A Catholic Priests ask the question of the day: Does God Hate Shrimp?

Does God Hate Shrimp?

Why is eating shrimp alright and gay marriage not?

by Fr. Casey Jones
Ok, here is the basic premise that is floating around: The bible says homosexual activity is a sin, but it also says that eating certain foods (or using certain fabrics, or working on the Sabbath, or cutting your hair, or shaving, or anything else in the Levitical code) is also a sin. So, all of you backward-thinking Christians should lighten up. You pick and choose what you want. You follow your own version of the bible. So, stop “hating”, and embrace gay marriage since you make up the rules as you go along anyway.
Please know this is intended in love and in letting people know the truth about what the Sacred Scriptures and the Church teach about homosexuality, because, frankly I am tired of the memes and comments about the bible and homosexuality that are strawmen, constructed under poor logic with false premises whose aim seems to be only to ridicule.

Fr. Casey Jones

Before I begin, let me make some opening comments.
First of all, to all my gay friends out there: I love you. I can’t tell you how much I love you. I will never know the trials and prejudices that you have had to endure. This is not hate, but clarification. You know this, but I just want to say it. I say it because: one, it’s true and two, I need everyone else to know that I love you. The catechism of the Catholic Church says it well: “[Homosexual persons] must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided. These persons are called to fulfill God’s will in their lives and, if they are Christians, to unite to the sacrifice of the Lord’s Cross the difficulties they may encounter from their condition.” (CCC 2358)
In that vein, secondly, I say: God loves you too. In fact, no matter who is reading this, I can assure you of God’s radical love for you and that he has a plan for your salvation. This is true of each and every one of you. Know that I love you all very much. I am selective of my Facebook friends.
Thirdly, no one group of people has a monopoly on sin. Many of my friends are living lives apart from Gods plan. I pray for you. I never preach at you. I never condemn. I try to present God’s love as an invitation, not as an imposition. You all know where I stand on the moral issues you know that I am a priest. You know that the Church teaches with the authority of Christ that certain moral actions are sins unto death and that these include sexual sins such as fornication (sex outside of marriage), adultery (sex with someone who is married, including those separated by a civil divorce, contraception, and anything else that takes God’s gift of sexual love outside of its context, which is both unitive and procreative, ends that are inseparable.
Fourth, please do not comment about me forcing my beliefs on anyone, this is intended as a presentation of what the Catholic Church teaches on homosexuality in light of Scripture, not an argument for or against civil homosexual marriage. That is a debate for another place and time.
Fifth, please do not come back at me with misplaced quotes from Pope Francis. Pope Francis upholds the teaching of the Church. Like him, (and for that matter, Jesus) I do not judge someone for an inclination, for an orientation that is not a choice made in freedom, but actions (be they hetero or homosexual) are choices. I do not judge anyone’s soul. That is for God, not me. But I can and, as a priest and a follower of Christ, should make judgments on objective moral actions.
Lastly, I do welcome honest and sincere questions in charity if they are on topic and fall into the parameters set above. Again, the topic is the Bible and Homosexuality.

Why is eating shrimp alright and gay marriage not?

In regard to the ceremonial and dietary laws of the Old Testament (the latter generally being related to the former), these were abrogated by the sacrifice of Christ. They aren’t necessary anymore. Christ has fulfilled the old law, it has passed away. It is not necessary to make sin offerings anymore. Christ came to fulfill it and to perfect these. They are done. He addresses this himself:

“Hear me, all of you, and understand: there is nothing outside a man which by going into him can defile him; but the things which come out of a man are what defile him…Do you not see that whatever goes into a man from outside cannot defile him, since it enters, not his heart but his stomach, and so passes on. (Mark 7:14-19)

