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estesbob
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Worst of all is that most Dioceses now require ANYONE who serves in ANY Ministry has to take a three hour course on child molestation. Id rather of signed an oath…
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AlanFromWichita
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Oh, yeah. I’ve taken that. Virtus training. When I was in that training, which I found rather interesting, my mind was spinning with imagination of how much money has been made to capitalize off the Church’s problems, including the Virtus thing. Of course, the entire video didn’t even mention, as I recall, anything other than laity being suspect. I’ll probably have to “renew” it soon so I guess I’ll find out.
Also I was pretty impressed at how well Virtus is training adults on both How To Gain A Child’s Confidence if you are a molester – with training straight from some of the best – and How To Avoid Getting Caught by showing, of course, the signs that allow others to check up on you.
Then again I’ve always been a bit of a skeptic. That class was eye-opening for some parents, and I guess that’s probably a Good Thing. I’m not sure it’s going to do anything to help the problem, but it does probably allow the Church do defend itself better in a court of law, since after all, we are “taking steps” to avoid problems of laity abusing children. (By the way, did we even know that was a significant problem before Virtus)?
Also I have to sign an agreement for a background check.
None of this is about teaching or about the Catholic faith. It’s just about legality and money and perhaps even an honest attempt to help correct the problem.
Still it smacks in similarity to the way the corporate world works when it gets in trouble. The executives get caught doing something wrong, so all the underlings have to take ethics training.
Alan
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AlanFromWichita
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I’ve decided that if I could change my vote, I would change it from “no” to “yes.”
What’s another piece of paper. If my pastor came up to me and said, “Alan, according to new rules you have to sign a piece of paper or you have to quit calling yourself Catholic” then I’d probably sign it. Really doesn’t matter what it says; if they want my signature I will gladly give it to them. I’m not nearly as hard core in person as I try to sound like on these forums. I’m a conformist, what the heck.
It’s just that my “absolutist” tendencies tend to kick in and object when we do things that are against Church Teachings, but really what I think I need to do for my own mental health, is learn how to get along. If signing a document is a new teaching, or at least my pastor thinks it is, so what? Obedience and fitting in is more important that spiritual purity, I would think, since in such a case it would be my opinion against the Church’s.
Bring it on. Whatever I have to sign, I’ll sign. I’m trying to get psyched up to sign those godawful papers to apply for food stamps, and so far I just can’t seem to do it. I think my strife for intellectual purity has not served me well throughout my life and I need to lighten up or I might not ever get a job and get back to supporting my own family.
Alan
What’s another piece of paper. If my pastor came up to me and said, “Alan, according to new rules you have to sign a piece of paper or you have to quit calling yourself Catholic” then I’d probably sign it. Really doesn’t matter what it says; if they want my signature I will gladly give it to them. I’m not nearly as hard core in person as I try to sound like on these forums. I’m a conformist, what the heck.
It’s just that my “absolutist” tendencies tend to kick in and object when we do things that are against Church Teachings, but really what I think I need to do for my own mental health, is learn how to get along. If signing a document is a new teaching, or at least my pastor thinks it is, so what? Obedience and fitting in is more important that spiritual purity, I would think, since in such a case it would be my opinion against the Church’s.
Bring it on. Whatever I have to sign, I’ll sign. I’m trying to get psyched up to sign those godawful papers to apply for food stamps, and so far I just can’t seem to do it. I think my strife for intellectual purity has not served me well throughout my life and I need to lighten up or I might not ever get a job and get back to supporting my own family.
Alan
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Gottle_of_Geer
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Gottle_of_Geer
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So what would you say if some others who disapproved of you for some reason thought that you should “leave the Church” ? 
That’s the trouble with thinking that people should leave - those who say such things may themselves be regarded as “not Catholic enough” by others; and may themselves come under scrutiny. ##
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Gottle_of_Geer
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If they are in the Church, they are Catholics. In any case, a complimentary adjective such as “devout” ought to be kept for holy people - Mother Teresa was (presumably) devout. Most of us are simply “practising” - God alone knows which of us may conceivably be devout.
To which there are several alternatives - not just the one:
Such as -- Donatism
- Pharisaism - some forms of this were extremely exclusive: those who did not keep the Law were “accursed”. Which is about one step beyond some Catholic attitudes to those Catholics who don’t come up to the required standards (quite whose, is not made clear).
