Pope Francis

Parent Cafe
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<p>If I’m not Catholic, why does it matter if I take communion when I visit? Apparently the concept that something is between me and God has no place in Catholicism</p>

<p>well, I guess it could be argued that when I visit another faith’s House of Worship, I should respect their rules…as a good guest. If they have an expectation that non-members shouldn’t do XXX, then I respectfully don’t do XXX. I’d feel that as a guest in their house of worship, that’s the thing to do. </p>

<p>as for something being between you and God…totally fine. Do it in your own home or in your own house of worship. </p>

<p>I wouldn’t go into my SIL’s Jewish temple and do things in it that would be offensive to the members. I wouldn’t start my prayers with the sign of the cross. I wouldn’t tell myself that this is “between me and God,” so to heck with them.</p>

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<p>Beil–I imagine that most Catholics who use birth control just don’t go to confession. There is a big difference in confession lines between conservative and liberal Catholic churches. But you’re right–the priest can’t forgive someone who isn’t sorry(“contrite”) for his/her sin, and doesn’t say that he/she will try to avoid that sin in the future. So there is no point in confessing a “sin” that you plan to continue. During confession, the person confessing says a prayer called the “Act of Contrition”–which says, essentially, that he/she is sorry for his/her sins and promises to change. There is no point in lying during confession, so if you don’t think something is a sin (even if you were taught that it is. . .) I’m not sure why you would mention it. The priest can’t read your mind, so he’s not going to know what your sins are. Actually, it is also a sin to make a “bad confession”–going to confession, but deliberately not confessing certain sins. So to avoid all this, many Catholics just avoid confession completely. I’m not saying this is what people should do. I’m just guessing what they might do. (I confess that I’ve never used birth control, so I don’t really know!)</p>

<p>Those who take communion in the Catholic church are saying that they believe what the church teaches about communion (that it truly is the body and blood of Christ). Other denominations don’t believe this, so they are not “in communion” with the Catholic church and what it teaches. But if you go up to communion, you are saying by your actions that you are “with the Church” when you’re really not. It is seen as dishonest and a scandal to believers.</p>

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<p>My T-shirt says “Deed above creed.”</p>

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<p>I see. I thought you were explaining it to me. But, of course I understood completely why… But, I see your point. Others might not ‘get’ it.</p>

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<p>" But you’re right–the priest can’t forgive someone who isn’t sorry(“contrite”) for his/her sin"</p>

<p>Do priests forgive sins? I thought only God could forgive sins. (I don’t believe that either, but that’s another issue entirely.)</p>

<p>My T-shirt says “Deed above creed.” </p>

<p>Read James 2:14 and following;</p>

<p>14 What does it profit, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can faith save him? 15 If a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food, 16 and one of you says to them, “Depart in peace, be warmed and filled,” but you do not give them the things which are needed for the body, what does it profit? 17 Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.</p>

<p>18 But someone will say, “You have faith, and I have works.” Show me your faith without your[a] works, and I will show you my faith by my** works. 19 You believe that there is one God. You do well. Even the demons believe—and tremble! 20 But do you want to know, O foolish man, that faith without works is dead?"</p>

<p>Unlike the writers of the other gospels, and Paul, James was a contemporary of Jesus and, unlike the others, actually knew Jesus. This was likely the earliest work in the New Testament.</p>

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<p>Not sure why Im jumping in, but a few thoughts:</p>

<p>Catholic doctrine regarding sex states that the married couple must be open to creating life. If you are impotent, then the marriage cannot create life. If you are using contraception, you are not open to creating life. If you are gay, your union is inherently sterile. A woman who is past menopause but makes love to her husband is not rejecting life, and she’s doing the exact same thing that created her children. </p>

<p>There are a lot of things that Catholics can do, as in, physically can do and aren’t going to be stopped, but that does not mean that such things are good for the soul, nor that the Church condones any of them. If you knowingly do not disclose mortal sins to your confessor, but take Communion anyway, you are doing yourself a disservice - you are not in a state of grace, know you aren’t in a state of grace, and you know that Communion is not going to help your soul. At best, that is useless; at worst, you are only pushing yourself further away from God. </p>

