My comments: This is the problem of the collision of trying to be pastoral and thus trying to change Church teaching to accommodate people's needs and wants.
Where I do agree with the bishop is that we can become too preoccupied with sexual sins great and small and attribute to these a seriousness that we don't attribute to other serious sins.
While the Church certainly uses natural law as a sign of Divine Law to promote our teachings on sexuality, there is also what Scripture and Tradition teach.
Apart from that, I think this bishop is raising hopes and expectations in many people who want the Church's teaching on sex to change but we all know these won't because of natural law, Divine Law, Sacred Scripture and Tradition. This is what is very unpastoral about the bishop, raising hopes in people that something will change when it won't. It's like a doctor telling a terminal patient he might live.
But if we changed our teachings about natural law we would become the darlings of so many progressive people!
Comments that are ugly or crude will be deleted. Be serious and be charitable.
8 comments:
Heh, heh..resisting temptation here, Fr....
I likewise agree that "we can become too preoccupied with sexual sins great and small and attribute to these a seriousness that we don't attribute to other serious sins." However, in this point we see the crux of liberalism. The "so-called" progressive want the Church to change sexual morality into mans image and likeness, whereas orthodox believers want to be transformed into GOD's image and likeness.
Fr, does the effort I am making to refrain from scurrilous jokes and smutty humor have any redemptive value?
This is the sort of thing that confuses me mightily. What I read in the catechism, nor in the Bible, is not simple condemnation for breaking a rule but a frustrated God driven to anger. I am also wondering aloud for the theologists here if the understanding of God is in error to speak of God acting out of anger in this instance. If we divert our gaze from God, and act in a direction that takes us from His presence, we are not being cast into Hell as much as scheduling hiking into it under our own power. This is a case of the person placing their animal natures before what we know objectively about sex. It is pleasant to encourage procreation versus the current popular idea that our species is a side effect of a fun weekend.
I do agree that how we respond to the people afflicted with uncontrollable sexual desires is important as a proper manifestation of Christ's influence in our lives. On the other hand, I think this bishop has a strong interest in this area and may be acting on his own urges.
Fr, you may remember when we were younger that it became important to acknowledge that alcoholism was a disease and not a moral failure. I remember thinking this was reasonable. Yet I can recall a specific incident where a person had wrecked his car and injured himself and others. When I commented that he was drunk while driving my friend objected that the other person was an alcoholic. My friend had succumbed to the same serious error our entire planet is struggling with about homosexuality: that a person has trouble controlling a problem does not make it acceptable when he doesn't. And the bishop falls for the fallacy (that's with an eff, right?) that sex is love.
There was a time in the past when I always respected bishops for their intellect and education. No mater what they might say or do, I thought they were educated and intelligent men. Not any more.
rcg
When I saw that he was speaking in a Unitarian church to a Voice of the Faithful gathering, I assumed the worst, but went on ahead and read anyway.
There's really nothing here for the faithful Catholic to discuss. The man is espousing a heretical point of view. No nuance, no subtlety--just throw out the natural law and Catholic doctrine, leaving what remains no longer Catholic in consequence.
Very true!
It has been my experience that the word nuance is now commonly used as a preamble to negating the importance of fundamental principles. I see that in this case, the signal was reliable.
Meyer, Yes, indeed! "Nuance" is a favorite word of liberals and progressive theologians...sort of like the totally meaningless term, "living document."
Post a Comment