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Jesus stopped a woman from being stoned and just said saying “sin no more” after she committed adultery. Now, how can you honestly believe Jesus would say anything remotely that you are saying about porn if he didn’t say anything, remotely as severe, about an adulterer right in front of his face?

Bad analogy. Jesus did not say that the woman was not guilty of adultery. He merely exercised His mercy and asked anyone there who was without sin to cast the first stone. His mercy trumped His justice, in a way. So it might be with each of us, when we transgress His commandments. But we should not presume on His mercy! He called the woman's adultery a "sin," just as he called the actions in Matthew 5:27 a "sin." As I said in an earlier post, I readily concede that there are gradations to the various "sins" we can commit. Neither direct adultery nor lustful thoughts would be as serious a sin as mass-murder, I suppose. But that certainly doesn't excuse them as inconsequential! Perhaps "looking a someone with lustful thoughts isn't "as bad" as direct, physical adultery, either, but that hardly excuses! It is still sin; Jesus says so directly. As such, it needs to be eradicated. One at least needs to try. Sure, God might take habituation, addiction, etc. into consideration when He judges us. But we don't have a clue to what extent He might do so, if He actually does at all. We only suppose He does to the extent that He judges our "free" actions, and acting under spiritual compulsion of addiction is not really engaging in "free acts." But it is sheer folly to barge on ahead with our objectively sinful acts on this basis! What about the obligation to confront our concupiscent impulses through cooperation with God's grace, as St. Paul more than suggests is necessary in 2 Corinthians 12:9?

We are not mere animals. We are charged to control the baser things our fallen and wounded nature finds attractive. Our life is a probationary period in which our eternal destiny is determined to the extent we succeed in self-mastery under God's grace. We all fall short of that to some extent over the course of our lives. But our victory is in the battle. If we don't even try, how much can we presume God "excuses"? If everything is "excused" as beyond our strength, how can we make sense of not only 2 Corinthians 12:9, but also 1 Corinthians 10:13, where we are promised that God will not allow us to be tempted beyond our strength? It is one thing to fight and occasionally fall short of the ideal through innate weakness, while subsequently repentant; it is another thing to simply not bother to fight at all.

For non-Christians, especially those who are non-Christians by choice, perhaps this whole business is just nonsense. If Christianity is based in Truth, however, that mindset is the real nonsense, for its implications are eternal. But, again, the author of the article which is the basis for this thread is not addressing them. He is talking to, and about, people striving to be better and more consistent Christians. If you want to snicker, go ahead. But this is the Religion Forum, so please consider that many here will have a less materialistic approach to this issue, and might find the author's POV constructive.

Who said men are 100% of the problem? I didn’t. But let’s not be coy. Men ARE most of the users of porn.

Other than your blanket denial of the obvious sense of the wording, what evidence do you have that Jesus is NOT speaking against lustful thoughts with respect to “looking at” women other than one’s wife (or, by extension, women having lustful thoughts “looking at” men not their husbands)? I am hardly taking Jesus out of context. It seems, rather, that you are gutting His context. How is looking at/acting out scenarios in/masturbating to pornography (while with or without one’s spouse) NOT lustfully looking at someone? How does that not fulfill the immediate context of what Jesus is saying in Matt. 5:27? Please be as expansive as you need, while citing authority sufficient to override the obvious and “perspicuous” wording of the text.

See post 16, which addresses a similar set of circumstances.

Perhaps it isn’t as bad as an “outright affair.” There are, after all, gradations to sin. But an outright affair isn’t “as bad” as mass murder! Surely, you wouldn’t justify an “outright affair” on those grounds, no?

This whole business, while perhaps not “as bad” as mass-murder, is still clearly involving sin for any Christian paying even a little attention. One need look no further than Matthew 5:27 to see that.

