Cafeterianism

[Vouthon]

Unfortunately there remain today followers of Feeney's concept of salvation.

Only as a tiny, breakaway sect known as the 'Slaves of the Immaculate Heart' that operate in Massachusetts. In January 2019, the diocese of Manchester, NH, published a clarification of the status of the Slaves and the St Benedict Center, stating that they were not approved by the diocese nor to be considered Catholic. The Feeneyites had been hoping for a reconsideration of status.

It's an American specific heresy and the 1949 Holy Office condemnation is still in force, meaning they aren't allowed to publicly label any of their materials as 'Catholic'.

The U.S. always seems to come up with the loveliest theologies doesn't it? Like Feenyism, Dominionism and Southern Baptism.

 

[joe1776]

The authority to interpret church doctrine belongs to the Church alone. Case in point a priest, Leonard Feeney, excommunicated for preaching his private interpretation of extra ecclesiam nulla salus.

Your comment is deceptive. It is true that the authority to interpret church doctrine belongs to the Church alone. It is also true that Feeney was excommunicated. But what you are calling "his private interpretation" was what the Church had been teaching for centuries before Feeny was born.

I recall Bishop Fulton Sheen back in the 1950s with a popular radio show. I read recently that Father Feeney was Sheen's choice when he needed someone to stand in for him.

 

[Vouthon]

If so called Catholics are only buying into half of the doctrine, does the belief structure still have enough left to still be Catholicism? I think if parishioners choose what doctrines they want to follow and what doctrines they do not, one may end up with some form of McCatholicism, but in my eyes, it certainly ain't Catholicism as it was intended.

Catholicism is a touch different from Protestantism.

Very few ex-Protestants refer to "lapse Protestantism" but being a 'lapse Catholic' or a nominal Catholic with a residual, cultural affiliation and set of values - not unlike Judaism, with a hint of ethnicism as well in the Irish, Filipino, Italian and other nationalities defined by a Catholic heritage - is a real phenomenon.

That said, even practising Catholics are not expected to be blind automatons. Simone Weil, one of the greatest Catholic thinkers of the 20th century (who never received water baptism), famously said in the 1930s that, "Whenever one tries to suppress doubt, there is tyranny".

 

[Vouthon]

Your comment is deceptive. It is true that the authority to interpret church doctrine belongs to the Church alone. It is also true that Feeney was excommunicated. But what you are calling "his private interpretation" was what the Church had been teaching for centuries before Feeny was born.

I recall Bishop Fulton Sheen back in the 1950s with a popular radio show. I read recently that Father Feeney was Sheen's choice when he needed someone to stand in for him.

If you believe that - "his private interpretation" was what the Church had been teaching for centuries before Feeny was born - then I take it you must have completely ignored my lengthy post explaining otherwise.

Feeney limited salvation to water baptism, which the Church demonstrably has never done. Baptism by desire, both explicit and implicit, and by blood has existed in our theology and magisterium for centuries before Feeney, indeed in some form or other since the patristics.

It's rather tiresome to be in my position, as someone who has copiously studied this particular issue, to discover that even when conclusive evidence is presented, folks still claim otherwise without justification in the sources (unless one reads Pope Eugene IV and Unam Sanctam entirely out of context with other contemporary and preceding magisterial and theological texts).

Feeney refused to recognise that his personal opinions were just that - personal opinions. Because he persisted in claiming that it was the position of the church, the Pope and Holy Office excommunicated him, revoked his right to teach theology and classed his organisation as heretical in 1949. And rightly so.

His personal opinion wasn't the issue but rather his claim that it approximated with Catholic doctrine, when it didn't. If he had simply limited himself to claiming that it was his opinion that everyone outside the RC was irredeemably damned by the simple fact they weren't water baptized, no one would have bothered with him (he'd just have been recognised as a bigot, which he was).

 

[pearl]

Well there we are - church doctrines themselves sometimes change, adding to the justification for the individual to make his own judgements in conscience.

Change would not be the correct term. What is Catholic dogma must be distinguished from a popular understanding of the same.
"The substance of the ancient doctrine of the deposit of faith is one thing, and the way it is presented is another." John XXIII. More recently the document Mysterium Ecclesiae (1973), frequently doctrine has been phrased in "the changeable conceptions of a given epoch". A doctrine may be historically conditioned and reshaped in a fuller understanding.

 

[pearl]

But what you are calling "his private interpretation" was what the Church had been teaching for centuries before Feeny was born.

It is my understanding that he was excommunicated for disobeying, 3 times, that was 'most grave and scandalous, as he refused to answer a summons to appear before the Holy Office and accused the Office of heresy. Did he not deviate form Catholic doctrine? Feeney wrote 'In the New Testament, you cannot be justified unless you want the water Jesus bequeathed us on the Mount of Olives; and you cannot be saved until that water is poured on your head!...It is not Baptism of Water, or damnation! If you do not desire that Water, you cannot be justified. And if you do not get it you cannot be saved. (Father Leonard Feeney, Bread of Life (Still River 1952) For Feeney one could be justified through Baptism of Desire, but not saved.

 

[joe1776]

If you believe that - "his private interpretation" was what the Church had been teaching for centuries before Feeny was born - then I take it you must have completely ignored my lengthy post explaining otherwise.

