believe that this is true if the claim leaves room for a process of development. I also question whether we can read “Jesus intended a ministerial priesthood restricted to males” from the fact that “the Twelve” all have masculine names. (I’m not questioning that they were all men, just pointing out that we only know that from their names–it isn’t something that the NT ever emphasizes that I can think of.)

“Clericalism” as I define it means, at the most basic theological level, defining the ministerial priesthood as something entirely distinct from the baptismal priesthood, rather than a special expression of the priesthood shared by all the baptized. As I understand the NT and early Christian tradition, all the baptized are priests to the world, but some people are set apart to be priests to their fellow-believers. To draw sharp divisions between clergy and laity is, inevitably, to undercut the basic truth that all the baptized are priests. And it seems (I say this tentatively and with humility, given the authoritative statement of JPII to the contrary) hard to see how one can say that some baptized people are invalid subjects for receiving the sacrament conferring a ministerial priestly role within God’s priestly people.

So who should have the authority to speak infallibly on matters of faith and morals? Someone has to have the final say.

First of all, I did not question that the Pope can, under certain circumstances, speak infallibly on matters of faith and morals.

But I challenge the idea that there’s some a priori necessity for someone to have this authority. That’s an assumption, and one that derives from worldly ideas about power and authority–ideas, furthermore, that have been shown to be false by the relative success of modern democracy.

Jesus didn’t set up a democracy–he wasn’t a Greek.

Actually, in Jesus’ day it would be more accurate to say “Jesus didn’t establish an absolute monarchy–he wasn’t a Greek.” Political authors of the Hellenistic period generally accepted that democracy was a discredited, outdated form of government and that monarchy was the only approach that really worked!

And it’s a straw man. I didn’t say that Jesus established a democracy.

He established a Kingdom with the pope as his steward–to whom he gave the keys to that Kingdom.

Jesus established a kingdom, which he explicitly said was to operate by rules entirely contrary to those of the world’s kingdoms.

There is only one Church established by Christ

And everyone baptized in the name of the Trinity has been incorporated into that Church, although they may live in only a partial union with the Church through schism or heresy or some other reason.

and only one authority to decide what is and what isn’t valid expressions of that Church’s doctrines and practices. There aren’t “other churches,” there are only bodies that broke away from that Church to create their own churches.

First of all, the Church recognizes that there are “particular churches” not in full communion with the Catholic Church. So your claim is simply inaccurate.

But of course I was speaking, in context, of “ecclesial communities” that lack apostolic succession. I used the word “church” in a colloquial sense there to mean “ecclesial communities.” But to be sure, my usage expressed a certain discomfort with the restrictive use of “church” to mean “a community of :Christians with a bishop in apostolic succession.” There might be other ways to express the importance of apostolic succession for a rightly ordered church with fully “valid” sacraments.

Is it any wonder the Church should rule that those that have left Christ’s one Church have no right to set themselves up in opposition to her and claim rights Christ didn’t give them?

I don’t think that being the Church is a question of “rights” in the first place. And most Protestants I know would find this a very strange usage. They don’t think that they have the “right” to be the Church. Surely one of the basic teachings of St. Paul is that none of us Gentiles have the “right” to be God’s people–we are all wild olive branches grafted in. It’s a gracious gift.

I would put it rather in terms of covenant. To be out of communion with Rome is to cut oneself off from the covenant Jesus made with Peter. To lack apostolic succession is to cut oneself off from the covenantal promises to the successors of the apostle. These are serious things. But at the same time, we can be confident that God is a gracious Lord to all who call upon Him.

 

[Contarini]

“Seems to reflect” according to whom?

Obviously according to me–the question I was answering had to do with my opinions. But I’m certainly not alone in this opinion.

Again, I’m talking specifically about the “in partu virginity,” which is little stressed and which many Catholics don’t even know is a teaching. The idea that Jesus came out of Mary’s womb without any physical change to her body seems to imply that Jesus, long before the Resurrection, didn’t have a normal physical body.

Apparently not according to the Church with the authority to decide matters of doctrine and morals.

Again, I present all these things as difficulties, not obstinate disagreements.

And where did you get the idea that Mary’s perpetual virginity in any way teaches that “sex is polluting?”

