Ask the Roman Catholic -- All kinds of qu

Open-minded or no, Checco, you have displayed a remarkably unscholarly disdain for something you obviously know very little about. To criticize religion--and especially religious institutions--you need not adhere to the faith they expound; you do, however, need to understand that faith, as well as the context in which it is understood by its adherents. If I were Janus, I wouldn't even bother responding to your infantile--and frankly quite dull--attempts to satirize Christianity; after all, proper satire requires some understanding of the subject being discussed. I'm afraid lobbing accusations of medievalism just doesn't cut it. Alas, Janus--as we all know--has more patience than I, so he may keep administering this intellectual drubbing a bit longer.

-Akolouthos

Addendum: Here's a thought. Perhaps you could explain, in your own words, the theological underpinnings of the all-male priesthood among traditionalist Christians. If you could do so sans sarcasm, it might prove a profitable exercise.

Edited by Akolouthos - 04-Nov-2007 at 19:54

hugoestr,

I'm not so sure he is just aiming at Roman Catholicism. After all, he did note that he finds all religions "coercive, selfish, and flat-out misguided."

As for the theological foundations of the role of gender in the priesthood, Janus has already briefly addressed the issue, and in lieu of any sophisticated critique of his intitial statement, cannot be expected to explain it any further. We need not fear; I trust that Checco will be able to dazzle us with a full explanation of the Roman position soon enough. For the record, while I feel Roman theological and ecclesiological positions tend to lack subtlety, I do not feel that they lack sophistication. Depending upon the level of depth in which you wish to examine any one point of doctrine, Roman theology is actually quite intricate.

With regard to whether or not women should be permitted to enter the priesthood, we must take theological arguments into account before practical arguments; after all, we must seek to conform our lives to the ideal, not to conform the ideal to our lives. The question can certainly be examined in a fresh light, but it is imperative that we do so responsibly. Unfortunately, some of the more radical advocates of the ordination of women to the presbyterate have already given the whole ideological position a bad name. There does need to be a discussion, but we must consider the question in the context of the history of tradition. The perspective of the Orthodox and Catholic Churches on gender are not as simplistic as they are often portrayed. In the East there has been an effort to revive the female diaconate, which, though it never was abolished, fell out sometime around the turn of the first millenium.

Oh, and among the many things that have contributed to the destruction of the Anglican Communion, it is hard to pick one that stands out.

-Akolouthos

Edited by Akolouthos - 04-Nov-2007 at 21:03

Edited by Akolouthos - 05-Nov-2007 at 06:37

Aye. On that we can definitely agree. Am I to understand by your post that you do not intend to keep me company all night? Poor form.

Edited by Akolouthos - 05-Nov-2007 at 06:52

Leaving god out of the discussion... and to adopt a sociological perspective; the family unit is a social convention. Mormons of the time of Joseph Smith saw polygamy as a "divine" convention... is there "divine" the same as yours? Divinity implies subjectivity, from the sociological perspective. Ancient Meso-Americans viewed human sacrifice as divine... does that match up? Not quite. As I persist in stating, "divinity" implies subjectivity.

Repressing the natural tendencies does not seperate us from beasts because biologically we are mammals, of the genus primate, of the family mammalia of the kingdom animal. The "seperates us from the beast" argument doesn't quite hold up, in light of the fact we're animals. Likewise, to suggest humanity as only pertaining to individuals living in a "modern" or European-normatized society implies classism, racism, and Euro (Greco-Roman-heirs, specifically)-centrism. There are plenty of non-European societies that didn't practice "divinely" inspired family unions... are they, therefore, sinners?

In regards to abortion; a tricky subject in any debate- having had one "myself (obviously, I didn't have it myself, but a girl I impregnated did)," I respect a woman's right to choose whether or not a single night would dictate the rest of her future life. Call it murder if you want. Hell, I'll even call it that too. Call it whatever you'd like; but it wasn't my body that was impregnated, and, ergo, the choice of what to make of that was not mine; I deferred to her. And I fully support her, and any other woman in her position. To call it an "unforgivable sin" is to imply that you can read the mind of a supposedly omniscient being; quite a mighty accomplishment for a single human institution.

The Bosom of Abraham (a supposed boon to the non-believers) only makes the concession that followers of Arahamic faiths can gain entrance to heaven, if I recall correctly, and only at 'the end of days' after however many years in Purgatory (good thing they finally got rid of that, btw), and only after embracing christ before the final judgment. Not terribly understanding of non-Catholic beliefs, in my opinion.

Thomas Aquinas; wonderful mind. 13th century. etc. I believe I've made my position known here. We don't live in the middle ages. Newer thinkers with more relevant ideas have hopefully stepped forward to pick up the slack. Godel I don't know. Can you give me links or sources so I can research the subject further? I agree, the Big Bang is equally suspect. I don't understand the math behind it (nor can many people fully claim to), and as far as I know, no one was actually there at the beginning of the universe to tell us what actually happened; but it makes Genesis equally suspect of fraud.

Recently, the Church has been acting globally in a responsible manner, certain Muhammed-related incendiary comments excepted (or quoting Crusade literature), but the fact of the matter is that the contemporary Church remains a repressive society. What the hell is "heresy" anyway? "Sh*t the Church don't believe in"? The practicers of Liberation theology include Bishops and Deacons and higher... but the pope doesn't like it, and thus it's heresy. How enlightened.
Heresy is another of those ideas I'd have hoped we left behind in the medieval period. How dare other people have conflicting viewpoints?

better to live free on earth than a slave to heaven,
BJC




Edited by Brian J Checco - 05-Nov-2007 at 07:59

Hi all,

I was writing my last post with toddlers jumping on my lap yesterday so I was not able to explain myself as much as I wanted.