I think you sincerely believe what you wrote is the truth. But, in my opinion, it represents more of the same line of malarkey that the Church has been dispensing throughout its history.

At the age of seven, in 1942, a priest told me that, if I believed as a Catholic, I would go to Heaven. If not, I'd go to Hell. Protestants, he added with obvious delight, were headed for Hell. All my Catholic friends and relatives were told the same thing by different priests.

Now, if this belief was a "common misconception" as you assert, it would only have taken a brief statement by any of the popes to deny it and set the record straight. But that never happened. You still have Catholics from my era who don't realize that Vatican Two changed anything.

I think that, like humanity itself, the Catholic Church has been making moral progress over the centuries. But it can't admit it. To admit moral progress would, at the same time, require an admission of being previously wrong. And admitting moral mistakes is tantamount to admitting that you can't speak for God.

 

[Vouthon]

For Feeney one could be justified through Baptism of Desire, but not saved.

Which is precisely where his heresy lay - the heresy condemned by the church in the 16th century under the name of Jansenism - given his repeated refusal to admit that this was just his personal opinion before the tribunal.

The traditional teaching of the church holds that baptism of desire works ex opere operantis, bestowing sanctifying grace which remits of original sin, all actual sins, and the eternal punishments for sin.

As I noted earlier, in his dogmatic Bull “Unigenitus,” Pope Clement XI in 1713 condemned the proposition by the Jansenist Quesnel which falsely stated that: ‘outside the Church, no grace is granted,’ (DZ 1379). Prior to this in 1690, Pope Alexander VIII had already condemned the teaching of the Jansenist Arnauld that “Pagans, Jews, heretics, and other people of the sort, receive no inlux [of grace] whatsoever from Jesus Christ,” (DZ 1295).

Also Fr. Henry Semple, S. J., in his “Heaven Open to Souls,” (1916) referred to the rigorist doctrine denying remission of sin by a Perfect Act of Contrition outside the church as a Jansenist heresy, citing the anathema in Session 14, Ch. 4, Can. 5, (DZ 898, 915) of the Council of Trent (1545–63): “That this contrition is perfect because of charity and reconciles man to God, before this sacrament [Penance] is actually received, this reconciliation nevertheless must not be ascribed to the contrition itself without the desire of the sacrament included in it".

Baptism by desire is a de fide doctrine. There are numerous canonised saints who died without receiving water baptism. If Feeney had been right, then the church would have erred in canonising these people.

 

[Vouthon]

I think you sincerely believe what you wrote is the truth. But, in my opinion, it represents more of the same line of malarkey that the Church has been dispensing throughout its history.

If it's malarkey as you claim, then how can I source a gazillion documents from the medieval - early modern period testifying to it?

I'm not making up the doctrine of baptism by explicit or implicit desire. It's there to read and study, actually the justification for it first arose in the New Testament, at 1 John 5:7, "There are three that testify: the Spirit and the water and the blood, and these three agree".

Feenyism is the belief that baptism of blood and baptism of desire (which is a de fide doctrine of the RC), whether explicit or implicit, cannot save a person if they die before receiving actual water baptism and that justification is not sanctifying grace. That's a heresy flatly condemned by the Council of Trent in the 1500s and before that by Pope Innocent II in the 13th century.

COUNCIL OF TRENT (1545-1563)

Canons on the Sacraments in General (Canon 4):

“If anyone shall say that the sacraments of the New Law are not necessary for salvation, but are superfluous, and that although all are not necessary for every individual, without them or without the desire of them (sine eis aut eorum voto),through faith alone men obtain from God the grace of justiflcation; let him be anathema.”

Decree on Justification (Session 6, Chapter 4):

“In these words...a sinner is given as being a translation from that state in which man is born a child of the first Adam to the state of grace and of the ‘adoption of the Sons’ (Rom. 8:15) of God through the second Adam, Jesus Christ, our Savior and this translation after the promulgation of the Gospel cannot be effected except through the layer of regeneration or a desire for it, (sine lavacro regenerationis aut eius voto)”​

Or in the early 20th, long before 1942:

FR. ALOYSIA SABETTI, S.J., FR. TIMOTHEO BARRETT, S.J., Compendium Theologiae Moralis, Tractatus XII [De Baptismo, Chapter I, 1926:

Baptism, the gate and foundation of the Sacraments, in fact or at least in desire, is necessary for all unto salvation...

From the Baptism of water, which is called of river (Baptismus fluminis), is from Baptism of the Spirit (Baptismus flaminis) and Baptism of Blood, by which Baptism properly speaking can be supplied, if this be impossible. The first one is a full conversion to God through perfect contrition or charity, in so far as it contains an either explicit or at least implicit will... Baptism of Spirit (flaminis) and Baptism of Blood are called Baptism of desire (in voto).​

21. FR. EDUARDUS GENICOT, S., Theologiae Moralis Institutiones (Vol. II), Tractatus XII, 1902

Baptism of the Spirit (flaminis) consists in an act of perfect charity or contrition, with which there is always an infusion of sanctifying grace connected...

Both are called “of desire” (in voto)...; perfect charity, because it has always connected the desire, at least the implicit one, of receiving this sacrament, absolutely necessary for salvation.​

At the age of seven, in 1942, a priest told me that, if I believed as a Catholic, I would go to Heaven. If not, I'd go to Hell. Protestants, he added with obvious delight, were headed for Hell. All my Catholic friends and relatives were told the same thing by different priests.

