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Thursday, September 9, 2021

THAT A CARDINAL HAS TO SAY SOMETHING LIKE THIS AND HE FELT HE HAD TO DO SO, TELLS US THAT THE CURRENT MAGISTERIUM OF THE CHURCH HAS CREATED THIS KIND OF CONFUSION THAT NEEDS CLARIFICATION ON SOMETHING SO BASIC TO FAITHFUL CATHOLICISM!

 The money byte in large print is to what I refer in the title. “So the president is not demonstrating Catholic teaching.” No kidding Cardinal Gregory, but the problem is that Catholics don’t know that and secular politics is more formative of their conscience and belief than Catholicism. 

When asked by the secular reporter if the Church would ordain women as priests, he emphatically said “no!” I congratulate the Cardinal on his answer. The reporter, though, and you have to watch her response, was incredulous at the answer. I don’t think she’s a Catholic, but maybe she is. But you could sense from her reaction that she felt the Catholic Church has to be canceled for this misogyny. 

The question to Cardinal Gregory, apart from congratulating His Eminence for his hand wringing, are you going to place a censure upon the President of the USA who is not “Catechist in Chief” but a Catholic under your authority?  


“OUR CHURCH HAS NOT CHANGED ITS POSITION ON THE IMMORALITY OF ABORTION, AND I DON’T SEE HOW WE COULD, BECAUSE WE BELIEVE THAT EVERY HUMAN LIFE IS SACRED. EVERY HUMAN LIFE IS SACRED.”

From CNA: 

The Archbishop of Washington on Wednesday clarified the Church’s teaching on when life begins, after Catholic President Joe Biden last week said life does not begin at conception.

“The Catholic Church teaches, and has taught, that life – human life – begins at conception,” said Cardinal Wilton Gregory at a Wednesday luncheon of the National Press Club, in Washington, D.C.

“So, the president is not demonstrating Catholic teaching,” he added.

Last Friday, Sept. 3, President Joe Biden said he did not “agree” that life begins at conception.

“I have been and continue to be a strong supporter of Roe v. Wade,” he said at the White House, answering a reporter’s question on abortion. “I respect them – those who believe life begins at the moment of conception and all – I respect that. Don’t agree, but I respect that,” he said.

Biden’s comments were a departure from previous statements of his on when life begins. In a 2008 interview as a vice presidential candidate, and again at a 2012 vice presidential debate, Biden said he believed life begins at conception.

Gregory addressed reporters and members of the public at a National Press Club Headliners Luncheon on Sept. 8.

After delivering remarks on journalism, Gregory took questions on various issues including abortion, COVID-19 vaccines, race and the Catholic Church, the clergy sex abuse crisis, the death penalty, and workers’ rights.

When asked if the Church has recently “softened” its teaching on abortion, Cardinal Gregory said the Church’s teaching has not changed.

“Our Church has not changed its position on the immorality of abortion, and I don’t see how we could, because we believe that every human life is sacred. Every human life is sacred,” he said.

Read more. 

17 comments:

TJM said...

More windbaggery. Words without action are meaningless.

Thomas Garrett said...

I do not believe Cardinal Gregory. Sorry, I just don't. I believe he is fully on board with the cause of ordaining women, but just doesn't feel safe admitting it yet.

John said...

Cardinal Gregory must have checked with the Nuncio before making this very necessary dismissal of the Catholic President's ignorant catechesis. Is the president now a heretic or a schismatic, like the Episcopalians across Lafayette Square? A more complete statement would have instructed the President next time he attends Mass to sit in the back pew. Of course communion will be out of the question since the Pres. is a public sinner.

rcg said...

I long for the time where men of different minds could inform and shape each other’s thoughts in public discourse that inspired the nation to higher standards. There is no need to condemn President Biden, as condemnable as he is, but to instruct him to natural and Divine Law as endorsed by the Church. The President will then become the highly visible example of his choices and serve a higher purpose whether he likes it or not. His Excellency, Archbishop Gregory will become a beacon for the Catholic faithful by his shining example or the flames of his immolation.

Fr Martin Fox said...

Actually, it seems to me a further clarification is in order.

When life begins is a question of science, not faith.

The moral value placed on human life -- at any stage -- is a moral and therefore religious question.

