Why do liberal Catholics stay in the Church?

[PRmerger]

I think the basic tenets, the underlying principles, are spot on.

Love EVERYBODY

Life is Sacred

Mortal Sin separates us from God

The we can willfully choose permanent separation from God

Such choices have consequences.

The Sacraments are a source of Grace

All of these things instinctively or organically feel true (as in the “Natural Law written on the hearts of every man”).

Much of the rest of quasi-Catholic “teaching” consists of well-meaning people trying to codify these principles of tenets into specific laws, rules, regulations with too little reference to the underlying principle.

Let me give you one example.

The Church teaches against masturbation as being a misuse of the sexual faculty for selfish pleasure. It neither creates new life, nor does it bring one closer to one’s spouse. I think that’s a good teaching.

Some people, focus the objection to masturbation on the actual physical act of self-stimulation rather than to the principle underlying the prohibition.

To these people, manual stimulation for the purposes of obtaining a semen sample to diagnose infertility is also prohibited, because they are focused on the physical act rather than the underlying reason the physical act is usually wrong.

I think that is not only “missing the forest for the trees” but just plain silly.

Its like those people don’t trust themselves (or others) to think about the underlying morality and act accordingly.

So, what criterion are you using to discern when the Church is right and when she is wrong?

Surely you’re not saying it’s when you feel she’s right she’s right and when you feel she’s wrong she’s wrong…right???

 

[lynnvinc]

This is a faux argument. It’s the same one used in the slavery/anti-slavery debates of the mid-nineteenth century. The reason it is not an argument at all is that whoever is in charge gets to force his beliefs on others. That’s what government is for, to govern. The only questions are, whose beliefs and by what process. When we vote, we vote for candidate “A” whose beliefs we want forced on society, as opposed to candidate “B” whose beliefs we don’t want forced on society.

I realize that. It is individualism, liberty, and rights taken to the extreme.

We do not have the right to harm others, including fetuses. We are not rugged individualistic monads, but are interconnected with everyone else and God’s creation; we all came from our mother’s wombs and learned from our parents, preachers & teacherk and it is ridiculous to think we are totally independent of others in a world of our own. We are responsible for others, not just for our own self. This goes so much against Western and American culture that it is hard indeed for people (conservative or liberal) to understand. These people are wrongly claiming they are against themselves having abortion, but they are also against imposing their morality on others. Morality is an eminently collective thing.

However, if we are to impose that morality on others, as we should, then we are also responsible for them and their children, if they are unable to make ends meet. America is grossly lacking in helpful social programs, which means to me that we Americans as a people are in a state of sin, a sin of omission. We need to get our moral house in order, at the same time that we impose morality on the whole society.

 

[lynnvinc]

Liberalism Is a Sin.

I think they are referring to the liberalism that today would be referred to as conservatism – the liberalism in Enlightenment philosophy, which was against government (qua monarchy) & Church oppression, which is also the foundation of our society – The Declaration of Independence and Bill of Rights, and laissez-faire capitalism. It is that liberalism, I think, that the book is against. And it probably has some good points, but we also need human rights and freedoms, which the Church now extolls.

 

[BillP]

So, what criterion are you using to discern when the Church is right and when she is wrong?

Surely you’re not saying it’s when you feel she’s right she’s right and when you feel she’s wrong she’s wrong…right???

I think it goes to when the CHURCH teaches something and when some misguided person who may or may not be connected with the Church teaches something.

I see very little (nothing?) to disagree with with ACTUAL CHURCH teaching.

I suppose the most common things people disagree with are;

Abortion
Birth Control
Ordination of Women

Now, just taking abortion, for instance.

I agree that abortion is always wrong. No problem there.

However, there are people who are prepared to tell me that Church teaching on abortion is actually much more extensive and detailed than it actually is.

The Church does most definitely NOT TEACH that contributions to the Susan G, Komen foundation for example are sins.

So in answer to your question I don’t ever decide whether or not I AGREE with what the Church teaches, but I often decide whether or not I AGREE with what many individuals think is Church teaching.

 

[PRmerger]

So in answer to your question I don’t ever decide whether or not I AGREE with what the Church teaches, but I often decide whether or not I AGREE with what many individuals think is Church teaching.

Then you are quite orthodox in your beliefs, BillP, and not a liberal, as the common understanding of “liberal in the Church” goes.

 

[BillP]

Then you are quite orthodox in your beliefs, BillP, and not a liberal, as the common understanding of “liberal in the Church” goes.

Well the people in my Parish would disagree with you. They think I’m quit liberal.

 

[lynnvinc]

Uh, why should Catholics oppose civil marriage altogether (even for heterosexuals)?