From the many early Christian and medieval writings which speak of sex as polluting, for starters?

The language is all over the place.

And that’s the sort of response that really makes Catholic faith hard for historically educated people. I can no more disregard what I know about cultural attitudes in the past than a scientist can disregard scientific evidence.

Nonsense. The Church has never taught any such thing. Mary remained a virgin because she was sacred to God, set aside for him alone. It has nothing to do with regular and normal sexual relations between husband and wife.

I didn’t say that the Church formally taught that sex was polluting. But this was clearly taken for granted by most writers in the early Church and clearly lay behind arguments for the perpetual virginity. Jerome’s Against Helvidius is perhaps the clearest example: “I must call upon the Lord Jesus to guard the sacred lodging of the womb in which He abode for ten months from all suspicion of sexual intercourse” (2). Or see the way he talks about the idea of Joseph and Mary having sex in sect. 10, calling Helvidius’ idea “voluptuous.” Or again in sect. 18 he calls Helvidius’ position “blasphemy.” In sect. 23 he interprets Rev. 14:4 as saying that all sexual behavior, even within marriage, is “defiling,” though he refuses to explain himself “for fear Helvidius may be abusive.” (It’s quite possible that the author of Revelation shared this idea, by the way. I am not drawing the standard Protestant dichotomy between an ascetic early Church and a sex-positive NT.)

To be sure, Jerome is perhaps the most anti-sex of orthodox writers in the early Church.

And Protestants don’t “over-define things” when they bring up any and all objections to everything the Church teaches?

Many Protestants do over-define things. But that’s neither here nor there. The Protestants I’ve associated with as an adult (Anglicans and Methodists) do not. My choice for years now has been between “mere Christianity” and Catholicism, not between, say, confessional Calvinism or Lutheranism and Catholicism. And one of my difficulties in making the choice for Catholicism has long been that I just don’t see why all the doctrines defined by the Catholic Church need to divide Christians. That anti-Catholic Protestants (who think that the doctrines are church-dividing and the Catholic Church wrong) are in error I take for granted.

I think your difficulties lie in thinking that every Protestant body is equal to Christ’s one established Church.

I don’t think that. But I do think that, as the Church teaches, all baptized Christians are in some sense members of the Church, and thus all Christian communities are, however imperfectly, expressions of the Church. I also see plenty of imperfections in the ways in which concrete Catholic communities embody the Church–these imperfections just don’t take the form of a lack of communion with Rome, a lack of apostolic succession, a failure to celebrate a full sacramental life, or a denial of some defined teaching of the Faith.

They aren’t. They are all right as far as they go and in the things they teach that are true and in encouraging people to have faith in Christ. But that doesn’t make them what only the Church is–the fullest expression of the faith. Nor does it confer on them the authority that Christ gave to his Church alone.

Nor do I think it does.

Edwin

 

[Della]

Obviously according to me–the question I was answering had to do with my opinions. But I’m certainly not alone in this opinion.

Again, I’m talking specifically about the “in partu virginity,” which is little stressed and which many Catholics don’t even know is a teaching. The idea that Jesus came out of Mary’s womb without any physical change to her body seems to imply that Jesus, long before the Resurrection, didn’t have a normal physical body.

From the many early Christian and medieval writings which speak of sex as polluting, for starters?

The language is all over the place.

And that’s the sort of response that really makes Catholic faith hard for historically educated people. I can no more disregard what I know about cultural attitudes in the past than a scientist can disregard scientific evidence.

I didn’t say that the Church formally taught that sex was polluting. But this was clearly taken for granted by most writers in the early Church and clearly lay behind arguments for the perpetual virginity. Jerome’s Against Helvidius is perhaps the clearest example: “I must call upon the Lord Jesus to guard the sacred lodging of the womb in which He abode for ten months from all suspicion of sexual intercourse” (2). Or see the way he talks about the idea of Joseph and Mary having sex in sect. 10, calling Helvidius’ idea “voluptuous.” Or again in sect. 18 he calls Helvidius’ position “blasphemy.” In sect. 23 he interprets Rev. 14:4 as saying that all sexual behavior, even within marriage, is “defiling,” though he refuses to explain himself “for fear Helvidius may be abusive.” (It’s quite possible that the author of Revelation shared this idea, by the way. I am not drawing the standard Protestant dichotomy between an ascetic early Church and a sex-positive NT.)

