Posted on 01/10/2015 2:18:24 PM PST by NYer
Wanna be. Just like homosexual pretend marriage.
There's also Canon 915 (not about full excommunication per se, but related) that those "obstinately persevering in manifest grave sin are not to be admitted to Holy Communion."
That's the law.
Shamefully, maddeningly, the law is not being enforced by any of our capon clerics. The political abortion-meisters are not "Catholics in good standing," but the pastors all the way up to Pope have not had the guts to enforce the law.
There's not a single problem in the Catholic Church that wouldn't be solved by Catholics being more Catholic.
The pastors have proven to be false shepherds. They have failed protect the flock, and to judge. But the themselves --- like all of us -- will face a Judge. I hope they know that.
Yes, we can.
Or if a man wants to get married and then become a priest, that's cool. They can do so in any of our 21 other Catholic churches/rites, other than the Latin.
Yes, we Catholics believe in the priesthood of the faithful. We also believe in the High Priesthood of Jesus Christ Our Lord. We also believe in the ministerial priesthood. So, you see, aMPU, it’s no problem. :o)
I had thought that, like most mainline Protestant churches, Methodists have ministers rather than priests. Does anyone (Methodist) want to elucidate this for me?
Please keep this in mind in your future replies. Thank you.
See #27.
The Pope says that celibacy is based on tradition only, and certainly it isn’t scriptural. It does seem a loss to prevent procreation by this group of men.
Be nice, think “elder” ;)
I agree. There are too many "Cafeteria Catholics" who don't follow the Precepts and Magisterium of the Church.
Women are not allowed to be pastors as per the Bible.
Regret to inform you the rcc does have a goddess.....her name is Mary.
Is that “Sola Scriptural?”
“The Pope says that celibacy is based on tradition only, and certainly it isn’t scriptural. “
I guess what Jesus said is not “scriptural”?
Matthew 19:12.
... It’s one thing to believe. It’s another to believe a falsehood.
You started out in exactly the right way: with an intelligent question. Thanks. It helps ground the discussion in reality.
A distinction must be made between different roles or positions in the Church. Some may too-casually use the words "pastor," "preacher," "minister," and "priest" as id they were identical in meaning, but they are not.
Pastor (in any church) usually means an ordained or officially recognized head administrator of a congregation. In terms of a job description there are certainly women who can administrate.
Preacher usually means a person who expounds on Scripture or teaches on faith and morals to a faith community. There are certainly women who have the intellectual capacity, knowledge, and communications skills to preach and teach.
Minister is broader and harder to define, but it indicates a person who carries out some role in upbuilding a church. It could be a choir director or musician, a person who visit the sick or imprisoned, or who leads youth, or mentors married couples, or instructs newcomers or foreign language people in the faith, or --- well, it could be a long list. In some churches, it may imply a salaried or staff position.
(Incidentally, this is of interest in U.S. law right now, because certain liberties are "granted" to churches--- for instance, to hire and fire employees a will, if those employee are considered "ministers." This is called a "ministerial exemption," and so now the Catholic Church is trying to make a lot of its employees (for instance parochial school teachers) ministers by legal definition, so they can recruit, hire, promote, and fire them without being entangled in "discrimination" laws.
Priest is something else altogether. A priest by definition is a person who offers sacrifice on behalf of the people. Most Christian denominations don't have priests because they do not offer sacrifice in their public worship.
In Catholicism (and Orthodoxy) a "priest" is not a job description so much as a a sacramental person: a person whose very body is an outward "sign." This is a gendered thing in two of our Sacraments. In Matrimony, the fact that there is a woman and a man is part of their "sign'" value. They have to be male and female: maleness and femaleness spells out who they are and what they signify on every level (physically/spiritually).
And the other Sacrament in which the body (as possessing a natural sexual identity)is an essential outward sign, is Holy Orders. A priest has to be male. It's not because of what he does (as pastor, preacher, minister) but because of what he is. He bodily represents Christ-the-Bridegroom.
The idea is man:woman::Christ:Church.
There are women who can serve the Catholic Church in certain kinds of parish administration ("pastoral ministry team") and take part in in the administration of a Diocese (there are women chancellors, Canon lawyers, and other Diocesan officials) and who can teach and preach (seriously, can't get me to shut up!!). That all depends on the woman's talents end training, like for anybody.
But the one thing a woman can't do is be a priest or perform the functions which are specifically priestly, e.g. celebrate the Sacrifice of the Mass.
There, you probably got more answer than you were looking for. But the main take-away point should be: "priest" is not just a job. It's not just a "what-you-do," it's a "what-you-are" and a "what-you-signify." A woman can do anything but be an embodied sign of Christ the Bridegroom.
Does that help?
And in fact even the Latin Church has married priests (e.g. married Anglican clergy who convert to Catholicism and are then trained and ordained as Catholic priests, can certainly stay married to their wives.) Plus, as I said, if a married man wants to be a Catholic Melkite, Maronite, Chaldean, Coptic, Greek Catholic (Byzantine) married priest, by all means that's the path he should pursue.
So there you go, married Catholic priests.
Thus celibacy of the Catholic (Latin) priesthood is voluntary. There are a number of choices. Men could choose one way or the other. You're not against celibacy as a choice, are you?
That is the first thing a person would know, who knew anything about Catholicism.
People ought to have the courtesy to admit it when they are factually wrong, especially when hey are talking about somebody else's belief.
If you wanted to, you could say "I think Catholics venerate Mary too much." That could be a proposition which could be rationally discussed. But to obstinately maintain that Catholics believe Mary to be a goddess, is like obstinately maintaining that Jews are Hindus. It just isn't the case.
It's also to call us liars, which is, to say the least, tiresome.
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