Roman or Catholic?

An Unsettled Tension 
One of the roles of the pope has always been the maintenance of the balance between the Roman and the Catholic dimensions. Roman Catholicism is the ongoing tension between two fundamental aspects of the whole: the Roman side, with its emphasis on centralized authority, pyramidal structure, binding teaching and the rigidity of canon law; and the Catholic side, with its emphasis on the universal outlook, the absorption of ideas and cultures and the inclusive embrace of practices into the Catholic whole. The resulting system is Roman Catholicism, at the same time Roman and Catholic. The human genius of Roman Catholicism and one of the reasons for its survival across the centuries has been its ability to be both, though not without tensions and risks of disruption.

Popes embody the Roman Catholic synthesis by holding together the Roman apparatus and the Catholic vision. Of course, they each do it differently, especially after the Second Vatican Council. John Paul II, for example, was a very Roman pope but at the same time a very Catholic one. For example, he strongly defended traditional Roman Catholic teaching (e.g. by launching the 1992 Catechism of the Catholic Church), but was second to none in promoting the universality of this Church around the world (e.g. inter-religious dialogue, traveling globally). Unlike John Paul II, who was both Roman and Catholic, Benedict XVI made the pendulum swing over the Roman pole. With his staunch conservativism in areas such as liturgy, morality and the critical relationship with the secular world, Benedict appeared to be more Roman than Catholic. He seemed to be a rigid, centripetal, doctrinaire pope. A Roman pope. Many felt that his papacy, while strong in its Roman centredness and boundaries, was weak in its Catholic breadth and warmth.

This criticism helps explain why a pope like Francis was chosen to succeed him. With the election of Pope Francis, Rome seemed to be wanting the pendulum to move in the opposite direction in order to re-address the balance. Distancing himself from many Roman features of the office (e.g. his refusal of the pomp of the Vatican Curia, his blurred teaching that leans away from official teachings), Francis has embodied the role of a very Catholic pope. His stress on “Who are we to judge?”, universal brotherhood with Muslims and other religions,ecological concerns, etc. made his papacy significantly shaped by the Catholic elements. The open-endedness of his teaching, coupled with the ambiguity of his language, has created some interest in the secular West, which resonates with much of what he says on social issues. This is to say that he is a very Catholic pope. Perhaps too Catholic andtoo little Roman for a growing number of Roman Catholics!

http://vaticanfiles.org/en/2020/02/vf172/

Papal mixed signals

http://vaticanfiles.org/en/2019/04/vf161/

Dereliction of duty

Benedict XVI has released what amounts to an informal encyclical: 

http://www.ncregister.com/daily-news/the-church-and-the-scandal-of-sexual-abuse

He confirms the sodomite establishment in Catholic clerical circles. More damning evidence from an insider who occupied the highest echelons of the Catholic church. 

Yet the problem with his lament is that he writes like a spectator witnessing an accident scene, while first responders intervene. But in addition to his admittedly brief pontificate, he was Prefect for the CDF from 1982-2005. He was JP2's righthand man. So where was the church discipline from the top down? Why does he act like a helpless bystander? 

Museum piece Catholicism

https://www.traditioninaction.org/religious/e012rp_Limbo24Reasons.html

https://www.traditioninaction.org/religious/e014rp_Limbo_Vree.html 

Limbo is nearly defunct. The official softening up exercise is well under way.

After Vatican II there are basically three factions: liberals, RadTrad/sedevacantists, and "respectable" mainstream conservatives (e.g. Robert George, Ryan Anderson, George Weigel). The Francis pontificate has a clarifying effect by forcing mainstream conservatives to either join the winning side or begin adopting the harmonistic strategies of the RadTrads.

The RadTrads are half-right. But it's a dilemma. RadTrads wax nostalgic for museum piece Catholicism. They cling wistfully to a version of Catholicism representing Pius IX, St. Alphonsus Liguori, the Rosary, the Roman Catechism, Fatima, and Eucharistic adoration. (An oversimplification, but you get the point.)