To be sure, Jerome is perhaps the most anti-sex of orthodox writers in the early Church.

Oh yes, I understand now. Thanks for clarifying. My concern here is that you are giving too much credence to comments made by theologians who were more culturally influenced than thinking with the mind of Christ. We see it today, as well, with the over emphasis on women’s roles and rights, etc., as if that were all that matters for some. Let it go. It hardly matters to us now. God has not changed, Christ’s teachings have not changed. As a woman I could care less, and I would be foolish to hang onto such things when the Church has long since rectified such attitudes.

Many Protestants do over-define things. But that’s neither here nor there. The Protestants I’ve associated with as an adult (Anglicans and Methodists) do not. My choice for years now has been between “mere Christianity” and Catholicism, not between, say, confessional Calvinism or Lutheranism and Catholicism. And one of my difficulties in making the choice for Catholicism has long been that I just don’t see why all the doctrines defined by the Catholic Church need to divide Christians. That anti-Catholic Protestants (who think that the doctrines are church-dividing and the Catholic Church wrong) are in error I take for granted.

Considering all the heresies, great and small, which the Church has had to fend off over the centuries, and it’s been 20 long centuries of men trying to redefine Christ’s teachings, is it any wonder that the Church defines what she does? Actually, the Church has defined very few things as “must believe” dogmas. It’s sad that Protestants find some dogmas objectionable, but there are as many objections as there are Protestants when each is allowed to decide such things for themselves. No mainline Protestant denomination expects their adherents to stick to what they teach, so it’s a mystery to me just what changes in Church teaching each would find acceptable. An impossible thing for the Church to sort out or do, don’t you think? Our Evangelical brethren do expect their people to stick to all they teach, in that they are, ironically, more like the Catholic Church than Episcopalians, etc.

I don’t think that. But I do think that, as the Church teaches, all baptized Christians are in some sense members of the Church, and thus all Christian communities are, however imperfectly, expressions of the Church. I also see plenty of imperfections in the ways in which concrete Catholic communities embody the Church–these imperfections just don’t take the form of a lack of communion with Rome, a lack of apostolic succession, a failure to celebrate a full sacramental life, or a denial of some defined teaching of the Faith.

This speaks to the dual nature of the Church, which mirrors Christ nature, which is both divine and human. Unlike Our Lord, though, our human nature is not yet perfected–we haven’t yet attained to the full stature of Christ, as St. Paul put it. No Christian body is going to have perfect people in it nor are all parishes going to be faithful expressions of the faith. As the saying goes, the Church is a hospital for sinners not a museum for saints. All the baptized are on the same journey, but the Church has all the tools needed for a successful journey. That there are so many truly holy, good, and faithful people in our times of doubt and “meism” is, to me, a testament to the promises Christ made to his Church in which subsists the fullness of the faith.

I would have liked to go into more detail, but the character limitation for posts won’t allow it. You are still very much thinking like a protest-ant, my friend. I understand since I was brought up Episcopalian and have great affection for the Church of my childhood, but I had to come to the place in which I let go of my ideas and trusted in Christ’s Church simply because she is Christ’s Church. It’s a matter of faith, not logic or reason alone, yes?

 

[Sarcelle]

If you go by this, then your whole religion would only have 2 beliefs/doctrine/dogma, the immaculate conception and the assumption of the Holy Virgin. This is not the way the Catholic Church decides what is Truth. The Catholic Church like the Orthodox Church believe in the consensus of the Fathers of the Church to be what the Church believes. And like it or not, there is some truth in what St. Augustine stated, he errs by calling it sin, if in fact he did call it sin, but it definitely is the consensus of the Fathers that even marital sexual relations are earthly, a consequence of Adam’s sin, and it is angelic to forgo sexual relations.

The view of marital relations as a consequence of Adam’s sin smacks of Gnosticism.

Last time I checked Gnosticism is a heresy.

The Church now teaches that marital relations have unifying and procreative aspects.

