Wherein Fr. Z rants:The world is going nuts. I have often felt a bit like Cassandra, but … Cassandra was right. Here is another take. From the pen of John Zmirak at The Stream with my emphases and comments:
The expected Supreme Court decision imposing on 50 states an entirely new understanding of marriage, and the frenzy of hatred that gay activists have stoked against Indiana for trying to shelter religious believers from crippling lawsuits should wake us to a cold and stark reality: The age of tolerance in America is vanishing before your eyes. The question is how Christians and other people of faith and good will are going to respond.Of course, some of us knew that the "age of tolerance" was a thinly-veiled fraud to begin with. But read more >>
19 comments:
By their nature, sodomites are subversive, and they will subvert and destroy any culture, law, or Church that accepts them with equanimity.
Sodomites can not tolerate any public expression (now, even private) of condemnation of their malign perversion and so none of this is any surprise but to try and rally Catholics in defense of religious liberty is spiritually suicidal according to Tradition.
Religious Liberty is a problem not a solution for Jesus Christ is King of all and any country which thinks it can legislate although He is indifferent to this sin crying to Heaven for Vengeance will have His Grace withdrawn from it and it will perish.
Tolerance on moral questions has a history of being dicey. Go back and read the history of Utah, where the Mormons were close to forced to knuckle under into abandoning polygamy. It's amazing how that story is all but forgotten just 100 years later. But the culture used to mitigate more for moral stringency, and now it pushes for moral leniency. And it is not the liberal politicians who have played the decisive role but the liberals educating our children, determining our culture, and shaping our parishes. The younger generation says, "Look, everyone is having sex. How can you expect them not too -- it's a natural and good drive -- and how can you begin to judge what two people do alone or say it's wrong when it's just acknowledging biology?" And the religious teachers start talking in convoluted knots about the real purpose of marriage before defaulting to how we've all already been redeemed and what we need to worry about is the least among us and not stepping on anyone's dignity. With those brushstrokes, the people in Indiana are easily painted as sheltered, closed-off, FOX News watching farmers. It's "Footloose" as recast by CNN.
Some random thoughts....
In principle I never really cared if the State issues a piece of paper to a same sex couple with the words "marriage" on it after a mock ceremony.
Other then objecting to it on moral and religious grounds I felt it was none of my business & was content to pray for the individuals involved and if the opportunity arose share with them the Truths of the Faith.
Like someone must have done with Norma McCorvey of Roe vs Wae fame who was still living with her lesbian lover when she came to Christ and was baptized. Both she and her lover became believers.
Over time she became Catholic and she and her lover remained friends but now living apart and chaste.
But this new generation of activists well they are not "Liberal" to quote Dennis Prager.
They are leftists and fascists. They are not content merely to live and let live. They want to punish us for merely thinking their lifestyle is wrong.
But this latest freakout...what can I say...WOW!
These people are just...evil.
God help them and forgive them.
My God keep them and may he keep them far away from us.
In "Fiddler on the Roof" someone asks the rabbi whether there is a prayer for the Czar. He replies, why of course, "May God bless the Czar and keep him far away from us." Funny, of course, though they're eventually persecuted by pograms and driven from their homes by an edict.
The idea of "not caring" whether the state issues a piece of paper to same sex couples is a lot like that. In fact, it's very much like the outlook of classic Anabaptists, for example, the John Howard Yoder's (Mennonite) classic, The Christian Witness to the State.
The problem with this point of view, as judged by Church teaching, is that it concedes territory to the enemy that belongs to Christ. If it were only a temporary concession stemming from inopportune circumstances, such as the Church had in the first three centuries or as we have now with Obama in office (as I suspect is the case), there is no problem in principle.
The problem, however, is that we ought to care about what the state does. Why? Not merely because the state, too, belongs to King Jesus, but because the idiotic decisions made by King Obama have a direct effect on the spiritual lives of millions, and potentially our own children and ourselves. Is it easier to grow in holiness in a society that allows unbridled immorality to have its way, for same-sex "marriage" to come to be seen as acceptable, along with everything else that afflicts our society from a culture of recreational sex, pornography, contraception, abortion (which Kreeft calls the "sacrament" of the Culture of Death)? Of course not. Food for thought.
