Pope Francis removes from Vatican doctrine office archbishop who is believed to have banned same-sex

[1213]

Since you wrote "Brave pope, seems to fear gay community, but not God...", then you have assumed as such, so no song & dance on your part changes that. For you to even make a statement like that is blatantly unethical. If you "don't know what was in his head" then you wouldn't have written what you did. It is never moral to assume the worse in a person.

That would mean Pope is not speaking on what is in his mind. I think that would be assuming the worse in the person.

 

[Glaurung]

It very much does, as Catholic theology is not static. When Vatican II came about, many Catholics were terribly angry. including one of my neighbors. And it just wasn't the changes we saw at mass that changed.

Thus, it wasn't just the change there that was quite dynamic as the lessons from the Holocaust led to changes, especially to end the demonization of the Jewish people that had existed and been perpetrated for centuries. Ever sense we have had popes that had been very cooperative without being condescending, not only towards Jews but also Muslims and others. We no longer judge them, which was done a lot before!

There are many other changes that have taken place, such as with a more recent change in the Catechism whereas now capital punishment is no longer justifiable and also Pope Francis' encyclical on climate change.

And we also need to remember that the "good old days" really weren't so good at times, so the Church has made adjustments and will continue to do so.

None of this is relevant. The question Metis is simple. Do you believe the Church has the authority to renounce its teaching on the intrinsic sinfulness of sodomy? My answer is an obvious no. Not because I deny any room for development or rearticulation of teaching depending on the needs of the times, but because to change the teaching here would be to deny not only the clear witness of Scripture itself but also the clear witness of two-thousand years of Christian moral teaching. Which is that sexual acts disconnected from their proper end (telos) are sinful and unrepentant sexual sin disqualifies a person from salvation.

Catholicism has a pillar that makes it unique.
That is free will.
And a consequence of free will is that not all sins are equal.

So therefore...I was raised Catholic and my catechist taught me that in God's eyes there are amendable sins and not amendable sins.

What two homosexuals do in the privacy of their own bedroom is nothing compared to what certain bankers do.
Certain bankers destroy countries, destroy families, led people to commit suicide.

All this focusing on something which is the speck of dust compared to the log in some people's eyes...is not that Catholic-like imho.

It is untrue that sexual sin is less serious than the others it is more fashionable to condemn. Indeed the tradition singles out sodomy in particular as being among the four worst sins. The other three being murder, fraud and the oppression of the poor. The only reason we deny the seriousness of sexual sin is because sexual sin has been normalized in the culture.

What is obvious is that your church has always believed in improvement. It should never have claimed indefectibility I think and that this claim to perfect knowledge or speech was corruption. Its not needed in a revealed religion. NT writings say things like "We have this treasure in vessels of clay." If it was held in vessels of gold that would be different.

Indefectibility is the promise made in Scripture that the true Christian Church will never fall nor fail in its teaching, because there is a real truth God desires man to know. Unfortunately, due to sin, many if not most people will reject the truth either in part or in whole. This is especially true today as the modern culture has enshrined sexual sin as the supreme good of human life.

Fortunately private revelations do not belong to the deposit of faith and Catholics nor required to believe them.

Never said they were. And you will notice the conditionals I used when mentioning Sister Lucia betrays a level of skepticism I hold for private revelations in general.

I think what you yearn for is the return of an exclusive Church and are unable to accept the Church as inclusive to those you think unacceptable to ever be members of the Kingdom. One either believes the Holy Spirit is a reality in guiding the Church through the centuries or just something to drag out when you agree. The Church is sanctified and guaranteed by God.

If the Church were to renounce its teachings on sexual ethics it would show false any claim to being guided and guaranteed by God. God does not contradict himself. The issue is not what God has revealed on this question. If you accept Scripture it is clear what God has revealed about it. It is simply that we do not like what God has revealed and as a consequence the modern culture has campaigned to not only deny it in secular life but to have even the Church itself deny it. If the Church is guaranteed by God then its teaching on the issue will never change because the truth cannot change.

 

[Estro Felino]

It is untrue that sexual sin is less serious than the others it is more fashionable to condemn. Indeed the tradition singles out sodomy in particular as being among the four worst sins. The other three being murder, fraud and the oppression of the poor. The only reason we deny the seriousness of sexual sin is because sexual sin has been normalized in the culture.

I am sorry to disappoint you but any Catholic priest will tell you that sexual sins are called venial sins (or sins of the flesh) and they are much less serious than murder, treason, fraud.
Murder is the gravest sin because it is not amendable.
Because a life cannot be recuperated.