In our “culture,” which is increasingly based on a self-absorbed worldview, porn is often excused as “victimless.” But the women involved are often mistreated, nearly always exploited; the men involved have many layers of sinful involvement, even down to the business transactions that are seedy, at best; and the consumers of porn are usually (almost invariably, if given enough time) hooked to the point of clinical addiction, at the expense of fidelity to their wives. And that’s just dealing with the more worldly considerations. The imperilled state of their souls is more important to a Christian, of course, and that is what this article strives to address. Its specific advice to priests is certainly good, by extension, for any Christian to follow. Matthew 5:27, again. And that is a direct quote from Jesus Himself! It should be obvious that quarreling with Jesus in this matter is way “beyond the pay grade” of any Christian whose faith is beyond a mere token.

This thread presupposes that, to properly understand it, a Christian worldview is held. If one is not a Christian, it would indeed seem foolish to prioritize this problem above some of the ones you mention.

But, for a Christian, it is simply undeniable that viewing porn and masturbation are sinful endeavors. Some might consider them very serious sins, some might consider them not so serious. But, as they are, in fact, sins in their essence, they certainly qualify as things we should be striving to avoid, if we are to “follow Christ.”

In previous threads along these lines, some of the more secular FReepers seem to think they are scoring points for Freedom and Civil Liberties in their zeal to uphold the porn industry and their “personal choice” to utilize pornography. If their worldview is all that secular, no Christian argument is going to disuade them. God will, indeed, respect their free will (their ability to make sinful choices, from His POV) to ignore Him or His commands. They are free, while in this life, to “party hard” if they wish. They are free to make no effort to avoid these modern enhancements of assault on our already fragile state of mind with respect to concupisence. They are free to ignore Him altogether. We believe that is a “bad use of freedom,” and that they’ll be positioned to regret it later. But God’s track record is clear enough: if His quiet calls to repentance are ignored, He will not force the issue.

But the article isn’t addressing such people! It is addressing people who struggle with this issue in an effort to co-operate with the grace of God and be free of addiction to porn. In other words, it is directed to Christians. If you are not a Christian, you won’t pay attention anyway.

But, if you are a Christian, how is masturbating to images of women who are not your wife maintaining true faithfullness to her? How is this not cyber-adultery? A Christian will be concerned with squaring his (or her) conduct in these matters with the clear commands of Christ, who is God! He might fail from time to time, or even quite often, but at least he will know what the proper standard of conduct is here, and will make some effort to conform to it. All he has to do, in the end, is truly conform his will to that of Christ, and use that will to consistently co-operate with the grace of God (2Corinthians 12:9). I grant that the road to that goal can be rocky, but the bottom-line I just mentioned is hardly impossible, else St. Paul, under God’s inspiration, would not have mentioned it.

If you think all of that is mubo-jumbo, there is nothing I or anyone else here can do to persuade you otherwise. But don’t trash the concept while it sits here on the Religion Forum! It’s directed at others with a completely different worldview. Just ignore it, and keep on walking down the wide and easy road.

Once again, you directly assert that the Lord speaks to you, and, in His Name, you assemble semi-random English words as if He uttered them in the order in which they are presented here. These “locutions” make no sense coming from the mouth of anyone, never mind an omniscient God! It doesn’t help your case that “God” seems to speak in English with decidedly poor grammar skills! Putting words into the mouth of God and claiming He literally spoke them is blasphemy, no matter how well intentioned the words might be.

You are either a false prophet or, as Hamish said to “Stephen, the Crazy Irishman” (who also had two-way conversations with God, BTW!) upon first meeting him in the movie Braveheart: “You’re a madman!”

Holy Liturgical Trivialization, Batman!

Wow ... just ... ... ... wow.

Canon 1040 defines “an irregularity” for receiving orders as a perpetual prohibition. One of the irregularities for receiving orders described in the following canon, 1041, part 4, is “voluntary homicide.” The two canons are reproduced in their entirety below:

Can. 1040 Those affected by any impediment, whether perpetual, which is called an irregularity, or simple, are prevented from receiving orders. The only impediments incurred, however, are those contained in the following canons.