The problem, however, is that we ought to care about what the state does. Why? Not merely because the state, too, belongs to King Jesus, but because the idiotic decisions made by King Obama have a direct effect on the spiritual lives of millions, and potentially our own children and ourselves
Exactly. Just as an excommunicant is still bound by Sunday obligation, so a State's duty to protect the common good remains even though the State is determined to make a hash of it; and Christians have a duty to remind everyone of it. Libertarian "punting" on marriage is not an option.
R R Reno at First Things comes through on this point:
http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/2015/04/duck-and-cover-catholicism
Christians of America and the Western world in general seem ignorant of history as they walk towards the meat grinder.
NEVER in history has demonization and dehumanization that is being represented today by the sodomite 'eunuch' class and its elite puppeteers, failed to be followed up by subsequent prosecution and eventual mass execution.
Does nobody look a psychotic leftist in the eye and see there a killer more bloodthirsty than any Islamist? The Red Terror in Spain, the Stalinist purges, the French Revolution's rivers of blood.
Wake up! The ones plotting your death are not hiding in a cave in Afghanistan. They are here! On your television screen and in your legislature. If you are not ready to act when the time comes, be ready to be martyred.That is the message of the last few months.
Essentially my sentiments as well. Just disturbing.
Mark is correct that there is plenty of enemy right in our back yards bent on destruction. But do pray for those abroad being murdered simply for professing Christ.
>In "Fiddler on the Roof" etc.....
>The idea of "not caring" whether the state issues a piece of paper to same sex couples is a lot like that. etc...
Czarist Russia was an Imperial Autocracy so prayer was the only recourse the Jews in Fiddler had thus I don’t see how the analogy holds? We live in a pluralistic republican democracy where Catholics are one of many & not the religion of the State. As such even before gay "marriage” the state issued licenses to marry to baptized persons who divorced & the validity of the sacrament left unexamined thus leaving open the possibility of acts of material adultery. The idea of issuing a license I believe came about later in American history so the state could regulate inter racial marriages which of course are not against natural law. America has never had a correct understanding of marriage and thus I believe my apathy toward her authority in this matter it is justified.
>The problem with this point of view, as judged by Church teaching, is that it concedes territory to the enemy that belongs to Christ.
Maybe the State should not regulate marriage rather it should fall upon the church? This leads to other issues of prudence. Such as if two men play act a “marriage” to somehow finalize their immoral relationship should they be arrested? I don’t favor criminal prosecution for consensual homosexual acts between adults done in private. I don’t see the value in putting two such men in jail with other men. As long as they do nothing indecent in public I would simply preach the gospel to them and invite them to embrace the Truth. Even in the OT the Law of Moses punished with the death penalty two men who performed Acts in public (and then only in front of 4 to 6 witnesses & only if they did a certain act which shall go un-named for decency sake). There has never been i believe a case in either the Mishnah or Talmud of someone being prosecuted for violating a certain un-natural sex act between men. However there are numerous stories of Rabbis walking in some forgotten area of the world communing with God and coming upon two men doing the unspeakable. The men would in all these cases threaten the life of the Rabbi.
Ironically this murderous hate can be found today in the opposition to the Law in Indiana.
> If it were only a temporary concession stemming from inopportune circumstances, such as the Church had in the first three centuries or as we have now with Obama in office (as I suspect is the case), there is no problem in principle.
IMHO the Church was better off when She did not get involved with the State.
>The problem, however, is that we ought to care about what the state does. Why? Not merely because the state, too, belongs to King Jesus, but because the idiotic decisions made by King Obama have a direct effect on the spiritual lives of millions, and potentially our own children and ourselves. Is it easier to grow in holiness in a society that allows unbridled immorality to have its way, for same-sex "marriage" to come to be seen as acceptable, along with everything else that afflicts our society from a culture of recreational sex, pornography, contraception, abortion (which Kreeft calls the "sacrament" of the Culture of Death)? Of course not. Food for thought.
Even in the times when there where Christian Emperors and Kings they only cared for the Church as far as the Church existed to further their own power. Granted there where a few Saints among them but only a few. King Obama rules because the Christians have failed to interact with the world or win it too Christ.
