Posted on 07/03/2014 2:49:02 PM PDT by Faith Presses On
As has been mentioned a lot lately due to the Hobby Lobby decision, the Supreme Court is made up of six Roman Catholics and three Jews. I have been meaning to post about this for awhile and it seems like an appropriate time to.
For me, as an evangelical, I've found it increasingly troubling that all five conservative-voting justices are Roman Catholic. My belief on it is that the trend to select Roman Catholics as the "conservative" pick seems to come from the sense that they are, overall, less likely to strictly follow God's Word than would be an evangelical and to be more receptive to the opinions of man. The trend in politics in recent years is for evangelicals and more conservative Roman Catholics (and mainline Protestants and Jews) to band together, which is appropriate, but the trend seems to have gone too far in that evangelicals are being influenced to overlook and forget about the true and significant differences between evangelical belief and that of Roman Catholicism. Something has gone wrong when five Roman Catholics represent conservative Christians on the Supreme Court.
In every diocese, I believe, not just the bishop but priests designated by the bishop can lift an excommunication.
I ain't no canonist, so if there's more to be said, I hope somebody will jump in and tell it better than I did.
In every diocese, I believe, not just the bishop but priests designated by the bishop can lift an excommunication.
I ain't no canonist, so if there's more to be said, I hope somebody will jump in and tell it better than I did.
Depending on the circumstances The person may be (NOTE: may be) required to make a public refutation of their previous position.
This would be in the case of notorious sinners or politicians (But I repeat myself), or other public advocates.
By making a good and sincere confession of such sins and receiving the sacrament of Penance or “Reconciliation.” If I am wrong, I am open to correction by anyone more knowledgeable. I very much wish that the Vatican would also require repentance as open and as publicized as the sin but I don’t think that is yet required.
I am not certain but I doubt that Missouri Synod and Wisconsin Synod Lutherans tolerate women pastors (that would be an Evangelical Lutheran Church in America specialty along with abortion justification and other evils). There is or was a quite substantial caucus of United Methodists known as "Good News Methodists" who tended toward orthodox answers to most such issues. I would defer to xzins knowledge and expertise on this since he spent his entire career as a quite conservative Methodist military chaplain. As to Presbyterians other than PC-USA on women pastors, perhaps Alex Murphy can enlighten us. Other Reformed Christians are invited to chime in as are other Catholics. We should all avoid mud-wrestling and theological food fights however.
Your overall point seems sound. Catholicism has a substantial body of defined dogma on these and other matters. I suspect that Reformed Christians would say that Scripture is what unifies their memberships. The problem is that Scripture seems to mean different things to different people which explains the multiplicity of churches and apparent conflicts among local churches. Again, in fairness, we Catholics have problems with local pastors and theologians who delight in wandering from defined dogma into speculation land or into outright heresy.
I do think our Catholic Church institutions do a better job of resisting "Que sera, sera" because of central dogma and institutions like the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.
I am hoping that you are right and also that the Church may consider REQUIRING, as a condition of lifting the excommunication, such refutation of previous public positions as publicly as the sins were publicized by the sinner.
Thanks for your kind words. May God bless you and Mr. Don-o and yours as well!
Lutheran Church Missouri Synod does not ordain women. It is today’s only real representative of Lutheranism. I am not Lutheran. I am Methodist. I can more easily make a case for female deacons than for female elders.
IIRC, any priest can lift the latae sententiae excommunication due to collaboration in an abortion. I hope so, because I’ve done it.
IIRC, this privilege is not in the Code of Canon Law, but was promulgated by JPII.
Reagan nominated a Jew, Douglas Ginsburg. He had to withdraw because HE SMOKED A JOINT. (In the presence of college or graduate students.
Actually, the Church isn’t really free NOT to require public repudiation of evil advocacy that has been public.
This is why Teddy Kennedy should NOT have had a Catholic funeral. Although canonists argued that, because there was a priest around at the time of death, that fulfilled the requirement that the deceased give some “sign” of the practice of the Faith, people with common sense know that the priest was one of the usual Kennedy toadies—a Mafia priest.