Related to this, but not the same issue exactly, is what a "person" is and when a human life begins to be a person, and what the significance of this is. Ultimately, "personhood" is a product of religion and philosophy; you can say that persons manifest certain characteristics, and then link those characteristics to observable qualities or behaviors. But to say that there is such a thing as a "person" and what it means? Goes beyond science.

This is important, because increasingly, we Christians are obliged to bear witness, not to religious truths, but to truths that are scientific: when life begins, and what male and female are; what being human is.

At some point we ought to say this more forcefully.

Fr. Allan J. McDonald said...

RCG,I am not sure I am following you. I do believe that a bishop, let's say Cardinal Gregory, should meet a public person who is Catholic but publicly denying particular aspects of Catholic moral teaching or something else, let's say he's telling his constituents who are not Catholic to enter a Catholic Church and receive Holy Communion because it is publicly distributed. The Cardinal should question him about what he is promoting and then discern with the person what is right and wrong and that he must either agree to uphold the Catholic Faith or stop receiving Holy Communion or stop telling those who are not Catholic to go and receive Holy Communion.

If that private meeting does not produce results, then there has to be a public correction and a public censure of some kind, no?

Fr. Fox, I am not sure what you are saying. There has to be some scientific information that would lead the Church to say that human life begins at conception.

We don't say that human life is present only in the woman's egg or the man's sperm, but it is present in terms of the ingredients needed to create human life.

Spilling one's seed apart from the procreative act is considered immoral and sinful but it isn't the same as an abortion. Harvesting a woman's egg might be immoral but it is not the same as abortion.

So I guess I am asking for clarification in terms of what you are suggesting.

rcg said...

My points are that we might desire for Cardinal Gregory to put the public beat-down on President Biden and are upset with him when he doesn’t do it when that is not necessarily the right thing to do. My second point is that threatening a non-believer, such as President Biden, with damnation has no intellectual force on him. The Church’s position on abortion is logical and scientific, so that can be put forth calmly. The double injury to women of sexual objectification then having them murder their own children to avoid even a basic responsibility for the child is damnable under any civil standard. Teaching that very simple lesson to the President addresses his need to be a strong leader and to save his own soul. Even if he continues down this path he will be the constant focus of how our nation will value human life and forever be associated with oppression and death or making a very hard choice. Poor Cardinal Gregory needs our prayers, too, to stand up as a white martyr and prepare for every possible attack.

Fr Martin Fox said...

Father:

I'm saying that "life begins at conception" isn't a statement of faith -- you don't have to believe in God to say that; and to deny it is to deny an empirically demonstrable fact.

It is not a good idea for us to cooperate in this game of taking inconvenient facts and shifting them into the ghetto of religious belief.

Two hundred years ago people said that Africans weren't human, or fully human. Is the contrary assertion merely a "religious belief"? Or is it actually a demonstrable fact? I say the latter, and I think it would have ill served the cause of racial equality if back then, those advocating equality had gone along with the racists saying, oh that's just your religious belief.

Similarly, those who support legal abortion are very happy to treat "life begins at conception" as a religious belief. Then they follow up with, "and don't you dare impose your religious belief on the whole society."

We shouldn't play that game. Facts matter.

OrdinaryCatholic said...

"; you can say that persons manifest certain characteristics, and then link those characteristics to observable qualities or behaviors. But to say that there is such a thing as a "person" and what it means? Goes beyond science."

Can anyone name or point to any human being at anytime in history who was NOT a person? When Mary greeted her cousin Elizabeth we are told that the baby in her womb leapt in joy at Mary's greeting. Now, would a human non-person do that? Just because we may not recognize the person in a fetal human being does not mean it is a not a person. When a person gets Alzheimers he/she remains a person, but a person we no longer recognize as before but a person nonetheless.

OrdinaryCatholic said...

"; you can say that persons manifest certain characteristics, and then link those characteristics to observable qualities or behaviors. But to say that there is such a thing as a "person" and what it means? Goes beyond science."

Can anyone name or point to any human being at anytime in history who was NOT a person? When Mary greeted her cousin Elizabeth we are told that the baby in her womb leapt in joy at Mary's greeting. Now, would a human non-person do that? Just because we may not recognize the person in a fetal human being does not mean it is a not a person. When a person gets Alzheimers he/she remains a person, but a person we no longer recognize as before but a person nonetheless.