Happy Easter Doc.
Yachov,
I'm really quite impressed at how Anabaptistic, even Mennonite, your views on the Social Kingship of Christ are. They are certainly not Catholic.
You write: "IMHO the Church was better off when She did not get involved with the State."
This view resembles that of the Anabaptist-Mennonite (AM) view in that, like Yoder's book I cited earlier, it sees the task of the Church in the world as "witnessing TO" the state, rather than being involved in statesmanship itself.
It may also have something in common with the Austrian-Libertarian (AL) view of the state found in the Jewish libertarian right-winger, Murray Rothbard, in The Anatomy of the State, insofar as he basically views the state as an alien and hostile entity that right-minded folk need to try to "work around," since it's basically out to steal your money and do no good.
Whether it's the AM or AL view, however, either way your statement agrees that the Church has no business being involved with the state and its goings on as such.
Traditional Catholic teaching agrees with the Aristotelian-Thomist view that the state has a positive role to play in human society in securing the common good. It views the state, as Aristotle did, as connatural to man, not merely as an inevitable result of Adam's Fall. The Popes since Leo XIII have rendered explicit what was perennially implicit in Catholic Social Teaching, namely the Kingship of Christ not merely over our private spiritual souls, but over our public bodily lives, in protecting citizens from corrupting influences and assisting them in their duties in securing not only their natural earthly goods and ends but their supernatural ends. That's what traditionally the Church insisted that states require businesses provide their workers with not only a living wage sufficient to procure private property but also with the leisure time required to fulfil weekly religious obligations, etc.
I find your view on this matter not nearly so confusing as confused.
Enjoy a Blessed Easter, Yachov.
Oh doc must you start a fight even during the holidays? Well I will indulge you if it’s all in good fun.
>I'm really quite impressed at how Anabaptistic, even Mennonite, your views on the Social Kingship of Christ are. They are certainly not Catholic.
Not as impressed as I am in how you read into my practical views on living in contemporary society an entire philosophy I would likely reject. Gee Doc would it kill you to merely ask me to clarify anything I say that is obscure to you rather then read heresy &or error into it?
Just saying…...
>You write: "IMHO the Church was better off when She did not get involved with the State."
>This view resembles that of the Anabaptist-Mennonite (AM) view in that, like Yoder's book I cited earlier, it sees the task of the Church in the world as "witnessing TO" the state, rather than being involved in statesmanship itself.
And the Banezian Thomistic view on Divine Sovereignty “resembles” the Augustinian view which in turn “resembles” the heretical Calvinist view but similarity does not dictate they are the same.
>It may also have something in common with the Austrian-Libertarian (AL) view of the state found in the Jewish libertarian right-winger, Murray Rothbard, in The Anatomy of the State, insofar as he basically views the state as an alien and hostile entity that right-minded folk need to try to "work around," since it's basically out to steal your money and do no good.
Since I am not aware of any of these ideologies I cannot comment and I am no more “libertarian” then traditionalist Catholic Thomas Wood. Thought like most modern American conservatives I don’t trust the State. i am an American I support the American Constitutional System and as a Forth Degree Knight of Columbus I am a patriot.
>Whether it's the AM or AL view, however, either way your statement agrees that the Church has no business being involved with the state and its goings on as such.
Rather I believe render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s and I don’t trust the State in the formal propagation of the Truth & other matters which are the sole providence and office of the Church. i am not at all against Catholic Statesmen or women serving in offices in the State I would think it ideal but realistically I think it is rare.
>Traditional Catholic teaching agrees with the Aristotelian-Thomist view that the state has a positive role to play in human society in securing the common good. It views the state, as Aristotle did, as connatural to man, not merely as an inevitable result of Adam's Fall.
I don’t disagree with this at all but I don’t see how it mandates any particular political solution to a particular social, moral or religious problem? Nor do I see it as mandating the formation of a Christian Monarchy as some reactionary Traditionalists seem to advocate or the mandatory formation of any particular political system?
That ideally any political system dominated by faithful Catholic persons of good will &acting on Christian principles is ideal then I am not at all against it. But there are fallen men and fallen men often run the government and not for the benefit of the Faith.