In this Jesus declares all food to be clean. The same issue is addressed later in the Acts of the Apostles where Peter is given a vision in which he is told that there is no longer clean or unclean food, but that he is free to eat all; a message which he spoke to the Church. Just as Christ today guides his church in the person of Peter’s successor. (See Acts 11:1-18)
As the Catechism puts it: “Jesus perfects the dietary law, so important in Jewish daily life, by revealing its pedagogical meaning through a divine interpretation . . . What comes out of a man is what defiles a man.” For from within, out of the heart of man, come evil thoughts” and further “In presenting with divine authority the definitive interpretation of the Law, Jesus found himself confronted by certain teachers of the Law who did not accept his interpretation of the Law, guaranteed though it was by the divine signs that accompanied it. This was the case especially with the Sabbath laws, for he recalls often with rabbinical arguments, that the Sabbath rest is not violated by serving God and neighbor, which his own healings did.” (CCC 582)
Jesus also abrogated ceremonial laws about the Sabbath:

“Jesus went through the grainfields on the Sabbath; his disciples were hungry, and they began to pluck heads of grain and to eat. But when the Pharisees saw it, they said to him, “Look, your disciples are doing what is not lawful to do on the Sabbath.” He said to them, “Have you not read what David did, when he was hungry, and those who were with him: how he entered the house of God and ate the bread of the Presence, which it was not lawful for him to eat nor for those who were with him, but only for the priests? Or have you not read in the law how on the Sabbath the priests in the temple profane the Sabbath, and are guiltless? I tell you, something greater than the temple is here. And if you had known what this means, ‘I desire mercy, and not sacrifice,’ you would not have condemned the guiltless. For the Son of man is lord of the Sabbath.” (Matt. 12:1-8)

Jesus was clear that he fulfilled the ceremony of the Old law, and therefore abrogated these aspects. In fact, large portions of St. Paul’s writings in the New Testament are spent dealing with this issue. He speaks quite a bit on why we don’t keep Jewish feats, why we don’t necessarily circumcise male children, why we are not bound to these ceremonial laws, because Christ, the perfect Sacrifice has fulfilled them.

This is not the case with the moral laws.

These are eternal. In fact, Jesus typically holds us to even higher moral standards. Jesus demonstrates this several times in the Sermon on the Mount, when he uses the formula: “You have heard that it was said…but I say to you” for example: “You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ But I say to you, Do not resist one who is evil. But if any one strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.” (Matthew 5:38)
One of these actually happens to address marriage:

“Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.’ But I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of unchastity, [πορνεία, a Greek word that is hard to translate into English whose exact meaning remains an enigma] makes her an adulteress; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery” (Matthew 5:31)

And another: “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that every one who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” (Matthew 5: 27) So, Jesus does not abrogate the moral Law, particularly the laws about marriage and Chasity. In fact, he holds us to an even higher standard that was acceptable before.

He specifies this again in Matthew 19:4-9:

He answered, “Have you not read that he who made them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one’? So they are no longer two but one. What therefore God has joined together, let not man put asunder.” They said to him, “Why then did Moses command one to give a certificate of divorce, and to put her away?” He said to them, “For your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so. And I say to you: whoever divorces his wife, except for unchastity,[ πορνεία] and marries another, commits adultery; and he who marries a divorced woman, commits adultery.” Thus Jesus establishes that marriage is an insolvable unity between a man and a woman. He does not permit divorce.

Scripture also makes it clear that, as I said before, taking God’s gift of sexuality out of context is a grave offense.

“Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither the immoral nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals [literally ‘sodomites’ i.e. those who participate in the actions, not those who have the orientation] nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor robbers will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God.” 1 Corinthians 6:9-11

Again, St. Paul makes the point that there is no one group who has a monopoly on sin, but that life in Christ entails putting sin behind us.
The same sentiment is found in the book of revelation: “But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the polluted, as for murderers, fornicators, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their lot shall be in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death.” (Rev. 21:8) Again, fornication is sex outside of marriage.

Now, you may want to say “A-ha! If you would ‘let’ gay people get married than it wouldn’t be a sin.”