So *if *anyone should leave, it’s the Catholic Pharisees and Catholic legalists. Because Christianity is founded not on legalism, not even on law - but on grace. Legalism is the father of schism - an attitude which is not prepared to bear with the imperfections of other Catholics, may lead those who have it to found or to join a sect from which all those “unsatisfactory”, “unCatholic” people are absent.
Quite why those who are not prepared to bear with the presence of “unsatisfactory”, “unorthodox”, or similarly deficient Catholics in the Church, should themselves be born with, is not clear, if one has a law-based POV. If one has a grace-based POV, it makes perfect sense - because we are all unsatisfactory when measured against the perfect Righteousness of God: so we are all fundamentally as bad as each other - “all have sinned,and fallen short of the Glory of God”. So we should all bear with one another, helping each other, instead of finding fault with each other.
- church-as-sect
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Gottle_of_Geer
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If belonging to the Church is to be decided by one’s attitude to its teachings and by nothing else, then the Church is no different from any human organisation.
And we certainly don’t need Christ if that is so.(He BTW seems to have put more emphasis on right doing than right believing - at least if St. Matthew is to be believed.)
Why bother with Him, if He is no more than the subject-matter of certain doctrines in the organisation we call the Catholic Church? They might as well be doctrines about the Tooth Fairy, if doctrine is all that matters - for if that is so, then experience of Christ is of no importance whatever. We don’t need Christ to join a political party or a social organisation, whether it be the Freemasons or the KKK or the ACLU or any other one cares to name.
To whittle Catholicism down to nothing but a bare list of ideological affirmations, is to denature it entirely. It becomes just another ideology - and the world is full of those already. If it has no resources to better the condition of the world, instead of adding to the woes of the world by being yet another ideology among many, but otherwise differing in character from none of them, then it can hardly be said to have anything to contribute.
This whittling down of faith into a list of doctrinal affirmations is typical of Fundamentalism.
Fortunately Catholicism is not a bare list of anything, but a way of living - and it’s easier to take away people’s name as Catholic, than the Living reality that name points to. ##
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Gottle_of_Geer
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Code:And what about our vows when we marry??? when we become a priest or a religious???
St. Paul took one - which is what led, indirectly, to his arrest. Which could be read as hinting that he did unwisely to make one.
So maybe - given the words of Christ about them - they should not be used in the Church.We can hardly be obeying Christ, if we do what He tells us not to do. ##
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trogiah
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In Matthew’s gospel Jesus states: “The scribes and the Pharisees have taken their seat on the chair of Moses.
Therefore, do and observe all things whatsoever they tell you, but do not follow their example. For they preach but they do not practice.”
I believe this passage gives a true Catholic Christian the right attitude to have in times when some leaders of the Church are clearly falling short of God’s Kingdom. I believe Jesus would say something similar about those who have inherited the seat of Peter. Not that I think all church leaders have gone astray, far from it. However, it does happen. And when it does happen, the appropriate Catholic response is to accept that those who inherit the seat of Peter (From Pope down to priest) retain that position even when their actions are flawed. But we are not expect or assume that those same people will always be correct in every word and deed.
peace
-Jim
Therefore, do and observe all things whatsoever they tell you, but do not follow their example. For they preach but they do not practice.”
I believe this passage gives a true Catholic Christian the right attitude to have in times when some leaders of the Church are clearly falling short of God’s Kingdom. I believe Jesus would say something similar about those who have inherited the seat of Peter. Not that I think all church leaders have gone astray, far from it. However, it does happen. And when it does happen, the appropriate Catholic response is to accept that those who inherit the seat of Peter (From Pope down to priest) retain that position even when their actions are flawed. But we are not expect or assume that those same people will always be correct in every word and deed.
peace
-Jim
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twiztedseraph
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Took an oath of fidelity to the Pontiff. 
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BibleReader
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This seems like an easy one. And I view myself as an intensely loyal Catholic, especially on the difficult questions of the age related to sex and reproduction.This is a question for Catholics only please.
If a vow of fidelity to the Magesterium of the Church were required to be Catholic, would you still be Catholic?
I’m sure this question will somehow be interpreted in a way other than the way I’m meaning it, so based on responses I reserve the right to tweak this question at a later date.