Can. 1041 The following are irregular for receiving orders:

1/ a person who labors under some form of amentia or other psychic illness due to which, after experts have been consulted, he is judged unqualified to fulfill the ministry properly;

2/ a person who has committed the delict of apostasy, heresy, or schism;

3/ a person who has attempted marriage, even only civilly, while either impeded personally from entering marriage by a matrimonial bond, sacred orders, or a public perpetual vow of chastity, or with a woman bound by a valid marriage or restricted by the same type of vow;

4/ a person who has committed voluntary homicide or procured a completed abortion and all those who positively cooperated in either;

5/ a person who has mutilated himself or another gravely and maliciously or who has attempted suicide;

6/ a person who has placed an act of orders reserved to those in the order of episcopate or presbyterate while either lacking that order or prohibited from its exercise by some declared or imposed canonical penalty.

How is it that even the secular world knows that these people can’t be reformed

Because, back in the timeframe involved - some 30 years ago - that was the course of action that the "experts" were recommending. The Church tended to believe the experts and their belief - naively, as it turns out - that therapy could work sufficiently well that laicization of the offenders wasn't automatically necessary. Do we know this to be incorrect today? Certainly. But such was not the case back then. It is unfair to project current clinical opinion onto the honest - if incorrect - "professional opinions" of former days, in order to paint a picture of deliberate malfeasance on the part of either the Church or the psychiatric community.

Awwwww...that’s nothing! Around about 1970, when the Novus Ordo was still a “New Thing,” I remember going to Boston’s South Station (sort of the local equivalent of Grand Central Station), and there was a sign on an easel in front of the small station chapel that said: “Catholic Mass, 12 Minutes or Less...Guaranteed!” My family needed to take them up with this promise once, and, being the little nudgenick that I was, I decided to time it. They made it! With something like a minute to spare!

I didn’t think it was possible for anyone to speak that quickly. I’ll bet the priest was an auctioneer or something before he was ordained.

His episcopal consecration, like that of the other three bishops consecrated by Archbishop Lefebvre, is “valid, but illicit.” In other words, he is a real bishop by virtue of the fact that Archbishop Lefebvre, undoubtedly consecrated validly himself, consecrated him among the four. However, he did so without the pope’s approval, and their consecration was therefore illicit, or “unlawful.” In the event that any or all of these bishops return to Rome, they will not have to be “reconsecrated.” They will, however, have to make some sort of encompassing profession of the Catholic Faith, insofar as they were part of a movement that has self-identified as being outside of Rome’s jurisdiction and has declared the (authentic) Catholic Church to have accreted to itself various beliefs not found in, or substantiated by, apostolic Tradition.

...in remissionem peccatorum

Amen! (”So Be IIt!”)

Follow the rubrics

A new encyclical

Not an option

The Holy Trinity

Pontifical Biblical Commission

Increased priestly vocations

New hermeneutics, bah!

Peter Kreeft says...

The Wanderer Press

Bishop Fabian Bruskewitz

Swimming the Tiber

Irrelevant Jadot bishops

No tie-dyed vestments

Approved Eucharistic prayers

Improved English translation

Catholicism is back!

Roma locuta est!

Actually, she'd probably insist that they be removed. She went toe-to-toe with BC for years in her absolute refusal to allow men to enroll in her courses. Boston College dithered with her on this for quite a while, but finally took some action when several male students filed a discrimination lawsuit. She abandoned her classes altogether at that point, which eventually led to her tenure being stripped away.

She was a highly disturbed woman who considered men in general to be utterly valueless, and shrieked her message along these lines for decades in classes, as well as in the media. I have no idea what prompted her anti-male hatreds, but anyone claiming - as a foundational justification for theological fulminations against men in general and God in particular - that 9,000,000 women were burned as witches in the Middle Ages clearly must have had a screw or two loose.

