‘Dear Father’ - Who’s a heretic or an apostate, and what’s a schism?

St. Louis Review ^ | January 27, 2006 | Father Joseph L. Parisi

[NYer]

I have heard the terms "heresy," "apostasy" and "schism" used in describing people and beliefs not in agreement with our Catholic faith, but I suspect that those terms are often used incorrectly. What are their proper definitions?

The Church distinguishes three specific genres of what it calls the sin of "incredulity" (Catechism of the Catholic Church, no. 2089).

Heresy is the obstinate denial by someone baptized of a truth which is to be believed with divine and "catholic" faith, or it may be an obstinate doubt about such a truth.

Apostasy is the total repudiation of the Christian faith.

Schism is the refusal to submit to the authority of the pope or to join in communion with the members of the Catholic Church subject to him.

As one considers these various sins, it is important to consider the fullness of the Church’s moral theology concerning them. Theologians distinguish between "material" and "formal" sins.

A person is in material heresy if it is the result of his upbringing in a particular religious tradition to which he is faithful and he is not responsible for not knowing the revealed truth. A person who willingly professes what he knows to be contrary to revealed truth is a formal heretic, personally guilty of heresy.

These same moral principles apply to the sin of apostasy. Thus, a person would be a material apostate who either leaves the Church or abandons his relationship with Christ Himself. He would only be considered a formal apostate if he willfully and knowingly repudiated Christ Himself or the Church.

Lastly, a person who rejects the supreme authority of the Holy Father over the universal Church is materially a schismatic. Only the person who knowingly and willfully refuses to submit to papal authority or of joining in communion with the Catholic Church subject to him is to be considered a formal schismatic.

In the years between the Council of Trent and Vatican II, it was common to refer to members of Protestant churches simply as heretics without any proper or important distinctions being applied to that judgment.

Today, in the rightful pastoral charity called for by the council fathers of Vatican II, there is a greater sensitivity in our references to our "separated Christian sisters and brothers."

It simply is not appropriate to attribute moral culpability to those who belong to materially heretical or schismatic churches.

Those who are formally guilty of heresy, apostasy or schism may be subject to the penalty of excommunication depending upon whether the conditions outlined in the 1983 Revised Code of Canon Law, (numbers 1321-1323 and 1364). If subject to the penalty of excommunication, the person can usually go to confession to have the penalty lifted. Bishops generally delegate their priests or certain particular confessors with this faculty.

If recourse to a higher authority is necessary, the confessor will generally invite the person to return to confession and obtain the remission of the penalty from the bishop and communicate it to the person on his next visit to confession.

[NYer]

Father Parisi is pastor of St. Jude Parish in Overland, MO.

[NYer]

Oh boy, could we produce a list!

[big'ol_freeper]

Do I dare say that I like the term heretic better than saying "our separated brothers and sisters". I don't say that to be mean but simply to show the significance of their error.

[Kolokotronis]

"...a person who rejects the supreme authority of the Holy Father over the universal Church is materially a schismatic. Only the person who knowingly and willfully refuses to submit to papal authority or of joining in communion with the Catholic Church subject to him is to be considered a formal schismatic."

That would be me and most of my ping list! :)

[AgThorn]

It simply is not appropriate to attribute moral culpability to those who belong to materially heretical or schismatic churches.

Since this was a single paragraph after a discussion on protestants, are all of us God fearing, bible beleaving, Jesus following Christians who are NOT Catholic to surmise that the Roman Catholic church views us all as members of heretical churchs? i.e. is this sentence inclusive of ALL protestants? i.e. non-Roman catholic, non-Orthodox Christians?

[AlaninSA]

"...a person who rejects the supreme authority of the Holy Father over the universal Church is materially a schismatic. Only the person who knowingly and willfully refuses to submit to papal authority or of joining in communion with the Catholic Church subject to him is to be considered a formal schismatic."

That would be me and most of my ping list! :)

There was that little thing called the Great Schism...

[AlaninSA]

Since this was a single paragraph after a discussion on protestants, are all of us God fearing, bible beleaving, Jesus following Christians who are NOT Catholic to surmise that the Roman Catholic church views us all as members of heretical churchs? i.e. is this sentence inclusive of ALL protestants? i.e. non-Roman catholic, non-Orthodox Christians?

I'll be your huckleberry.

Yes.

Think about it - in terms of the Catholic Church. In our view, all other denominations came after the formation of the Catholic church. Lutherans, Baptists, Presbys and Methodists were all born of movements and persons working years after the establishment of the Catholic Church.

The Bible, holidays and many of the beliefs of these various denominations all stem from Catholicism - and the differences of belief all stem from the ideological differences of individuals (Wesley, Calvin, Luther, etc.).

[Kolokotronis]

" There was that little thing called the Great Schism..."

Ah yes; the great unpleasantness! Well, we seem to all be working through that one. You guys are coming around quite nicely! :)

[vox_freedom]

From article: Schism is the refusal to submit to the authority of the pope or to join in communion with the members of the Catholic Church subject to him.

Like St. Athanasius?

St. Athanasius
Fighter of heresy, falsely accused, ridiculed, condemned, removed from office by heretics and church hierarchy, banished for over ten years, returned, expelled for a second time, continued to fight for the Faith, the entire world against him, "no friends but God and Death...," died, and ultimately declared a Saint.