The problem is that from the beginning, the scriptures point that marriage is a union between a man and a woman. Yes, there were concessions made for polygamy and other circumstances, but Jesus ended that when he brought the law to perfection, (See Matthew 19 above). So to someone who reads scripture honestly, saying “gay marriage” is like saying “square circle”. It is not this way because the bible or the Church says it is so. The scriptures and the Church say it is so, because it is so.
All of this being said, We as a Church, I feel, have a long way to go in reaching out to the LBGT community. I think it can be done in love. I know several people who identify as homosexual who are living chastely, even some in domestic partnerships, who follow the moral teachings of the Church. It’s not easy, just like it isn’t easy for the hetro couple who cannot perform the martial act for health reasons that arise during the marriage.

As the Catechism states “Homosexual persons are called to chastity [glossed as ‘The moral virtue which, under the cardinal virtue of temperance, provides for the successful integration of sexuality within the person leading to the inner unity of the bodily and spiritual being]. By the virtues of self-mastery that teach them inner freedom, at times by the support of disinterested friendship, by prayer and sacramental grace, they can and should gradually and resolutely approach Christian perfection.” (CCC 2359)

We all have the things we struggle with as far as an inclination to sin, thank God I am not judged on my inclinations, nor on the actions of which I have repented, but by God’s grace we all are called to be holy.
This again, was an attempt to explain what many people see as a contradiction. I hope that it was successful. Boundaries being set, questions/discussion is encouraged. God bless you all.

Drew Brees ; all Pro QB and all Pro Dad!!

Report: Drew and Brittany Brees expecting fourth child

Credit: WireImage

(Photo by Steve Granitz/WireImage)

wwltv.com

Posted on February 2, 2014

A report on E-Online says that Drew Brees' wife Brittany is expecting the couple's fourth child.

The article said that the couple made the announcement on the red carpet at a Super Bowl-related event Saturday night.

The child will be the fourth for Drew and Brittany. They already have three sons - 5-year-old Baylen, 3-year-old Bowen and 1-year-old Callen.

Saints fans forgive and forget; overwhelmingly cheering for native New Orleanian Peyton Manning today

This is what I will always remember when I think of Peyton Manning and Super Bowls:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBlvjtfpPAg


We will always remember that in a tough twist of fate for the popular so of Archie Manning, it was indeed Peyton who threw the game winning pass, fortunately for Saints fans into the waiting arms of Tracey Porter.


However, many Saints fans were wired for a few hours after the greatest win in the history of Saints football and it continued for a few days to Drew Brees told us to collectively let it go.  You see Saints fans thought it a bit odd that Peyton made no attempt to congratulate Drew Brees or Coach Sean Payton or any other Saints player.  In fact, he really kind of exited stage left and quickly!!


Despite the instant anger, which amused me because we just won the Super Bowl, Saints fans and almost all New Orleanians, still love the Mannings.  Archie is a favorite son, although he is the only non-native.  He and Olivia had three boys: Cooper, Peyton and Eli.  All were born in the Crescent City.  All lived in uptown New Orleans.  All went to and played football for Newman High School.  And all New Orleans followed Cooper at Ole Miss, until his neck injury sidelined him for ever, then Peyton to Tennessee and we all booed collectively when he did not win the Heisman.  We followed Peyton to the Colts then Eli to the Giants. And we cheered both on in every Super Bowl, except of course 4 years ago.


Now today, we hear and read from reliable New Orleans media, the local fan base is supporting Peyton and the Broncos by a margin of 80% to 20% against.  Now some of that could be that Saints fans are learning to really hate the Seahawks.  But, in the end, it is the love affair with the Mannings, despite that lack of a handshake, that makes us pull up a chair and cheer for Peyton.  Yep, down here in New Orleans we forgive and forget; Laissez Les Bon Temps Rouler!!!

Jimmy Akin gives a superb overview of the Feast celebrated today: The Presentation of the Lord

What's happening at the Presentation of the Lord?

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by Jimmy Akin Sunday, February 02, 2014                

40 days after his birth, Christ was presented at the temple. Why?            

