THE SYNOD 2015

Another Cardinal has his say.
He does seem to have a good point.


4th August, 2015.
The Vatican Insider.
‘Remarried divorcees’ too blunt a term says theologian


The pro-theologian emeritus of the pontifical household has questioned the appropriateness of the term “remarried divorcees” canonically and pastorally.

Cardinal Georges Cottier said in an interview with Jesuit journal La Civilta Catholica that the term is too generic and is applied in “fundamentally different situations”.

The Swiss Dominican described two very different cases which come under the “remarried divorcee” category.

One case is that of a person who has been abandoned by his or her spouse and who holds custody of their children.

This person meets someone who offers them help and security and the two marry.

The other case involves a married person with adolescent children who “meets a younger and brilliant individual”.

“They are carried away by passion, abandon their family, divorce and enter into a civil marriage” and “take part in parish life”.

“These are different cases,” Cardinal Cottier said.

The second one involves a “scandal”, while the first is linked to solitude, a difficulty in moving on, “vulnerability, need, including for companionship”.

“Generally, in every situation, justice requires certain important factors to be taken into account”: “The duty one has towards the abandoned spouse, who often remains faithful to their sacramental vows, the rights of the children born during the first and legitimate marriage”.

What is needed is “prudent judgement”, Cardinal Cottier stated.

“I believe that the solution to some problems should come from the prudent judgement of the bishop.

“I say this not without hesitation and doubt, seeing division between bishops.

“My claim refers first and foremost to certain situations where there is a big likelihood of the first marriage being null but it is difficult to provide canonical proof”.

“In rigorism there is an innate brutality that goes against the gentle way God has of guiding each person,” he added.

Cardinal Cottier said there are men and women who, “due to a negative judgement which was expressed in an impersonal and insensitive way, have felt a terrible rejection”.

“This is where confessors have a huge responsibility,” he said.

“Whenever they express a judgement and whatever this judgement is, it needs to be expressed and explained in a way that communicates the Church’s maternal concern.”

 

The problem with this kind of theology is?

How can one make sense of it?

It is as if he is trying to put square poles into round holes!

 

What exactly was his "good point"?
Everything he said was crap.

 

St. John the Baptist was martyred for true matrimony. May he intercede for us against these men who would make his sacrifice vain and reverse the very words of Christ in Scripture.

 

little me, your comment is a perfect illustration of the truth of the good Cardinal's comment - “In rigorism there is an innate brutality that goes against the gentle way God has of guiding each person,”

 

Do you mean that you don't think that the two examples are realistic?
Or do you mean that even if they are realistic there are not significantly different pastoral or moral situations?

 

What part of ''Everything'' did you not understand?

 

What part of "Little Me" has "Mac" in it, you rigorist .

 

I was just trying to help BH.
Was not sure what part of ''Everything '' could confuse a man such as yourself .

 

...said the spider to the fly?

Or as the ancient wisdom of China (my heathen wife) would put it, "you hide your head but stick out your bum, you think I cannot see..." (freely translated) .

 

St. Vincent of Lerins:

"What then will the Catholic Christian do, if a small part of the Church has cut itself off from the communion of the universal Faith? The answer is sure. He will prefer the healthiness of the whole body to the morbid and corrupt limb.

"But what if some novel contagions try to infect the whole Church, and not merely a tiny part of it? Then he will take care to cleave to antiquity, which cannot now be led astray by any deceit of novelty.

"What if in antiquity itself two or three men, or it may be a city, or even a whole province be detected in error? Then he will take the greatest care to prefer the decrees of the ancient General Councils, if there are such, to the irresponsible ignorance of a few men.

"But what if some error arises regarding which nothing of this sort is to be found? Then he must do his best to compare the opinions of the Fathers and inquire their meaning, provided always that, though they belonged to diverse times and places, they yet continued in the faith and communion of the one Catholic Church; and let them be teachers approved and outstanding. And whatever he shall find to have been held, approved and taught, not by one or two only but by all equally and with one consent, openly, frequently, and persistently, let him take this as to be held by him without the slightest hesitation."

(The Vincentian Canon, in Commonitorium, chap IV, 434,
ed. Moxon, Cambridge Patristic Texts)

 

Moral relativism at its finest, every word of it.

 

Call it what you will: unbending, rigid, steadfast. I'm in good company.

 

And we are well warned what to think of those who will try to change the law.

For do I now persuade men, or God? Or do I seek to please men? If I yet pleased men, I should not be the servant of Christ.



Which is not another, only there are some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ. 8But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach a gospel to you besides that which we have preached to you, let him be anathema. 9As we said before, so now I say again: If any one preach to you a gospel, besides that which you have received, let him be anathema.

 

But perhaps not when accompanied with "brutality".
... which important consideration helps decide if an ambiguous strength is indeed a virtue (steadfastness) or a vice (rigorism) - just as the Cardinal states.

Black and white statements that leaves little room for mature discussion ("everything") , complete identification of objective truth with ones own view (some admission of the possibility of error in what is one's own subjective opinion and limited education/experience before a Cardinal Theologian perhaps), use of brutish words ("crap") and disrespectful tone to one whose office demands better...are these things tending more towards rigorism than steadfastness perhaps?

Somewhere Aquinas says that one cannot have a single virtue without in fact having all the other virtues to some degree.
I have never quite understood that until just now.

How much healthier to say, "I personally believe the good Cardinal is mistaken in almost all he says here."
Why would we let our hearts to say "Everything he said was crap" .

 

"For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear."

 

It seems one side of the upcoming synod debate is holding a pre-meeting in September to be addressed by none other than Mary McAleese: http://wdtprs.com/blog/2015/08/rome-shadow-synod-ii-september-10-12 .

Well I'm not breathless with enthusiasm to hear her anyway...

 

Well, I was really asking a much less abstract question.
Why you may think the two real-world examples he distinguishes (typical from his experience by the sound of it) are not significantly different?

 

Yes the poor Cardinal speaks classic moral relativism as "little me" was quick to point out. The violence comes when you point out the truth and are called intolerant. I will not say "everything he says is crap"... just I will repeat our Lords vernacular "it passes into the latrine".