www.byzcath.org Forums General Discussions Town Hall What would you say if . . .

Dear Bob,

Reading back through this thread I overlooked or forgot about this post and Father Mack's above it.

Forgive my weak memory and thick head.

Prayers that all works out to the best for you.

In Christ,
Bill

Bill:

The thrust of all these quotes has been to bring us 180 degrees from the traditional approach to the Christian life as any of us would understand it or have been taught it.

The "embrace your sin, it's part of who you are" is followed by "forget about this trying to be good thing that you've been taught in the past" because "we spend too much time trying to get to be something we can't become." To summarize, embrace your sin and wallow in it. It's who we are as human beings and we'll never be anything more.

There is no room for the Holy Spirit, no room for Divine Inspiration, no room for the ascetic struggle, no room for the Scripture to be inspired, no room for . . .

These things started to "clunk" in my head early on and they continue to do so. It's often not as stark as this, but usually a little subtle twist to something that is completely orthodox that gives it just enough turn to make it just not quite right. I should add that an article that was published in a newsletter for laypeople was so far off the wall that I sent it to some priests that I trust and they came back with a near unanimous decision of its being "heretical syncretism," though none knew that I had sent it to anyone else.

For example, a statement made that "Jesus is no more present in the Sacred Host than in the monstrance that holds it or the pew you are sitting on" is quite a way off the mark. That one is usually a shocker for clergy as well as other people who hear it. A little like God being defused throughout creation but not being the Totally Other that He is. So if you destroy the creation, you don't have God anymore either.

How about atonement meaning that you become God yourself and become part of God: sort of like the Hindu idea that we all become fused into some impersonal oneness with the universe and lose our individual identity. I understand the idea of communion, "coming into union," and "at-one-ment," but cannnot ever see myself as the creator of the universe. I also find it demeaning to think that I'd just disappear into nothingness, becoming part of some greater whole but losing my own thougths, memories, etc. And this free-wheeling use of language together with so many authors like Matthew Fox and others leaves me with little reason to give someone immersed in this stuff the benefit of the doubt.

But my purpose was not to stir up things for people. It was to gauge how far off this sort of thing is. I read a book some 16 years ago that was a study of how far the New Age had penetrated the Catholic Church to that point. And many of the things I have posted were hinted at in this book as being taught at some seminaries during the 1980s. I should add that my former spiritual director just emailed me and told me tht he was shocked by all this and says that while some of these "kernels" might be something to discuss in depth it appears that the whole "ear" is in "serious peril."

I can assure you that these are not taken out of context but are the things that make one sit up and say "What"?

BOB

Emrace your sin.


Oh well, guess it doesn`t matter that Jesus told the sinners to go and sin no more!

Bob,

If you belong to the Latin Rite, then under Canon Law you have rights:

THE OBLIGATIONS AND RIGHTS OF ALL THE CHRISTIAN FAITHFUL [vatican.va]

I'm not saying that your counsellors are wrong, especially if they are speaking prudentially, but I do think, that unless your bishop is incredibly arrogant, you could express your opinion without any fear of censure. One of the most important rights is to be taught the fullness of the Catholic Faith, and nothing else, in the Church. Again, I'm not saying "go for it"; just that you are not without (Church) legal recourse.

Michael

Hi Alice,


After the VCII Decree on the Pastoral Office of Bishops in the Church Christus Dominus "built up" the description of the Bishop's office in the Church, and with the creation of the Episcopal Conferences, there was a lot of cheerleading from American canonists and theologians that the bishops should show more "spine" with regard to the Vatican, Pope included. Some of the bishops drank more deeply than others from these prideful waters, and have given the impression that they are in a practical schism with Rome. "Vatican documents" is how they designate directives from the Holy See; and various experiments have been carried out for which nobody was ostensibly punished. Some have taken that as "encouragement" from the Vatican, while others seem to just have a "tin ear".

I think the Eastern Church was not thrown into such a tailspin by all this for a number of reasons. One of them seems to me to be that the hierarchs are much closer to the laity there than in the Latin Rite. I understand that many (most? all?) lay people in the Eastern Churches are acquainted with their Bishops. This is certainly not true in the Latin Rite. I think your Bishops have more feedback loops than ours, whose sources of information tended to be like-minded clerics and religious, rather than a broad sample.

Another probable reason is that the Eastern bishops were already "decentralized" by virtue of sui iuris designation.

A third possible reason is that many of the Eastern churches were suffering persecutions, and were more interested in important matters of life and death than in niceties of "spirit of Vatican II" experimentation. This was an important aspect of the Latin Church in Poland as well.

We all pray that the Lord rebuke this storm soon!

Michael

Dear Michael,

Thank you very much for your response.

I do still wonder if this 'independent' spirit of the Bishops is as predominant in other Roman Catholic countries (Europe, South America) as it is here.

In Christ,
Alice

Just my opinion...