TJM said...

Father McDonald,

Somewhat off topic but I thought you would like to read this article published in the Wall Street Journal. Here is the opener and the money quote:

"Wall Street Journal: "The Power of the Latin Mass"
The Wall Street Journal's Rome reporter, Francis X. Rocca, published a piece online today that will run in Saturday's paper, looking at what the traditional Latin Mass means to those who attend it.



It is an honest, opinion-free report of Catholics, young and old, who prefer the TLM. Rocca has consistently written articles for the WSJ that feature a diversity of views and people -- the opposite of other mainstream media, such as the New York Times or Reuters, which rely on the same tired sources. Seriously, look at most other mainstream news articles on Catholic issues and you will likely find John Carr, Thomas Reese, John Gehring, Massimo Faggioli or James Martin in just about every article. Mainstream media are notorious for either an obvious slant or one-sided perspective from this small group of men who feed lazy reporters by completing their preconstructed narrative concerning traditional Catholics."

Maybe we should get Santita a subscription to broaden his world view!

TJM said...

Father Fox,

Your point is well taken and is in line with Archbishop Cordileone's recent public statement.

Notice which priest who posts here avoids this topic like a Vampire and the cross?

Fr Martin Fox said...

Ordinary Catholic:

My point wasn't to question whether human beings are persons. My point was to be precise about the sort of statement it is: and I say it again: it isn't simply a statement of physical science, in the way that male or female or species ("homo sapiens") is.

May I suggest you do a little work online and search for the word "person" and where it comes from and what sort of statement it represents. It is a very interesting word and concept, often misused in casual speech.

For example, I recently had a correspondence with the bishop (sorry, I don't recall his name) who is overseeing a new translation of the Mass lectionary. I wrote to him because of an embarrassingly bad use of the term "person" in St. Paul's letter to the Ephesians (2:12-2), where Paul refers our Savior as follows:

“…that he might create in himself one new person in place of the two….”

This is really bad. The reason this happened was because the translators were trying to avoid "create in himself one new man..." which is how it used to be rendered. Oooh, that's sexist, that's exclusionary! But whoever came up with that commits a mistake many make: in treating "person" as a synonym for "human being." While this is a common in casual speech, it's quite wrong. And in the context of talking about Jesus Christ, it's especially bad, because he is a Divine Person, not a human person.

The point is, despite how you and many people use the term, the word means something other than you may think. And "personhood," while a real thing and something we must defend, is not easily reducible to empirically demonstrable facts. (I say, "not easily," as opposed to impossible.) Am I a person? Yes, but I'm not sure this is a statement of science, as opposed to a statement of the Judaeo-Christian value system that underlies our laws and social values.

I might add that this idea of "personhood," while it is consistent with Scripture, doesn't come directly from Scripture. It comes from Greek philosophy.

If you still don't buy that, or you don't get what I'm saying, I can propose an exercise. Come back at me with what you think is a careful definition of "personhood," and then I will let you know whether you get a passing grade. It's not easy. I would probably get a failing grade without doing some careful homework.

TJM said...

For all you "Catholics" who voted for Biden, this one's for you to deal with:

The Biden administration on Thursday sued the state of Texas over its new law prohibiting most abortions after the detection of a fetal heartbeat.

In a complaint filed in a federal district court in West Texas, the Justice Department said the state acted “in open defiance of the Constitution” in restricting “most pre-viability abortions.”

In open defiance of a made up right.

Mark said...

Interesting article in The Independent (a British newspaper) giving historical background to civil enforcement mechanism used in Texas abortion law, and also warning Republicans and gun lobby that the strategy could be a “double-edged sword”:

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/texas-democrats-department-of-justice-department-of-justice-merrick-garland-b1918407.html

Mark said...

TJM:

This Opinion piece by Archbishop Cordileone was recently published in the “left wing” Washington Post:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/09/05/our-duty-challenge-catholic-politicians-who-support-abortion-rights/

Mark said...

TJM:

Here’s another one for you—this time in the “left wing” New York Times:

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/09/opinion/texas-abortion-pro-life.html