 

[pacloc]

The view of marital relations as a consequence of Adam’s sin smacks of Gnosticism.

Last time I checked Gnosticism is a heresy.

The Church now teaches that marital relations have unifying and procreative aspects.

How so? What is your definition of Gnosticism that would make the consequence of Adam’s sin affect the body a gnostic belief? I don’t claim to know much about Gnosticism, but I think you are referring to the idea that the physical world is evil and we must ascend in spirit shedding our physical body. This is very different than the idea that the body has received a curse due to sin. Just as having to relieve ourselves, deal with illnesses, and fight against gluttony and other things, sexual relations were viewed as a curse by most of the Church Fathers, I don’t know of any of the more influential fathers that taught otherwise. This does not mean it is sinful by any means, just as relieving ourselves is not sinful. This also does not mean that every aspect of marriage is a curse. It just means that children would have been brought into being by another method had we not fallen. The Christian thing to keep in mind is that in the resurrection, the body will be made divine because of Christ’s Incarnation bringing Divinity to man, including the body. And we know that Christ plainly said that we will be like the angels, not married. It is also very clear from St. Paul’s words that only those Christians that would suffer from desire should marry. (not meaning that the majority should not marry, but simply that marriage is a consent for those that would be better off married.)

So if you could, please provide some evidence that this view is in fact Gnostic. Throwing around the word heresy so easily should have a better explanation.

 

[DaveBj]

The view of marital relations as a consequence of Adam’s sin smacks of Gnosticism.

Last time I checked Gnosticism is a heresy.

The Church now teaches that marital relations have unifying and procreative aspects.

Not hardly. This is what St. Augustin taught, and I don’t think I would call him a Gnostic.

 

[Contarini]

Not hardly. This is what St. Augustin taught, and I don’t think I would call him a Gnostic.

No. Augustine believed that there would still have been sex if Adam had not sinned. Many of the other Fathers, especially the Greek Fathers, believed that there wouldn’t have been.

But guess what: Augustine gets blamed as the anti-sex guy. . . . (there are some reasons for that, to be sure, but it’s still ironic)

 

[DaveBj]

No. Augustine believed that there would still have been sex if Adam had not sinned. Many of the other Fathers, especially the Greek Fathers, believed that there wouldn’t have been.

But guess what: Augustine gets blamed as the anti-sex guy. . . . (there are some reasons for that, to be sure, but it’s still ironic)

That does not completely jibe with what I was reading last night. He believed that there would have been sex, but it would not have been what we call sex.

 

[Contarini]

That does not completely jibe with what I was reading last night. He believed that there would have been sex, but it would not have been what we call sex.

Which text were you reading? In what I’ve read, he says that there would have been physical intercourse but that it would have been without “passion.” (Passion was, for him and most other ancient writers, a negative term.)

So you’re right–it wouldn’t be what we call sex, because it wouldn’t be the same ecstatic, maddening, addictive experience. But the physical acts, as I read him, would be the same. His problem with sex wasn’t its physicality, but its psychology.

Edwin

 

[Peter_J]

I agree with that, although of course “Traditionalists” are not the Magisterium!

That’s very true. But they – and I mean not just the ones here but even the more hardcore SSPX-type traditionalists – do in fact agree with the views that were held by some past popes.

I think the deeper issue, at least sometimes, is when Protestants study history and come up with questions but then are silenced by a we-never-change type response that doesn’t do justice to their questions.

 

[eddie_too]

there are many catholic doctrines that i do not completely understand.

it would be foolish for me or anyone to disagree with a doctrine of the Church that i or they do not completely understand.

 

[DaveBj]

Which text were you reading? In what I’ve read, he says that there would have been physical intercourse but that it would have been without “passion.” (Passion was, for him and most other ancient writers, a negative term.)

So you’re right–it wouldn’t be what we call sex, because it wouldn’t be the same ecstatic, maddening, addictive experience. But the physical acts, as I read him, would be the same. His problem with sex wasn’t its physicality, but its psychology.

Edwin

Coincidentally, it was the one I finished just last night – the Treatise on Marriage and Concupiscence, from Volume V of Series 1 of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers.