It is, however, arbitrary to make older magisterial pronouncements as the yardstick to measure newer magisterial pronouncements. Ad hoc to make older magisterial pronouncements more authoritative than newer magisterial pronouncements. The logical response is to conclude that the underlying paradigm is fatally flawed. The ideal of a divine teaching office is a romantic fiction, falsified by history. 

Papal dilemma

Ratzinger has expressed muted concern over the direction that his successor is taking the church. His diplomatic understatement no doubt reflects a much deeper dismay or panic. His life's work is unraveling. 

Why doesn't he intervene more forcibly? Of course, at his age, he doesn't have the stamina for a knockdown drag out fight. But this is just a question of making public statements.

My guess is that he's be reticent because Francis presents an intractable papal dilemma. It's exceedingly rare to have two living popes. Suppose they have a very public disagreement over the fundamental direction of the church. Suppose Ratzinger says he's the voice of authentic Catholicism while Francis says he's the voice of authentic Catholicism? Which pope are faithful Catholics suppose to follow? Flip a coin?  

I suspect Ratzinger doesn't say more because that would expose the Catholic conundrum. So long as this is a hypothetical scenario about contradictory popes, it's easier for Catholic apologists to paper over the divergence. But if you have two living popes at loggerheads, the system self-implodes. 

It's a game of chicken: blink or head-on collision. Ratzinger can only oppose Francis by causing a track wreck that destroys the papacy. Mutual annihilation. 

So there is no solution. At best, Catholicism was an idealistic theory. But things have come to a head. If you have two leaders at the top of the pyramid, and they give the faithful contradictory directions, there is no referee. 

The pope was supposed to be the referee. When popes disagree, the practical incongruity of the system is exposed. 

In one sense this is nothing new. There's plenty of diachronic contradiction between a former pontificate and a later pontificate. But when it's simultaneous, that brings the dilemma from the background to the foreground. 

Who's minding the store?

From a recent interview:

Benedict XVI: There is no doubt that on this point we are faced with a profound evolution of dogma. While the fathers and theologians of the Middle Ages could still be of the opinion that, essentially, the whole human race had become Catholic and that paganism existed now only on the margins, the discovery of the New World at the beginning of the modern era radically changed perspectives. In the second half of the last century it has been fully affirmed the understanding that God cannot let go to perdition all the unbaptized and that even a purely natural happiness for them does not represent a real answer to the question of human existence. If it is true that the great missionaries of the 16th century were still convinced that those who are not baptized are forever lost – and this explains their missionary commitment – in the Catholic Church after the Second Vatican Council that conviction was finally abandoned.
 
From this came a deep double crisis. On the one hand this seems to remove any motivation for a future missionary commitment. Why should one try to convince the people to accept the Christian faith when they can be saved even without it? But also for Christians an issue emerged: the obligatory nature of the faith and its way of life began to seem uncertain and problematic. If there are those who can save themselves in other ways, it is not clear, in the final analysis, why the Christian himself is bound by the requirements of the Christian faith and its morals. If faith and salvation are no longer interdependent, faith itself becomes unmotivated.

Lately several attempts have been formulated in order to reconcile the universal necessity of the Christian faith with the opportunity to save oneself without it. I will mention here two: first, the well-known thesis of the anonymous Christians of Karl Rahner. He sustains that the basic, essential act at the basis of Christian existence, decisive for salvation, in the transcendental structure of our consciousness, consists in the opening to the entirely Other, toward unity with God. The Christian faith would in this view cause to rise to consciousness what is structural in man as such. So when a man accepts himself in his essential being, he fulfills the essence of being a Christian without knowing what it is in a conceptual way. The Christian, therefore, coincides with the human and, in this sense, every man who accepts himself is a Christian even if he does not know it. It is true that this theory is fascinating, but it reduces Christianity itself to a pure conscious presentation of what a human being is in himself and therefore overlooks the drama of change and renewal that is central to Christianity. Even less acceptable is the solution proposed by the pluralistic theories of religion, for which all religions, each in their own way, would be ways of salvation and in this sense, in their effects must be considered equivalent. The critique of religion of the kind exercised in the Old Testament, in the New Testament and in the early Church is essentially more realistic, more concrete and true in its examination of the various religions. Such a simplistic reception is not proportional to the magnitude of the issue.

