Posted on 03/29/2006 12:18:14 PM PST by pravknight
Spoken like a true schismatic.
The Body of Christ isn't a game - it is a deadly serious matter.
The Holy See is the sole earthly source of authority in Christ's Church.
I think he meant that Latin-rite Catholicism isn't the only game in town. He stated above that he is Melkite.
Herein lies a subtle contradiction. If Jesus Christ is acknowledged at least as a prophet by the Muslims, and prophets are truly inspired by God, how do the Muslims deny the Divinity of Jesus Christ Who solemnly and explicitly proclaimed Himself to be God — equal to the Father? Did the Catholic Church ever in its history look with esteem upon the religion of Islam?
I think I like this guy!
How can this be interpreted “in the light of tradition”?
Not to mention in the light of Scripture.
He said Rome, by which he means the Holy See, in the context of a post in which he stated that he would rather attend a Mass celebrated by a schismatic than by an incompetent bishop in communion with the Holy See.
He stated above that he is Melkite.
He also stated above that "most Eastern Catholics" believe that the Holy See has defected from the faith.
I know this is false, since the same kind of lame theological blundering of the sort perpetrated by Mahony can be found in the Eastern Rite episcopates as well.
Pravknight has an agenda, and it is not that of an obedient Melkite Catholic.
Why do bother posting such drivel? This "bishop" is not Catholic.
Amen.
You mean in the light of your private interpretation of Scripture.
What Vatican decree declared Ngo Dinh Thuc's episcopal consecrations invalid? As far as I know, none.
NeoCats argue that it can, but by its own internal logic, it shouldn't.
A central purpose of Vatican II was to replace Scholasticism with Phenomenology as the philosophy in the Mind of the Church.
Phenomenology says that one must look at any object in a new way, "bracketing" or "suspending" everything previously thought to be true about the object.
Ergo, the Church is not the Kingdom or the Mystical Body of Christ -- the Church is "the People of God."
The Gospel is not a call to prepare for the afterlife; it is a Social Gospel of redistributing wealth from the haves to the have-nots, calling on lawmakers to protect Rawlsian "basic rights" (housing, health care, a living wage, etc.), and working for World Peace.
The Mass is not a "vertical" Sacrifice to God, but a "horizontal" celebration of a Community joined by one Spirit.
Lumen Gentium is a phenomenological description of what the Church is and who the Pope, bishops, priests, religious and laity are. Nowhere does LG say that the Pope and bishops are supposed to preserve Apostolic Tradition.
Well then, if it's not in their job description, it must not be important.
The "perpetual reform" Vatican II calls for means that the Pope, bishops, theologians, etc. must perpetually look at the Church in newer and newer phenomenological ways. Interpreting V-2 according to "Tradition" would just stunt the growth of the "perpetual reform."
As Heraclitus said, "You never step into the same Church twice."
LOL!
You have made a very important point, however, which is that VatII was the outcome of a fundamental philosophical shift. Many people think it was an expression of Modernism, a theological heresy, but it is much more profound than that and involved people who were not Modernists - but whose entire philosophical underpinnning had, unperceived by them, been transformed by Kant and Hegel and other post-Enlightenment philosophers into something that could not possibly continue to accept Catholic tradition in any sense of the word.
You might enjoy Fr. Jonathan Robinson's new book, The Church and Modernity, which gives a wonderful summary of this ("modern" and "post-modern" thought), particularly its effect upon the liturgy.
Of course, the question is what, if anything, can be done about it.
This is complete nonsense. As someone who has just written a thesis on Sacrosanctum Concilium, I can tell you that the Second Vatican Council did not make the Mass a "horizontal" celebration of the community. According to SC, the Mass is a sacrifice, the Church is the Mystical Body of Christ, and the primary purpose of the liturgy is the worship of God and the sanctification of man that results from worshipping Him. While it also refers to the Church as the People of God, that people is a hierarchically ordered community, not some amorphous, autonomous community that can do whatever it wants. Sacrosanctum Concilium did NOT make the community the subject or the object of the liturgy.
At least get your facts straight if you are going to criticize. This took all of 10 seconds to locate using the "find (on this page)" function in Internet Explorer on the copy of Lumen Gentium on the Vatican website:
Among those various ministries which, according to tradition, were exercised in the Church from the earliest times, the chief place belongs to the office of those who, appointed to the episcopate, by a succession running from the beginning,(7*) are passers-on of the apostolic seed.(8*) Thus, as St. Irenaeus testifies, through those who were appointed bishops by the apostles, and through their successors down in our own time, the apostolic tradition is manifested (9*) and preserved.(10*)
- Lumen Gentium, 20
Credibility, credibility, credibility, credibility, credibility. Or the lack thereof.
I was once a Protestant. Of course you will deny that you rely upon the infallibility of your own scriptural hermaneutic because it would leave you in a lurch.
When I realized Protestantism was a total fabrication of the 16th century Deformers, I bolted?
Then what did?
Actually, most of the documents of VatII did little about anything. They were just tantalizingly vague, in many cases, and nature abhors a vacuum. Obviously, there were people just waiting to rush in and fill that particular vacuum with their own thoughts on the matter.
And what denomination were you?
Among those various ministries which, according to tradition, were exercised in the Church from the earliest times, the chief place belongs to the office of those who, appointed to the episcopate, by a succession running from the beginning,(7*) are passers-on of the apostolic seed.(8*) Thus, as St. Irenaeus testifies, through those who were appointed bishops by the apostles, and through their successors down in our own time, the apostolic tradition is manifested (9*) and preserved.(10*)
- Lumen Gentium, 20
As I read LG 20, it refers singularly to the "small-t" apostolic tradition of preserving the manner in which persons become bishops, in a line going back to the Pentecost. It does not, imho, impinge upon, say, any duty to preserve the Canon, or tenets of the Nicene Creed. To me, it is not worded as a mandate that those chosen to be bishops must hand the faith down exactly as they have received it.
The St. Irenaeus quote implies that if someone is properly appointed a bishop in the apostolic succession, then he will undoubtedly pass on the "apostolic seed" faithfully. I think Church history since Irenaeus in general, and since Vatican II in particular, shows that this cannot be presumed uncritically.
We might also quibble as to how to interpret the metaphor "apostolic seed." Does it mean preserving the totality of the Catholic Faith as it has developed over 1900+ years? Or did the Council Fathers think it meant the sort of "World Peace" Social Gospel described in Gaudium et Spes? I would incline toward the latter. Or perhaps the "seed" is just the Pentecostal blessing of the Holy Ghost to the Apostles being passed along.
Does Sacrosanctum Concilium ever explicitly say that the Mass is the propitiatory sacrifice to God of a spotless victim? As distinct from, say, a sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving?
Once Lumen Gentium has phenominologically reidentified the Church as the "People of God," the old, "bracketed" notion of the Church as the Mystical Body of Christ can be phenomenologically reinterpretted a la Congar as individuals animated by the same Holy Spirit to work for Social Justice and World Peace. This is the phenomenological meaning of "sanctification" -- to be liberated from bourgeois capitalistic selfishness, and to focus on the needs of the Other (like the Good Samaritan or Dorothy Day). The hierarchy guides the congregation to this "sanctification."
The phenomenological approach is that this type of "sanctification" is the true fruit of the graces received through the sacraments, and that real worship of God is not just words and gestures in the church building, but going out and living the Social Gospel by changing the world into the peaceable Kingdom of God.
Forgot to add: I know that the Council Fathers never use the word "transubstantiation," so precisely what they mean by "the body and blood of Christ" is open to interpretation.
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