When I said that the argument of Checco wasn't sophisticated, what was I trying to get at was that the Roman Church has a series of easy targets and all what critics have to do is to point at them. If the Roman Church didn't insist on making bad arguments, it it wouldn't be so easy o make an effective attack on them with so little effort.

The Roman Church may have some elaborate theological argument to support what are unsupportable positions, but my feeling is that the theological arguments dress up what were in fact just custom or pragmatic decisions from the past.

So the biggest enemy of the Roman Church is the Roman Church itself. And it mostly comes from an institutional inability to change a position once it has been made. Reams and reams of apologetics are created to support unsupportable positions.

And it isn't eve that the Roman Church won't change their positions; they do it all the time. It is that they insist on defending really bad ones with little strong arguments of evidence. Pope infallibility anyone?

Again, my criticism is that the Roman Church adopts bad policies that makes it easy to defeat.

I must admit, it seems you all have more theological training, and more of a grasp of the specifics of individual Vatican councils and what not, but I'm beginning to wonder whether this is more about the certain semantics behind isolated policies, or the overwhelmingly stagnant way in which the Church dogma presents itself to the non-Catholic world...
Most of these things take place, but are not particularly noted by anybody other than hardcore Catholics; wile it reinforces their belief that the 'true faith (as they see it)' is adapting itself and coming into line with the modern world- however, I'm half convinced that if this were in fact the case, and the Church was indeed the institution that it portrays itself to be to Catholics, that people of other faiths would be more apt to noticing this as well. As it stands, it seems doctrinal changes come few and far between, and are generally not alluring enough to lure people (ex-Catholics, and the non-practicing 'Catholic' demographic) back into the Church, let alone convince and convert non-Catholic members. Overwhelmingly, Church attendance in America has been on a downhill slope for 50 years or so, and those numbers are even more dramatic worldwide, with many Europeans adopting secularism as their 'religion,' and the Churches isolation of a million or so Catholic practitioners of Liberation Theology in Brazil (country home to the most Catholics worldwide; sorta like Indonesia is for Islam). In effect, to agree with hugoestr, the Roman Churches greatest enemy is its own unwillingness to change and adapt, and this may well lead it to being a thing of the past after a few more centuries; and I agree that if this is the case, and that it refuses to change some of it's more dogmatic ideals, that it will largely be the instrument of it's own demise. Just one more of those ancient, extinct sects, that people will argue semantics about in a 24th century incarnation of AllEmpires.
Cheers.

Hi, Janus,

Before going on, let me make a public statement that you have done a great job representing what is more or less the official positions of the Church in this thread.

Furthermore, I like reading your posts on any topic, and I was very happy that you were able to come back I say this because these kinds of conversations often end up hurting friendly interactions even when they weren't meant to do so. These shouldn't be taken personally, but they often do, inadvertently. I want to let you know that at least from my part I don't have any ill feelings or malice towards you or your position. To me most of the discussion is purely intellectual .

Also, sorry for missing your sarcasm. I haven't slept right recently, so I missed it Mea culpa.

I read a few years ago the document that condemned liberation theology. It seemed that they condemned the whole thing, on the basis that one shouldn't be using Marxisism as theology. It was written by Pope Ratzinger.

By this I am not saying that the Roman Church gave up on social justice. The document made it clear that social justice was a keen interest of the church. But liberation theology, as a movement, was condemned, as far as I understand it. I could be wrong though.

I do disagree with your position on living under dictatorships. Having lived through one real one and living through a quasi one right now, I will add that it is not easy or pleasant. Furthermore, if the church refuses to take the side of the poor, the church ends up endorsing the terrible regimes. Unfortunately the Roman church seems to have had a bad track record on this in Latin America.

To be fair, many of the leading human rights champions have been priest in Latin America as well. Most of them happened to be the liberation theology crowd.

As for the points that they refuse to change, here is the list of the most important ones:

* Married priests
* Female priests
* Allowing contraception
* inflexible position on abortion

Of all these, the position on abortion is the most legitimate since it is a truly complex issue. I believe that the church as taken a rather simplistic scientific position, but it is a fair one.

Contraception has been a fiasco for the church. The doctrine of life beginning on conception followed by the idea that any prevention is wrong has lead to many people to leave the church. It is nice for childless men to say that we should have as many children as possible, but as many devout Catholics have told me, the Vatican won't pay the bill on raising them. But these positions are not as bad for the church as the priests ones.

The church doesn't have enough priests, so Latin America has become an easy target for evangelicals, who often have small intimate churches. Evangelicals have done a steady job at converting people, a few of them at a time.

They need more people. However, the celibacy requirement and the no females allowed rule reduces the number of potential priests.

The theological underpinnings for the priest arguments are very weak. The reality is that they are not comfortable with the changes.

Either one of the changes would rescue the Church big time. I know several Catholics who were seminarians who didn't become priests because they fell in love and got married before becoming priests. They tend to be active in the church nevertheless. Make them priests, and you suddenly have more religious pastors.

The same with women. If the Eastern Church can have female deacons, why not the Roman Church? They wouldn't be full blown priests, but they could take care of many of the parish ministries.

Deacons in general would be great for the Church, but I ignore why they don't use them as much as they could. From what I understand they currently can be married if they are male, but I haven't met one in real life.

P.S. Let's focus on the priests issues rather than abortion and conception since they have been discussed before in other threads.

Catholic church does not support and condemns the use of birth control, in any form.

Originally posted by hugoestr As for the points that they refuse to change, here is the list of the most important ones: * Married priests * Female priests * Allowing contraception * inflexible position on abortion