Well, he and they must have been poorly educated in their own religion (I doubt he's in a list of the top-ranking theologians of the 20th century?), because Pope St. Pius X had stated the following clearly in his 1910 Catechism:


CATECHISM OF ST

17 Q: Can the absence of Baptism be supplied in any other way?

A: The absence of Baptism can be supplied by martyrdom, which is called Baptism of Blood, or by an act of perfect love of God, or of contrition, along with the desire, at least implicit, of Baptism, and this is called Baptism of Desire.

29 Q. But if a man through no fault of his own is outside the Church, can he be saved?

A. If he is outside the Church through no fault of his, that is, if he is in good faith, and if he has received Baptism, or at least has the implicit desire of Baptism; and if, moreover, he sincerely seeks the truth and does God's will as best he can such a man is indeed separated from the body of the Church, but is united to the soul of the Church and consequently is on the way of salvation...

He who finds himself outside without fault of his own [therefore], and who lives a good life, can be saved by the love called charity, which unites unto God, and in a spiritual way also to the Church, that is, to the soul of the Church.
​

In the exact same year as this particular priest spoke with you in 1942, there were two very learned priests who held an American Catholic talk show on radio by the name of Rumble and Carty. They stated in response to this very question:

179. Would a good and practicing Jew go to heaven, despite his not being baptized a Christian?

Yes, provided through no fault of his own he did not at any time advert to the truth of Christianity, and to the necessity of actual baptism; and provided he sincerely believed Judaism to be still the true religion, and died truly repentant of all serious violations of conscience during life.

Source: Radio Replies, third volume, by Fathers Rumble and Carty, Radio Replies Press, St. Paul 1, Minn., U.S.A., copyright 1942, page 43.
​

1942. Same year. Humbly, I would suggest that your priest wasn't following the party line and had no justification for teaching heresy to a minor, if he was consciously aware of doing so. Perhaps he was a Jansenist or Feeneyite, or perhaps he just hadn't studied theology to the degree he should have. It's not surprising that such views were brought into line by 1949 in the U.S. Clearly, it had been a pervasive heresy in America, perhaps due to the fundamentalist culture.

If he had published those views in an official document, he might have pipped Fr. Feeney to excommunication by a few years.

Now, if this belief was a "common misconception" as you assert, it would only have taken a brief statement by any of the popes to deny it and set the record straight. But that has never happened. Not ever.

Yes it did, first when the Jansenists were condemned in 1690 and 1713 (as quoted in a prior post of mine), then by Pope Pius IX in 1854 and 1863, and then again by Pope Pius XII in 1949 over the Feeney debacle. That's a consistent papal line over the course of three centuries and a long time before Vatican II.

For the Pius IX statements in the mid-nineteenth century, see:

POPE PIUS IX (1846-1878) — Singulari Quadam, 1854:

174. “It must likewise be held as certain that those who are affected by ignorance of the true religion, if it is invincible ignorance, are not subject to any guilt in this matter before the eyes of the Lord. Now, then, who could presume in himself an ability to set the boundaries of such ignorance, taking into consideration the natural differences of peoples, lands, native talents, and so many other factors? Only when we have been released from the bonds of this body and see God just as He is (see John 3:2) all we really understand how close and beautiful a bond joins divine mercy with divine justice.”

Quanto Conficiamur Moerore (1863):

“...We all know that those who are afflicted with invincible ignorance with regard to our holy religion, if they carefully keep the precepts of the natural law that have been written by God in the hearts of men, if they are prepare to obey God, and if they lead a virtuous and dutiful life, can attain eternal life by the power of divine light and grace.”​

I think that, like humanity itself, the Catholic Church has been making moral progress over the centuries. But it can't admit it. To admit moral progress would, at the same time, require an admission of being previously wrong. And admitting mistakes is tantamount to admitting that you can't speak for God.

The church has admitted and apologised for many misdemeanours, including its connivance in witch trials, paedophile cover-ups and the Spanish Inquisition. We also believe in the progressive development of doctrine, which St. Bonaventure wrote treatises on in the 13th century.

But it shouldn't have to apologise for something it never actually taught as doctrine.

 

[joe1776]

If it's malarkey as you claim, then how can I source a gazillion documents from the medieval - early modern period testifying to it?

Cherry-picking and selective translation and interpretation of old documents is commonplace in religious debate.

You need to understand that you are trying to deny a Church position that was common knowledge in my lifetime. Catholics believed it and non-Catholics resented them for it. Because of my Italian surname, and the assumption that I was Catholic long after I left the faith, I often felt prejudice from the mostly Protestant world I lived in; this prejudice centered on the arrogant boast that only Catholics would go to Heaven.

If this was a "common misconception" as you claim. Why was it never denied until Vatican Two? Any pope, in any century, along the way could have said simply "No, that's not true. That's not what we believe." I think the current pope is that first to take the position clearly and in public statements.

The church has admitted and apologised for many misdemeanours, including its connivance in witch trials, paedophile cover-ups and the Spanish Inquisition.

Pope John Paul II made more than 100 public apologies for prior sins of the Church during his reign. The reason he had so many is that the Church had never before admitted to wrongdoing.

