Filum Romanum - A Thread for the Catholic Church

A priest my family and I knew from childhood was found guilty today of sexual abuse in the school my sisters went to. I don't want to believe, but a conviction like that is not made lightly.

An interesting analysis of the current synod: Beyond the Hype About a Vatican Upheaval: "The synod on the family isn’t close to being the revolutionary gathering that some imagine."

The author agrees that this synod has allowed a more open and frank discussion on homosexuality than any previous one.

Vatican Bishops Scrap Opening to Gays, Divorced Members.

Well, that was quick.

edited 18th Oct '14 11:52:14 AM by Hodor

No change in doctrine.The Church cannot change her doctrine. A recent example (recent in terms of a 2,000 year old entity), is contraception. Pope Paul VI formed a commission to study the question of whether contraception could be consistent with Catholic teaching. It hadn’t been so far, but maybe something had been missed. The majority of the commission voted to approve birth control. Guess what. Despite majority opinion, Church teaching did not change.

If this is true, I give up. May as well be apathetic about it (cause apathy is a less painful state of being).

They were never going to "change" Church doctrine anyway.

If, on occasion, I crack jokes about Filipinas dumping fetuses at Catholic Churches around here, it's because it's the unfortunate very horrible truth and because I would rather feel cynical-humorous about the subject matter than hopeless-despair.

I guess leaving fetuses at Churches is a step-up from throwing still alive babies into rivers or drowning them in milk.

Would someone care to explain how the Synod works? From my understanding it's composed of bishops, and because of this not being a regularly scheduled one it was smaller, but even then it seems to be massive.

The Other Wiki says that the bishops are "the heads of Eastern Catholic Churches, the presidents (only) of episcopal conferences, three members (not ten) of religious institutes and the cardinals who head dicasteries of the Roman Curia."

Just the first two seem to produce big numbers, I'm having trouble wrapping my head around it.

Also the whole "Eastern Catholic Churches" thing is likewise hurting my head.

From my basic understanding is that the Eastern Catholic Churches are from Greek (and other languages) speaking parts of the Eastern Roman Empire that sided with the Pope in the Great Schism. They developed somewhat different traditions partly because of the language barrier and partly because they were in areas where the Pope had little if any political power.

Gross over-simplification though.

I'm just getting hung up on the "Eastern" part of the name, it bugs me as the churches are all global now anyway.

Random example time. The Council of Florence issued the following, extremely strong statement against the possibility that non-Catholics might obtain salvation:

This is not at all the current position of the Church, of course. For instance, Lumen Gentium claims that

and the Catechism of the Catholic Church (847) states that

The contradiction is typically resolved by claiming that those who, while not professing Catholic beliefs, strive to do good and to follow God (insofar as they are able to, but then again that applies to everyone) cannot really be said to be outside the Catholic Church. They are not fully members of it, sure; but they are not so separated from it that they cannot obtain salvation through it, even if they do not know that.

That's fine and good, but that's very much not what Pope Eugene IV meant in his Bull of the Council of Florence. One might say that it is a "development" of that doctrine, if one squints hard enough; but to claim that nothing in the Church's doctrine has changed since the Council of Florence would be, I think, extremely disingenuous.

In any case, no, the Church won't change the doctrine, that's for sure. But I would not be surprised if, a little at a time, it "clarified" the doctrine along lines similar to the ones I described above.

edited 19th Oct '14 4:52:35 AM by Carciofus

A couple articles from the Catholic Herald:

• Playing with a Ouija board isn't funny, it's stupid and dangerous. Francis Phillips reminds her readership that "dabbling in the occult" is "playing with Hellfire". After all, the Devil is very real, in Catholic teaching.

• Bishops' decrees on SSPX may be illegal, say traditionalist group. The International Una Voce Federation sticks up for the SSPX.

And one from Crux Now:

• Pope Francis has conservatives talking schism. Easier said than done.

Interesting...

Well, yes, but the occult doesn't work. The devil has nothing to do with it, it's all human delusion and silliness.

The Handle, the Catholic Church's official position is that the devil is real, he is active on earth among humans, and occult practices are both real and dangerous. And that the Devil is delighted to hear people say that "it's just a game" or "the occult isn't real", because that plays into his hands.

Ah, yes; "the greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing people that he didn't exist".

As someone who was raised a Muslim, Deal with the Devil and Faustian Bargain are completely alien concepts to me. Satan is nothing more than a whisperer, but you don't strike deals with him except metaphorically. That is, when you sacrifice your principles for the sake of your desires. In the mundane, non-supernatural way.

And that's your opinion. I've heard of/seen enough weird shit to at least suspect there's interference.

Perhaps it needs Percussive Maintenance?

@Handle: However, you have a personal jinn who is tempting you to do evil, if I'm not mistaken, and this is not supposed to be a metaphor.

The Catholic view on supernatural events (to use a rather meaningless but fairly-understandable term) is that they exist. The Virgin Mary does appear now and then, it's not just a mass hallucination borne of religious hysteria, miracles have actual effects on the world, and yes, demons are capable of possessing people's bodies and forcing them to see or do things that they would not otherwise. They still train exorcists just in case a bishop discovers a situation that the diocese's trained psychiatrists simply cannot explain through any form of mental illness, stress or drug addiction. And thus, they believe that the practice of magic is a very real danger to people's souls.

@Personal djinn: no, no, that's the Adversary. That's his job. The Whisperer (of Terrible Advice).

Djinns aren't Satan's Crew of Fallen Angels. They're another divine creation. Humans are made of clay, Angels (and "Demons") are made of Light, and Djinns are made of smokeless fire. Some Djinns believe in God, some don't. Some mean well, some don't. They're kinda eldritch/fae-ish so they suck at being good and they can be evil inadvertently, and vice versa. The official stance is that, since humans can't do anything about them, we should just stop worrying and not think about it too much.

That last sentence was a Non Sequitur. Demonic Possession, therefore Deal with the Devil?

edited 5th Nov '14 4:54:41 PM by TheHandle

@Rami- One quibbel, the church has never said that magic, as such, is real. Accusations of witchcraft were almost always met with repercussions for the accuser, for example.

The difference is that the Catholic Church's stance is that while the Devil mostly works through "whispering" as you put it, rather than directly affecting someone, he can and does directly act, if the person has somehow opened themselves to him that way. The "opening" can be accidental (like playing with occult practices in the belief that they're harmless or don't really work) or deliberate, as would be the case of someone who actively invokes him. That last would be where a Deal with the Devil comes in. The number of people who choose to place themselves in a position to "deal" are rare, though.

^ The effects of magic can be real. But the ability to do it can be either divine (healing, usually) or diabolic (pretty much everything else, including fortunetelling and curses). Basically, if the magic is damaging, self-centered or self-aggrandizing, or ill-intended, the power source is diabolic.

Repercussions against the accuser occurred in some areas, during some witchhunts. It was far from universal.

edited 5th Nov '14 5:13:12 PM by Madrugada

Well, what does Satan do when acting directly? What's even the point? It seems very off-mission for him. His goal is to prove that humans suck and are unworthy of the role God gave them. Unless... he's cheating? Why would he do that? God is quite happy to test us on his own.

Showing we're corruptable is pretty supportive of that view point.

Maybe by creating situations were the bad of humanity can show better. Like the Joker did in The Dark Knight.

Again, no need for direct intervention just to do that.