<p>Baelor- I don’t think we can say with absolute certainty that Martin Luther was in a state of mortal sin when he died. </p>
<p>Remember that the offense must be of grave matter (certainly his deviant theology would qualify here), done with complete knowledge and full consent- here’s where he may have had some wiggle room and where we cannot say now, nor could anyone really say back then where he really stood on these things. As you may remember, he didn’t start out as a heretic- he wanted to meet with the pope and discuss the need for reform and the out of control situation with indulgences. The Pope refused to meet and Luther got weirder and weirder in his theological writings. Now, he was given many chances to change his statements, but the Pope also literally went after him to kill him. So- complete knowledge and full consent- I can’t say for sure. </p>
<p>As you say, the Church can never definitively say whether someone is in hell. That is because only God (and the sinner) really know whether the offense was mortal or not and whether the individual died in a state of mortal sin.</p>
<p>Nope. In the church in which I was raised, one was expected to repent of one’s sins. However, in many Protestant churches, one is taught that salvation is not dependent on repenting of one’s sins, being “good,” or any other action on the part of the human being. In fact, if being “good” were a requirement to get into heaven, virtually no one would qualify. So Jesus died in order to to pay for the past and future sins of humanity. In order to earn salvation, one must simply believe in Jesus as the Son of God (or “the Messiah”).</p>
<p>This was always quoted to me regarding salvation:</p>
<p>“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that **whosoever believeth in him **should not perish, but have everlasting life.” John 3:16</p>
<p>There was the expectation that once a conscious decision to “believe” in Christ as the Messiah was made, that the Christian then would develop a trusting, intimate relationship with God, would model their behavior on that of Christ, and would try to become a loving, kind, and good citizen. However, the salvation was granted exclusively on a SINCERE belief in Jesus as son of God.</p>
<p>I agree with the past 2 posts, that is what I have been taught as a Catholic.</p>
<p>Off topic, but on topic, my personal take is that we should all be like Private Ryan at the end of the movie…tell me I earned it. </p>
<p>To me nobody expects a priest to be at every Catholic death to administer the last rites. Thus, it goes back to my two last points. You need to believe in the fact that Jesus was here for our salvation, and you tried to live a good life by the Christian standard.</p>
<p>I don’t believe that St Peter is at the Pearly Gates saying you yelled at your kids today and didn’t ask for forgiveness so you are outta here.</p>
<p>I believe God is forgiving if you want and accept it.</p>
<p>*he may not provide absolution without the necessary conditions on the penitent’s part of sincere sorrow for the wrong and a firm purpose of amendment. Thus, a person stating that he was sorry for planting a bomb but had no intention of disarming the bomb, or planting other bombs, would not be absolved. *</p>
<p>True…</p>
<p>the same could be said for someone who has kidnapped someone and is holding him/her hostage. The kidnapper can’t get absolution while he’s still holding the person hostage. </p>
<p>The priest will strongly tell the kidnapper that he must release the person and then absolution can be granted if truly sorry. </p>
<p>The priest is not allowed to go report the crime because his religion’s position is that HE wasn’t told of the sin, God was told. That is one reason why a priest cannot treat someone differently outside of the confessional based on what he was told inside the confessional. </p>
<p>*To me nobody expects a priest to be at every Catholic death to administer the last rites. Thus, it goes back to my two last points. You need to believe in the fact that Jesus was here for our salvation, and you tried to live a good life by the Christian standard.</p>
<p>I don’t believe that St Peter is at the Pearly Gates saying you yelled at your kids today and didn’t ask for forgiveness so you are outta here.*</p>
<p>Yelling at your kids is probably not a sin anyway (unless you said something truly awful), but really, the point is that minor sins don’t send people to hell anyway. Some sins (unrepented) are deadly…most sins are not.</p>
<p>I get feedback when I talk to God. If my confession isn’t sincere, the Holy Spirit convicts me. Neither God nor I am fooled when I try to pull the wool over his eyes.</p>
<p>I would agree pipmom. Martin Luther was not excommunicated for a grave sin. He was excommunicated for publicly claiming the Catholic church had strayed considerably away from the Bible. I don’t think that is a mortal sin just a difference of opinion.</p>
<p>By weirder and weirder, pipmom, what do you mean?</p>
<p>This is an almost dishonest oversimplification.</p>
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<p>You are placing an undue emphasis of the excommunication itself. The fact that he was not excommunicated for a grave sin does not mean that he also later did not commit a grave sin. He was a heretic, period. Heresy is a mortal sin.</p>
<p>Balcony Boy- What I meant by weirder and weirder was: Luther didn’t start out as a heretic- he was rightly concerned about the direction the Church was taking. As the situation between him and the Pope escalated, and he did more and more theological writing, he veered severely away from Catholic doctrine. I meant “weirder and weirder” as a shorthand, if you will, for getting to a heretical position from the Church’s point of view.</p>
<p>He was excommunicated for his theological statements- not for having complained in the first place.</p>
<p>“The “school of thought” is irrelevant in the context of action on the part of the confessor (or anyone to whom it relates) until it is incorporated into the CCC or canon law, etc. In other words, the fact that this may be a topic of discussion for particular theologians does not change the fact that the priest is currently absolutely bound by the seal of confession”</p>
<p>I feel over my head discussing RC. In my own faith tradition this would be called the distinction between halacha, and meta halacha. The halacha is the religious law, determined over time by the consensus of leading rabbis following certain rules of decision. Metahalacha is the question of how to apply ethics from outside the system to halacha to the system. It addresses such question as A. To what extent and how should the decisors of halacha attempt to go beyond a purely formal approach, and make their decisions in light of extra-halachic ethical principles (which can include items in the bible other than the legal “thou shalts” - what we call Aggadah) B. when is it ethically permissable for an individual to violate halacha on behalf of an extra-halachic ethical principle. </p>