As for admitting to the pedophile cover-ups, that only happened when the cover-ups could no longer be covered up. That's hardly a sign of high moral character.

 

[Vouthon]

You need to understand that you are trying to deny a Church position that was common knowledge in my lifetime. Catholics believed it and non-Catholics resented them for it. Because of my Italian surname, and the assumption that I was Catholic long after I left the faith, I often felt prejudice from the mostly Protestant world I lived in; this prejudice centered on the arrogant boast that only Catholics would go to Heaven.

If this was a "common misconception" as you claim. Why was it never denied until Vatican Two? Any pope, in any century, along the way could have said simply "No, that's not true. That's not what we believe." I think the current pope is that first to take the position clearly and in public statements.

So, in other words, your belief that this interpretation of the doctrine told to you by a priest in 1942 (the same year I've cited competing and far more authoritative sources disputing this interpretation) is full-proof, cannot be rebutted? It doesn't matter how many documents I cite demonstrating that the Catholic Church has never restricted salvation purely to water baptism but has for centuries espoused baptism by desire, whether explicitly or implicitly, because your still going to claim otherwise without basis?

I have quoted, by my count, 16 independent attestations to baptism by desire as official church doctrine - ranging in time from Pope Innocent II in the 12th century to Pope Pius XII's Holy Office in 1949. I can certainly keep going, and as I do, your going to find it harder to call this cherry-picking in my case (which it isn't).

In response, you have addressed none of these quotations but simply fallen back on your own life experience of what you were personally taught and imbibed in the 1940s. I would ask, sincerely, that you appreciate why I do not find that persuasive as an argument. Personal anecdotes from one's childhood, important though they may be for an individual, do not trump verifiable documentation from official church sources ranging from a whole host of different time periods evidencing the development of a consistent stream of thought on an issue.

What matters is that scholarship and validated source material prove your interpretation wrong. That it was "common knowledge" in your lifetime and social milieu growing up is unfortunate, because practically all the texts I've cited range from centuries to decades before your lifetime. And they are authoritative sources from popes and accredited theologians writing under imprimaturs.

I cannot agree with you, because the evidence simply isn't in your favour. If you deal with my evidence and rebut it, then I'd be happy to respond in kind.

As for admitting to the pedophile cover-ups, that only happened when the cover-ups could no longer be covered up. That's hardly a sign of high moral character.

I never implied that it did suggest high moral character, it evidently doesn't.

My point was, rather, that the paedophile scandals were real and factual episodes that the church hierarchy was complicit in covering up, and so should have apologised for.

But they did not restrict salvation to water baptism as you imply by backing Feeney's aberrant interpretation, so they can't apologise for that, only Feeney and those of his mindset (like the Jansenists who preceded him) can apologise for that.

Your understanding of 'no salvation outside the church' ignores the doctrine of baptism by explicit or implicit desire - which has always qualified it to varying degrees - and so hugely misinterprets the teaching, by effectively caricaturing it. And this extends, yes, to anyone from whom you imbibed the same mistaken interpretation, priest or otherwise.

Nothing in the phrase 'no salvation outside the church' defines membership of the church or restricts it to formal water baptism. You yourself, and the individuals who taught this interpretation to you, made this unwarranted intellectual leap which contradicts the age-old doctrine of the salvific efficacy of baptism by blood or desire without formally receiving the actual sacrament, which was declared de fide by the Council of Trent in its session 7 anathemas and many centuries before that by a range of different popes and fathers.

If your interpretation were correct, then a number of canonised saints with officially approved cults and churches named after them, would in fact be in hell, because they never underwent formal water baptism before their deaths but received its saving grace by means of desire alone according to the church.

 

[joe1776]

So, in other words, your belief that this interpretation of the doctrine told to you by a priest in 1942 (the same year I've cited competing and far more authoritative versions of it for) is full-proof, cannot be rebutted?

You have a better chance of convincing me that pigs can fly.The Church's position in my lifetime, until Vatican Two, was as I've stated it.

It doesn't matter how many documents I cite demonstrating that the Catholic Church has never restricted salvation purely to water baptism but has for centuries espoused baptism by desire, whether explicitly or implicitly, because your still going to claim otherwise without basis?

Your arguments about baptism are irrelevant. The only issue that matters here is the bottom line: Was the Church's position prior to Vatican Two that only Catholics would go to Heaven and that Protestants, Jews and anyone else who heard and rejected the doctrine of Catholicism destined for Hell?

In response, you have addressed none of these quotations but simply fallen back on your own life experience of what you were personally taught and imbibed. I would ask, sincerely, that you appreciate why I do not find that persuasive as an argument.

I don't expect to persuade you. I make arguments in this forum hoping to persuade readers who are open-minded on the issue.

What matters is that scholarship and validated source material prove your interpretation wrong.

Scholarship? Scholarship assumes an unbiased mind. You aren't claiming to be unbiased here, are you?

That it was "common knowledge" in your lifetime is unfortunate, because practically all the texts I've cited range from centuries to decades before your lifetime. And they are authoritative sources from popes and accredited theologians writing under imprimaturs.

If you had asked me to concede at the beginning of our exchange that you could put together your "evidence." I would have so conceded.