If I had heard Teddy’s confession, I would have required him to publish a thorough repudiation of his pro-murder advocacy as a condition of absolution. Now, either the Mafia priest did this, and Kennedy refused, and was refused absolution. (And the priest can never say a word about it.) Or, much more likely, the Mafia priest simply pretended, along with the entire Kennedy family, that support for abortion is a non-issue, gave Kennedy “absolution,” and dispatched Kennedy to Hell.
Cardinal O’Malley, of course, could hardly contain his giddiness at the chance to mingle with all those Kennedys, and President Obama!!!—slobber, slobber, pant, pant! And Domingo! His blog post on the funeral is stomach-turning.
Devout evangelical Christians don’t go by what feels right and wrong to them, but surrender themselves to the Lord, are under the authority of His Word, and are guided and corrected by the Holy Spirit. Two of the conservative Catholics on the SC voted against DOMA and for Obamacare, which has made us subjects to the state and even with the Hobby Lobby ruling makes free contraception (including abortifacients) a protected right.
Souter was almost certainly no surprise to those who picked him. While the bases of both parties have certain values, the upper tiers do as well. The base of the GOP supports it for the sake of Christianity and capitalsim, but the upper levels are far more about capitalism, including power and greed. I support capitalism, too, but also see the corruption in everything of this world. And so, for example, the same large corporations supported by Christiann conservatives also have been instrumental in pushing for “gay marriage,” and Fox News tends to promote Christian values while Fox entertainment attacks it. The leadership in both parties has their own agendas, and that of the GOP would overall prefer it to be morally moderate, and will connive and push for it as much as the base allows it to. And one way they’ve tried to do that is with moving the SC to the left on moral issues. There are a lot of ways to do that, and they have, including by choosing Catholics. Eventually they’ll just try leaving Christianity.
This has nothing at all to do with there being no religious tests allowed. An entirely different matter, and since the liberals tried to bring it up with Romney (whose cult of planet gods and until recently seeing African-Americans as accursed IIRCdoes depart from the foundation of Christianity) it’s important that the GOP voters get the matter straight. Even with no religious tests, all GOP members of Congress are Christian, and devout Christians are overwhelmingly GOP while secular humanists are Dem. There is nothing against a party choosing or not a candidate or nominee for any reason. If you believe God created us and salvation is found only in Jesus, who will you want to choose? Although not the same exactly, it’s like the government can’t prevent people of different religions from marrying, but that doesn’t mean a Christian can’t say they’ll only marry another Christian.
Nominating Catholics has not moved the supreme court to the left. Republican presidents have nominated judges of several faiths. The only ones who have held true to principle have been the Catholics.
Ford- John Paul Stevens, Protestant, turned out to be very liberal on the Court.
Reagan- First choice Sandra Day O'Connor, Protestant, was conservative in many decisions but also was very liberal in decisions on affirmative action and other issues.
Reagan- Scalia, Catholic, has been a leading inteelectual on the court and a principled conservative.
Reagan- Bork, Catholic, was a leading intellectual and principled conservative. Democrats were afraid of his ability and integrity and mounted a vicious campaign against him. He was rejected by the Senate.
Reagan- Ginsberg, Jewish, a liberal judge whose nomination was withdrawn.
Reagan- Kennedy, Catholic, a moderate judge often called the swing vote.
G.H.W. Bush- Souter, Protestant, a leftist liberal on the court as liberal as any judge during his term. Resigned from the court during his term.
G.H.W. Bush- Thomas, Catholic, a principled conservative. Has been consistently conservative in his positions.
G.W. Bush- Roberts, Catholic, an intellectual and conservative. His last minute change in his Obamacare opinion was weird but he has been generally conservative.
G.W. Bush- Harriet Meyers, Protestant, liberal to moderate. Her nomination was withdrawn.
G.W. Bush- Alito, Catholic, an intellectual and principled conservative.
