ARCC SPOT LIGHTs

What Every Roman Catholic Should Know about Self-Excommunication

ARCC spot LIGHT

(analysis of Church issues offered by the ARCC Publications Committee, R. Schutzius, ed.)

 

What Every Roman Catholic Should Know about Self-Excommunication
Thu Jan 1, 2009 8:44 am

 

Most Catholics are familiar with Excommunication.  It is a penalty imposed by Church authorities for having done serious things like abortions, heresies, schisms, and other crimes.  The purpose is to seek repentance and protect the faithful.  In days gone by it could be deadly as now-canonized saints like St. Joan of Arc, learned the hard way.  The two general types are a) AUTOMATIC - the kind that happens just by doing the deed, and b) IMPOSED - the kind that needs to be issued, publically or secretly, by some Church official.

 

New on the Excommunication scene is the concept of Self-Excommunication (SEx) whereby one excommunicates oneself.   There are apparently two different types of SEx: 

 

a) Self Excommunication in the External Forum (SEx-EF) which occurs when a Church official declares that you have excommunicated yourself (even without your knowledge) or after a certain time period (30 days), and

 

b) Self Excommunication in the Internal Forum (SEx-IF) whereby one excommunicates oneself by doing or believing the same thing as those who have been self excommunicated in the External Forum (SEx-EF).  This latter category, (SEx-IF), can be further divided into:

 

 ACTIVE (SEx-IF-Active) which includes those Catholics who are still active in the Church but support such things as the ordination of women, birth control, same sex unions, stemcell research, in-vitro fertilization, Obama for President, shared control of Church property, and more recently, active support for child sex-abuse victims (others to be added later), and

 

PASSIVE (SEx-IF-Passive) which includes those Catholics who have just passively left the Church and moved on.  (The third largest group of Christians in the US).

 

The above is offered as an observed description of this phenomenon and is not in any way official.   A preliminary search finds no official reference in Church Law nor in past documents that deal directly with this, a gap soon to be filled no doubt by the Catholic media.  Practically speaking, there is not much defense against the SEx-EF except to repent quickly if possible.   Those who fall into the SEx-IF-Active category would be well advise to keep a low profile and avoid going public, until such time as the Spirit calls you to be a more prophetic Christian.

 

It is obvious to many that our Church is in serious trouble, and that such machinations are only attempts to avoid the inevitable need for reform through accountability, openness, and participation of all.  Please pray that the loving Spirit of God who dwells amongst us will prevail and help our poor Church.  

 

REMEMBERING THE WOMEN  (This book has the following alternate Sunday readings.)

Jan. 4 - Epiphany  1 Kings 10:1-13, Matt 2:1-12

Jan 11 - Baptism   Judith 13:18-20

 

Support for The Association for the Rights of Catholics in the Church (ARCC) is greatly appreciated. 

Circulate freely with source acknowledged.  Comments welcomed  rschutz1@prodigy.net  or  1-877-700-ARCC (2722).

Non Violence

ARCC spot LIGHT (analysis of Church issues offered by the ARCC Publications Committee, C. Inda & R. Schutzius, eds)

Violence by Commission and Omission
Jan 15, 2009

When we Catholics go to confession, we ordinarily pray the CONFITEOR (I confess) or the Act of Contrition.  We ask for forgiveness for what we have done and what we have failed to do, i.e. sins of commission and omission. A similar practice is included in the introductory portion of the Mass Liturgy. In the society at large we often identify acts of violence by commission--assassinations, thefts, kidnappings, unjust imprisonment. If we stop to reflect we can also identify acts of violence by omission--the starvation of thousands who are forgotten by "the system"; standing by in the face of genocide; the futureless lives of children born with some form of brain damage because of a high degree of pollution (e.g. lead or cancerous poisons in their environment; and, perhaps, a kind of  spiritual famine that affects millions of the members of the society we know as the Catholic Church. Violence is all around us--by commission and omission.  The Catholic Church as a hierarchical social entity offers examples of both types of violence.  ARCC was founded to respond to violence brought at the level of the magisterium (the teaching mission) in punishing Fr. Hans Kung, a recognized scholar and writer, member of the teaching arm of the Church, for having  dared to question a Church teaching.  His permission to teach as a Catholic theologian was revoked.  He was no longer a resource on which the system could rely.  He threatened its authority. Catholics are also currently the victims of Church violence by omission.  As F. Donald Cozzens points out: "our first challenge is to break through the wall of denial and silence guarding the present ecclesial order" (SACRED SILENCE, 2002, P. 6). (secrecy, misuse of power, cover-up, sexual and homosexual discrimination, threats and punishment for dissent in conscience, misuse of authority, etc.)    The current response in some areas to withhold Sunday contributions is an example of a nonviolent action aimed at weakening one of the institution's sources of power, i.e. material resources, and thus gaining the attention of the hierarchy.