I was amused that you offered quotations from Pope Pius IX to support your case. Not only were his statements not clear, public denials of my position, but I recall that this pope in 1866 wrote that he could find nothing in divine law to prohibit the buying, selling or trading of slaves. He was right according to the Bible but morally wrong at a time when most of the world had already abolished legal slavery.

Your understanding of 'no salvation outside the church' ignores the doctrine of baptism by explicit or implicit desire and so hugely misinterprets the teaching. And this extends, yes, to anyone from whom you imbibed the same mistaken interpretation.

I, and the citizens of the USA that I encountered in my lifetime, did not reach the conclusion that the Catholic Church taught that Heaven was reserved for Catholics by reading and interpreting Church doctrine on baptism. We got it from priests, bishops, cardinals and popes who seemed, at the time, to be on the same page.

 

[Vouthon]

You have a better chance of convincing me that pigs can fly.The Church's position in my lifetime, until Vatican Two, was as I've stated it.

And yet, numerous sources from well before your lifetime flatly contradict your stance.

Your arguments about baptism are irrelevant. The only issue that matters here is the bottom line: Was the Church's position prior to Vatican Two that only Catholics would go to Heaven and that Protestants, Jews and anyone else who heard and rejected the doctrine of Catholicism destined for Hell?

No, not on the basis of them simply being aware of the church, Christ and her teachings and being outside it, because they sincerely believe that their own religion or philosophy is the truth.

If that were true, then the Catholic Encyclopedia of 1912 (which had a nihil obstat and imprimatur) could not have published this with the church's approval:


CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: Religious Toleration

But does the proposition that outside the Church there is no salvation involve the doctrine so often attributed to Catholicism, that the Catholic Church, in virtue of this principle, "condemns and must condemn all non-Catholics"? This is by no means the case. The foolish and unchristian maxim that those who are outside the Church must for that very reason be eternally lost is no legitimate conclusion from Catholic dogma...

The gentle breathing of grace is not confined within the walls of the Catholic Church, but reaches the hearts of many who stand afar, working in them the marvel of justification and thus ensuring the eternal salvation of numberless men who either, like upright Jews and pagans, do not know the true Church, or, like so many Protestants educated in gross prejudice, cannot appreciate her true nature. To all such, the Church does not close the gate of Heaven...

In her tolerance toward the erring the Church indeed goes farther than the large catechism of Martin Luther, which on "pagans or Turks or Jews or false Christians" passes the general and stern sentence of condemnation: "wherefore they remain under eternal wrath and in everlasting damnation." Catholics who are conversant with the teachings of their Church know how to draw the proper conclusions. Absolutely unflinching in their fidelity to the Church as the sole means of salvation on earth, they will treat with respect, as ethically due, the religious convictions of others, and will see in non-Catholics, not enemies of Christ, but brethren. ​

APA citation. Pohle, J. (1912). Religious Toleration. In The Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company.

Ecclesiastical approbation. Nihil Obstat. July 1, 1912. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., Censor. Imprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York.​

I don't expect to persuade you. I make arguments in this forum hoping to persuade readers who are open-minded on the issue.

My religious confession does not prohibit me from being open-minded on this, or any other, issue. If you read my prior posts, you will find that I regard the nativity accounts in the gospels of Matthew and Luke to be unhistorical, for example. Likewise, I think it's quite evident that Jesus had brothers and sisters, such that the Catholic doctrine of Mary's perpetual virginity is a much later tradition.

I am not immune to critically analysing my own religion but rather invite it.

But on this, I have engaged in far too much analysis of the question and read too many sources to endorse your interpretation. In my humble assessment, you espouse a far too narrow, caricatured, unnuanced, uncontextualized, ahistorical and ultimately unevidenced position that misrepresents the idea under discussion.

I actually think that what may going on here, is that you might be rejecting my arguments without proper scrutiny because I am a Catholic, on the presumption that I am therefore too biased to be taken seriously, which is unfortunate if true.

I, and the citizens of the USA that I encountered in my lifetime, did not reach the conclusion that the Catholic Church taught that Heaven was reserved for Catholics by reading and interpreting Church doctrine on baptism. We got it from priests, bishops, cardinals and popes who seemed, at the time, to be on the same page.

The quotation above was published by the Archdiocese of New York in 1912 by Cardinal John Farley, as part of the official Catholic Encyclopedia of that era. It's American and doesn't support the interpretation you were taught, and moreover it was written decades before 1942. The Radio Talks by Fathers Rumble and Carty were broadcast in 1942, in America to an American Catholic audience, again rejecting your stance entirely. Did you read them? How then do you account for this?

And I have referenced priests, bishops, cardinals and pontiffs from centuries to decades prior to your lifetime who clearly and unequivocally state otherwise.

But you just overlook the references without any apparent consideration, because you are convinced of a certain paradigm derived from your own life experience, and are seemingly unwilling to countenance or meaningfully engage with any possible evidence to the contrary.

I am looking for you to draw up source material so that we can discuss it or critically engage with the source material that I have quoted. I cannot comment upon your own personal anecdotes or what you were taught as a child by a priest, because I am not privy to those experiences which are specific to you as an individual. As such, these anecdotes are not liable to pass muster with anyone other than yourself. They are not 'proofs' substantiating your argument.

But I can comment on the available source material and progression of thought throughout history of this doctrine in the church's magisterium, which is what actually matters.

