Tolerance
Professor Hale links to a story where a lesbian woman makes a fuss over being refused communion.
You have to read the whole story to understand what is going on. Jewelled Cranberry has an excellent post on it here. I suggest you read the whole thing.
Money quote, from the “offended” party:
“You brought your politics, not your God into that Church yesterday, and you will pay dearly on the day of judgment for judging me,†she wrote in a letter to Guarnizo. “I will pray for your soul, but first I will do everything in my power to see that you are removed from parish life so that you will not be permitted to harm any more families.â€
Harming families? By following the laws of the Church? How can this be?
It is “harming Families” because it isn’t “Tolerant”.
Sorry. The only person who brought their politics into the church was the lesbian woman, and this is the kind of axe you will see them swinging over and over again as the government forces the Church to act according to it’s PC wishes, and not the rules set down by the Creator.
Still think that Gays ought to be free to marry? Really, they’re the kindest, gentlest people you know, right?
So long as you’re not a devout priest trying to stay firm to the Calling. Then watch out.
Look, I think people should just be as happy as they can get themselves. If they can only be happy at the expense of other’s faith, that’s a sort of a dealbreaker. You can think that Gays seeking the recognition of marriage is solely and only about their love for one another.
But you’re wrong.
This is but one example. There are others, and this situation will recur and recur until the Church, beaten and bruised, will slink off to a corner and all but die, it’s only adherents being those too stubborn to be pushed around by an intrusive PC government.
God forbid, on the other hand, that you raise a question about the new State Sponsored religion of Ecological awareness and Planet Saving Nonsense, then you’re a criminal. That is a church to which I will never belong, preferring my soul to my freedom, thankyouverymuch. Don’t expect me to give up either without a hard won fight.
To the church leaders who rolled belly up and submitted to this woman: Shame on you. I would be embarrassed to call myself a Catholic, but for the fact that you now cannot. Oh, you can pretend, but you’re in the soup now. I hope you like it.
14 comments Og | Uncategorized
The lesbian “Catholic” wasn’t seeking God, shewas seeking an issue. She doesn’t need ceremony or a priest to be close to God.
One of the good things about the Protestant movement was the idea of the “priesthood of the believer.” That women can approach God on her own without the need of anyone else.
Being CPT Obvious, I point out that she is seeking political confrontation, which may well be a religious experience for her.
“That women can approach God on her own without the need of anyone else.”
You mean, the foundation of Christianity? this is not something the Protestants have that the Catholics do not, this is a concept hijacked from the Catholic playbook. In fact, you’re taught in grade school what sacraments you can administer yourself and how to do so.
Catholics do not “Approach” G-d through his ministers. never have, never will. Ministers are there for a whole lot of reasons, but that isn’t one of them. Actually, the predominant reason those ministers exist is as shepherds, guiding parishioners to the light and away from apostacy, for instance. Making a 2000 year old text have meaning in todays world is another.
I’m constantly amazed at what “Facts” protestants “believe” about Catholicism that just aren’t true and have no basis in truth.
Okay, I won’t get into a theological debate with a former seminary student.
That, however, doesn’t take anything away from my basic premise. The woman was not seeking a religious experience,she was seeking a political confrontation. For all we know, she could be an atheist.
Precisely, Mike. The agenda was all on her side.
I will say, without taking away from anything you said, my mom used to take communion from the priest who knew she had divorced my dad. Dad knew he wasn’t allowed and watched her take it.
We know that many priests serve politicians (Biden, Kerry, Kennedy) who are pro-abortion, pro gay marriage, etc.
A little consistency would have protected that priest.
As for your views of what protestants think of catholic theology, a lot of us are former catholics and only know what we saw in the local parish, got from the nuns in school and didn’t go to seminary.
There’s a prominent catholic radio host (Al Kresta) who was protestant. I talked to him frequently while he was making his decision and he told me, like you, that catholics didn’t believe all the stuff I thought they did.
Then he moderated a debate between a catholic priest and a protestant wherein all the stuff we had thought we were taught as kids was defended by this catholic priest who was credentialed to defend the faith.
Yet, when my dad had his last rites, I would have thought the priest was a protestant minister (no candles at the throat, etc.).
I’ve been at catholic masses that were like that also.
I’m not arguing a theological point.
I’m not hurling mud.
I’m trying to explain something.
It just appears that there is not a consistency of position.
Same as protestants.
“It just appears that there is not a consistency of position.”
No question, this is true. I give you Father Michael Pfleger as evidence. The world is loaded with morons. Catholics are in the world. Catholicism is loaded with morons.
You can receive communion after a divorce. You’re just not supposed to if you remarry or are living in sin.