http://www.catholicworldreport.com/Blog/4650/full_text_of_benedict_xvis_recent_rare_and_lengthy_interview.aspx

The Media's Thumb On The Scale On Christmas Issues

Here's another misleading Christmas article by Time. We get this sort of thing year after year, from so many media outlets. Liberal sources, like Time, run stories critical of a traditional view of Christmas, while more conservative sources in the media tend to either not respond or respond with a shallow affirmation of traditional beliefs.

Ashley Ross cites Luke's comment about Jesus' approximate age (Luke 3:23) and tries to turn it into something Luke "slightly miscalculated", which is "confusing". Since Luke is giving an approximation, how does that involve miscalculation or confusion?

Much of her article is about extrabiblical traditions, like whether Jesus was born on December 25. She raises the common objection to shepherds tending their flocks in winter and Joseph and Mary traveling at that time of year. She doesn't interact with the counterarguments, like the ones I bring up here.

Regarding Pope Benedict XVI's book on the infancy narratives, she writes:

Picking the wrong pope

...outgoing pope, Benedict XVI, who as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger was asked on Bavarian television in 1997 if the Holy Spirit is responsible for who gets elected. This was his response:

I would not say so, in the sense that the Holy Spirit picks out the Pope. ... I would say that the Spirit does not exactly take control of the affair, but rather like a good educator, as it were, leaves us much space, much freedom, without entirely abandoning us. Thus the Spirit's role should be understood in a much more elastic sense, not that he dictates the candidate for whom one must vote. Probably the only assurance he offers is that the thing cannot be totally ruined.

Then the clincher:

There are too many contrary instances of popes the Holy Spirit obviously would not have picked! 

http://ncronline.org/print/blogs/all-things-catholic/quick-course-conclave-101

But if that's the case, then where does that leave apostolic succession?

PBS on the Resignation of Pope Benedict: “he was killing the church”

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/religion/secrets-of-the-vatican/robert-mickens-from-benedict-to-francis/

When he resigned, Benedict XVI left a church that was almost run into the ground. Some brighter people and more astute people on the workings of the church had confided in me, even people on the inside, he was killing the church. People were moving away from the church; people were leaving the church in droves.

What he did in his seven years as pope or so, is he brought back into the mainstream many fringe groups on the extreme right, groups that did not like or threw into question the reforms that happened at the Second Vatican Council in the 1960s. The modernization of the church these people did not like. They wanted to go back to the old Tridentine Mass, the pre-Vatican II Mass, and he allowed them. These people were brought back into the mainstream of the church, even though they’re tiny little pockets, insignificant pockets really, [and] they became the tail wagging the dog.

This was driving away a lot of people, even inside the Vatican. The Vatican is naturally a conservative place. … Ratzinger, Benedict XVI, was too conservative even for them.

On Pope Francis:

What’s the biggest danger he faces?

… The strength of this pope will be the people, and the people who continue to push him. …

His biggest danger is that there are a lot of small-minded bishops that were appointed under Benedict XVI and John Paul II and a whole cadre of clergy that were ordained in the last 10 years on some idea of priesthood in church, so very different from the one that Francis is putting forward, who will find it hard to be enthusiastic and to follow and to pick up his message and to diffuse it among the people.

Pope Francis vs Pope Benedict: “Liturgical Reform”

Pope Francis vs Pope Benedict on Liturgical Reform

For faithful Roman Catholics everywhere who take comfort in the security and the stability of Roman Catholicism over the centuries, one pope has now shot down the deepest desires of a previous pope.

It’s a clear case of Pope Francis vs Pope Benedict on “Liturgical Reform”. One of the key hallmarks of the papacy of “Pope Benedict” was “liturgical reform”. If one recalls, Benedict first started permitting “the faithful” to use “the Tridentine Mass” again – the old Latin form that was universally (by all Roman Catholics without exception) practiced between the councils of Trent and Vatican II.