<p>There IS a school that says that denies any validity within Judaism to any extrahalachic principles - all that is ethical is within “the four cubits of the law”. There are however thinkers who disagree. The first school is widely held by the ultra-Orthodox, the latter is widely held by Conservative Judaism - Modern Orthodoxy, AFAICT, has a mix of opinions. </p>
<p>If I read what I have read here correctly, the thinkers quoted above are not denying that their position is against Cannon Law. They are claiming that there can be an ethical and religious imperative to violate Cannon Law, and to accept the consequences. I do not know how mainstream or fringe that position is within RC. A link of some kind would be helpful.</p>
<p>*That’s one of the reason for having confessions to a priest because he can point such things out. A person just saying he’s sorry privately to God but has little or no intention of stopping the behavior doesn’t get that kind of feedback. *</p>
<p>*Neither God nor I am fooled when I try to pull the wool over his eyes. *</p>
<p>You may have a well-formed conscience. Not many people do. Rationalization gets the best of people - they can try to justify all kinds of bad behavior to minimize/mitigate guilt. They may shop-lift something and then try to minimize it by claiming it’s not really bad to steal from rich merchants. Or, they might cheat on their taxes and claim it’s not really bad because the gov’t expects too much.</p>
<p>As for someone who either has no realistic intention of stopping the sin or is doing little to avoid the temptation of that sin, that is where a priest is very useful.</p>
<p>A person may confess having an affair with a co-worker that he/she worked closely with. The person may have ended the affair, but has done nothing to remove the temptation…such as moving to another office, getting different assignments, etc. A priest would point out that continuing to work closely with someone that you had an affair with is very dangerous and should be stopped.</p>
<p>Again, it’s great that you’re very self-aware and possess a good conscience. If everyone was like you, none of this might be needed. And, as we know, rules/laws/etc aren’t really designed for those who “do the right thing,” they are designed for the weaker amongst us.</p>
<p>“Or, they might cheat on their taxes and claim it’s not really bad because the gov’t expects too much”</p>
<p>In that case I suspect they wouldn’t see at as a sin, and wouldn’t confess it to the priest. </p>
<p>In my faith tradition too, we repent directly to the creator. We do so especially as part of prayer services that repeat over and over again that repentance in the heart is NOT enough, that behavior must change, amends be made. If someone wants specific help in changing their life, they may talk to a rabbi (but with no “seal of confession” beyond the rabbi’s personal ethics and promise of confidentiality) or they may go to a therapist (or both). Clearly this system does not work for everyone. As, indeed, RC confession appears not to work for everyone.</p>
<p>Indeed. But I guess the question must then be asked, “What constitutes a Catholic?” The Church has its conception of the nomenclature. But are the WomynPriests Catholic? They think so. I certainly don’t. In other words, what legitimacy does this “school of thought” have? Disobeying Canon Law has ideological underpinnings and ideological consequences. It is hard for me to take such advocacy seriously unless I have a more complete sense of its context.</p>
<p>*“Or, they might cheat on their taxes and claim it’s not really bad because the gov’t expects too much”</p>
<p>In that case I suspect they wouldn’t see at as a sin, and wouldn’t confess it to the priest. *</p>
<p>True…but a priest often goes over these possible sins. At our church, there is a hand-out before you go into confession and it lists things like “cheating on taxes”.</p>
<p>Anyway…the point is that when someone tells a priest his sins, and then tries to do the “rationalization dance” to the priest, the priest can intervene. The same for when someone confesses cheating on their spouse, but has made little effort to avoid being around that person. A priest is going to ask about that and ask about any efforts being made to improve the marriage.</p>
<p>Interesting. Luther was a heretic in the eyes of the Catholic church because he questioned the direction the church was going (paying for indulgences, etc). That doesn’t make him a heretic in God’s eye and that is what counts.</p>
<p>as a matter of actually improving behavior. It is not for me to address what works as RC theology, and I have not really thought about the different effectiveness vs other approaches wrt to comfort. Mom2collegekids appeared to me to be asserting that this is a uniquely effective means to change behavior. I dont want to get into a faith versus faith comparison who does what sins, (aside from the general rudeness of that, it would be impossible to know how many self proclaimed RCs actually go to confession regularly, or even how many affiliated Jews attended full services on Yom Kippur, etc, etc) </p>
<p>In lieu of that I merely note that in all faith traditions, there are folks for whom the faith tradition’s ways of encouraging behavioral change, fail to change behavior. We should all endeavour to use our faith traditions way’s to improve ourselves as we can, but I am skeptical of claims for the unique benefits of one faith tradition’s approach.</p>
<p>BalconyBoy, let me rephrase your statement to accurately reflect the position you forwarded:</p>
<p>“Martin Luther is not a heretic in God’s eyes because the Catholic Church is not correct.”</p>
<p>So, of course, from that perspective, he is not a heretic. He was, however, a heretic in the eyes of the Church (and, it and I would posit, God), and not because he opposed indulgences. He was a heretic because his theology was heretical, thereby making him a true heresiarch. I hope I have used enough words from that root to get the point across. From the perspective of the Catholic Church, he was and is a heretic (again, not simply because he “didn’t like the direction blahblahblah”). If you do not accept the Catholic Church’s authority, that is one thing. But such a framework is not relevant to this thread.</p>
<p>P.S.: What the Church does concerns God since She is Christ’s Bride.</p>
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<p>Thank you. I certainly agree, although, as a Catholic, I would say that Reconciliation is necessary regardless of whether you find it personally useful.</p>
<p>He was a heretic in the eyes of the Catholic church. I would agree with that. I would not agree that the Catholic church and God are synonomous. </p>
<p>But what about Luther’s theology was heretical?</p>