Part II
>The Popes since Leo XIII have rendered explicit what was perennially implicit in Catholic Social Teaching, namely the Kingship of Christ not merely over our private spiritual souls, but over our public bodily lives, in protecting citizens from corrupting influences and assisting them in their duties in securing not only their natural earthly goods and ends but their supernatural ends.
Yes but in terms of specific prudent policy the Church leaves it to us to make prudent judgements about how to bring that about & I am convinced in terms of homosexuals (under the conditions described) putting them in jail does nothing. That they should be prevented from flaunting indecency in public and in front of children I am all for but jailing them for their sinful activities does nothing.
>That's what traditionally the Church insisted that states require businesses provide their workers with not only a living wage sufficient to procure private property but also with the leisure time required to fulfil weekly religious obligations, etc.
Which again I am not against but again even the Church does not mandate any particular political policy or political system to bring this about. What policies exist to deal with the evils of society are based on prudent judgement. For example I don’t see why even in a Catholic Monarchy why the law should mandate private consensual homosexual behavior between adults be dealt with with either execution as in the Christian Byzantium Empire (Christ spared the Adulteress..just saying) or imprisonment with other men (where in said environment they will still indulge in these activities & even more and temp others to do so).
>I find your view on this matter not nearly so confusing as confused.
Most likely because you are not distinguishing between prudent policies vs principles. Also I didn’t come to make an exposition on what political systems to reform society but to express my apathy towards “gay marriage” & my conservation against the Gay Brownshirts using their gains as leverage to attack us.
Yachov,
I clearly did distinguish prudent policies from principles when I wrote: "If it were only a temporary concession stemming from inopportune circumstances, ..."
I think it may have been thou who did not distinguish when he was talking about one from the other. I'm talking about principles.
Furthermore, if you're going to cite Scripture like a good Protestant, you can't get away with choosing some (Jesus and the adulterer) and not others (Levitical capital punishment for same-sex activity) without stating the principle in view of which you choose one and not the other, or argue merely from OT silence regarding same-sex dispositions apart from acts, let alone public acts -- AND you've got to tell the reader whether you're referring in such references to principles or prudential judgments.
"... reactionary?" Watch your language, friend.
Again, when you reference Catholic Monarchy you're confused or at least confusing. You seem to be talking on the prudential level, but it's not clear. You seem to believe that on the level of principle Catholics have no explicit norms. There is one: King Jesus. He will not invade as a democrat! Every knee shall bow, whether anyone likes it or not.
That's the principle in light of which every prudential judgment ought to be made. Circumstances make it seem ridiculous that anyone should suggest an amendment to the constitution requiring our government to acknowledge the existence of God, let alone the sovereignty of King Jesus. But He is, even if denied by all of congress and every branch of government. Accommodations must be made, but not in the direction of abandoning our principles, but in the direction of conforming our prudential judgments incrementally to the ideal. Hence, a politician that objects to all abortions except for rape and incest is preferable to one who accepts abortion in any circumstance.
(continued ...)
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But it is repugnant to Catholic principle than any Catholic should confess "apathy" or "indifference" to such matters. Even Maritain, that lover of the American experiment, believed that the U.S. government should publicly acknowledge God's existence. That was in the 1940s. In the 1930s state universities in the U.S., like Purdue, had compulsory chapel attendance. Say all you want about the chapel services not being Catholic; but the ethos of that day was far less hostile to notions of divine transcendence and objectively binding moral absolutes than today. And when an abominable man holds the office of president who for the first time in history speaks in favor of same-sex so-called "marriage," this has an effect, like the one you referenced in Indiana. One cannot remain indifferent.
It's one thing, like Alasdair MacIntyre, to complain that political action on the national level has become almost meaningless; but it's another thing to regard political activity as such -- which can occur on the state and local level in much more concrete ways -- is meaningless or a matter of unconcern.