I am sorry...these are the basics of Catechism.
I would appreciate if you spoke about Catechism and if you showed the evidence that back your claims.


A last question.
Two situations
A) Two men love each other. They are loyal to each other. They are in a very romantic relationship.

B) A man and a woman are married since 20 years. They are bored ...so they have decided to do very naughty things. Swinging....
That is they meet another couple, and they switch partners. Heterosexual sex only.

So are you implying that B is less sinful than A because it deals with heterosexual sex?

 

[Glaurung]

I am sorry to disappoint you but any Catholic priest will tell you that sexual sins are called venial sins (or sins of the flesh) and they are much less serious than murder, treason, fraud.

The claim that sins of the flesh have only ever been seen as venial is not true. Sexual sins are mortal. Saint Paul himself states as much in Corinthians. Now it is trivially true that some sins are more serious than others. Even sexual sins vary in seriousness. But it would be a poor defense to stand before Our Lord in judgement and claim that you deserve to have your sins overlooked because you managed to get though life without murdering anyone.

I am sorry...these are the basics of Catechism.
I would appreciate of you spoke about Catechism and if you showed the evidence that back your claims.

Lust
2351 Lust is disordered desire for or inordinate enjoyment of sexual pleasure. Sexual pleasure is morally disordered when sought for itself, isolated from its procreative and unitive purposes.

Masturbation​

2352 By masturbation is to be understood the deliberate stimulation of the genital organs in order to derive sexual pleasure. "Both the Magisterium of the Church, in the course of a constant tradition, and the moral sense of the faithful have been in no doubt and have firmly maintained that masturbation is an intrinsically and gravely disordered action." "The deliberate use of the sexual faculty, for whatever reason, outside of marriage is essentially contrary to its purpose." For here sexual pleasure is sought outside of "the sexual relationship which is demanded by the moral order and in which the total meaning of mutual self-giving and human procreation in the context of true love is achieved."

Fornication
2353 Fornication is carnal union between an unmarried man and an unmarried woman. It is gravely contrary to the dignity of persons and of human sexuality which is naturally ordered to the good of spouses and the generation and education of children. Moreover, it is a grave scandal when there is corruption of the young.

Pornography
2354 Pornography consists in removing real or simulated sexual acts from the intimacy of the partners, in order to display them deliberately to third parties. It offends against chastity because it perverts the conjugal act, the intimate giving of spouses to each other. It does grave injury to the dignity of its participants (actors, vendors, the public), since each one becomes an object of base pleasure and illicit profit for others. It immerses all who are involved in the illusion of a fantasy world. It is a grave offense. Civil authorities should prevent the production and distribution of pornographic materials.

Prostitution
2355 Prostitution does injury to the dignity of the person who engages in it, reducing the person to an instrument of sexual pleasure. The one who pays sins gravely against himself: he violates the chastity to which his Baptism pledged him and defiles his body, the temple of the Holy Spirit. Prostitution is a social scourge. It usually involves women, but also men, children, and adolescents (The latter two cases involve the added sin of scandal.). While it is always gravely sinful to engage in prostitution, the imputability of the offense can be attenuated by destitution, blackmail, or social pressure.

Rape
2356 Rape is the forcible violation of the sexual intimacy of another person. It does injury to justice and charity. Rape deeply wounds the respect, freedom, and physical and moral integrity to which every person has a right. It causes grave damage that can mark the victim for life. It is always an intrinsically evil act. Graver still is the rape of children committed by parents (incest) or those responsible for the education of the children entrusted to them.

Homosexuality​

2357 Homosexuality refers to relations between men or between women who experience an exclusive or predominant sexual attraction toward persons of the same sex. It has taken a great variety of forms through the centuries and in different cultures. Its psychological genesis remains largely unexplained. Basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity, tradition has always declared that "homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered. "They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved.

Catechism of the Catholic Church - PART 3 SECTION 2 CHAPTER 2 ARTICLE 6​

*I would have put it all under a spoiler for neatness' sake, but for some reason every attempt to do so results in multiple spoilers strewn across the post. The formatting is behaving weirdly.

I could of course highlight phrases such as intrinsically evil, intrinsically disordered, grave, gravely immoral and scandalous as language indicating the Church sees the above 'Offenses against Chastity' as mortal. But it will not make a difference if you are going to be obtuse and claim that such language does not imply mortal sin.