To understand the power of nonviolent action, a fine source is the writings of Gene Sharp. It is obvious, says Sharp,* that the power wielded by rulers is not intrinsic to themselves, but comes from the society they govern.  With that bestowed power they are able to direct the behavior of other people, draw on large human and material resources, wield an apparatus of sanctions and direct a bureaucracy in the administration of their policies.  We can easily substitute hierarchy for rulers, curia and college of cardinals for bureaucracy,  bishops, priests, religious, lay workers and Catholics in general for human resources, collections, gifts, parish contributions to dioceses, diocesan contributions to the Vatican, etc. for material resources, and interdicts, excommunications, etc. for sanctions.  It then becomes obvious that the power of the hierarchical church structure equals, as Sharp points out regarding societal structures in general, the totality of all influences and pressures, including sanctions, available to a group or society for use in maintaining itself, implementing its policies and resolving internal and external conflicts. Should we not attempt to expose these influences and pressures so we can resist them intelligently and effectively?  By failing to act intelligently and strongly we may omit a duty to "speak truth to power," and thus sin by omission.

*Dr. Gene Sharp, The Albert Einstein Institution. www.aeinstein.org. e-mail einstein@igc.org .  

 phone 617- 247 4882, fax 617 247 4035.
 

Sunday Jan. 18, Second Sunday, 2 Samuel 14:1-21,   Matt 27:55-56

Sunday Jan. 25, Third Sunday, 1 Corinthians 1:10-18 

 

Support for The Association for the Rights of Catholics in the Church (ARCC) is greatly appreciated. 

Circulate freely with source acknowledged. 

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Press Release - Pope Benedict: Be Catholic!

January 25, 2009

To Pope Benedict: Be Catholic! 

The latest move by Pope Benedict XVI to reinstate four schismatic bishops of the St. Pius X Society--which rejects the liberalizing decrees of Vatican Council II (1962-65)--is shocking as it negatively highlights the millions of Catholics he apparently is not interested in reaching out to, including the millions deprived of the Eucharist because of the medieval law requiring that only celibate males can be priests. Last spring the Pew Foundation found that there are currently 65 million American Catholics--and 30 million former American Catholics! These latter are not Vatican II rejectionists like the Traditionalists, but most likely are either Catholics who are deeply disappointed at the anti-Vatican II Restorationism of Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI, or never really learned about the Freedom Spirit of Vatican II in the parched years after the appointment of Cardinal Wotyla as Pope in late 1978. 

We of the Association for the Rights of Catholics in the Church (ARCC, founded in 1980 in the wake of the Vatican repression of Catholic thinkers in 1979) welcome the reaching out to the few million Traditionalist Catholics.  

We also cry out for a reaching out to the 30 million alienated former American Catholics! (How many more millions of former Catholics are there elsewhere in the world!?) We also look for a reaching out to the untold millions of the 65 million current American Catholics who are barely holding on to their church membership by their fingernails, threatening to swell the ranks of the 30 missing millions.  

Personally, I also plead with my former colleague on the Catholic Theological Faculty of the University of Tübingen, Professor Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict, to reach out not only to the right, but also to the left. Make our Church truly catholic, universal! 

Professor Leonard Swidler, Ph.D., S.T.L.