It only took him six months to do it. And he didn’t even wait for him to pass away.

One priest recently reflected on Pope Ratzinger’s “legacy” in this respect :

Only the future can tell how much the liturgical theology of Joseph Ratzinger will continue to enter into the life of the Church via the Roman Magisterium. That liturgical theology, of course, is itself the heir of the classical Liturgical Movement, applied to the problems of today in such a way as to herald a New Liturgical Movement. This renewal movement, like its early 20th century predecessor, has not been a uniform one by any stretch of the imagination. But it clearly reflects the thought of Joseph Ratzinger.

So the “thoughts of Joseph Ratzinger” have been snuffed out by this new and popular pope. Can anyone say “wolf in sheep’s clothing”?

Let’s take a closer look at what has been snuffed out:

Checking Out Google+ “Authorship”

John Bugay, an Author on Google+

As I continue to look for a job, I’ve come across a number of different applications for “social media”. I mentioned yesterday, I check and contribute to the Twitter feed now (I’m “@johnbugay”). Yes, it’s dangerous. Yes, @Frank_Turk is “out there”. But we’ve got to keep up with the technology.

One of the things that I’ve found out about Twitter is that there are two kinds of people: those on Twitter, and those who find out later.

If you’re following enough people, the Twitter feed can be a torrent. Jump in, watch it for a few minutes, open 5000 tabs in your browser, then jump out and try to sort it all out.

I’ve met some fascinating people this way, one of whom is a business owner and a “social media” and “marketing technology” expert. She recently wrote an article “How Google Authorship Changes the Rules for your Search Results”.

As a marketer, I do see the value for what I’ve called “shameless self-promotion” on occasion. Jokingly, when people ask, I tell them “I’m a world-famous blogger”. (When Steve Hays first asked me to write for Triablogue, my response was, “it would be the dream of a lifetime”). Yes, I blog on topics that are somewhat arcane, but I’m also aware that I write about things that mean very much and hit close to home to people.

I’ve had a chance to check out “Google Authorship”. As the article recommends, I’ve gone in and updated my profile. You can find it here (and again, I’d like to invite Triablogue readers to connect with me – just please let me know who you are).

But notice that “Google Authorship” does what it’s advertised to do: I typed in “Pope Benedict” (and the Google-recommended top-searches also pop-down), and note whose photo comes up at the bottom of the graphic nearby. The link takes you to the Google+ page where the article appears in my profile.

(I’m not sure if Google just puts my article up for my own benefit, or if the rest of the world can see it. However, it was a pretty amazing thing to see my photo here).

Here is the original article. It’s not even an original article that I wrote; it’s a comment that I picked up from the Anglican Continuum blog.

In any event, I’ve had some encouraging interviews in the last couple of weeks. A job search is one of those things: “it ain’t over till it’s over”. Meanwhile, you just keep plugging away at it.

(I’m “@johnbugay”).

Follow Triablogue on Twitter: @triablogue.

Who “Ruined” the Roman Catholic Church?

Peggy Noonan, the syrupy WSJ writer (and former Reagan speech writer) who famously coined the phrase “John Paul the Great” (whom Neuhaus predicted would usher in “the Catholic Moment”), now throws that hopeful papacy and the Ratzinger one under the bus and signs onto the “Church-in-ruins” model that Francis of Assisi was asked to fix:

One of the most famous moments in St. Francis's life is the day he was passing by the church of St. Damiano. It was old and near collapse. From St. Bonaventure's "Life of Francis of Assisi": "Inspired by the Spirit, he went inside to pray. Kneeling before an image of the Crucified, he was filled with great fervor and consolation. . . . While his tear-filled eyes were gazing at the Lord's cross, he heard with his bodily ears a voice coming from the cross, telling him three times: 'Francis, go and repair my house which, as you see, is falling into ruin.'" Francis was amazed "at the sound of this astonishing voice, since he was alone in the church." He set himself to obeying the command.