Well, according to what a priest once told me over 38 years ago civil marriage is a serious sin, and not a venial sin. He was referring to a heterosexual marriage. He was referring to my marriage. I was a Protestant at the time, trying to convert to Catholicism. He felt because of this very serious sin, I should not be admitted for many years, maybe 10 years.

Luckily we did have a Catholic marriage right away, and I went to India with my husband (we’ve now been married 42 years thru civil marriage & 38 through Church marriage), and his uncle priest (Vicar General of the Diocese, and a very saintly man…so it was special) gave me first communion.

So that’s how I became a Catholic.

However, I have never forgotten that I was in a state of serious sin, and that all who have civil marriages are in sin. I suppose that only applies to Catholics, who should know better, perhaps not to non-Catholics, who wouldn’t know about it.

The upshot is, I’m wondering why Catholics are making such a big deal of gays having civil marriages, since these marriages are not at all recognized as marriages by the Catholic Church. A Carmelite in my community explained that it was to prevent them from committing 2 sins (homosexual acts & civil marriage), but that doesn’t seem to hold water for me. Tho it is a point…we should prevent them from further sinning. But then shouldn’t we also prevent heterosexuals from that sin as well??

 

[PRmerger]

Well the people in my Parish would disagree with you. They think I’m quit liberal.

Can you give an example of something you’ve professed that would make them believe you’re a liberal?

 

[sedonaman]

… America is grossly lacking in helpful social programs, which means to me that we Americans as a people are in a state of sin, a sin of omission. …

What planet are you living on? Take a look at where the money comes from and where it goes here schweikert.house.gov/ByTheNumbers .

Then read this heritage.org/research/reports/2011/07/what-is-poverty .

 

[sedonaman]

…America is grossly lacking in helpful social programs, which means to me that we Americans as a people are in a state of sin, a sin of omission. …

America might be in a state of serious sin, but it’s not for lack of social programs:

How Much Does the Nation Spend on Welfare? - Public Aid.

[How Much Does the Nation Spend on Welfare? - State Expenditures For Social Welfare"]](http://www.libraryindex.com/pages/8...elfare-STATE-EXPENDITURES-SOCIAL-WELFARE.html).

How Much Does the Nation Spend on Welfare? - Private Welfare Expenditures.

 

[BillP]

Can you give an example of something you’ve professed that would make them believe you’re a liberal?

Here’s a pretty good one actually.

This thread: forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=580242

Many people claim that only a “liberal” would disagree with the writers of the editorial decrying the content of “Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship.”

My opinion is that “Forming Consciences…” represents the ACTUAL Church teaching and the writers of the editorial are actually wrong in their assertions.

 

[Joe_5859]

Here’s a pretty good one actually.

This thread: forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=580242

Many people claim that only a “liberal” would disagree with the writers of the editorial decrying the content of “Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship.”

My opinion is that “Forming Consciences…” represents the ACTUAL Church teaching and the writers of the editorial are actually wrong in their assertions.

It is interesting to me because the U.S. bishops can’t seem to make anyone happy with that document. I heard a “liberal” theologian give a talk on the 2008 edition and he decried it as the bishops eschewing social issues (minus abortion, of course). He said that the shift in language was a subtle but unmistakable shift which made it very, very clear that abortion was the main issue on the bishops’ minds. That was where their “passion” was (as he described it). The rest was all lip service.

 

[sedonaman]

It is interesting to me because the U.S. bishops can’t seem to make anyone happy with that document. I heard a “liberal” theologian give a talk on the 2008 edition and he decried it as the bishops eschewing social issues (minus abortion, of course). He said that the shift in language was a subtle but unmistakable shift which made it very, very clear that abortion was the main issue on the bishops’ minds. That was where their “passion” was (as he described it). The rest was all lip service.

I’ve read a lot of their documents, and the thought came to me of just who are they talking to, each other?

 

[melbanglican]

Why do they stay? Because they don’t want to leave the Church they love and watch it become the Christian equivalent of Hizbollah or of the ‘think-tank’ behind the regime in Tehran.

Has the Church ‘drifted’ rather to the right and become more authoritarian since Vatican II? There seems to be a great deal of anger and discontent here in Australia among the rank-and-file clergy with regard to the hierarchy in this nation and in Rome.

christiancentury.org/article/2011-04/survey-finds-discontent-among-australian-catholic-priests

Food for thought.

 

[DJ_Pius_X]

I recently read (can’t remember where) that the reason most dissident Catholics stay in the Church is because they realize that if they left then their influence would weaken (i.e. no one would really care what they think). I think this seems reasonable enough with respect to Catholic politicians who support abortion, gay marriage, etc. It also could apply to dissident priests. And even those people in charge of organizations like Catholics for Choice.