President, Association for the Rights of Catholics in the Church

Prof. Catholic Thought and Interreligious Dialogue
Temple University, Philadelphia, PA 19122

E-mail: dialogue@temple.edu ; Web: http://astro.temple.edu/~dialogue/Swidler/
Editor, Journal Ecumenical Studies; Pres Dialogue Institute http://jesdialogue.org
Religion Dept Temple Univ Philadelphia, PA 19122 http://www.temple.edu/religion
Pres, Association for the Rights of Catholics in the Church  http://arcc-catholic-rights.net

ARCC spot LIGHT - Annulments: External and Internal Forum

ARCC spot LIGHT (analysis of Church issues offered by the ARCC Publications Committee,  L. Arceneaux, R. Schutzius, eds.)

 

ANNULMENT: External Forum and Internal Forum
Sat Jan 31, 2009 7:49 pm

 

Baptized couples bestow the sacrament of Marriage on each other by a commitment of life-time fidelity.  If two capable people freely commit, a sacramental marriage is achieved. They become instruments of God's grace for each other.  

As many as half of Catholic marriages now end. What explains this? Two possibilities are: 1) An essential element was missing from the beginning of the marriage, or 2) it was lost along the way.   Either way, the sacramental element (conferring grace on each other) does not exist.  While divorce/remarriage, like contraception, has become more a matter of individual conscience, it is a much more serious matter with profound consequences.

Every human effort should be made to avoid the tragedy of a failed marriage.  Human failures occur. Mistakes are made.  But life goes on and so does one's spiritual life.  God continues to love us in spite of our failures.  The Church offers two options to those in failed unions.   

 

The External Forum Annulment (EFA) is a process whereby the Catholic Church judges that a failed marriage never reached a sacramental level even though one or both of the parties thought they were doing all necessary. The judgment is based on external evidence. Once an annulment is granted, the parties may attempt another marriage in the Church.  Annulments do not nullify civil marriages nor render illegitimate children born of  failed unions.  

The Internal Forum Annulment (IFA) process is a self-help alternative whereby one judges in conscience that a failed marriage is no longer sacramental.  The judgment is an internal, conscience-based conclusion made with or without objective evidence.  

 

Both processes attempt to resolve the status of a failed marriage. Respect for the authority of the Church and for the integrity of a well-formed conscience to judge the validity of a marriage are involved.  Both are human judgments with these same conditions of circumstances and conscience.

1) The firm conviction in conscience that a previous marriage does not have sacramental status due to a lack of an essential condition in one or both parties.* 
2) The sacramentality of the current marriage is judged valid in the eyes of God and Christian community

Where possible, annulment should be sought through the External Forum process.  When this is not possible (too costly or for lack of objective evidence) the Internal Forum Annulment process is an alternative way to affirm the judgment made in conscience that a marriage never was or is not now a valid sacramental marriage.   

 

The Church does not provide much information about the IFA since no official external verification is involved.  The IFA remains an internal process between the individual and an objective advisor/guide/spiritual director/parish priest. Beginning about 1000 years ago the Church  began to assert judgment over the sacramental marriage of Christians.  It established and maintains tribunals to do this based on external evidence.  It cannot and does not judge the internal decision made by an individual since this is a conscience matter. 

 

Catholics are free to use ALL the legitimate processes of the Church.  Following a well informed conscience is one of these processes.  Faced with this judgment, always give due respect to the authority and process of the Church, while mindful that the right to enter into the difficult IFA process, following the conclusion of your own conscience, is a legitimate alternative recognized by the Church.  

  

Guidance through the IFA process serves as an unbiased assessment of this very personal decision based on prayer (conversation with God) and trust in God's mercy.  See  "Confronting Power and Sex in the Catholic Church" by Bishop Geoffrey Robinson  (Chapter 8), for a more complete treatment and guidance on the formation of conscience and IFA.