The Church celebrates the Presentation of the Lord.

It's a feast that happens every year on February 2nd.
We read about the presentation of the Lord in Luke 2, but the text can be a little mysterious.
What is actually happening there?
Some claim that Luke himself didn't know . . .

What Luke Says

Here is what Luke actually says about the event . . .

[22] And when the time came for their purification according to the law of Moses, they brought him up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord [23] (as it is written in the law of the Lord, "Every male that opens the womb shall be called holy to the Lord") [24] and to offer a sacrifice according to what is said in the law of the Lord, "a pair of turtledoves, or two young pigeons."

He then records the encounters with Simeon and Anna the prophetess, but at the moment our focus is what Luke refers to as "their purification."
What is he talking about?

The Purification of the Mother

The first thing to note is that Luke is not talking about the time of Jesus' circumcision. That occurred on the eighth day after his birth. Luke has already talked about that and is now referring to a later time.
Specifically, he's talking about the fortieth day after Christ's birth.
We know that because of he quotes from Leviticus 12:8 ("a pair of turtledoves, or two young pigeons"), which refers to the purification ritual that a Jewish mother needed to perform to become ritually clean again after childbirth.
In the case of a boy, this was on the fortieth day after childbirth (which is why this feast is on February 2--40 days after Christmas, counting Dec. 25 as the first day).
In the case of a girl child, the purification was later.
This leads to a question . . .

Why "Their" Purification?

Leviticus only mentions the purification of the mother, not anybody else. So why does Luke refer to the time of "their" purification?
Some have thought Luke was fuzzy on how all this was supposed to work.
That seems unlikely to me. Luke may have been a Gentile Christian, but he was living amidst numerous Jewish Christians, and in keeping with his habit of investigating things thoroughly, he would have been able to find out precisely how these things worked.
I think another explanation is more likely, and there are several possible ones.
One is that Luke is just speaking in a general way. The rite of purification was something that the whole family was present for. They all made the journey to the temple together, and so it was in some sense "their" effort, even if it was Mary in particular who was being ritually purified.
If a modern family goes to a restaurant to celebrate the birthday of one of it's members, it is in one sense "their" party, even if in another sense it is the party of the one having the birthday.
In the same way, if the whole family goes to the temple for a purification, Luke can speak of it as "their" purification, even if they aren't all being purified.

A Poor But Obedient Family

There are a couple more things to note about Mary's purification.
The first is that the offering she made indicates that the Holy Family was poor. The ordinary offering was a lamb and a dove, but in cases where a family was too poor for that, two doves were used instead.
Despite its noble lineage, belonging to the line of David, Joseph's family had fallen on hard times and was among the poor.
They were still obedient to what the Law of Moses required, though. This is the reason why Mary offers the second dove as "a sin offering" (see Lev. 12:6), though she herself was immaculate.
This act does not indicate that she was a sinner any more than Jesus' circumcision, baptism, or participation in other sacrificial rites indicates that he was a sinner.
And there is more happening here . . .

The Redemption of the Firstborn

Luke also quotes Exodus 13:2, which deals with the redemption of firstborn males.
The idea behind this ritual was that every male firstborn--whether human or animal--is holy to God, the same way that the firstfruits of a crop were holy to God.
Consequently, they had to either be given to God in sacrifice or redeemed--bought back from him.
Since human sacrifice was illegal and immoral, all firstborn boys had to be redeemed, which was done by their father paying a priest five shekels.

Luke Confused Again?

Again, people accuse Luke of being confused about this. It is argued that the redemption of the firstborn didn't take place at the temple, and so there was no reason for the Holy Family to bring Jesus there.
Again, the criticism is misplaced.
While it may have been possible for a boy to be redeemed anywhere, it was natural for this to be done at the temple, and we know--in fact--that there was a tradition of doing so.
We read about that in Nehemiah 10:35-36, where the people took an oath, saying

We obligate ourselves . . . to bring to the house of our God, to the priests who minister in the house of our God, the first-born of our sons and of our cattle, as it is written in the law.