I think that the Pope's recent talks to the South American bishops imply that some of them have also suffered from a bit of "independitis". Liberation theology is mostly "communism with a snarling face on a Christian", and the priests have become very politicized. I think Europe is about the same as the USA, if not a bit worse (since their attitude is "the Bishop of Rome is one of Us").

I think in Africa and Asia, there is much too much work, and evangelization taking place, and "realworld" problems to address, for Bishops to worry how they stack up versus the Pope. I think they see him as a friend and ally. It seems to me that the mistakes they make are by excess; the kind of mistakes you "like" to see.

Michael

Michael, I would take issue with this one particular comment.

Even Benedict when he was the head of the CDF made a disctinction between different types of liberation theology. He only condemned the type that made uncritical use of Marxist philosophy, and that replaced the redemption in Christ with social liberation. Admittedly, this type of liberation theology has been widespread, but the CDF did not condemn all liberation theology. See the book, The Essential Pope Benedict XVI: His Central Writings and Speeches Joseph Ratzinger is very clear he is only calling out a certain type of liberation theology for criticism.

I do not believe in any liberation theology that is not based on Christian orthodoxy.

But sometimes the critics of Liberation theology offer nothing else to address the social injustice in Latin America.

Surely the answer to Latin America's grinding poverty and social injustice is not silence. In many of these countries, only a handful of families own the vast majority of airable land.

We cannot be content to practice charity along; the Scripture is replete with condemnations of social injustice and calls us to speak out against, and to defend the right of the oppressed (Cf. Isaiah 1:17; Proverbs 24:10-12; Proverbs 31:8-9; Psalm 103:6-7; Psalm 82:3-4; Amos 2:6-7; Jeremiah 22:16)

Although secular, Marxist, forms of liberation theology have been condemned or censored- liberation theology has not been condemned in all its forms.

The context of poverty and oppression in Latin America in the 1980's produced at least one well-known, undeniably holy saint- Blessed Oscar Romero, assisinated Archbishop of El Salvador- and doubtless many others that we have not heard about it.

The Preferential Option for the poor, which has its roots in liberation theology, has been adopted in to the teaching of the Catechism of the Catholic Church:

1586
For the bishop, this is first of all a grace of strength ("the governing spirit": Prayer of Episcopal Consecration in the Latin rite):78 the grace to guide and defend his Church with strength and prudence as a father and pastor, with gratuitous love for all and a preferential love for the poor, the sick, and the needy.

2443 God blesses those who come to the aid of the poor and rebukes those who turn away from them

2448...Hence, those who are oppressed by poverty are the object of a preferential love on the part of the Church which, since her origin and in spite of the failings of many of her members, has not ceased to work for their relief, defense, and liberation through numerous works of charity which remain indispensable always and everywhere."[247]

Blessings,

Lance

OH MY!!!!! Umm I dont know if I would hang around, so this was a priest and where is he now?

Hanni

Hanni:

This is just a sampling of things I've heard over the past six years. The priest is still in the parish and most people to whom I've gone are shocked because no one has ever brought quotes like this to anyone' attention. It's a test for us and many don't catch enough of this type of thing to know that it just isn't right.

In Christ,

BOB

haha I heard a stomach full of this kind of thing for sooooo long. I could barely tolerate it, but for courtesy's sake, I kept relatively quiet.

No more. I can't tolerate it, and I go off when I hear such evil being pandered as Gospel.

"Woe to those who call good evil, and evil good."

I think I read that in the BIBLE.

Has anyone noticed that a lot of the priests making these weird statements seemed to have been ordained in sixties and seventies right when the seminaries started going to hell in a hand-basket? I volunteer at a local Roman Rite parish and one weekend we had a priest come and visit us from the Diocesan Vocational Office. He gave a talk on how great it was to be a priest by listing all the materialistic perks to being one. Traveling, monthly allowance, time for you and so on an so forth. It was the most repulsive thing I have ever heard, it was like he was saying it was a career and not a calling, a job and not a vocation. There was no indication of how much it meant to be a Shepard of souls or how he loved celebrating the Sacraments. However at the same meeting we had a seminarian talk to us, and he was filled with the Holy Spirit. He glowingly spoke of his love for Our Lord and sacraments and how he was yearning for ordination. Also a very elderly nun was there in her habit (gasp a Roman Catholic Nun in a habit...its a sign of the Apocalypse!) who spoke of Our Lord as the source and summit of her existence and that He is the constant fount of mercy at whose foot she abides. Needless to say the students got a lot of good advice from the last two, and after the meeting the priest was handing out vocational cards and waiting to talk to the students but they all went over to the seminarian and nun instead.

Thank God that Vocation Office director didn't get anyone to "sign up" based on that garbage; those kinds of people are equivalent to shady military recruiters who list the 'perks' of being a soldier - college money, housing, insurance, loans, free travel, monthly stipend, etc - without mentioning the primary purpose - 'be prepared to give up your life and take someone else's life for your country when ordered' .. if that's not for you, the rest will not remove the misery! And you'll probably be out of there faster than you got in!