 

# All Catholics have the right to follow their informed conscience in all matters.   (ARCC Charter  of  Rights, No 1)

# All married Catholics have the right to withdraw from a marriage which has irretrievably broken down.  All    such Catholics retain the radical right to remarry. (ARCC Charter of  Rts.No.30)

# All Catholics who are divorced and remarried and who are in conscience reconciled to the Church have the right to the same ministries, including all sacraments, as do other Catholics. (ARCC Charter of Rts., No. 31)

 

 

More readings: 

http://arcc-catholic-rights.net/internal_forum.htm
http://arcc-catholic-rights.net/internal_forum_1.htm
http://chiesa.espresso.repubblica.it/articolo/73422?eng=y
http://www.amazon.com/Confronting-Power-Sex-Catholic-Church/dp/0814618650/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1228255513&sr=1-1

* Common defects of decision

1. Inability to fulfill the obligation because of sexual identity confusion

2. Inability to communicate-emotional paralysis, one way communication

3. Pro forma action i.e. marriage to gain immigration/citizenship, pretending

4. Against one's will - forced to marry, fear of displeasing someone

5. Excessive self centeredness, narcissism

6. Hidden details about the 'other' - something that would have been a 'deal breaker' but kept hidden

7. Psychological dysfunction to abuse the 'other'

 

REMEMBERING THE WOMEN

  (This book has the alternate Sunday readings.)

2/8/09 Fourth Sunday - Micah 6:1-8

2/15/09 Fifth Sunday - Numbers 12:1-16, 20:1 

 

Support for The Association for the Rights of Catholics in the Church (ARCC) is greatly appreciated. 

Circulate freely with source acknowledged.  Comments welcomed  rschutz1@prodigy.net  or  1-877-700-ARCC (2722).

Letter to Pope Benedict

AN OPEN LETTER TO POPE BENEDICT XVI ON INDULGENCES
February 12, 2009

Dear Holy Father Benedict,

First I greet you as former colleague of the 1960s (I as Visiting Professor) on the Catholic Theology Faculty of the University of Tübingen! In that same vein I also greet you as the Founding Editor of the Journal of Ecumenical Studies which had the privilege of publishing an essay yours in our very first issue (1964); I am also happy to recall that we also published in that first issue an essay by your then good friend Hans Küng, who hired you at Tübingen University.  Second, I wish you well in your most demanding responsibility as the Pope of the Catholic Church. Thirdly, I address you as the co-founder and current president of the Association for the Rights of Catholics in the Church (ARCC), which was founded in 1980 in the wake of the Vatican attack on our former University of Tübingen colleague Professor Hans Küng.

It is about the most recent episcopal actions being taken with your approval that I would like to engage you in a theological and pastoral dialogue. I am speaking of the renewed promotion of Indulgences, which your predecessor Pope John Paul II also advocated. (see February 11, 2009 New York Times

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/10/nyregion/10indulgence.html?scp=1&sq=indulgences&st=cse). I must confess that I am deeply disappointed in this new development, which appears as the latest in a series of restorationist efforts to roll back the joyful renewal accomplishments of the Second Vatican Council in 1962-65.

I am especially disappointed because you as a creative young theologian were deeply involved in that effulgence of Catholic creativity and renewal. You participated with eagerness in the wonderful “throwing open the windows of the Vatican,” as was said by your earlier predecessor Pope John XXIII—and in his Aggiornamento, “Bringing up to date” of the Catholic Church.

In your earlier role as theologian you were very aware of the “quantification” of God’s love for humankind in the medieval notion of Indulgences. Perhaps one could have made a case for such “simplifying,” such “thingifying” moves in a time and culture when very few people could read. But as you, and the bishops of Vatican II who you, Hans Küng, and the other Agiornamento theolgians counseled well knew, such a mentality no longer speaks to modern people who live in a mental world of scientific, historical thought categories. Surely a return to such medieval thinking is not going to draw back to an active Catholicism the current 30 million(!) former American Catholics, nor is it going to spiritually nourish the rapidly shrinking 65 million current American Catholics, who include many thousand more lay Catholic trained in contemporary theology than there are active Catholic priests!

A return to Tradition? Yes, we are looking for your theological and pastoral leadership in a return to your creative Aggiornamento Vatican II theology!