 

[Estro Felino]

@Musing Bassist
You havent replied to my question yet.
This is a concrete situation. Not theory.


A question.
Two situations
A) Two men love each other. They are loyal to each other. They are in a very romantic relationship.

B) A man and a woman are married since 20 years. They are bored ...so they have decided to do very naughty things. Swinging....
That is they meet another couple, and they switch partners. Heterosexual sex only.

So are you implying that B is less sinful than A because it deals with heterosexual sex?

 

[Glaurung]

You havent replied to my question yet.

Be patient. I only noticed your edit after I posted my previous reply to you.

So are you implying that B is less sinful than A because it deals with heterosexual sex?

In a certain sense yes. Again look at the catechism in regards to homosexuality. It states that Scripture condemns same-sex acts as being particularity depraved. The Church teaches that such acts are not in accordance with the final end (the telos) of the sexual act; the good of spouses and the procreation of children. That is not to say swinging is not a severe sin in its own right as adultery offends against marriage directly. So whether or not it is worse (in aggregate) than acts that occur between two people in a committed same-sex relationship is a rather moot question. That would be for God to judge. In any case, both are mortal.

 

[Estro Felino]

Be patient. I only noticed your edit after I posted my previous reply to you.


In a certain sense yes. Again look at the catechism in regards to homosexuality. It states that Scripture condemns same-sex acts as being particularity depraved. The Church teaches that such acts are not in accordance with the final end (the telos) of the sexual act; the good of spouses and the procreation of children. That is not to say swinging is not a severe sin in its own right as adultery offends against marriage directly. So whether or not it is worse (in aggregate) than acts that occur between two people in a committed same-sex relationship is a rather moot question. That would be for God to judge. In any case, both are mortal.

I am sorry ...this is not the Catholicism I was brought up with.
In the situation A) there is a romantic relationship. Two people who really love each other. Who make love out of love.

In the situation B) there is no love. Only genital pleasure. There are just piglets who have turned their conjugal home into a pigsty.

I do not feel like a Catholic, if there is this confusion between sex and lust, inside the doctrine.

 

[pearl]

If the Church is guaranteed by God then its teaching on the issue will never change because the truth cannot change.

It's not a question of change. Revelation is closed, but our, including Catholic, understanding of it is never closed off. The present teaching on the issue has not changed the church's position on the sacrament of marriage within the Church but is pastoral. Jesus would never say 'go away from me' to a gay person.
The space he (Pope Francis) has carved out, then, includes the pastoral care of L.G.B.T. people in the church and the acceptance of same-sex couples in the social sphere, bordered by the rules on sacramental marriage and his position on “gender ideology.”
Francis’ encouragement to reach out pastorally not simply to L.G.B.T. individuals but, as he said to the Slovakian Jesuits, “homosexual couples,” also stands in contrast to the practice of many institutions in the United States, often with the encouragement of local bishops, to fire employees who are in same-sex marriages. Firing people, depriving them of their livelihood and removing them from often long-standing positions within their communities, is the opposite of “pastoral care.”
Pope Francis is making space for LGBT people in the church—with limits. And it’s a huge step forward. | America Magazine

Contrast that approach with Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI’s recent description of same-sex marriage as a “distortion of conscience” and Benedict’s comment in 2012 that it “threatens the future of humanity itself.”

 

[metis]

None of this is relevant.

I don't agree for reasons already expressed, plus that a static "ship" would never be able to handle changing conditions.

The Church has changed over its almost 2000-year existence, thus it will continue to change as time goes forth. OTOH, what is important is that the Church should not throw the baby out with the bathwater, thus some things should never change, imo, especially the basic teachings of Jesus and the Twelve. Councils, ex cathedra teachings, and encyclicals have brought about changes, and rightfully so, imo.

 

[Glaurung]

It's not a question of change. Revelation is closed, but our, including Catholic, understanding of it is never closed off.

My contention is that the sinfulness of same-sex acts is in divine revelation. Thus it cannot change. There is no 'new' way to understand an explicit Scriptural prohibition.

Sure, those who struggle with a homosexual inclination deserve to be treated with the same respect and dignity as everyone else, but compassion for people's feelings is not license to ignore the divinely revealed moral law. Which is that certain sexual acts are intrinsically sinful by their object. And this applies to heterosexuals too. Marriage is no more a license to misuse the sexual faculty than is the claim that your sexual inclinations are an intrinsic aspect of your personal identity.