Republican presidents have nominated Protestants, Catholics and a Jew. The ONLY ones who have upheld conservative principles are the Catholics. They are the ONLY ones who stood up to the enormous leftist pressure in Washington DC.
You were wrong when you said Republican presidents ONLY nominate Catholics. You were wrong when you said Catholics moved the court to the left.
As I’ve said, this is about GOP picks. The GOP selection process. It’s just what the title says. But the Dem picks might shed more light on the whole situation. Dems want the U.S. to be like the most unchristian nations in Europe, and choosing secular Jews might be as close as they can come to rejecting Christianity and embracing atheism as they politically can at the moment.
For the GOP leadership, many of the powerful would like to ditch Christianity, but for the base. Christianity’s strength in America is far more from the common believers than from those anywhere in leadership. And evangelicals should remind those leaders of the differences between their beliefs and those in Catholicism, and that while there can be cooperation, the differences are irreconciliable and the two aren’t interchangeable, as they’ve become. Are evangelicalism and Catholicism interchangeable to you? And how about God’s will and plans? How do you view all five conservative SC justices being Catholic in the light of His plans and will?
That sounds as if you DO NOT think it's right that there are 5 Roman Catholics on the SCOTUS. Therefore, I pointed out that we can't have religious tests.
Now, you are saying that it would be better if they were from different conservative Christian religions. That seems to indicate that you don't believe in religious tests either. In that we (now) agree.
The real question is why so many of our justices are Roman Catholic. It is not a statistical impossibility, but it is a bit of an oddity.
My personal sense is that at least one of the reasons is that Catholics having better schools.
Is it true only priests in the US are given that ability? I thought I read somewhere that in other countries if one is excommunicated, simply going to Confession will not lift the excommunication.
I believe it is worldwide, and applies only to the excommunication that results from abortion.
Ah ok thanks.
As a Roman Catholic, I identify myself as a Roman Catholic. I do not spend much time, nor will I, defining myself as NOT Evangelical, not Pentecostal, not Eastern Orthodox (my choice if ever I did the unimaginable and ceased being Catholic since the Eastern Orthodox have the seven sacraments, a validly consecrated Holy Eucharist that is the Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, a legitimate Sacrifice of the Mass, apostolic succession, etc., AND some legitimate tie to Jesus Christ's promise to be with the Church all days to the end of the world) or not Jewish, not Buddhist, not Hindu, not Sikh or whatever.
If you prefer to be an Evangelical, good for you! It is simply not my cup of tea. See previous paragraph as to why I would only consider the Eastern Orthodox Church as an alternative. America! It's a great country!
As a Catholic, I regard many outside the Church as nonetheless Christians. Do you concede that Catholics are also Christians, baptized with water in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost? Or do you regard the Church of Rome as an unGodly cult of some sort? Put your cards on the table.
I have previously posted that I sympathize with the view that Evangelicals may reasonably wonder why GOP presidents who are quite reliant on Evangelical voters, never choose one or more for SCOTUS. I don't think there needs to be some sort of proportional representation. Frankly, as a Catholic, a SCOTUS consisting of nine reliable Evangelicals would be just fine.
With all due respect, I have a problem with the notion that a GOP leadership is "ditch"ing Christianity by naming Antonin Scalia, Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas and even John Roberts to the SCOTUS. Sotomayor is not our responsibility as conservatives. Nor, frankly, given her way of life, is she the responsibility of Rome. She is just the latest baptized in any and all Christian faiths to apostasize to heathenism. And that is why Obozo appointed her.
How would I view the fact that all five conservative (giving Kennedy more credit than he deserves) justices are Catholic in light of God's will and God's plans? No problem. Nine Clarence Thomases or Sam Alitos or Antonin Scalias would likely please God. Roberts a bit less so. Kennedy? Kennedy is a mess on most matters that count and proof positive of the continuing effect of the Fall.
Why do I get the feeling that you like to press on in chewing that old anti-Catholic slipper?
As conservatives, regardless of faith differences, let us be allies on the many, many things upon which conservatives agree. Let us disagree civilly and respectfully where we cannot agree.
May God bless you and yours!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.