No Mention of Redemption?

Interestingly, Luke does not mention Joseph paying the five shekels to a priest. Why not?
It could be that he simply takes this act for granted, just as he doesn't go into the details of the rite of Mary's purification. He's cited the Old Testament passages referring to these rites, and he takes that as sufficient indication they were performed.
But some have thought there may be a deeper significance to his failing to mention Jesus being redeemed.
Why might that be?

Still Consecrated

The obvious answer would be that Jesus was considered as still consecrated to the Lord.
Two reasons suggest themselves. First, as the Jewish Encyclopedia notes:

Not only priests and Levites, but also Israelites whose wives are the daughters of priests or Levites, need not redeem their first-born. 

Joseph was the husband of Mary, and Mary was a relative of Elizabeth, who was "of the daughters of Aaron" (Luke 1:5), so perhaps Mary's lineage didn't require her to have her Son redeemed.
In that case, he was presented at the temple in acknowledgement of his consecration to God.
Or, if the redemption was done, Luke may meant to suggest, on a literary level, that Jesus remained totally consecrated to God.
Benedict XVI comments:

"Evidently Luke intends to say that instead of being 'redeemed' and restored to his parents, this child was personally handed over to God in the Temple, given over completely to God. . . . Luke has nothing to say regarding the act of 'redemption' prescribed by the law. In its place we find the exact opposite: the child is handed over to God, and from now on belongs to him completely" (Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives: 3).

Read more: http://www.ncregister.com/blog/jimmy-akin/what039s-happening-at-the-presentation-of-the-lord/#ixzz2sBk11r1n

Dedicated to works of mercy he was killed by his in-laws

St. Adalbald of Ostrevant

                                 

St. Adalbald of Ostrevant

Feastday: February 2
Died: 652

• Noble and martyr, who faced some of the most vicious in-laws ever recorded. Adalbald was the son or grandson of St. Gertrude of Hamage and was born in Flanders. He was a nobleman at the court of Dagobert I of France. Going to Gascony, in France, to put down a local rebellion, he met a noblewoman, Rictrudis, daughter of Ernold. He married Rictrudis despite the objections of her relatives who resented his military activities in her region. Both Adalbald and Rictrudis dedicated themselves to acts of mercy and to religious projects. Adalbald then returned to Gascony only to face his in-laws who killed him. Many miracles were recorded at his tomb, and Adalbald was named a martyr.

Great article that affirms the Church's teachings are firm; difference in style yes; in substance Pope Francis and Pope Benedict not so different

Meet the new pope — same as the old pope

By Kyle Smith

January 31, 2014

Pope Francis blesses a child's parrot at St. Peter Square at the Vatican Wednesday. Photo: AP Photo/L'Osservatore Romano