The Church has changed over its almost 2000-year existence, thus it will continue to change as time goes forth. OTOH, what is important is that the Church should not throw the baby out with the bathwater, thus some things should never change, imo, especially the basic teachings of Jesus and the Twelve. Councils, ex cathedra teachings, and encyclicals have brought about changes, and rightfully so, imo.

Answer the question. Do you believe our times are so fundamentally different that God no longer expects human beings to follow the natural law in regards to sexuality? Do you believe a reversal of Catholic teaching on this issue is the will of the Holy Spirit?

 

[Kelly of the Phoenix]

That is simply not true Homosexuality was looked down on by all religions and society a mere 20 30 years ago. Every other church that exist and society did the same thing or do you deny that.

All religions?

 

[pearl]

My contention is that the sinfulness of same-sex acts is in divine revelation. Thus it cannot change. There is no 'new' way to understand an explicit Scriptural prohibition.

And the human authors who wrote knew nothing of any sexual orientation, only understood as deliberate perversion.

Understanding Scripture with the Church
66 "The Christian economy, therefore, since it is the new and definitive Covenant, will never pass away; and no new public revelation is to be expected before the glorious manifestation of our Lord Jesus Christ."28 Yet even if Revelation is already complete, it has not been made completely explicit; it remains for Christian faith gradually to grasp its full significance over the course of the centuries.

109 In Sacred Scripture, God speaks to man in a human way. To interpret Scripture correctly, the reader must be attentive to what the human authors truly wanted to affirm, and to what God wanted to reveal to us by their words.75

110 In order to discover the sacred authors' intention, the reader must take into account the conditions of their time and culture, the literary genres in use at that time, and the modes of feeling, speaking and narrating then current. "For the fact is that truth is differently presented and expressed in the various types of historical writing, in prophetical and poetical texts, and in other forms of literary expression."76

- "through the contemplation and study of believers who ponder these things in their hearts";57 it is in particular "theological research [which] deepens knowledge of revealed truth".58 CCC

 

[metis]

My contention is that the sinfulness of same-sex acts is in divine revelation. Thus it cannot change. There is no 'new' way to understand an explicit Scriptural prohibition.

The are already changes that have taken place in regards to how we may view homosexuality and treat those who are. Whether this will lead towards other changes is too early to tell.

Answer the question. Do you believe our times are so fundamentally different that God no longer expects human beings to follow the natural law in regards to sexuality? Do you believe a reversal of Catholic teaching on this issue is the will of the Holy Spirit?

I cannot speak for the Holy Spirit, plus the HS is not an encyclopedia that answers all questions.

My final point is that we now know that homosexuality is largely genetically driven [hormonal], thus it begs the question that if one believe God made us all, why did He make some homosexually inclined if it's morally wrong?

 

[Kelly of the Phoenix]

I think the real heresy gripping the Church these days (gripping both clerics and laity) is the idea that one can compromise between the world and God. Not so I say. Christ was clear. The world is his enemy. Either Catholicism is false and it will compromise and therefore defect or Catholicism is true and secular modernity will become a historical footnote. (Or Christ will come and end the world).

So slavery is still moral? Abortion? Genocide? Pedophilia? These things are clearly not wrong in the Bible except for when it happens to the authors. If the religion can’t change, why not be Jewish?

 

[Kelly of the Phoenix]

So, please tell us how exactly you know what's in the Pope's head? Do you think God hates gays? Do you think Jesus hated Gays? If we all are ultimately made by God, do you think that God makes junk? Do you hate gays?

Yeah pretty sure there was this scene where God specifically called out Pete for daring to call His creations unclean.

 

[Kelly of the Phoenix]

None of this is relevant. The question Metis is simple. Do you believe the Church has the authority to renounce its teaching on the intrinsic sinfulness of sodomy? My answer is an obvious no. Not because I deny any room for development or rearticulation of teaching depending on the needs of the times, but because to change the teaching here would be to deny not only the clear witness of Scripture itself but also the clear witness of two-thousand years of Christian moral teaching. Which is that sexual acts disconnected from their proper end (telos) are sinful and unrepentant sexual sin disqualifies a person from salvation.



It is untrue that sexual sin is less serious than the others it is more fashionable to condemn. Indeed the tradition singles out sodomy in particular as being among the four worst sins. The other three being murder, fraud and the oppression of the poor. The only reason we deny the seriousness of sexual sin is because sexual sin has been normalized in the culture.