Go and repair my house, which is falling into ruin. Could the new pope's intentions be any clearer?

But after the great hopefulness of Vatican II, and the long and “great” papacies of JPII (with Ratzinger as the “doctrinal watchdog”) and then Ratzinger the great theologian, how in the world is “my house” [in this metaphor, the “One True Church”] falling into ruin?

Ruin is a very strong word. In this way, the convert-hopefulness of John Richard Neuhaus, exemplified in his work “The Catholic Moment” and the very founding of the journal “First Things”, is in “ruin”. But never mind that.

She continues:

The Catholic Church in 2013 is falling into ruin. The church has been damaged by scandal and the scandals arose from arrogance, conceit, clubbiness and an assumption that the special can act in particular ways, that they may make mistakes but it's understandable, and if it causes problems the church will take care of it.

What were JPII and Ratzinger doing for the last 35 years? Who were the “arrogant”, “conceited” “clubby” “insiders” who, while promising such hope, in the meanwhile, “shepherded” Christ’s “one true church” into ruin? Where is the “true church” if not in this “visible hierarchy” that was so promised to give the kind of “epistemological certainty” that Roman Catholic converts know to rely on?

It’s not “the liberals” who ruined things. It was the last two popes, the last two “shepherds”.

Conservative Roman Catholics vent disappointment over Benedict’s papacy

Analysis: Conservatives vent disappointment over Benedict’s papacy:

“Now, however, with Benedict set to leave office eight years later in an unprecedented departure, many on the Catholic right are counting up the ways that Benedict failed them, and wondering how their favorite watchdog turned into a papal pussycat.”

All his initiatives remain incomplete,” Michael Brendan Dougherty, a Latin Mass enthusiast, lamented at Slate the day the pope made the shocking announcement that he would resign on Feb. 28….

Benedict did not sufficiently clean house in the clergy sex abuse scandal and did not appoint enough hard-liners to the hierarchy; he did not bring the old Latin Rite schismatics fully back in the fold, a mission that will likely end with his pontificate; he was too quick to mollify Muslims or pursue ecumenical gestures; and he charted, as Dougherty put it, “a precarious middle course” theologically.

Even his three encyclicals — the most authoritative documents a pope writes — focused on social justice issues and often embraced the kind of liberal policy prescriptions that sent conservatives into conniptions….

That vaunted German managerial instinct? It seemed to have no effect, as the Vatican under Benedict became a mismanaged palace of court intrigue and financial scandals, lurching from gaffe to disaster, and all exposed to public view when the pope’s own butler leaked reams of internal papal documents.

Benedict was “as bad as a pope has been for 200 years,” Joseph Bottum wrote in a withering verdict delivered in the latest edition of The Weekly Standard. “All in all,” he said, “a terrible executive of the Vatican.”

Last among equals

I happen to think the pope's resignation could be an example of humility. He seems to have voluntarily stepped aside to make room for a successor because (among other reasons) he thinks to hang on as pope at this point would not be in his own best interests let alone the RCC's best interests. He doesn't think he's capable enough to lead the RCC any more. He doesn't think the RCC would do as well with him at its helm as it would with another. Or so it seems to me at this point.

At the same time, others better informed can of course correct me, but as far as I understand there is some tension or at least an unsettled dispute between the pope, the bishops, and councils (e.g. conciliarism) over who has the final authority in the RCC. For example, Win Corduan has documented a bit of this.

Now, the RCC has the doctrine of papal primacy in place. I take it Catholics see the papacy as central to the RCC since they believe Christ himself founded his church upon Peter.

However, if there is an unsettled dispute over final authority within the RCC, then, I wonder, why doesn't the pope step away from papal primacy? Instead of first among equals, why not adopt the attitude of last among equals? Isn't this the way of humility?

Or why not at least accept other bishops have equal authority to the pope, deferring to the judgment of all the bishops (including the bishop of Rome) on a matter? Generally speaking, aren't two brains better than one?