Further to what you said in your first paragraph, Augustin said that pre-Fall “sex” would have taken place only for the conception of children. The emission of seed would have a voluntary act, without the bumping and grinding that we’re familiar with. The simile that he used was the voluntary release of urine, an unfortunate choice, but one can understand what he meant.

 

[simspt]

Starting this thread as it was a discussion on another thread… and we didn’t want to get it derailed.

Not sure if it is a doctrine but the Church’s position on capital punishment is very difficult for me.

 

[Michael68]

Not sure if it is a doctrine but the Church’s position on capital punishment is very difficult for me.

I understand. I look to this quote, “Vengeance is mine says the Lord”
I believe capital punishment is vengeance.

 

[Blue_Horizon]

Coincidentally, it was the one I finished just last night – the Treatise on Marriage and Concupiscence, from Volume V of Series 1 of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers.

Further to what you said in your first paragraph, Augustin said that pre-Fall “sex” would have taken place only for the conception of children. The emission of seed would have a voluntary act, without the bumping and grinding that we’re familiar with. The simile that he used was the voluntary release of urine, an unfortunate choice, but one can understand what he meant.

I have found the very weird descriptions of “sex” before the fall (how would they know) somewhat anti-body. In these descriptions there seems to be an abhorrent non acceptance that penetration and the obvious function and purpose of the human genitalia could really be true. If this isn’t somewhat Gnostic I don’t know what is.

Its the same sort of mentality that will not allow that Jesus exited his mother through the birth canal because that is somehow defiling. It is a common ancient Eastern type of thinking. Buddha, 600 years previous, too was allegedly not born through the birth canal. Buddhism of course is highly Gnostic influenced.

 

[fred_conty]

A previously posted question …
And where did you get the idea that Mary’s perpetual virginity in any way teaches that "sex is polluting?

Answer posted by Contarini …
From the many early Christian and medieval writings which speak of sex as polluting, for starters?

The language is all over the place.

And that’s the sort of response that really makes Catholic faith hard for historically educated people. I can no more disregard what I know about cultural attitudes in the past than a scientist can disregard scientific evidence.

Some bible quotes that point out that there is a struggle between body and soul, and that the body pulls down the soul.

Galatians 5:16-17
Live in accord with the spirit and you will not yield to the cravings of the flesh. The flesh lusts against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh; the two are directly opposed. That is why you do not do what your will intends.

1 Cor 9:25-27
But I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified.

The appetites of the body are very strong, and so some of the Christians developed an unhealthy view toward the goodness of the body, and most especially toward the sexual appetite. And in fact out of this view came a heresy that all material things were bad, and again this applied most especially to sex.

This heresy developed to the point that it became widespread to avoid receiving Christ in Holy Communion because our body was generally thought to be impure. Then the church said that it was a mandate from Christ that we receive him and then the church eventially made a law that a Catholic must receive Holy Communion at least once a year, based on Christ saying “do this”.

But what some believe cannot be categorically taken that that is what the church teaches. And so we need to look at what the church actually teaches and taught.

 

[Contarini]

I would add that the anti-sex attitude definitely had something to do with the exploitative, “patriarchal” nature of sex in the ancient world. One of the paradoxes pointed out by feminist scholars (a paradox from a modern feminist perspective at least) like my old professor Liz Clark is that the early Christians who were most “pro-woman” tended to be most “anti-sex.” Jerome sounds like a raving misogynist one minute and a feminist the next, and he had close, respectful friendships with ascetic women. Asceticism offered women a way out of domination by men.

One of the things that reconciles me to the doctrine of the perpetual virginity (at least post partum) is the role that it seems to have played in developing a doctrine of consent as essential to marriage. If Joseph and Mary were married but didn’t have sex, then marriage must be based on something other than consummation.

Edwin

 

[Contarini]

That’s very true. But they – and I mean not just the ones here but even the more hardcore SSPX-type traditionalists – do in fact agree with the views that were held by some past popes.

I think the deeper issue, at least sometimes, is when Protestants study history and come up with questions but then are silenced by a we-never-change type response that doesn’t do justice to their questions.

Absolutely.

I believe this is an important part of my calling–to make a case for Catholicism (and Christianity generally) that takes the “messiness” of history into account.

Edwin