Sincerely, 

Leonard Swidler, Ph.D., S.T.L., LL.D., LL.D.
Professor of Catholic Thought and Interreligious Dialogue
Co-Founder and Editor, Journal of Ecumenical Studies
Co-Founder and President, Association for the Rights of Catholics in the Church

ARCC spot LIGHT - Moral Judgements

ARCC spot LIGHT (analysis of Church issues offered by the ARCC Publications Committee, J Romasco & R. Schutzius, eds.)

 

Moral Judgment
Feb 15, 2009

 

A study of Church history reveals that Church Canon Law evolved from Roman law. When the Roman Empire became Christian, prevailing Roman Law dealt with governance for a stable Empire. The Pax Romana needed to merge different peoples as citizens of an ever expanding Empire. This required rigor of law but also some flexibility. Rather than rigid legal decisions by a judge, a tribunal system emerged.

Governance focused on maintaining order in the transfer of property rights across generations, and accommodation followed in support of tribal families from the beneficence of the manorial wealth. These people were concerned with laws and rights in protection of their wealth. As the Empire declined, control of wealth and property rights was extended to all citizens as social structure changed, including juridical definition of marriage.

Just as with Roman Law, Church law eventually recognized the need for flexibility to accommodate the right of individual conscience. The documents of Vatican II and the Catholic Catechism both reaffirm that "value decisions" are ultimately personal and that the "Dignity of the Individual" ultimately is the final test.

Catechism: Dignity of the Conscience

1786 Faced with a moral choice, conscience can make either a right
judgment in accordance with reason and the divine law or, on the contrary,
an erroneous judgment that departs from them.

1787 Man is sometimes confronted by situations that make moral judgments
less assured and decision difficult. But he must always seriously seek what
is right and good and discern the will of God expressed in divine law.

1788 To this purpose, man strives to interpret the data of experience
and the signs of the times assisted by the virtue of prudence, by the advice
of competent people, and by the help of the Holy Spirit and his gifts.

1789 Some rules apply in every case: One may never do evil so that good may result from it;

 

In applying the above to failed marriages, the Church has established tribunals to judge the validity of a marriage using what objective evidence that can be obtained, but it is not feasible for a tribunal to judge all the possible causes of a failed marriage.  Catholics seeking to resolve the validity of a failed marriage are well advised to seek the help of these tribunals.  But the right of an individual to act on the decision of a well formed conscience with . some form of objective confirmation remains primary.  Official recognition by the Church is desirable and helpful, but not determinative.   Again, "value decisions" are ultimately personal and the "Dignity of the Individual" ultimately is the final test.   

 

Remembering the Women Sunday Readings    (Review the Book) 

Sunday Feb 22, 7th Sunday, Genesis 19:15-26

Ash Wednesday Feb. 25, Exodus 21:7-11, Deuter. 15:12-17, 21:10-14, Oroverbs 4:3-13, Luke 1:45-55, Ester 14:3-14

Sunday March 1, 1st Lent, Genesis 2:15-17, 3:1-7.

 

Authorization is hereby given to distribute this article, as is, without change.  Thank you.

Support for The Association for the Rights of Catholics in the Church (ARCC) is greatly appreciated. 

Comments welcomed  rschutz1@prodigy.net  or  1-877-700-ARCC (2722).

ARCC spot LIGHT - Too Much Truth?

ARCC spot LIGHT (analysis of Church issues offered by the ARCC Publications Committee, R. Schutzius, ed.)

 

How much truth is too much truth?
March 1, 2009

"Societies cannot survive without authoritative institutions. But which authoritative persons or institutions can withstand constant critical scrutiny? In our culture, we are predisposed to see damage done from failing to question authority. We are far less capable of grasping the destruction that can come from delegitimizing authority with corrosive suspicion. How much reality must we choose to ignore for the greater good of our own souls, and society?"  Rod Dreher  (a Dallas Morning News columnist and author of the Crunchy Con blog on Beliefnet.com).

Do we blame the killings of Lincoln, JFK, and Martin Luther King on the American people?  Are we all responsible for the Salem witch trials?  These examples and others like them occurred right here in the good old USA, but no one blames us all.  So why do we blame the Jews for the murder of Jesus? "Let us pray for the perfidious Jews" has been the Holy Week prayer for centuries.  Why not "Let us pray for Jews, the people who bore the blame of the Church for centuries"?