 

[SalixIncendium]

No, it isn't supposed to be a hierarchy of closeness to God.

There is such a hierarchy, in a sense, but it consists not of those having more clerical authority but rather of those with the lowliest status who rank first in the Kingdom of God, a 'reverse dominance hierarchy' if you like. Hence why Jesus openly stated that little children were the 'closest' to the Kingdom and that adults had to become like children to enter into it, or else they never would. Remember his phrase, "out of the mouth of babes"?

Jesus was clear about this and his teaching is binding on all Christians, of whatever stripe:

Matthew 20

25 But Jesus called them to him and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. 26 It will not be so among you; but whoever wishes to be great among you must be your servant, 27 and whoever wishes to be first among you must be your slave; 28 just as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many.”​

Matthew 21

Jesus said to them, “Truly I tell you, the tax collectors and prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God before you [religious leaders]."​

In the medieval and early modern period, the priestly office was often abused to become what it was never intended to be - but any notion of clerics having more access to Deity than the laity, simply on account of their specific charism as an ordained minister of the sacraments, is heretical and known as 'clericalism' which is distinct from a healthy sacerdotalism.

The Protestant doctrine of the "priesthood of all the faithful" is also recognised by the Catholic Church. To deny it, would be to violate the principle of fundamental spiritual and epistemic equality defined by St. Paul in his epistle to the Galatians 3:28: "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus".

But the church also incorporates 'gradations' of service, not holiness or 'access' to God - one of which is the ordained ministers, or deacons, priests and bishops. The pope's official title has always been, "Servant of the servants of God" in fulfilment of the verses quoted above from Matthew.

The Holy Spirit is believed to be universally present and available to all human beings, hence why St. Paul claimed that, in contrast to the then still functioning Second Temple in Jerusalem (which he himself respected and sometimes worshipped in), the true temple of God is in fact the body of each individual human person made in His Image and Likeness, in 1 Corinthians 6:9: "Don't you realize that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to you by God?"

As Pope St. John Paul II put it in his 1990 encyclical Redemptoris Missio:


Redemptoris Missio (7 December 1990) | John Paul II

The Spirit’s presence and activity affect not only the individuals but also society and history, peoples, cultures and religions. Indeed, the Spirit is at the origin of the noble ideals and undertakings which benefit humanity on its journey through history...The interreligious meeting held in Assisi was meant to confirm my conviction that “every authentic prayer is prompted by the Holy Spirit, who is mysteriously present in every human heart.”​

Nonetheless, different 'charisms' are thought to have been imparted to different members of the body of Christ, in consonance with each person's individual vocation. Thus, St. Catherine of Sienna was the recipient of mystical revelations and union with God that few priests have ever enjoyed, yet they have the charism through their ordination of absolving sins and celebrating the Eucharist, whereas she does not.

Protestants also recognise different 'callings' - hence why you have some people in Pentecostal churches who can allegedly speak in tongues, whereas the gift has not been given to everyone.

But two-tiered holiness has been moved away from since Vatican II.

See:

Innocent Civilians


The ban on clerical fighting was part of a general prohibition on the clerical use of weapons which extended to hunting as well as warfare. Clerics could not shed blood, either human or animal. The ban on clerical participation in war was not simply an implication of the advice to those who served God not to be concerned with the things of the world.

Rather, it was the act of killing which was thought to sully (as the ban on clerical hunting clearly shows). The ban on clerical participation is an acknowledgement that the most Christian thing to do is forgo all killing.

The established reasoning was to be based on the idea of the two levels of Christian vocation put forward by Eusebius of Caesaria. Eusebius held that Christians of the higher level (the clergy and religious) were to aim at the highest Christian ideals; they were bound by the ‘counsels of perfection’…

This differentiation between lay and clerical morality is not firmly grounded and there is certainly no biblical basis for it. It is odd to interpret Jesus’s command of non-resistance strictly for those Christians who desired to attain perfection (equated with clerics)…That something is not to be done by the most perfect Christians, because they are the most perfect Christians, is almost an acknowledgement that it ought not to be done by any Christian​

Vatican II attempted to pivot the Church away from this spurious “two-tier model” of holiness:

The Universal Call to Holiness and Apostolate is a teaching of the Roman Catholic Church that all people are called to be holy, and is based on Matthew 5:48 - “Be ye therefore perfect, as also thy heavenly Father is perfect.”…

Chapter V of the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, Lumen gentium discusses the Universal Call to Holiness:

…all the faithful of Christ of whatever rank or status, are called to the fullness of the Christian life and to the perfection of charity; …They must follow in His footsteps and conform themselves to His image seeking the will of the Father in all things. They must devote themselves with all their being to the glory of God and the service of their neighbor.[3]
​

We are all called to the “perfection of charity”, not merely clerics.

Why must one confess their sins to a priest rather than directly to God? In my queries to clergy, I was told that my voice could not be heard by God unless it was through a member of the clergy, those that had the "ear of God." Have things changed in the half century since I departed from Catholicism?

 

[InChrist]

I see it fromm the opposite perspective: "cafeterianism" is the approach when the truth does matter: the person carefully considers the merits - including the truth - of each aspect of the religion.

I'd say that the person who accepts the whole religion as a package without this careful consideration is the one for whom truth doesn't matter.