[Rytwyng]

...there is no appropriate category in Catholic thought for the phenomenon of Protestantism today (one could say the same of the relationship to the separated churches of the East). It is obvious that the old category of ‘heresy’ is no longer of any value. Heresy, for Scripture and the early Church, includes the idea of a personal decision against the unity of the Church, and heresy’s characteristic is pertinacia, the obstinacy of him who persists in his own private way. This, however, cannot be regarded as an appropriate description of the spiritual situation of the Protestant Christian. In the course of a now centuries-old history, Protestantism has made an important contribution to the realization of Christian faith, fulfilling a positive function in the development of the Christian message and, above all, often giving rise to a sincere and profound faith in the individual non-Catholic Christian, whose separation from the Catholic affirmation has nothing to do with the pertinacia characteristic of heresy. Perhaps we may here invert a saying of St. Augustine’s: that an old schism becomes a heresy. The very passage of time alters the character of a division, so that an old division is something essentially different from a new one. Something that was once rightly condemned as heresy cannot later simply become true, but it can gradually develop its own positive ecclesial nature, with which the individual is presented as his church and in which he lives as a believer, not as a heretic. This organization of one group, however, ultimately has an effect on the whole. The conclusion is inescapable, then: Protestantism today is something different from heresy in the traditional sense, a phenomenon whose true theological place has not yet been determined.”

-- Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, "The Meaning of Christian Brotherhood" (Ignatius Press)

The supreme irony of all this, is that by validating the good that Protestantism has done, he makes the Tiber seem a bit warmer.

[Iscool]

Since this was a single paragraph after a discussion on protestants, are all of us God fearing, bible beleaving, Jesus following Christians who are NOT Catholic to surmise that the Roman Catholic church views us all as members of heretical churchs? i.e. is this sentence inclusive of ALL protestants? i.e. non-Roman catholic, non-Orthodox Christians?

That's exactly what they teach...And during the middle ages, if you refused to bow to the pope, you were murdered, burned at the stake, babies were killed in front of their mothers, etc...That is not a 'church' I care to belong to...

[fdcc]

That's exactly what they teach...And during the middle ages, if you refused to bow to the pope, you were murdered, burned at the stake, babies were killed in front of their mothers, etc...That is not a 'church' I care to belong to...

You wouldn't happen to have a reference for this remarkable historical nugget would you?

[Zetman]

That's exactly what they teach...And during the middle ages, if you refused to bow to the pope, you were murdered, burned at the stake, babies were killed in front of their mothers, etc...That is not a 'church' I care to belong to...

Since Protestants are guilty of this behavior, and more (Queen Elizabeth I, etc...), may we also assume that you would not like to belong to any protestant "church" either??

[Victoria Delsoul]

Those who are formally guilty of heresy, apostasy or schism may be subject to the penalty of excommunication depending upon whether the conditions outlined in the 1983 Revised Code of Canon Law, (numbers 1321-1323 and 1364). If subject to the penalty of excommunication, the person can usually go to confession to have the penalty lifted. Bishops generally delegate their priests or certain particular confessors with this faculty.

Can we submit a few names... on second thought, a lot of names.

[Alex Murphy]

Heresy is the obstinate denial by someone baptized of a truth which is to be believed with divine and "catholic" faith, or it may be an obstinate doubt about such a truth.

Apostasy is the total repudiation of the Christian faith.

Schism is the refusal to submit to the authority of the pope or to join in communion with the members of the Catholic Church subject to him.

NYer, would you say this is a faily authoritative definition of these terms (from the Catholic view)? I ask because, among some Protestants, I hear the terms thrown around w/o much of a solid definition behind them.

[TexConfederate1861]

Being a "schismatic" depends on who is doing the name calling. From the Orthodox point of view, it is the Latin Church who is in "schism".....but you guys seem to be coming around. :) (as my Orthodox Brother stated earlier)

[PAR35]

Sounds like Parisi needs to track down that Ratzinger fellow and straigten him out. He might have trouble doing that, however, as I understand Ratzinger recently changed his name and moved to another country.

[tenn2005]

"Think about it - in terms of the Catholic Church. In our view, all other denominations came after the formation of the Catholic church. Lutherans, Baptists, Presbys and Methodists were all born of movements and persons working years after the establishment of the Catholic Church."

This is a false statement. The true church of the Bible which was founded by Jesus and preached by his apostles predates the Catholic church by several hundred years.

[AgThorn]

"Think about it - in terms of the Catholic Church. In our view, all other denominations came after the formation of the Catholic church. Lutherans, Baptists, Presbys and Methodists were all born of movements and persons working years after the establishment of the Catholic Church."

This is a false statement. The true church of the Bible which was founded by Jesus and preached by his apostles predates the Catholic church by several hundred years.

Amen. The RCC is part of our history, but I too feel that it is more often than not farther from it's true apostolic mission than many other Christian faiths. It is our strongest candidate for centralizing our Christian faith, and I am often at more odds with the anti-Catholics than I am with the Catholics. However, your simple statement is quite true. The true mission of ouf faith is our relationship with God and our membership in His church.

[civis]

Right, there was the Church of Corinth, the Church of Jerusalem, the Church of Ephesis, the Church of Hippo, of Thessalonia, of Alexandria, et al. And these remain alongside the Churches of San Antonio, New York, Mexico City, Paris, et al. That is why it was called catholic, or universal. It was Roman because everything was Roman. It was hierarchical because Rome was so, and society remains so today despite democratic theory. Christ remains the Head of the body that is the universal Church; but every organization of men demands a leader. (The ancient Hebrews begged for a king and the Lord provided a king.) The bishopric of Rome, being the seat of St Peter, was acceded this necessary highest office, the power-struggle with the Churches of Jerusalem and others notwithstanding, such struggles being inherent to human nature.

Our Blessed Mother loves obedience. The Lord, providing for us, will make use of all our errors. Keep the Faith of your fathers and mothers, whatever it may be, for civilization depends upon that; but do not despise the RCC for its rightful pastorate.