In Acts 5:27-42 we learn how that Jewish spiritual leaders rounded up the apostles and were ready to have them killed.  They were saved by the courage and wisdom of a Pharisee named Gamaliel who warned them about making another mistake.  (Note that Pope Benedict desperately tried to remedy a mistake offensive to the Jews about Bishop Williamson and his denial of the holocaust.)  If  the Jewish people are not to be blamed for the death of Jesus, who is?  Benedict does not say.  Might the truth be too hard to admit, that it was the Jewish hierarchy who were responsible for this crime (especially given the current situation in the Church today)?  Might history be repeating itself?  Is it not time for Catholics to speak up like Gamaliel and renew his warning about the need for a reality check and reform in the Church: ".... if it is of God you will not be able to overthrow it. Else perhaps you may find yourselves fighting even against God"? 

 

The answer to Ron Dreher's question, "How much reality must we choose to ignore for the greater good of our own souls, and society?", is that we must never ignore reality, especially when it results in pain and suffering for the innocent.  Our bishops ignored pedophilia among priests to protect the good image of the Church.  To protect their own image the hierarchy hides the reality that it was the very hierarchical leaders themselves who killed Jesus.  And the Jewish people have suffered from this cover-up ever since.  Is this too much truth for the hierarchy? 

 

Remembering the Women Sunday Readings   

3/8, 2nd Sunday of Lent, Quinquagesima = 50 days before Easter) Gen. 11:27-32, 12:10-20,  Num. 11:10:15

3/15, 3rd Sunday of Lent, John 4:5-30, 39-42

 

 

Authorization given to distribute this article as is without any change.  Thank you.

Support for The Association for the Rights of Catholics in the Church (ARCC) is greatly appreciated. 

Comments welcomed  rschutz1@prodigy.net  or  1-877-700-ARCC (2722).

The Association for the Rights of Catholics in the Church says: Shame!

Press Release

March 8, 2009

Professor Leonard Swidler, S.T.L. Ph.D. LL.D., President,
Association for the Rights of Catholics in the Church
dialogue@temple.edu   

The Association for the Rights of Catholics in the Church says: Shame!

When is the last time Cardinal Re of the Vatican, or any Vatican official, or indeed, any bishop, excommunicated a Mafioso responsible for deliberate murders?

But Archbishop José Cardoso Sobrinho of Brazil did excommunicate the mother who permitted an abortion to save the life of her nine-year old daughter who was rape-impregnated by her stepfather!  

And this excommunication was defended by Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, head of the Roman Catholic Church’s Congregation for Bishops, as he told La Stampa, an Italian daily newspaper. 

According to the report, the abortion was undertaken to save the life of the nine-year old mother. Why was Archbishop Sobrinho not at the side of the little raped child and her agonizing mother spiritually helping them - instead of publicly condemning them? 

Perhaps the archbishop and the Vatican wonder why so many tens of millions of intelligent, sensitive Catholics are fleeing the Church? Here is another stunning reason! 

Again, ARCC says to Archbishop Sobrinho and Cardinal Re: Shame!

Leonard Swidler, Ph.D., S.T.L., LL.D., LL.D.
Prof Catholic Thought & Interreligious Dialogue
Temple Univeristy, Philadelphia, PA

E-mail: dialogue@temple.edu ; Web: http://astro.temple.edu/~dialogue/Swidler
Editor, Journal Ecumenical Studies; Pres Dialogue Institute http://jesdialogue.org
Religion Dept Temple Univ Philadelphia, PA 19122 http://www.temple.edu/religion
Pres, Association for the Rights of Catholics in the Church  arcc-catholic-rights.net

ARCC Spot LIGHT - No Statue for Galileo

ARCC spot LIGHT (analysis of Church issues by the ARCC Publications Committee, R. Schutzius, ed.)

 

No Statue for Galileo
Mar 15, 2009

Cardinal Ratzinger once described Galileo's trial as "fair and reasonable" and most likely the hierarchy considered it so at the time.  The rub comes, and continues to rub the Vatican the wrong way, because they were seriously wrong and demonstrated their reliance on literal scripture over science by condemning and excommunicating him.