Thanks for expressing your perspective. I'm not disregarding the importance of careful consideration. I just think when people approach religious and /or spiritual beliefs they./we all too often choose "cafeteria style" what suits us and our own personal tastes/desires or that which accommodates our sinful behaviors, rather than the truth which may conflict with our agendas and desires.

 

[InChrist]

That begs the question. The point is that "truth", as far any individual conscience is concerned, is that which he or she is prepared to take to be true, or possibly true.

For a church, or even scripture, to simply state that such and such is "truth", and expect automatic belief, is not good enough, given that different churches and scriptures say contradictory things and interpret things differently. Who and what, then, is one to believe? It has to be something that a person works out for themselves.

"Quid est veritas?". Pilate had a point, uncomfortably for us all.

Yes, it is a personal process that each one must work out, nevertheless I believe the starting point for anyone is to sincerely seek God's truth no matter how dim their understanding may be.

 

[Vouthon]

Why must one confess their sins to a priest rather than directly to God?

Not at all sins, to be precise. Venial sins do not require the sacrament of penance and never have.

For certain classes of sin, those typically relating to what the tradition calls "grave matter", it has been customary since the patristic times for these sins to be confessed to another person, preferably a priest.

A private Act of Contrition in the absence of a priest, however (if one is unavailable), is sufficient.

In terms of why we confess to
priests at all, James 5:16 invites us to "confess our sins to one another."

Note, not simply privately to God. At times, public confession before a church assembly was practised, but this was deemed far too intrusive and so the confessional with an ordained minister alone became the norm.

In discharging his specific priestly duties in relation to the sacraments, a cleric is simply manifesting the grace of Christ in one way, with one charism, whereas others manifest the same grace in another fashion.

The priest does not interfere with one's private prayer life. He cannot make one experience Union with God or a foretaste of the Beatific Vision. That's up to the individual and God.

Thus, the highest and closest experience of God that the church recognises, contemplative prayer, is not mediated by a priest or any other intermediary.

But some experiences are deemed to be most beneficial when mediated through the guidance of a pastor entrusted with a special charism conducive to that end.

And the sacrament of penance, along with the Eucharist, is among these.

But the sacrament of marriage, for instance, isn't. You are no doubt aware that in the Catholic tradition, a church wedding is not canonically necessary, because the priest does not actually marry the couple and impart the grace of the sacrament, but they themselves do this by means of the exchange of vows and consummation through sex. The priest is just a witness to their sacrament to one another.

No priest needed to mediate that particular grace, or many others.

 

[SalixIncendium]

Not at all sins, to be precise. Venial sins do not require the sacrament of penance and never have.

So you might see my confusion when being sent off to say 12 hail Marys and 4 Our Fathers as penance for not doing my homework and lying to my parents about it.

Perhaps the clergy needs to be educated in this lesson.

 

[Vouthon]

So you might see my confusion when being sent off to say 12 hail Marys and 4 Our Fathers as penance for not doing my homework and lying to my parents about it.

Perhaps the clergy needs to be educated in this lesson.

I think the one thing we have learned from the scandals of the past decades, is that an unhealthy and elitist clericalism led a good number of priests and bishops to abuse their authority in different ways. The sexual abuse crisis among priests (and cover-up by bishops) is only part of the issue.

Priests are not infallible and many of them are simple parish shepherds that have the basic theological training needed to run a parish. They can and do err, unfortunately, and many a priest has been corrected for teaching erroneous doctrine by the Vatican. Many of them do a great job and are excellent shepherds of their flock but the vast majority of them are not professors of theology, nor do they aspire to be so.

Their life is all about the pastoral, the tending of the flock, and overseeing the sacraments. We have theologians to do the heavy lifting doctrinal study. A priests job is to care for the souls of the laity, minister the sacraments (especially the holy Eucharist) and conduct funerals and the like.

Priests don't take part in deliberations at ecumenical councils, only bishops do because bishops exercise the teaching authority of the church as the Magisterium (in a college, although the Pope exercises that role in his person as well).

Only those of greater prowess tend to get appointed to higher positions in the clerical hierarchy.

To become a Pope, for instance, one generally needs to be multilingual and the role of a bishop, overseeing an entire diocese, requires years of expertise and special qualities.

I, like Pope Francis, am an opponent of clericalism. The church has never officially taught it but in practice, it has often lived it i.e.

Clericalism is ugly perversion, pope tells seminarians

ROME - Priests must always keep in mind that their mission is to serve others and not claim superiority over the people entrusted to their care, Pope Francis said.

Meeting with seminarians from the Sicilian coastal city of Agrigento Nov. 24, the pope told them that priests must never forget their roots and that God chose them from among their people to serve.

“Clericalism, my dear ones, is our ugliest perversion. The Lord wants you to be shepherds; shepherds of the people, not clerics of the state,” he said.

Choosing to set aside his prepared speech and speak off-the-cuff with the group, the pope said priests are urged by the Holy Spirit to go out in mission and spread the word of God. However, priests must avoid the danger of “going out, not to bring a message, but to ‘go for a walk'” on their own without any direction.

For this reason, he added, priests must be in communion and constant dialogue with their bishops who are there to help them discern the right path.

“The bishop doesn’t just assign a task - ‘take care of this parish’ - as if he were the head of a bank that assigns tasks to employees. No, the bishop gives a mission: ‘Go, sanctify those people, bring Christ to those people.’ It is another level,” the pope said.