OG…
I’m not Catholic but did attend a Catholic grade school for a time and have no issues with the faith. In this particular topic of refused communion I will side with the priest, he abided by doctrine and made the right decision. I have compassion for the woman in question who’d suffered the loss of her mother and further will not question or pass judgment upon her chosen life style. The Catholic Church has been a bastion of stability, even though often forced, but none the less continued to endure. I fear for Christianity in our country, we are complacent and unrepentant choosing instead to love materialism.
What I don’t know about this story is more than what I do know. Was this woman a public lesbian “Act Up!” activist known in the parish, or was her lesbianism less known and therefore not prone to cause scandal and misunderstanding? Circumstance 1, like Pelosi and Kennedy, people in the public eye going against Catholic teaching in supporting abortion, or if you’re in a country like Haiti or the Philippines where you think non-Catholics get the Eucharist to take home and abuse in their witch doctor rites, there’s where refusal for Eucharist comes in under Canon 915. Circumstance 2, if her disorder was more of a private matter, then refusal, then we’ve got a problem, Houston. She should know better, she knows what Paul teaches when he says do not receive the Eucharist if you know you’re not in a state of grace lest you eat and drink a condemnation on yourself, and if she receives, she’s the only one she’s hurting, and the priest can’t mind read on her state; only she can know if she hit Confession and did nothing out of sorts before Mass.
Refusing someone Eucharist is like drawing a pistol. You better darn well be sure your target is dead naughts publicly guilty, otherwise the it hits the proverbial fan.
Like Jimmy Buffett once said, there’s a fine line between Saturday Night and Sunday Morning, and with Confession seldom being right before Mass anymore, I wonder how many heathens from the clubs last night are sauntering into a line they shouldn’t be in, gay or straight.
Same for divorcees. If one honestly tries to do right, and we all have moments of sin and make a mistake we later have to confess, then one should be eligible for Eucharist those times one is in good grace, and refrain when one had a weak moment. But if one lives with someone or remarries, then it’s called obstinacy in sin, and one should not go up.
It’s the conflicting message point that Ed mentioned, not a desire to publicly judge, for that is for God alone. Sorry to everyone for turning this into Old Timey Catholic Hour, but if you’re not Catholic I hope you find it at least informative.
p.s.: in the Sacrament of Marriage, it’s the couple that administers it, not the priest – he just witnesses on behalf of the Church. But try explaining that esoterica to the thugs when they try to force you to perform a marriage that has no valid couple to administer it.
Was the priest the lesbian’s confessor? If not, how did he know what she does behind closed doors? Is he obligated to refuse Communion to someone he suspects of mortal sin or should he need to know?
She approached him prior to the fact. You really should read the linked pieces theyre very good.
Read the linked article.
It is an issue I am confilicted on. I do not believe that same on same is good or right.
I do not want the government telling me what I can do.
I believe the church is the moral authority.
I also belive the Priest did what he believed.
It saddens me to the core that we are even discussing marriage as anything other than what it ever was.
May God have mercy on us.
I read the linked pieces. I read the WaPo article. I did read where the priest learned just before the funeral mass that the daughter was lesbian. I didn’t read where the daughter was the one who told him. And, what difference does that make?
Was the priest correct in refusing Communion to someone he suspected of mortal sin or should he know.
“Was the priest correct in refusing Communion to someone he suspected of mortal sin”
Indeed, he was. That’s what he’s supposed to do according to Canon law.
I just saw on Ann Barnhardt where the deceased’s daughter introduced herself and her female lover to the priest prior to the Funeral Mass, hence making a prima facie right out of the box statement of her obstinacy in mortal sin loudly and clearly. She in effect planted her flag on the hill, and when she brazenly appeared for Eucharist, he had his choice made for him, for he is a stand-up priest who knew this would be the hill he’d die upon, and he unflinchingly made the right choice.
Now if the bishop heard him out and yet sent the apology, then shame on him. If he talked over the priest, dressed him down, and wouldn’t hear the lead-up, then shame on him. All he did was make a white martyr of the man (white martyr is where you suffer in life yet are not killed for your faith – as opposed to the obvious red martyr – it goes all the way up to life imprisonment, loss of ability to work and earn a livelihood, banishment from the community, etc.).
I ought to thank these liberals. With every attack, they make a more devout and fervent Catholic out of me.
I like Barnhardt’s use of the John Chrysostom quote, the road to hell being paved with the skulls of bishops. And remember Dante even put certain Renaissance Popes in hell. The English bishops flipped for Henry VIII and sold out Thomas More. The USCCB didn’t get its courage up until it own ox was getting gored – we lay Catholics have had our health insurance options screwed for years without their coming up with an alternate Catholic friendly alternative. This priest, who crossed the Tiber from the Anglican to Catholic church, has nailed what will happen: http://gkupsidedown.blogspot.com/2012/03/coming-persecution.html