<p>Speaking of which: one of my non-Catholic, Chrisitan friends said that he tried to keep track of his sins on an Excel sheet, but crashed his computer. That highlights the general idea: all people do monumentally horrible things to others, their families, their coworkers, themselves, and God, every day. That does not mean that you reconfigure what it means to sin; you ask for forgiveness and try to forgive others when they sin. </p>

<p>Middle school students could not pass an advanced organic chemistry exam, but we wouldn’t stop saying that molecular biology works differently, or that the kids shouldn’t keep trying in school. Same idea. </p>

<p>But the great thing about religion is that if you don’t like yours, you can find a different one or make your own - no break-up speech, dumping via text, rescuing your plant from his windowsill. There isn’t even any paperwork. But, like a relationship, there is little point in trying to change the other party, and even less in wasting your life when there is that much friction and unhappiness.</p>

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<p>The computer crashed from a large excel file…?</p>

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<p>sorry, my bad–I was careful in my previous post to use the word “absolve.” It is God who forgives sins–the priest, acting in the place of Christ, “grants absolution.” He does not “forgive sins.”</p>

<p>Interesting that you should quote that particular passage from the Bible, mini. Catholics are often accused of putting works over faith–as in thinking that they can get into heaven by doing good works. Catholics will often quote this passage to show protestants that salvation isn’t through “faith alone.”</p>

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<p>The Church rejected Jansenism more than 200 years ago. To my way of thinking (as an outsider), despite all kinds of talk, this would seem to be an unbridgeable gap between Catholics and Protestants. And the contradiction is in the Book itself. James and Paul clearly do not agree, and would find each other’s conclusions “fighting words”. And, of course, it flares up again and again. Ten times more Christians were killed by other Christians in the years following Constantine, at least partially over this issue, than all the Christians martyred between the time of Jesus and Constantine. </p>

<p>The Tanach in the Jewish tradition wrestles with this issue as well, and ties it to the time when the Israelites were receiving the Ten Commandments. “We will do, and will hear”, said the Israelities, committing themselves to works before arriving at any statement of faith or belief, and that one couldn’t come to faith without works preceding them (as per James).</p>

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<p>Do priests forgive sins? I thought only God could forgive sins. (I don’t believe that either, but that’s another issue entirely.)</p>

<p>During the Mass and during Confession, the priest is not “himself” during those times. He is acting in Persona Christi (in the Person of Christ). If that doesn’t blow you away, then the teaching that the Sacrifice of the Mass is a forever sacrifice will surely do you in…lol. The same sacrifice during the Mass, is the same sacrifice at the time of Jesus’ death on the cross. Catholics aren’t “re-sacrificing” Jesus…it’s an unbloody sacrifice that is made present in a mystical way. God is outside of time.</p>

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<p>I may have missed the answer somewhere along the thread. But why can’t sterile or impotent people marry, on the basis that they may be subject to a miracle and produce children anyway?</p>

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<p>Sterile can, impotent can’t. Impotent can’t consummate marriage.</p>

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<p>*
15Jesus saith to them: But whom do you say that I am? 16Simon Peter answered and said: Thou art Christ, the Son of the living God. 17And Jesus answering, said to him: Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-Jona: because flesh and blood hath not revealed it to thee, but my Father who is in heaven. 18And I say to thee: That thou art Peter; and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. 19And I will give to thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven. And whatsoever thou shalt bind upon earth, it shall be bound also in heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt loose upon earth, it shall be loosed also in heaven. *
Matthew 16</p>

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<p>The above passage is really about the papacy. Peter, the first pope, was given the Keys of the Kingdom and given the power to “bind and loose”. There is a foreshadowing of this in the Old Testament…need to look up passage. </p>

<p>Regarding the priest’s role in Confession:</p>

<p>After his resurrection Jesus told the apostles, “‘As the Father has sent me, even so I send you.’ And when he had said this, he breathed on them, and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained’” (John 20:21–23). (This is one of only two times we are told that God breathed on man, the other being in Genesis 2:7, when he made man a living soul. It emphasizes how important the establishment of the sacrament of penance was.)*</p>