Bishops should also take the time to know their priests and not act like “the owner of a company” or “a master” but rather a “father who helps them to grow” and prepare them for the mission, he said.

“The more the bishop knows the priest, the less danger there will be of making mistakes in the mission he will give him,” the pope said. “You can’t be a good priest without a filial dialogue with the bishop. This is a non-negotiable thing, as some like to say.”​

 

[joe1776]

I am looking for you to draw up source material so that we can discuss it or critically engage with the source material that I have quoted. I cannot comment upon your own personal anecdotes or what you were taught as a child by a priest, because I am not privy to those experiences which are specific to you as an individual. As such, these anecdotes are not liable to pass muster with anyone other than yourself. They are not 'proofs' substantiating your argument.

You probably aren't old enough to remember a time before Vatican Two, but for me, your doubt of my account of the Catholic position before that event is as amusing as someone doubting that the Holocaust ever happened.

I used about 20 minutes in searching to find this quote from Thomas Ryan, director of the Loyola Institute for Ministry about Vatican Two: "This shift included the Catholic Church’s attitude toward other religions. Before Vatican II, Catholics weren’t supposed to visit other denominations’ houses of worship. Catholics looked down on other religions and thought of them as condemned to hell."

Here are a few quotes to support my assertion that Father Feeny was advocating the Church's position held before he was born:

Pope Innocent III: There is but one universal Church of the faithful, outside of which no one at all can be saved.

Pope Boniface VIII: We declare, say, define, and pronounce that it is absolutely necessary for the salvation of every human creature to be subject to the Roman Pontiff.

Pope Eugene IV: The most Holy Roman Church firmly believes, professes, and preaches that none of those existing outside the Catholic Church, not only pagans, but also Jews and heretics and schismatics, can have a share in life eternal; but that they will go into the eternal fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels, unless before death they are joined with Her; and that so important is the unity of this ecclesiastical body that only those remaining within this unity can profit by the sacraments of the Church unto salvation, and they alone can receive an eternal recompense for their fasts, their almsgiving, their other works of Christian piety and the duties of a Christian soldier. No one, let his almsgiving be as great as it may, no one, even if he pour out his blood for the Name of Christ, can be saved, unless he remain within the bosom and the unity of the Catholic Church.

St. Irenaeus (130-202), Bishop and Martyr: "The Church is the entrance to life; all others are thieves and robbers. On this account we are bound to avoid them . . . . We hear it declared of the unbelieving and the blinded of this world that they shall not inherit the world of life which is to come . . . . Resist them in defense of the only true and life giving faith, which the Church has received from the Apostles and imparted to her sons."

St. Augustine (354-430), Bishop and Doctor of the Church: "No man can find salvation except in the Catholic Church. Outside the Catholic Church one can have everything except salvation. One can have honor, one can have sacraments, one can sing alleluia, one can answer amen, one can have faith in the Name of the Father and the Son and of the Holy Ghost, and preach it too, but never can one find salvation except in the Catholic Church."

St. Fulgentius (468-533), Bishop: "Most firmly hold and never doubt that not only pagans, but also Jews, all heretics, and all schismatics who finish this life outside of the Catholic Church, will go into eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels."

Pope St. Gregory the Great (590-604): "The holy universal Church teaches that it is not possible to worship God truly except in Her and asserts that all who are outside of Her will not be saved."

St. Thomas Aquinas (1226-1274): There is no entering into salvation outside the Catholic Church, just as in the time of the Flood there was not salvation outside the Ark, which denotes the Church."

St. Louis Marie de Montfort (1673-1716): "There is no salvation outside the Catholic Church. Anyone who resists this truth perishes."

St. Robert Bellarmine (1542-1621), Bishop and Doctor of the Church: "Outside the Church there is no salvation...therefore in the symbol (Apostles Creed) we join together the Church with the remission of sins: 'I believe in the Holy Catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins"...For this reason the Church is compared to the Ark of Noah, because just as during the deluge, everyone perished who was not in the ark, so now those perish who are not in the Church."

St. Alphonsus Maria de Liguori (1696-1787), Bishop and Doctor of the Church: "All the misfortunes of unbelievers spring from too great an attachment to the things of life. This sickness of heart weakens and darkens the understanding, and leads to eternal ruin. If they would try to heal their hearts by purging them of their vices, they would soon receive light, which would show them the necessity of joining the Catholic Church, where alone is salvation. We should constantly thank the Lord for having granted us the gift of the true Faith, by associating us with the children of the Holy Catholic Church ... How many are the infidels, heretics, and schismatics who do not enjoy the happiness of the true Faith! Earth is full of them and they are all lost!"

Pope Pius XII (1939-1958): Some say they are not bound by the doctrine which teaches that the Mystical Body of Christ and the Roman Catholic Church are one and the same thing. Some reduce to a meaningless formula the necessity of belonging to the true Church in order to gain eternal salvation. Others finally belittle the reasonable character of the credibility of Christian Faith. These and like ERRORS, it is clear, have crept in among certain of our sons who are deceived by imprudent zeal for souls or by false science."

I'd like you to note that Pope Pius XII reigned during my early life and just before Vatican II. So, his quote confirms my version of the Church's position during my lifetime before Vatican Two.