MORE FROM

Kyle Smith

Sorry, liberals: Pope Francis is not the Barack Obama of the Vatican.
The media’s fantasy that the new pope is a revolutionary determined to steer the Church left reached a new level of fatuousness this week when Rolling Stone gave Francis the full Lady Gaga treatment, placing him on its cover with the headline, “The Times They Are a-Changin’.”
No, they ain’t.
Rolling Stone joined Time (which crowned Francis its Person of the Year for 2013), The Advocate (ditto) and The New York Times in a group self-delusion that the pope is coming around to their views on economics, homosexuality and ordination of women.
The basis for all this is a misreading of a few out-of-context quotations, ignorance of longstanding church doctrine and (perhaps most of all) a frenzy to enlist the pope against the left’s favorite bogeymen, Sarah Palin and Rush Limbaugh.
In Rolling Stone, writer Mark Binelli swooned, noting that Palin called Pope Francis “kind of a liberal” (before backtracking) and Limbaugh denounced the pope’s views as “pure Marxism.” With enemies like those, the left thinks, Francis must be OK.
But MSNBC shouldn’t go booking the pope to co-host the Rachel Maddow Show just yet.
It’s hard for liberals (and maybe some conservatives) to wrap their heads around this, but Catholic doctrine doesn’t line up neatly with American views of left and right. The church is steadfastly pro-life on abortion (we associate that with conservatives) but equally pro-life on capital punishment (a view we call liberal). Nor has the Vatican altered its commitment to uplifting the poor or its related suspicion of capitalism.
Yes, Pope Francis critiqued “trickle-down theories which assume that economic growth, encouraged by a free market alone, will inevitably succeed in bringing about greater justice.”
But (pace Limbaugh), Francis also blasted Marxism, if not in the same speech: “The ideology of Marxism is wrong,” he said in December.
It’s not like Benedict XVI (whom Binelli compared to Freddy Krueger) was an apostle of Milton Friedman either: “Both capitalism and Marxism promised to point out the path for the creation of just structures,” he said in 2007. “And this ideological promise has proven false.
Capitalism, Benedict continued, left a “distance between rich and poor” and is “giving rise to a worrying degradation of personal dignity.”
Pope John Paul II showed perhaps the most enthusiasm for capitalism of any pope, yet even he said, “There are many human needs which find no place on the market. It is a strict duty of justice and truth not to allow fundamental human needs to remain unsatisfied.” He warned against a “radical capitalistic ideology” that lacks an “ethical and religious” core.
Did Francis (as the Times proclaimed last September) complain that the church was “obsessed” with gays, abortion and birth control? Not quite.
Here’s what he said: “The church’s pastoral ministry cannot be obsessed with the transmission of a disjointed multitude of doctrines to be imposed insistently.”
Nothing new here, either: The pope was just focusing on the big picture. Benedict said the same thing, albeit more directly, in 2006, noting that, for press interviews, “I always knew the questions in advance. They concerned the ordination of women, contraception, abortion. . . If we let ourselves be drawn into these discussions, the church is then identified with certain commandments or prohibitions; we give the impression that we are moralists with a few somewhat antiquated convictions, and not even a hint of the true greatness of the faith appears.”
Yes, Pope Francis said, “Who am I to judge a gay person of goodwill who seeks the Lord?” But this is consistent with the Catechism of the Catholic Church, which states that gays “must be accepted with respect, compassion and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided.”
In 2010, while still just a cardinal, he called gay marriage “a destructive attack on God’s plan” and last year Francis was “shocked” by a gay-adoption bill, according to a bishop who discussed the matter with him. Ordination of women? Francis said in November that this was “not a question open for discussion.” Abortion? “Horrifying,” he said on Jan. 13.
There is a Bob Dylan song that encapsulates the media’s coverage of Pope Francis, but it isn’t “The Times They Are a-Changin’.” It’s “Idiot Wind.”

Will the Church move in a new direction regarding divorced and remarried Catholics? 2014 should be interesting!

When the Church of Rome Forgave Second Marriages

During the first centuries the divorced and remarried were pardoned of their sins and given communion, but later this practice was abandoned in the West. Today Pope Francis has brought it back onto the field, while the dueling goes on among the cardinals

by Sandro Magister




ROME, January 31, 2014 • In the middle of February the cardinals and bishops of the council of the secretariat of the synod will meet to evaluate the responses to the questionnaire distributed all over the world in October.

The synod has as its theme "the pastoral challenges of the family" and will be held in Rome from October 5-19. Among the thirty-nine questions of the questionnaire, five concern divorced Catholics who have gone on to a second marriage and the impossibility of their receiving the sacraments of the Eucharist and reconciliation.

The discussion on this point is very heated, and the pressure to admit the divorced and remarried to communion is very strong in public opinion, with the support of prominent bishops and cardinals.

In the Catholic Church today, in fact, the only way for the divorced and remarried to be admitted to Eucharistic communion is the verification of the nullity of the previous marriage celebrated in church.