In Christ,
Nancy
However, I am one of the few who voted “No.”
Why?
Well, there are “penumbral” phases of Magisterial infallibility – areas where one MUST obey the Magisterium UNLESS one can come-up with an articulable reason why one thinks the Church is mistaken and should change its position.
One of the Church’s great saints, Athanasius, personally confronted this problem.
In the Early Church, as the Church was confronting the vast, powerful Arian heresy, Pope Liberius was asked to comment upon the correctness of the Arian heresy. As Liberius was surrounded with Arian-supporting troops, Jerome and Athanasius both maintain that rather than trust almighty God Liberius gave an incorrect answer which clearly permitted a belief in incorrect theology.
People of the Christian world at the time said that they “went to bed Christian, but awakened Arian.”
Only Bishop Athanasius held out, publicly, so that another saying arose at that time: “Athanasius against the world.”
Finally, Liberius did a turn-around: Liberius condemned his own prior position on Arianism, and approved the Athanasian formula.
Now, note: If what occurred occurred as Jerome and Athanasius describe, then was it sinful for Athanasius to defy Rome, so that it was “Athanasius against the world”?
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estesbob
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Gottle of Geer said:## So what would you say if some others who disapproved of you for some reason thought that you should “leave the Church” ?
That’s the trouble with thinking that people should leave - those who say such things may themselves be regarded as “not Catholic enough” by others; and may themselves come under scrutiny. ##
It seems quite simple to me. If you reject the teachings and doctrines of the Church you should find another Church.
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buffalo
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I do at Mass.
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Kristina_P
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frdave20
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here at St Charles Borromeo Seminary, all of the profs have to take an oath of fidelity to the Holy Father and MAgisterium of the Church… AWESOME, isn’t it??
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BibleReader
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Also, would Christ, Himself, want more than a simple affirmation – a simple “yes”?This is a question for Catholics only please.
If a vow of fidelity to the Magesterium of the Church were required to be Catholic, would you still be Catholic?
I’m sure this question will somehow be interpreted in a way other than the way I’m meaning it, so based on responses I reserve the right to tweak this question at a later date.
In Christ,
Nancy
**33 ****"Again you have heard that it was said to your ancestors, ‘Do not take a false oath, but make good to the Lord all that you vow.’ ****34 ****But I say to you, do not swear at all; not by heaven, for it is God’s throne; ****35 ****nor by the earth, for it is his footstool; nor by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King. ****36 ****Do not swear by your head, for you cannot make a single hair white or black. ****37 **Let your ‘Yes’ mean ‘Yes,’ and your ‘No’ mean ‘No.’ Anything more is from the evil one. Matthew 5:33-37.
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rwoehmke
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When Modernism was condemned, weren’t Catholic Theologians and priests required to make a vow of this type?
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Desert_Father
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Let me up the anti. If the Magesterium forbade an otherwise civily lawful command of the United States Government, who would you obey? No man can serve two masters. As for me, I am a Catholic. It took sixteen years of graduate study in theology, in four different seminaries of four different denominations to convince me that there is no other truth and no other choice but absolute fidelity to the Magesterium. If that means the fireing squad, then I will pray that they be forgiven. 
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proud2bcatholic
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Yes, it is awesome.
Professors at all Catholic Universities should also have to, but most don’t and continue to teach things that are contradictory to the faith.
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Strider
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I think you have your own Catch-22 here. Those who “reject Church teachings,” may still be called “catholic” by virtue of their baptism, but there is a certain block of teaching, called Dogma and Doctrine, that one MUST believe in order to ba a FAITHFUL Catholic.
Cafeteria Catholics aren’t Catholics except in name. Those who teach theology at Catholic colleges are supposed to have a Mandatum from their ordinary and have signed the concordance with Ex Corde Ecclesia. Some of those who haven’t or don’t have been censured by the church, e.g., Fr. Charles Curran. Some who haven’t and don’t have gotten off Scott-free, e.g., Fr. Richard McBrien. I don’t know why.
But my point is that, those who, by the grace fo God, accept all Dogma and Doctrine of the Catholic Church should have no problem signing a document of fidelity to the Magesterium.
CINO is just that, and is, IMHO a technicality.
Where’s a pen?
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