Why not let the bishops or councils have the final authority? Why insist on papal primacy? Why not step aside if the matter of final authority is in legitimate dispute? All things equal, isn't it better for a single man to decline authority and allow a group of (it would seem) equally qualified men (bishops, including himself) to exercise it?

Perhaps Catholics will counter all things aren't equal. Rather, to do so would conflict with the belief that Christ founded his church on Peter and gave the power to "bind and loose" to Peter. That it's hardly proud to abide by what Christ has instituted. After all, the pope is supposed to be the vicar of Christ.

But if there's an unsettled but legitimate dispute between the pope, the bishops, and councils over final authority in the RCC, then one might think there's room to consider the possibility that bishops or councils could have the final say-so for the RCC instead of the pope. Perhaps the interpretation of such passages may not be so clear cut. Further I would think other bishops could ask questions like, aren't all the apostles of Christ "vicars" of Christ? What makes the bishop of Rome so special as the vicar of Christ such that he is the sole vicar for the entire RCC whereas all the other bishops in apostolic succession are only bishops of their diocese?

But I'm obviously treading as gracefully as a bull in a china shop with respect to these matters. Not to mention coming across as woefully ignorant. However, I'm sure people like John Bugay, Matt Schultz, Jason Engwer, Steve Hays, etc. can weigh in far more knowledgeably than I ever could. So I'll stop now and defer to them if they or others wish to correct me or otherwise add their thoughts.

Thoughts on the Papacy and Benedict XVI

http://wincorduan.bravejournal.com/entry/120040

Live Blogging on the papal resignation:

There are a couple of live blogs dedicated to the papal resignation, if anyone is interested

http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/uk-world-news/live-blog-the-latest-news-and-reaction-1703344

http://blogs.wsj.com/dispatch/2013/02/11/live-blog-pope-benedict-resigns/?mod=WSJ_latestheadlines

I've pulled the following tidbits:

Benedict XVI Resignation: Vatican Press Briefing

http://www.news.va/en/news/benedict-xvi-resignation-details-of-press-briefing

2013-02-11 Vatican Radio

(Vatican Radio) Pope Benedict XVI announced his resignation from the Petrine office on Monday morning, effective February 28th, 2013 at 8PM Rome Time. The Director of the Press Office of the Holy See, Fr. Federico Lombardi, SJ, gave a briefing to journalists in the Press Office of the Holy See at 12:30 PM Monday afternoon, during which he clarified the following points:

Pope Benedict XVI has given his resignation freely, in accordance with Canon 332 §2 of the Code of Canon Law.

Pope Benedict XVI will not take part in the Conclave for the election of his successor.

Pope Benedict XVI will move to the Papal residence in Castel Gandolfo when his resignation shall become effective.

When renovation work on the monastery of cloistered nuns inside the Vatican is complete, the Holy Father will move there for a period of prayer and reflection.

Pope Benedict XVI to Resign February 28

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

There is a 30 second ad at the front of this video. See also this link: http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/02/11/16924342-pope-benedict-xvi-to-resign-on-feb-28-vatican-says

Housewives Called to Communion

I keep handy a copy of J.I. Packer’s “A Quest for Godliness: The Puritan Vision for the Christian Life” [©1990 Crossway Books]. According to Packer, with respect to spirituality, “the Puritans are giants compared to us, giants whose help we need if ever we are to grow” (16).

Last, night, I came across the chapter on marriage and family. Packer notes “there is much to be learned by tracking Puritan thought on marriage and the family” (260). Especially, he notes, “the Puritans, like the Reformers, glorified marriage in conscious contradiction of the medieval idea that celibacy as practiced by clergy, monks, and nuns is better—more Christlike, more pleasing to God—than marriage, procreation, and family life” (260).

Packer cites a number of Puritan writings on the tenderness of married love. Here are several selections:

There is no such fountain of comfort on earth, as marriage.

It is a mercy to have a faithful friend that loveth you entirely … to whom you may open your mind and communicate your affairs …. And it is a mercy to have so near a friend to be a helper to your soul and … to stir up in you the grace of God.