On the basis that she had to have been some sort of (self-inflicted) tortured soul, I hope that God has mercy on her. She sure had none on herself, from what those of us in the Boston area could see all these years.

Exactly. How do they know there's an al Qaeda connection already? For the present, it would be better to suppose that this was a Lone Nut-job for Allah rather than let the public be stampeded into supposing everything that happens has an al Qaeda connection. Too many of these potential false flags will leave us with no civil liberties at all. If every firecracker that goes off is supposed to have an "al Qaeda terrorist," or, even worse, "someone who has connections with al Qaeda" behind it, you can count on that sort of thing being used to make it virtually impossible to function as a society. The politically-correct incompetents at TSA and "Homeland Security" will see to that.

Look, guys. It really isn't that hard to maintain security here in the West. To the extent that Muslims are disproportionately prone to attempts to infiltrate and attack - on the individual or small-group scale - American and other Western societies, we deny them access. All immigration (except for the persecuted Christian minorities) from Islamic countries should be halted immediately. All immigrants currently in these countries should be deported immediately. Native-born citizens of Muslim persuasion should be the ones getting the screenings at airports.

Sounds hard? Not really. It wasn't that long ago (pre-1965, to be exact) that the US itself had immigration quotas that were far more discriminatory than that, and for all the wrong reasons to boot! Western Europe had better think long and hard right now. In the meantime, the US should refuse entry from all Muslim countries for all people but diplomats - with a close eye being kept on them, too. If those countries don't like it...tough. Saudi Arabia, for example, has massive restrictions on just visits - never mind immigration - from non-Muslims. Mere presence of "infidels" in Mecca means death to them. These guys are familiar with the concept, then! They should have no objections to our new-found discriminatory policies that can't be dismissed as rank hypocrisy.

We should drill our own oil and find other ways to create the energy we need. Then we'll have absolutely no use for these people, and can completely isolate them economically and travel-wise. If they hate us so much, let them solve their own agricultural, medical and technological problems completely cut-off from the West. Not a hair of their heads will be harmed by us (as much as I despise these people, I'm not really into turning the entire Middle East into shocked glass, either; just get out of their part of the world and leave them be). When Islam withers on the vine of its own fanaticism, and reverts to near-Stone Age technology and population levels, then we'll see about helping these people again.

In the meantime, get these people out of Europe and the US! If the politicians had even cartilage forming their spines, work would already be underway toward that goal right now.

If God speaks the type of gibberish found in the first sentence of this...um...locution, then I believe I will be very disappointed when I meet Him face-to-face. What a letdown that will be! I always thought the omniscience and omnipotence of God meant, among other things, that He could speak in proper and lofty English if He so desires. If Jedediah is receiving these messages verbatim, then I guess I was wrong about God's capabilities.

Jedediah, this is just nonsense. Stop the pretense, and just admit that these posts are just the products of your own musings and wishful thinking. It is blasphemy to put words into God's mouth that He has not directly spoken to you - no matter how well-intentioned the motive might be behind those words. I'm pretty sure that He hasn't actually been speaking to you, so...do the math on the blasphemy and false-prophet stuff. 'K?

It's really easy for me to remember the anniversary of my baptism. I was baptized less than a minute after I was born, as "Baby Boy." On a couple of occasions, I have had to combine the "Baby Boy" baptismal certificate with a hand-written letter to my parents from the hospital priest and my birth certificate to demonstrate that the BB and I are one and the same baptized person. My parish supplied the rest of the rite outside of the essentials a couple of months later, after I came home.

I’m not sure I understand what you’re asking. In post 9, you indicated that you understood that this is a list of “errors.” Number 15, just like the rest, is the text of an error, and not what the Church actually believes or teaches. Given that “Every man is free to embrace and profess the religion he shall believe true, guided by the light of reason” is listed as an error, and would be considered as such by nearly any Christian - at least as it applies to non-Christian religions - I don’t see what you would find wrong with it yourself.