When I compared your stance to that of Anabaptist Mennonites, this speech by George Weigel (or this) is the sort of thing I had in mind. I suspect that you, along with most Catholics today, would find little fault with it. That, however, is a measure of how far everyone has fallen passively into the heresy of Americanism condemned by Leo XIII. Typical "separation of church & state" thinking. Weigel says that the state "cannot make the act of religion," a proposition directly condemned by earlier Catholic Social teaching as most recently summarized by Cardinal Ottaviani in "The Duties of a Catholic State" in 1953.
One of the ironies of history is that those in our generation who jumped on the bandwagon of Americanism represented by Fr. John Courtney Murray, S.J. and Jacques Maritain -- like Fr. Sirico at the Acton Institute, Fr. Richard John Neuhaus and Joseph Bottum at First Things, and preeminently George Weigel, have had to do some serious back-pedaling since the HHS Mandate made clear that the happy dream of American pluralism wouldn't be nearly so congenial to Catholics as many had supposed.
So I suppose we'll all end up in the trenches or prisons or scaffolds together eventually anyhow.
Happy Easter.
>I clearly did distinguish prudent policies from principles when I wrote: "If it were only a temporary concession stemming from inopportune circumstances, …”
With all due respect that is kind of ambiguous, indeed that is more ambitious than Vatican II also it begs the question how from this sentence "In principle I never really cared if the State issues a piece of paper to a same sex couple with the words "marriage" on it after a mock ceremony.” without any other qualifiers you got support for anabaptist heresies and errors and right wing Jewish libertarian theory etc? That is over the top.
Anyway let me hit the high points so this doesn't devolve into a needless dispute over nothing.
>Furthermore, if you're going to cite Scripture like a good Protestant, you can't get away with choosing some (Jesus and the adulterer) and not others (Levitical capital punishment for same-sex activity) etc....
No Doc a good Protestant would only consider Pericope de Adultera & the Levitical code alone. I consider Jewish Tradition as to how the Levitical codes where operated and strictly speaking it referred to public sex acts otherwise 4 to 6 men would have to simultaneously walk in on two guys having at it & a whole bunch of other conditions need to be fulfilled to bring about a death sentence and there is no report of them ever having done so.etc...
>"... reactionary?" Watch your language, friend.
You started it brother. ;-)
>Again, when you reference Catholic Monarchy you're confused or at least confusing.
No I was being cheeky because you are a Traditionalist & there is a subset of reactionaries (who sometime float in trad circles) who really believe absolute Monarchies are the only divinely authorized form of government and republican democracy is evil. I certainly believe in the Kingship of Jesus.
I assume you are being cheeky with me to make a point about Traditional Catholic political teaching and principles. Specifically "The Duties of a Catholic State" etc...
Well it is all in good fun.
>But it is repugnant to Catholic principle than any Catholic should confess "apathy" or "indifference" to such matters.
Nonsense! It is no different than having "apathy" or “indifference”toward a pagan offering incense to the Emperor. I would pray for his conversions and the conversion of the Empire &I would not force him to be a Christian but I am not going to care about it until they try to make me do it then like St Polycarp I pray for the grace to tell them to shove it.
It's not hard.
Part II
>When I compared your stance to that of Anabaptist Mennonites, this speech by George Weigel (or this) is the sort of thing I had in mind. I suspect that you, along with most Catholics today, would find little fault with it. That, however, is a measure of how far everyone has fallen passively into the heresy of Americanism condemned by Leo XIII. Typical "separation of church & state" thinking. Weigel says that the state "cannot make the act of religion," a proposition directly condemned by earlier Catholic Social teaching as most recently summarized by Cardinal Ottaviani in "The Duties of a Catholic State" in 1953.
I realize there is a lot that is unsettled in terms of religious liberty, Vatican II, development of doctrine and I await a time when the Church sees fit to address it but till it does I stay out of it.
I don't care if the secular state I live in gives a meaningless piece of paper to two dudes. I care if they tell me I must accept those two dudes as married as if it where equivalent to what is between me and my wife by the sacrament. Then I
object.
>One of the ironies of history is that those in our generation who jumped on the bandwagon of Americanism represented by Fr. John Courtney Murray, S.J. and Jacques Maritain -- like Fr. Sirico at the Acton Institute, Fr. Richard John Neuhaus and Joseph Bottum at First Things, and preeminently George Weigel, have had to do some serious back-pedaling since the HHS Mandate made clear that the happy dream of American pluralism wouldn't be nearly so congenial to Catholics as many had supposed.