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<p>“NONE of those things are doctrines. Why would you think that they are/were??? lolololololololol”</p>

<p>I missed the joke here. I would think those things were doctrine because Judge John Noonan, a devout Catholic, advisor at Vatican II, law professor, and federal judge, classified them as such. See his seminal article, “Development in Moral Doctrine.” Theological Studies 54 (1993). Not all Catholic leaders agree with the way you have drawn this line.</p>

<p>The US government, of course, is not subject to Jesus’s advice to sell all your goods and give to the poor, but church leaders are. Jesus did not say, “This instruction should only be followed if poverty will be eliminated as a result.” Plenty of Catholics – St. Francis first among them – have identified the conflict inherent in sitting on a golden throne as you lead the followers of Jesus. The church has a number of principled answers to this dilemma, but it is a dilemma, and Francis I appears to be interested in acknowledging it and in reducing the physical luxury that surrounds him. I think that’s wonderful.</p>

<p>Re staying with the church when you deeply disagree with some of its teachings: I have a dear friend who is a Mass-attending Catholic who supports, among other changes, the ordination of women. Her explanation for this apparent contradiction is that the church belongs as much to the believers as it does to the hierarchy. She thinks some dudes in Rome have no right to drive her away from HER church. She and her pastor and her congregants are Catholicism too. I don’t think it’s a choice I would make, but I was able to understand her feelings when she put it that way.</p>

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<p>If you’ve never travelled to a third world country and visited some of the cathedrals and churches there with their gold chalices and ornate buildings while the starving are begging on the front steps then you can’t understand how I feel about how badly the Catholic church handles its money. And if you have, and aren’t moved, then I really don’t understand.</p>

<p>I also can’t understand belonging to a group whose rules are so contradictory to my own. I agree with the poster who compared it to a country club that bans minorities. Until the church accept all, it won’t have me as a memeber.</p>

<p>Before you come on here again and explain that it does accept all, I mean equally. How a group can be against two people of the same sex marrying can never be adequately explained away to me.</p>

<p>Then there’s the whole birth control issue. I agree that most Catholics use birth control. Yet they are all content to belong to a group that bans it even for the poor people struggling to feed themselves. Nope. Not very sympathetic if you ask me.</p>

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<p>fordiscussion, I really think your post sums up my general feelings about the Church, and why I left.</p>

<p>I also, though, believe that the cover up of the pedophile priest issue, and the continually moving the predators into new places to perpetrate those crimes, isn’t just an issue, it is a crime against humanity of epic proportions which brings up the massive issue of the splinter in the eye.</p>

<p>I’m just a better Buddhist than a Catholic, in the end. Though, I have heard Hannah’s friend’s argument, as well, and do not disagree with it. In fact, if everyone who became disenchanted with the church in the last years were to leave, the change that needs to happen with the Priests simply would never have happened. It has really been the Catholics agitating from inside the Church which has begun to bring about at least some change, though not nearly enough, in terms of criminal priests and their protectors.</p>

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<p>A fairly minor miracle could reverse impotence.</p>

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<p>I missed the joke here. I would think those things were doctrine because Judge John Noonan, a devout Catholic, advisor at Vatican II, law professor, and federal judge, classified them as such. See his seminal article, “Development in Moral Doctrine.” Theological Studies 54 (1993). Not all Catholic leaders agree with the way you have drawn this line.</p>

<p>Sorry, but he’s not in a position of authority on what is or isn’t doctrine. The Church Magisterium is that authority. And, those AREN’T doctrines…never were, never will be.</p>

<p>It’s irrelevant what (often self-appointed) church leaders are stating about this or that. It’s what the pope and Magisterium say.</p>

<p>Now, I’ll read what Noonan wrote. I suspect it’s not what you’ve purported or he’s seriously confused.</p>

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<p>So, back to Pope Francis:</p>

<p>Read this morning about how Pope Francis came out of the side gate to shake hands with the public.</p>

<p>So happy with this wonderful man, who is going to be the People’s Pope, being accessible to his Parish of the World.</p>

<p>May he continue his humility and work with the poor and teach us all, no matter what their faith, to be better people.</p>