God is the first Institutor of marriage, gave the wife to the husband, to bee, not his servant, but his helper, counselor, and comforter.

And then there is the well-known commentary of Matthew Henry on Genesis 2:22:

The woman was made of a rib out of the side of Adam; not made out of his head to top him, nor out of his feet to be trampled upon by him, but out of his side to be equal with him, under his arm to be protected, and near to his heart to be loved”.

Packer speaks of “the erotic agape of a romantic marriage” which was common in Puritan life.

Called to Desperation

This runs counter, now, to what the Called to Communion wives are experiencing. Perhaps they went along with their husband’s whims to give up the Reformed faith and move to Rome. I know, from correspondence with members of Jason Stellman’s church, that Jason’s wife did not give up her membership at Exile Presbyterian, and further, Jason’s youngest son made a profession of faith in that church. We should continue to pray for the difficulties left behind when these men gave up the faith.

“Marriage and Family” have a somewhat different meaning for Roman Catholics. Packer notes:

Thomas Aquinas gave teaching on womanhood that undergirded the opinion [that celibacy is more virtuous, more Christlike, and more pleasing to God]. He went so far as to opine that the birth of a girl is the result of a male embryo going wrong; that while a married man’s wife is a convenience to him, in that she enables him to procreate and avoid concupiscence (roving passion, prompting promiscuity), in all other respects a man will always make him a better companion and helpmeet than his wife, or any woman, can ever be. Furthermore, affirmed Aquinas, woman are mentally as well as physically weaker than men, and more prone to sin, and are always by their nature subject so some man. Husbands may correct their wives by corporal punishment if necessary, and children ought to love their father more than their mother. It may be said without fear of contradiction that the great theologian’s oracles about the second sex make distinctly dismal reading.

Nowadays, Roman Catholics pride themselves on their Church’s “Social Teaching”, but that is only a recent phenomenon. These attitudes of Aquinas were dominant for perhaps the largest portion of the time when “the Roman Catholic Church” was in ascendancy.

Thomas’ negativism here was not, indeed, entirely his fault; not only did Aristotle, whose thought Thomas sought to claim for Christianity, take a very low view of women, but many of the orthodox Fathers, whose teaching Thomas’ method required him to follow, had been just as negative and down-putting with regard to women, and even more so with regard to sexual relations in marriage. Chrysostom had denied that Adam and Eve could have had sexual relations before the Fall; Augustine allowed that procreation was lawful, but insisted that the passions accompanying intercourse were always sinful; Origen [who had made himself a eunuch for the Kingdom] had inclined himself to the theory that had sin not entered the world the human race would have been propagated in an angelic manner, whatever that might be, rather than by sexual union; and Gregory of Nyssa was sure that Adam and Eve had been made without sexual desire, and that had there been no Fall mankind would have reproduced by means of what Leland Ryken gravely calls ‘some harmless mode of vegetation’. (260–261).

Never fear. One reason why 90+% of Roman Catholic married couples today thumb their noses at Roman Catholic teaching about “marriage and family” is because John Paul II and Benedict XVI have been champions of a similar ethic on marriage. When he was a mere bishop, Karol Wojtyla (later John Paul II) wrote the book that was a major contribution to the birth control encyclical, Humanae Vitae.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer writes from prison (December 18, 1943) “to put it plainly, for a man in his wife’s arms to be hankering after the other world is, in mild terms, a piece of bad taste, and not God’s will. We ought to find and love God in what he actually gives us; if it pleases him to allow us to enjoy some overwhelmingly earthly happiness, we mustn’t try to be more pious than God himself and allow our happiness to be corrupted by presumption and arrogance, and by unbridled religious fantasy which is never satisfied with what God gives” (Letters and Papers from Prison, pg 168).

The Emperor Wants your Marriage

And yet, this is exactly the way that the “Holy Fathers” want Roman Catholics to approach love in marriage.