Nullity can be attributed to numerous causes, and the ecclesiastical tribunals are generally understanding in resolving even difficult marriage cases by this means.

But it is impossible for the ecclesiastical tribunals to address the great number of marriages suspected of invalidity. According to Pope Francis - who cited his predecessor as archbishop of Buenos Aries in this regard - null marriages could be as many as "half" of those celebrated in church, because they are celebrated "without maturity, without realizing that it is for life, for social convenience."

Most of these invalid marriages are not even subjected to the judgment of the ecclesiastical tribunals. Not only that. Ecclesiastical tribunals exist and function only in some countries, while large regions of Africa, Asia, and Latin America itself go without them. In some areas of recent evangelization monogamous and indissoluble marriage has not yet been accepted by Catholic common opinion, in a persistent context of unstable or polygamous unions.

Against this backdrop, is there a way around the impossibility of resolving by judicial means the great number of transitions to a second marriage?

Joseph Ratzinger, both as cardinal and as pope, had repeatedly brought up the hypothesis of allowing access to communion for the divorced and remarried "who have come to a well-founded conviction of conscience concerning the nullity of their first marriage but are unable to prove this nullity by the judicial route."

Benedict XVI warned that this "is a highly complex problem and ought to be studied further."

Meanwhile, however, it has become a widespread practice for the divorced and remarried to receive communion by their own initiative. This is tolerated by priests and bishops and here and there is even encouraged an officialized, as in the German diocese of Freibourg. With the risk of leaving everything to the conscience of the individual and of increasing the distance between the lofty and demanding vision of marriage as it appears in the Gospels and the life practiced by many of the faithful.

As the synod on the family draws near, Pope Francis has made room for an encounter between positions that are different if not opposed, contributing himself to generating the expectation of "openness."

On the one hand, he ordered the publication in seven languages in the October 23 issue of "L'Osservatore Romano" of a note from the prefect of the congregation for the doctrine of the faith, Gerhard L. Müller, very rigorous in reaffirming the indissoluble "sanctity" of Christian marriage and in rejecting "an adaptation to the spirit of the times" such as the granting of communion to the divorced and remarried simply on the basis of their decision in conscience.

On the other hand the pope has allowed bishops and cardinals - even those resoundingly in his confidence, like Reinhard Marx and Óscar Rodríguez Maradiaga - to speak out publicly against Müller and in favor of lifting the ban on communion.

The proponents of the change, when they make their position explicit, ultimately rely on the conviction of the individual conscience.

But is conscience the only means of solving the problem of the divorced and remarried?

According to what happened during the first centuries of Christianity, it is not. Back then there was another solution.

*

Attention to how the Church of the first centuries addressed the question of the divorced and remarried has been called back recently by a priest of Genoa, Giovanni Cereti, a scholar of patristics and ecumenism as well as being for more than thirty years an assistant of the movement of conjugal spirituality of the Equipes Notre-Dame.

A few months ago Cereti republished a scholarly study he published for the first time in 1977 and then again in 1998, entitled: "Divorce, new marriages, and penance in the primitive Church."

The centerpiece of this study - replete with references to the Fathers of the Church at grips with the problem of second marriages - is canon 8 of the Council of Nicaea of 325, the first of the great ecumenical councils of the Church, the authority of which has always been recognized by all Christians.

Canon 8 of the Council of Nicaea says:

"As for those who call themselves pure, if they should wish to enter the catholic Church, this holy and great council establishes [. . .] before all else that they should declare openly, in writing, that they accept and follow the teachings of the catholic Church: and that is that they will enter into communion both with those who have gone on to second marriages and with those who have lapsed in the persecutions, for whom the time and circumstances of penance have been established, so as to follow in everything the decisions of the catholic and apostolic Church."

The "pure" to whom the canon refers are the Novatianists, the rigorists of the time, intransigent to the point of definitive rupture both with remarried adulterers and with those who had apostatized to save their lives, even if afterward they had repented, been subjected to penance, and been absolved of their sin.