But my question is, what about the average layman? The man or woman who attends Mass weekly, yet his opinion on many things is not in accord with the Church. Why do these folks remain in the Church? You can’t really say that they stay for reasons of influence or power. So what is it?

Thanks.

No one cares what we think in the first place. I really hope that as more of the liberal young priests rise though the church hierarchy, the church will liberalize and realize that what its leadership has done is wrong…

But I’m not holding my breath.

 

[Rock_Happy]

I recently read (can’t remember where) that the reason most dissident Catholics stay in the Church is because they realize that if they left then their influence would weaken (i.e. no one would really care what they think). I think this seems reasonable enough with respect to Catholic politicians who support abortion, gay marriage, etc. It also could apply to dissident priests. And even those people in charge of organizations like Catholics for Choice.

But my question is, what about the average layman? The man or woman who attends Mass weekly, yet his opinion on many things is not in accord with the Church. Why do these folks remain in the Church? You can’t really say that they stay for reasons of influence or power. So what is it?

Thanks.

Perhaps many of them are optimists, and they think that there is some hope for their more conservative brethren, and therefore don’t wish to abandon them in their time of need.

 

[sedonaman]

No one cares what we think in the first place. I really hope that as more of the liberal young priests rise though the church hierarchy, the church will liberalize and realize that what its leadership has done is wrong…

But I’m not holding my breath.

Don’t go without chocolate, either. How do you explain that 2,000 years of Church history got it wrong, but one generation [the “more liberal young priests”] got it right?

LIBERALISM IS A SIN
liberalismisasin.com

 

[Contarini]

No one cares what we think in the first place. I really hope that as more of the liberal young priests rise though the church hierarchy, the church will liberalize and realize that what its leadership has done is wrong…

But I’m not holding my breath.

It seems to be the other way round. By and large the younger priests seem to be more conservative and the liberal priests seem to be retiring/dying off.

Perhaps this is just conservative Catholic propaganda–do you have evidence that the pattern really is the other way?

I have trouble rooting for either conservative or liberal factions in the Catholic Church–one of the pragmatic reasons I’ve found it hard to become Catholic. When I initially became interested in Catholicism, I was very much under the sway of the conservative apologetics movement represented on this forum. But I had trouble swallowing that version of Catholicism hook, line, and sinker. I was very put off by the intellectual frivolity/dishonesty and cavalier dismissal of the tradition that I found in the local (quite liberal) Catholic parish, so I easily accepted my conservative friends’ judgment of liberal Catholicism. Over the years I’ve come to see that things are much more complicated, and I don’t see either the conservatives or the liberals as the good guys and the other party as the bad guys.

Edwin

 

[DJ_Pius_X]

It seems to be the other way round. By and large the younger priests seem to be more conservative and the liberal priests seem to be retiring/dying off.

Perhaps this is just conservative Catholic propaganda–do you have evidence that the pattern really is the other way?

I have trouble rooting for either conservative or liberal factions in the Catholic Church–one of the pragmatic reasons I’ve found it hard to become Catholic. When I initially became interested in Catholicism, I was very much under the sway of the conservative apologetics movement represented on this forum. But I had trouble swallowing that version of Catholicism hook, line, and sinker. I was very put off by the intellectual frivolity/dishonesty and cavalier dismissal of the tradition that I found in the local (quite liberal) Catholic parish, so I easily accepted my conservative friends’ judgment of liberal Catholicism. Over the years I’ve come to see that things are much more complicated, and I don’t see either the conservatives or the liberals as the good guys and the other party as the bad guys.

Edwin

I actually have no proof other than personal experience. It just seemed that way from the seminarians I’ve known.

 

[DJ_Pius_X]

Don’t go without chocolate, either. How do you explain that 2,000 years of Church history got it wrong, but one generation [the “more liberal young priests”] got it right?

LIBERALISM IS A SIN
liberalismisasin.com

Interesting. Checked out the website, saw that it referred to Isabella the Second as a “Glorious Promoter of the Inquisition”. Wow, really? The Inquisition? The Spanish Inquisition? Who nobody expects?

I’ve gotta say, it’s hard to take seriously, especially with such a broad statement as “Liberalism is a Sin”.

Sure, there have been 2000 years of doing things the same way. That doesn’t mean that they’re automatically good. If we trusted tradition as the final authority, we’d still be living in caves. This argument hints at “If it was good enough for granddaddy, it’s good enough for me,” and almost militantly ignorant point of view.