In celebrating the 400th anniversary of Galileo's accomplishments, now Pope Benedict praised Galileo as a man of science and deep faith.  As a sign of rehabilitation of Galileo a statue of him was to be erected in the Vatican gardens (thanks to a generous sponsor).

Poor Galileo, it is not to be so.  It was announce by the Vatican in January that the project would be scrapped and the sponsor was urged to give his money to other science projects.  A statue of Galileo in a garden he frequently visits would remind Pope Benedict of a tragic error.  Not a very pleasant thought to one at the center of the religion-science struggle for truth.  It would also remind him of his cancelled visit to Rome University last year after staff and students accused him of defending the Inquisition's condemnation of Galileo.

Few want constant reminders of past mistakes, but the powerful should, lest they fail to question their decisions and attitudes.  Too bad Pope Benedict will not have a big statue of Galileo to remind him of his, but the way things are going, he doesn't need any more reminders.   Vatican officials will participate in a conference in Florence on the whole Galileo affair in May, gathering for the first time all the key Church institutions since Galileo's condemnation.  Maybe a "Blessed Galileo"? Don't bet on it!

What do you have in your life's garden  to keep you humble?  Married people don't need to ask.   

 

Remembering the Women Sunday Readings   

3/22, 4th Sunday of Lent, - Ester 8:1-8, Exodus 35: 20-29

3/29, 5th Sunday of Lent - Jeremiah 31:15-14

 

Authorization given to distribute this article as is without change.  Thank you.

Support for The Association for the Rights of Catholics in the Church (ARCC) is greatly appreciated. 

Comments welcomed  rschutz1@prodigy.net  or  1-877-700-ARCC (2722).

ARCC Spot LIGHT - Forever in Conflict?

ARCC spot LIGHT (analysis of Church issues by the ARCC Publications Committee, R. Schutzius, ed.)

 

Forever in Conflict?  
Apr 15, 2009

 

The world was shocked when we heard the news about the comments of Pope Benedict XVI about the use of condoms not  preventing AIDS, but might even be the opposite.   Taken in a global context, the use of condoms is not going to eliminate AIDS.  So, from one perspective the Pope is right.  However, practically speaking, condoms do offer a medically proven defense against contracting this deadly disease.  The medical profession, AIDS workers, and governments seeking the common good of the community all disagree with the Pope, as does the general consensus of the world population.  

 

Don't expect a Papal retraction anytime soon.  The Church's long-standing opposition to this and other forms of contraception is not going to change even in the face of reality.  Here is yet another ever-present conflict between Catholic teachings and scientific evidence.   The scientific community is just as definitive and dogmatic as is the Pope, but at least science gives way to new and better understanding of reality.  Galileo is the classic example of religious recalcitrance, while science offers but a passing glimpse of reality in the history-book of the universe. 

 

With condoms, again the Church pits a current teaching against what appears to be reality.  Is there no middle ground? Fortunately, a Brazilian bishop did state the common-sense-obvious  -  that it would be wrong for a HIV-positive spouse not to use a condom to protect his/her partner.   The same can be said of any such coupling, sinful or not.  

 

Failure to recognize that we, and the world we live in, are a "work in progress", i.e. not fixed, but growing in our understanding of reality,  leads to these conflicts time and time again.   Fortunately, the definitive declarations from either camp no longer carry the stamp of infallibility anymore but must be tested over time.  This leaves the interim period of our current understanding open to the individual's well-informed conscience.  With a conscience informed by the one important mandate of Christ, "love one another as I have love you", try to be the best "work in progress" you can in your attempt to know, love, and serve God better.  

 

Remembering the Women Sunday Readings   

4/19 Second Sunday of Easter - Mark 16:1-8

4/26 Third Sunday of Easter - Mark 16:9-14

 

Authorization given to distribute this article as is without change.  Thank you.

Support for The Association for the Rights of Catholics in the Church (ARCC) is greatly appreciated. 

Comments welcomed  rschutz1@prodigy.net  or  1-877-700-ARCC (2722).