Whether we are Catholic "Lite" or Catholic "Taliban" without terroristic characteristics of course, we are all Catholic, no?
In the past a good Catholic was distinguished from a bad Catholic by how faithful one was to Sunday Mass and Holy Days of Obligation, Confession, support of one's parish and diocese, not eating meat on Friday, supporting Catholic education, etc.
But usually good Catholics and bad Catholics spoke to one another and bad Catholics weren't so haughty as to think they were good Catholics. They admitted their shame and sheepishly moved the conversation on.
John Allen has a good article today on talking to one another, Catholic Lite and Catholic Taliban. Is it possible?
READ JOHN ALLEN'S ARTICLE "THOUGHTS ON POST TRIBAL CATHOLICISM BY PRESSING HERE!
5 comments:
This article seems to come from a particular perspective that is threatened by the 'counter-revolution' of the 'conservatives'. The core of it appears based in apologetics for the revolutionaries by assuming everyone agrees on a 'post-modern' perspective. I will leave it to my intellectual superiors to decide if that is a valid assumption. However, the article itself goes on to discuss how the various perspectives can 'all just get along' when the basis of post-modernism is the rejection of polarity in favour of the seamless and subjective spectrum of personal perspective.
The Church leaders need to establish a sharp line, or at least a stripe, where on one side diverse solutions to problems are allowed and that those disparate solutions do not constitute sin in and of themselves; while on the other side there is strict enforcement of doctrines of faith we would be much better off.
As it stands now we have people who believe views on economics are sinful while arguing that clown vestments are in keeping with Church teachings.
rcg
I'll answer the questions as the price of admission. 1) my tribe is definitely the Traditionalist Tribej and 2) as for learning to speak to each other....I would have to say it would be the exception and not the rule. Although a few of the Lites actually have intelligents thoughts about religion, the truth is most of them just run on feelings and emotions which tend to be driven by self want. For them its about them and not God. You canKt talk to that.
Increasingly, I choose not to discuss politics with my liberal acquaintences or liturgics and theology with liberal prots or progressivist (read "lapsed") Catholics. It ruins dinner, sours group activities, makes work unpleasant, and forces me to Confession to do penance for profanity, homicidal thoughts, and other kinds of malice.
Ambrose Bierce once defined an argument as, "an event whereby two parties come together to discuss an issue, each party leaving more thoroughly convinced of his original position than previously."
In the 1960s and 1970s, the Young Turks of the counterculture and New Left, and their counterparts within the Church, asked simply that their voices be heard too. Then they gained control of certain aspects of the Church, and the secular political system, and reversed their stand on the right to be heard--they ruthlessly silenced those who held opinions different from their own.
I thus find John Allen's prescription of a safe place for dialogue between orthodox Catholics and dissenters who would redefine Catholicism out of existence (see comments to his article for examples) to be dangerous.
true, Milton did say "Who ever knew Truth put to the worse, in a free and open encounter?" which is a cornerstone of the right of free speech. But often those who are interested in subverting the institution (be it the institution of Church or the institution of state) have no interest in a free and open encounter. The goal of the New Left wasn't to have a civil discourse; it was to revolutionize society, and free speech was simply an expedient for achieving that agenda, to be discarded when it was no longer useful.
So the dissenters who are clamoring for a right to be heard in the Church today are, in my experience, not interested in engaging in a mutual search for truth. The Church has stated for two thousand years that it has the truth. Instead, the dissenters are seeking legitimacy, which they will use to _undermine_ the truth. In short, they apparently don't believe the Church's two thousand year old claim.
The correct answer is simple. Command Catholics to accept the authority of the Church, or insist that they cease to identify themselves as Catholic. Nothing is to be gained by dialoguing with people who already have their minds made up except to scandalize the faithful and lead more of them astray.
Anon, Amen!
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