Indefectibility is the promise made in Scripture that the true Christian Church will never fall nor fail in its teaching, because there is a real truth God desires man to know. Unfortunately, due to sin, many if not most people will reject the truth either in part or in whole. This is especially true today as the modern culture has enshrined sexual sin as the supreme good of human life.


Never said they were. And you will notice the conditionals I used when mentioning Sister Lucia betrays a level of skepticism I hold for private revelations in general.


If the Church were to renounce its teachings on sexual ethics it would show false any claim to being guided and guaranteed by God. God does not contradict himself. The issue is not what God has revealed on this question. If you accept Scripture it is clear what God has revealed about it. It is simply that we do not like what God has revealed and as a consequence the modern culture has campaigned to not only deny it in secular life but to have even the Church itself deny it. If the Church is guaranteed by God then its teaching on the issue will never change because the truth cannot change.

Not sure why you seem so eager to prevent people from going to heaven. Anyway, in terms of authority figures lying to people about God’s will, welcome to life. Also also, sexual sins have not been normalized. We just realized some sins are petty. Or do you execute people for wearing mixed fabrics?

 

[Glaurung]

And the human authors who wrote knew nothing of any sexual orientation, only understood as deliberate perversion.

Sexual orientation is a nineteenth century abstraction, not a fundamental truth by which we must understand the morality of our sexual actions. Which in the Christian tradition is the natural law. The teaching is that the good of spouses and the openness to the procreation of new human life are intrinsic to a morally licit sexual act.

Sexual perversity then is the divorce between a sexual act and the final end of the sexual faculty. The more divorced from the final end the more perverse the act. Which is why I would argue that using pornography is actually worse a sin than simple fornication. As at least with fornication you're using the sexual faculty as (at least partially) intended.

If you don't accept some notion of the natural law the notion of sexual perversity ceases to make sense. Which is why the culture has become ever more permissive. The prevailing moral logic can only deconstruct taboos and thus we will see a continued push to normalize nearly every manifestation of sexual behavior. As we abandon Christianity we slick back into the pagan barbarity of antiquity.

My final point is that we now know that homosexuality is largely genetically driven [hormonal], thus it begs the question that if one believe God made us all, why did He make some homosexually inclined if it's morally wrong?

Why are we inclined to sin sexually at all if God intended the sexual act to exist within relation to a specific end?

Because mankind has lost original justice and must therefore struggle with his fallen nature.

But it must surely be within the divine power to remove concupiscence? Yes, yet God has kept human weakness in place because the struggle is meritorious. He even allows demons to tempt us (as if our fallen natures weren't enough) so clearly it is the divine will that we struggle with sin. All we are promised is the grace to move towards sanctification if we but cooperate.

 

[pearl]

Sexual orientation is a nineteenth century abstraction, not a fundamental truth by which we must understand the morality of our sexual actions. Which in the Christian tradition is the natural law. The teaching is that the good of spouses and the openness to the procreation of new human life are intrinsic to a morally licit sexual act.

And the teaching has not changed, marriage must be open to procreation. Nothing Francis has stated disagrees with it. What he is stating is that neither you nor I, nor the Church has the right to determine who is accepted into the Kingdom, that belongs to God alone.

 

[metis]

Which in the Christian tradition is the natural law.

IMO, "natural law" is more the result of scientific analysis versus that which was written by people thousands of years ago who would have no clue what a "hormone" is. Either we as Catholics accept established science or we're working out of a dark-age mentality.

 

[Glaurung]

And the teaching has not changed, marriage must be open to procreation. Nothing Francis has stated disagrees with it. What he is stating is that neither you nor I, nor the Church has the right to determine who is accepted into the Kingdom, that belongs to God alone.

Yet, Scripture is clear that sexual sin disqualifies a person from salvation. So, if we actually believe in this Christianity thing, then we need to be honest about what it teaches. To be told that your sexual inclinations are disordered many hurt your feelings but Our Lord never said the truth would always be to our worldly liking.

To say pope Francis accepts the teaching means nothing if that teaching comes to be denied by Church practice. To bless same-sex relationships as some German clerics are doing is to deny the teaching by act.

IMO, "natural law" is more the result of scientific analysis versus that which was written by people thousands of years ago who would have no clue what a "hormone" is. Either we as Catholics accept established science or we're working out of a dark-age mentality.

You dance around it but it is obvious you believe same-sex acts to be morally licit. That there are no ends by which human actions must be governed. Either God has changed his mind, or the Church is wrong. Either way, Catholicism is false.