Except history hasn't really shown us a Catholic State that was a Utopia either. We are fallen and we can't get up.
Still as far as I am concerned you can all debate it all with each other till the Church steps in to clarify
as she has always done eventually. You can drag Mark Shea who has decreed all Libertarians are heretics into the mix & I will sit on the sidelines to watch.
>So I suppose we'll all end up in the trenches or prisons or scaffolds together eventually anyhow.
Yes we all will.
You do have the last word Doc since it is your blog.
Peace and happy Eastern.
Christ has Risen!:-)
Yachov,
"... a temporary concession stemming from inopportune circumstances" is explicit: it addresses "circumstances," which are changeable, and "temporary concession," which is a prudential judgment in light of those circumstances. "Ambiguous"? "Over the top"? Let's see who's the most measured here and clear-headed, shall we?
In the next paragraph where you say this is "kind of ambiguous," you immediately go on quote yourself: "In principle I never really cared ..." which I understand you to take as an example of what you mean by a prudential judgment. However, your opening two words are "in principle," are they not? How is this not confusing? Now I've not said that "you started it," or called you a "reactionary neocath," or a "foam-at-the-mouth neoconservative," but just pointed out facts. Let's try to keep it that way if we can.
I'm not sure your Levitical exegesis holds. It seems to assume that OT law addresses only the external act and that only the NT ("It has been said ..., but I say unto you ...") addresses the heart; but the OT is full of references to dispositions of the heart, not least the two last commandments of the decalogue that address motives of the heart ("coveting," which is the root cause of many other sins). Nor does the fact that Jesus forgave the adulterer, telling her to "go and sin no more" necessarily imply that He rejected the temporal punishment still due under the Torah for sins already forgiven. After all, He says in Matthew 5:18, "... till heaven and earth pass away, not one jot or tittle will pass from the law till all is fulfilled."
No, I wasn't being "cheeky"; and yes, some of your remarks clarify your earlier statements. Thanks.
<continued ...)
(continued ...)
The "last word," since you insisted:
Yachov, you wrote:
"I realize there is a lot that is unsettled in terms of religious liberty, Vatican II, development of doctrine and I await a time when the Church sees fit to address it but till it does I stay out of it."
There's nothing unsettled about what's binding in terms of the duties of a society toward the Catholic Church and Catholic faith. The fourth paragraph of Dignitatis Humanae, a document John Courtnay Murray tried to hijack by his footnotes in the Abbott translation of the V2 documents, was later inserted by Paul VI as a purported safeguard against just the sort of interpretation Murray was intent on giving (and Weigel types after the Council). In it, Paul VI writes:
"Religious freedom, in turn, which men demand as necessary to fulfill their duty to worship God, has to do with immunity from coercion in civil society. Therefore it leaves untouched traditional Catholic doctrine on the moral duty of men and societies toward the true religion and toward the one Church of Christ."
He is saying here that "religious freedom," which is the topic of the document, does not give society the liberty of indifferentism toward the duty of society as a whole (including the state) towards its obligations of submission and obedience to the tenents of true religion. It only means that conversion cannot be coerced, which the Church has always held. It doesn't mean "separation of Church and state" or that religions is a "private" matter or should be a matter of "indifference" in the public square.
You say you don't care if the secular state gives a "meaningless piece of paper to two dudes," but you do care if they tell you you "must accept those two dudes as married." That is a distinction without a difference. What do yout think the state is saying by this piece of paper? Don't you think the media hype over it suggests that it is a bit more than "meaningless"? To you, maybe; but should any Catholic consider it meaningless?
Just as the fact that we our sinners does not mean that we should cease striving for sanctity, the fact that no Catholic state has been a "utopia" does not mean that Catholics should cease striving collectively for the objective common good, the outlawing of same-sex "marriage," pornography, and, yes, the Austrian-Libertarian heresy that denies a community-determined "just wage" rather than the iniquitous canard of "whatever the market will bear." (I'm glad to have an issue on which I agree with Mark Shea!)
Viva cristo rey!
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