Which Church teachings do you struggle to accept?

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Hans_W said:
As Rosebud says, simple love, unconditional love and trust for my God and Saviour.
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Right, and how does that Love manifest itself? Oh if only Jesus had addressed this…;)😉

If only He said how to Love Him. If only those that did Love Him were given charge of some kind of institution for us all…
 
A splendid quote for us all to return to again and again:

"Only in truth does charity shine forth, only in truth can charity be authentically lived.

Without truth, charity degenerates into sentimentality. Love becomes an empty shell, to be filled in an arbitrary way. In a culture without truth, this is the fatal risk facing love. It falls prey to contingent subjective emotions and opinions, the word “love” is abused and distorted, to the point where it comes to mean the opposite."

~ Pope Benedict XVI

CARITAS IN VERITATE

w2.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/encyclicals/index.html
 
Bookcat said:
“Being Christian is not the result of an ethical choice or a lofty idea, but the encounter with an event, a person, which gives life a new horizon and a decisive direction.”

~ Pope Benedict XVI Deus Caritas Est
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““To gaze upon Christ!” If we do this, we realize that Christianity is more than and different from a moral code, from a series of requirements and laws. It is the gift of a friendship that lasts through life and death: “No longer do I call you servants, but friends” (Jn 15:15), the Lord says to his disciples. We entrust ourselves to this friendship. Yet precisely because Christianity is more than a moral system, because it is the gift of friendship, for this reason it also contains within itself great moral strength, which is so urgently needed today on account of the challenges of our time. If with Jesus Christ and his Church we constantly re-read the Ten Commandments of Sinai, entering into their full depth, then a great, valid and lasting teaching unfolds before us. The Ten Commandments are first and foremost a “yes” to God, to a God who loves us and leads us, who carries us and yet allows us our freedom: indeed, it is he who makes our freedom real (the first three commandments). It is a “yes” to the family (fourth commandment), a “yes” to life (fifth commandment), a “yes” to responsible love (sixth commandment), a “yes” to solidarity, to social responsibility and to justice (seventh commandment), a “yes” to truth (eighth commandment) and a “yes” to respect for other people and for what is theirs (ninth and tenth commandments). By the strength of our friendship with the living God we live this manifold “yes” and at the same time we carry it as a signpost into this world of ours today.”

~ Pope Benedict XVI 8 September 2007

““I want them to understand that it is beautiful to be a Christian! The generally prevailing idea is that Christians have to observe an immense number of commandments, prohibitions, precepts, and other such restrictions, so that Christianity is a heavy and oppressive way of living, and it would therefore be more liberating to live without all these burdens. But I would like to make it clear that to be sustained by this great Love and God’s sublime revelation is not a burden, but rather a set of wings—that it is truly beautiful to be a Christian. It is an experience that gives us room to breathe and move, but most of all, it places us within a community since, as Christians, we are never alone: first of all, there is God, who is always with us; secondly, we are always forming a great community among ourselves: a community of people together on a journey, a community with a project for the future. All of this means that we are empowered to live a life worth living. This is the joy of being a Christian: that it is beautiful and right to believe!””

~Pope Benedict XVI 2005

(quotes snipped from Vatican website: vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/homilies/2006/documents/hf_ben-xvi_hom_20060108_battesimo_en.html

vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/audiences/2012/documents/hf_ben-xvi_aud_20120516_en.html
 
Tomdstone said:
In 1990, there were 62,824 marriage annulments granted in the USA. In 1929, there were 9 marriage annulments granted in the USA. Why has there been this explosion in the number of marriage annulments granted except that the Catholic Church has changed its teaching on what constitutes grounds for a marriage annulment? Before Vatican II, the grounds were quite grave such as if one of the partners was already married, lack of canonical form, induced grave and unjust force or fear, impotence, etc. However, since Vatican II, the grounds for granting the annulment have been liberalized to include such vague things as “lack of due discretion”. This was why a Catholic marriage tribunal declared that the marriage of U.S. Congressman Joseph Kennedy was null and void, even though he had known his wife nine years before they were married. So when I examine the situation with regard to Catholic marriage annulments, I struggle to understand and accept the idea that the Catholic Church cannot change its teachings,
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This is why most people call annulments “catholic divorce”. The increase in annulments have definitely mirrored the explosion in civil divorces in secular society. Personally, I do not see a major difference between divorce and annulments.
 
Contraception- I often question the biblical basis for the CCs teachings on this.
 
QuestLove said:
I do not see a major difference between divorce and annulments.
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Big difference.

A finding of nullity (and annulment) - is about the discovery and judgment that something that looked to happen -did not happen. That no marriage took place in reality before God.

It is worlds away from a divorce.
 
QuestLove said:
The increase in annulments have definitely mirrored the explosion in civil divorces in secular society.
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The increase in the number of annulments granted in the USA far exceeds the increase in the number of divorces in the USA over the period from 1929 to the present. Over this period:
Divorces went from about 200,000 per year to about 1,200,000 per year.
Annulments went from about 9 per year to as high as 50,000 per year.
 