John Paul II cautions his readers that love in marriage can quickly turn to lust, and urges his readers not to succumb to it. There is a difference between “lust” and “holy sexual desire”. “John Paul goes on to articulate that while the sexual urge is itself a gift from God that attracts towards one another, it is possible that this can easily corrupt the person when he/she seeks only the sexual attributes of the other than the person as a whole.” (Rev. Benjamin P. Bradshaw: “The Theology of the Body according to Pope John Paul II: Conference IV: From Lust to Love, updated 3/20/2010). Citing Wojtyla’s “Love and Responsibility”:

Inevitably, then, the sexual urge in human beings is always in the natural course of things directed towards another human being, this is the normal form in which it takes. If it is directed towards the sexual attributes as such this must be recognized as an impoverishment or even a perversion of the urge…It is just because it [sexual urge] is directed towards a particular human being that the sexual urge can provide the framework within which and the basis on which the possibility of love arises (pg 49).

The document continues, citing Benedict XVI:

For his part, Pope Benedict beautifully addresses this distinction in his first encyclical Deus Caritas Est/God is Love published on Christmas day, 2005. In part I (of II) of the encyclical, Benedict addresses the transformation of eros, or erotic love (amor concupiscentiae) to agape or self-giving love (amor benevolentiae). The Holy Father points out that while erotic love is itself a great good, it must be purified, and in a way vivified by the self-sacrificing nature of agapic love:

An intoxicated and undisciplined eros, then, is not an ascent in “ecstasy” towards the Divine, but a fall, a degradation of man. Evidently, eros needs to be disciplined and purified if it is to provide not just fleeting pleasure, but a certain foretaste of the pinnacle of our existence, of that beatitude for which our whole being yearns…Purification and growth in maturity are called for; and these also pass through the path of renunciation. Far from rejecting or “poisoning” eros, they heal it and restore its true grandeur.

For the Roman Catholic male, then, you should remember Pope Benedict XVI when making love to your wife. He says it is good to make love to your wife, but then, the pope wants you to know that you ought not to be thinking lustful thoughts about her. That is a fall, a degradation. At that moment, you must take the pope’s instructions to heart and work toward “purification and growth in maturity” which are called for.

Wives, Roman Catholic wives, now, do not tempt your husbands to lust. Burn your lingerie, your lacey nighties; you too, must work for purification of yourself and your husband in bed, lest your corrupted eros ultimately lead to lust, and pride, and using your husband as a product.

You Desperate Called-to-Communion Housewives should now pause for a word from Your Holy Sponsor.

Pope compares disobedient Catholics to Judas

http://m.ucanews.com/news/2012/08/30/pope-compares-disobedient-catholics-to-judas

So, if you're a Roman Catholic and you think the "Assumption of Mary" dogma was stretching things a bit, or if you think a little artificial contraception never hurt anyone, then the Pope wants you to leave Roman Catholicism, rather than to stay, and wink and nod at such things.

Pope Benedict XVI delivered an address from the Vatican on Sunday in which he suggested that those who disagree with Catholic teachings or do not believe in Jesus Christ should leave the church rather than become betrayers like Judas.

"Judas," Pope Benedict said, "could have left, as many of the disciples did; indeed, he would have left if he were honest. Instead he remained with Jesus. He did not remain because of faith, or because of love, but with the secret intention of taking vengeance on the Master."

The leader of the Worldwide Roman Catholic Church added that Judas' most serious crime was falsehood, which the pope described as "the mark of the devil." He added that Catholics needed to always be sincere like St. Peter and believe in Jesus.

LifeSiteNews reported that Monsignor Ignacio Barreiro, the Human Life International Rome Director, confirmed that the pope's comments are very much related to the Catholic Church's formal teachings in support of traditional marriage and pro-life views.

"For those Catholics who cannot bring themselves to believe the formal teachings of the Church on life and family matters it would be more honest to leave the Church rather than betraying Her," Barreiro said.

"We regret very much that the person is so inclined and we wish they would have a conversion to truly believe," he added....

Monsignor Barreiro noted that differences in opinion were not prohibited in the Catholic Church, but in some circumstances it was better to just obey the important teachings and "sacrifice your will."