Posted on 11/13/2009 5:37:11 AM PST by marshmallow
Well, it seems that we agree on the legitimacy of the US government. Note that the said legitimacy, or lack of it, has nothing to do with who elected who, when and how, and what the Constitution has to say about the process.
My advice to all Catholics and in fact all Bible believing Christians is to support the government when it is doing something right, ignore it when it is not, resist it when it does some direct evil like removal of religion from the public square and baby-killing, and try to do what is moral as if no government existed. In other words, my advice is to behave like free people do.
Alex;
The crucifixes on the wall are not legal. The Hague is actually correct based upon the laws of Italy. Now what will you do?
No, they would never have been pirnces. Why would God give authority to usurpers? According to +Paul, all authorty is from God; none is from the devil.
Advise Italians to disobey the injust laws of their country.
Usurpers of power do not have any authority. They have force, but not authority. If they attempt to legislate, they are to be disobeyed, because, per Romans 13, they act without authority.
I would give some legitimacy to inherited authority, that is if “prince” is to be taken literally. But still, a (literal) prince might have inherited certain property rights, but he does not have authority to legislate against divine principles of justice.
Alex, you are making up things as you go along in order to "prove" your point. Force is inherent in any authority, or else authority is an oxymoron. Anything that has force has authoirty. That includes princes, heads of state, hurricanes, earthquakes, plagues, floods, etc. All authority is from God. It is a delegated power or delegated force.
You are confusing authoirty with moral authority. +Paul doesn't. He makes a universal sweeping generalization that all authority comes from God, moralm or not.
This is consistent with the Church teaching that evil has no authority unless we give in into it and thus rebel against God. That's why worshiping idols was such a big no-no in Judaism. In fact idols really means devils.
Therefore +Paul states that rebelling against authority, any authority, is rebelling against God.
No, advise them to change the laws, or redefine Italy as a theocracy. What you are advising, Alex, is rebellion. If that were how people dealt with anything they didn't like, we would have anarchy.
It is true that authority often has force behind it, but it is not true that he who has force is ipso facto authority. If St. Paul wanted us to submit to force, he would have said so without the distinctions between good and evil spread through the chapter.
Att his poit I am advocating civil disobedience. Rebellion might become the next step. Anarchy is, by the way, far preferable to a secular state allowing the Hague cretins to rip crucifixes from walls.
He does. The good and evil is mentioned with respect to he governed and not the one who govern. Maybe you should read it in modern English for better comprehension (NAB or NIV).
The rest of the chapter is about love.
You are advocating rebellion if you don;t have your way, if others don't agree with you, or believe as you do. Anarchy may be preferable to you, but obviously most people can foresee way this is not such an appealing alternative.
In this country we change laws and argue for better, kinder and more just society. We don't pick up guns and rebel against everything we disagree with.
The Church does not teach or condone rebellion.
True, but irrelevant, and it is not a translation issue (I just checked with the original, Douay is very faithful to it). The princes are said to foster good works among the governed and restrict evil works. Since a prince can use his force ofr that, he is good, and therefore, it is implied, if he is using force in the oposite way, he is evil and the chapter does not apply to him.
I am advocating civil disobedience and pointing to a possibility of rebellion if basic freedoms, such as freedom of religion is usurped by the government. Especially, a foreign government. Nothing new here: Jefferson and Garibaldi would agree with me.
Well, I checked with NAB which the Catholic Church says is the Cathoic Bible now. Not Douay or Vulgate, okay.
Then our shcolls should be full of every kind og religious sumbol, form pagan to to Chritian, all in the name of some rleiigous freedom. The state does not prohiobit you or eprsecute you for being a Catholic. That's all freedom of rleigion means. Religion is not free to forcse its symbols on everyone or to abrogate othe rpeople's freedoms.
Disobedience to the state is sedition and that is punishable in this country Alex. especially over something silly like religious symbols in public schools. You are not a subject to foreign government, so that is a moot point, but when you are in a jurisdiction of a foreign government and on its soil, you are subject to obedience to it.
Thwe readings at Mass are from NAB, hopefully not for much longer. The Church does not have an official translation. The Vulgate is considered sufficient for understanding, or something like that.
I agree that in the US the situation is more pluralistic, especially if you count the Christian denominations separately. But even in the US this is something that the local school administration can decide locally. Quite possibly, several symbols might coexist, or separate chapels might be dedicated. Surely, non Christian enclaves also exist and it is fine for non-Christian symbols to dominate in them. That is what freedom of religion is. When you ban a symbol, you ban expression of religion on public square and therefore you no longer have religious freedom. You have some remnant of it, — for example, you are allowed to have a crucifix in your house, but that is not freedom. I could have icons and crucifixes in my mother’s house in the Soviet Union too, but no one would suggest that the Soviet Union had religious freedom.
My comments about foreign government inserting itself were in relation to the situation in Italy, where it was some kangaroo court outside of Italy that banned the crucifixes. We have not sunken as low yet, but on the other hand we have enough internal oppressors of freedom, we can be enslaved in no time without help from the Hague. And we probably will, before an awakening takes place.
Name one public school district in the United States that has the authority to put crucifixes on their classroom walls. Just one. My comments about foreign government inserting itself were in relation to the situation in Italy, where it was some kangaroo court outside of Italy that banned the crucifixes.
It is not a foreign government or kangaroo court. It is something that Italy has signed up for: membership in the EU and its laws and edicts. The court was something that Italy agreed to take as superior to itself. By Italian law, this is the correct result. Change the law, and you change your results.
From The Headlines of the News today
“Italian Mayors Order Crufixes Put in Classrooms in Revolt against European Court Ruling
Polish president and Greek Orthodox Church also hit out at decision against crucifixes in classrooms”
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2009/nov/09111702.html
Excerpt...
The BBC reports that the Orthodox Church plans to hold an emergency Holy Synod to hash out a plan to oppose the ruling
Probably none will have the courage to do so but any one has the moral authority. But I never held the present situation in the US regarding religious freedom as anything worth imitating or obeying.
something that Italy has signed up for: membership in the EU and its laws and edicts.
No one can sign up to obey injust laws. Italians should ignore the "court", and if their government yields to the court, they should disobey their government.
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