Hans_W said:
I want to get the discussion back to what Rosebud said:

There is too much emphasis on Church teaching and rules and regulations. So many claim that we, and we alone, know the Truth, we have the Answers. Everything needs to be analysed and interpreted and, of course, WE got it right. What is missing today is HUMILITY - the realisation that we can only grasp next to nothing of the Truth with our little brain.
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Oh…for this to be true!

Where exactly is there ‘too much emphasis’…? The pulpit? Lucky. Schools…? Hmm…even luckier. The seminaries…? I don’t know…maybe.
 
Bookcat said:
Big difference.

A finding of nullity (and annulment) - is about the discovery and judgment that something that looked to happen -did not happen. That no marriage took place in reality before God.
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It’s that simple. How can anybody question this simple truth?
 
QuestLove said:
This is why most people call annulments “catholic divorce”. The increase in annulments have definitely mirrored the explosion in civil divorces in secular society. Personally, I do not see a major difference between divorce and annulments.
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The principles underpinning the two are entirely different. Divorce is an always-available option to “undo” the legal structure of the marriage. Annulment may determine that the conditions for a valid marriage (personal commitment) were never present.

Social norms have changed dramatically and people are now more far willing to consider these actions than in the past.
 
Tomdstone said:
The increase in the number of annulments granted in the USA far exceeds the increase in the number of divorces in the USA over the period from 1929 to the present. Over this period:
Divorces went from about 200,000 per year to about 1,200,000 per year.
Annulments went from about 9 per year to as high as 50,000 per year.
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Does not thd figure of “9” speak to the Catholic precept of marriage as permanent? It did not come easily to many to realise that marriage may have been flawed from the start.
 
QuestLove said:
This is why most people call annulments “catholic divorce”. The increase in annulments have definitely mirrored the explosion in civil divorces in secular society. Personally, I do not see a major difference between divorce and annulments.
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annulments are confirmation that the marriage was never valid
 
cena said:
annulments are confirmation that the marriage was never valid
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Exactly.
But it does not mean it never happened, which is what some people take it to mean. Which is why some catholics are annoyed when non-catholics considered you a divorce`(e).
 
IdiNaPut #339
Contraception- I often question the biblical basis for the CCs teachings on this.
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First, as the Catholic Church has given us the Sacred Scriptures as the Word of God and She has been created by Jesus of Nazareth to lead us to and to teach us all truth “questioning”, as meaning that She is in error, is fanciful. The Sacred Scriptures condemn contraception, and explain the foundation by Jesus of His Church and no other.

From Fr John A Hardon, S.J.
CONTRACEPTION. Deliberate interference with marital intercourse in order to prevent conception. It is the performance of the marriage act with the positive frustration of conception. Also called conjugal onanism, from the sin of Onan, referred to in the Bible (Genesis 38:8-10);
therealpresence.org/cgi-bin/getdefinition.pl
 
Bookcat said:
Big difference.

A finding of nullity (and annulment) - is about the discovery and judgment that something that looked to happen -did not happen. That no marriage took place in reality before God.

It is worlds away from a divorce.
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Ideally that should be the difference but in reality most times it is not. I’m hard-pressed to see how someone who has been married for over 20 years, made a life with kids and grandkids and took a vow can state with a straight face that the marriage was invalid. (Not to say there are no valid cases - of course there are). And acts all huffy when they get the “side-eye”.
 
Tomdstone said:
The increase in the number of annulments granted in the USA far exceeds the increase in the number of divorces in the USA over the period from 1929 to the present. Over this period:
Divorces went from about 200,000 per year to about 1,200,000 per year.
Annulments went from about 9 per year to as high as 50,000 per year.
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I know that’s why I say “mirrored”. The number for divorces obviously contain non-catholics while I am assuming that only catholics are applying for an annulment. But if you were to normalize the scale, there was a six-fold increase in divorces in this time period while for annulments there was a 5,000-fold increase during the same time period.
I was not even using the numbers to say that one is worse than the other. My main point was that whatever is happening in the secular world re: the permanence of marriage is also affecting the catholic church.
 
QuestLove said:
Ideally that should be the difference but in reality most times it is not. I’m hard-pressed to see how someone who has been married for over 20 years, made a life with kids and grandkids and took a vow can state with a straight face that the marriage was invalid. (Not to say there are no valid cases - of course there are). And when such a marriage is annulled walks around like nothing happened.
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Because the decision to divorce is most often not ‘mutual’.

As one who was on the receiving end of a unilateral decision to end a marriage I can assure you that “state with a straight face that the marriage was invalid” is a pretty inaccurate statement. There is confusion and pain and the annulment process was a great part of healing. Even if the marriage was deemed invalid I would guess that in the majority of cases that one spouse did not think it was at the time.

The simple fact that one spouse files for divorce indicates that the ‘intent’ of marriage (in the proper and beautiful Catholic sense) was likely not there to begin with.

The church has reached out in recent times to extend her mercy to the divorced. Having a chance to have a proper marriage blessed with children is a gift.
 
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