In demanding of the Novatianists, in order to be readmitted into the Church, that they "enter into communion" with these categories of persons, the Council of Nicaea was therefore reiterating the power of the Church to forgive any sin whatsoever and to receive into full communion again even the "digami," meaning remarried adulterers and apostates.

Since then, two tendencies with regard to the divorced and remarried have coexisted in Christianity, one more rigorist and one more inclined to forgiveness. During the second millennium, the former came to hold sway in the Church of Rome. But before that there was room for the practice of forgiveness in the West as well.

The newly created cardinal Müller, in his note in "L'Osservatore Romano," writes that "in patristic times, divorced members of the faithful who had civilly remarried could not even be readmitted to the sacraments after a period of penance." But immediately after that he recognizes that "from time to time pastoral solutions were sought for very rare borderline cases."

Ratzinger adhered more closely to the historical reality, in a text from 1998 republished on November 30, 2011 in multiple languages in "L'Osservatore Romano," which sums up as follows the status of the question according to the most recent studies:

"It is claimed that the current magisterium relies on only one strand of the patristic tradition, and not on the whole legacy of the ancient Church. Although the Fathers clearly held fast to the doctrinal principle of the indissolubility of marriage, some of them tolerated a certain flexibility on the pastoral level with regard to difficult individual cases. On this basis Eastern Churches separated from Rome later developed alongside the principle of akribia , fidelity to revealed truth, that of oikonomia , benevolent leniency in difficult situations. Without renouncing the doctrine of the indissolubility of marriage, in some cases they permit a second and even a third marriage, which is distinct, however, from the sacramental first marriage and is marked by a penitential character. Some say that this practice has never been explicitly condemned by the Catholic Church. They claim that the 1980 Synod of Bishops proposed to study this tradition thoroughly, in order to allow the mercy of God to be more resplendent."

Further on, in the same text, Ratzinger points to Saint Leo the Great and other Fathers of the Church as those who "sought pastoral solutions for rare borderline cases" and recognizes that "in the Imperial Church after Constantine a greater flexibility and readiness for compromise in difficult marital situations was sought."

The ecumenical council of Nicaea was in fact convened by Constantine himself and its canon 8 expressed precisely this orientation.

It must also be specified that in that period those who went on to a second marriage and were readmitted into communion with the Church remained with their new spouses.

Over the following centuries in the West, the penitential period that preceded readmission to the Eucharist, initially brief, was gradually extended until it became permanent, while in the East this did not happen.

It was the ecclesiastical tribunals in the West in the second millennium that addressed and resolved the "borderline cases" of second marriages, verifying the nullity of the previous marriage. But in doing so they eliminated conversion and penance.

Those like Giovanni Cereti who today are calling attention back to the practice of the Church of the first centuries are proposing the return to a penitential system similar to the one adopted at the time, and still maintained in a certain form in the Eastern Churches.

By extending the power of the Church to absolve all sins, even for those who have broken their first marriage and entered into a second union, the way would be opened - they maintain - to "a greater appreciation of the sacrament of reconciliation" and to "a return to the faith by many who today feel excluded from ecclesial communion."

Perhaps this was what Pope Francis was thinking about when, in the interview on the return flight from Rio de Janeiro on July 28, 2013, he opened and closed "a parenthesis" - his words - on the Orthodox, who "follow the theology of what they call oikonomia, and they give a second chance [of marriage]."

Adding immediately afterward:

"I believe that this problem [of communion for persons in a second marriage] must be studied within the context of the pastoral care of marriage."

Homily for the Presentation of the Lord: is Jesus the light of my life?

Happy Ground Hog's Day!!  Yes today we find out if that rodent from up north, also known as Punxsutawney Phil will predict 6 more weeks of winter or if we can look forward to an early spring.  And don't we all wish for an early spring, especially after this past week.  How did everyone do surviving the great ice storm of 2014?  For us in the deep south, we just experienced sleet, some snow, ice covered roads, icicles hanging from our roofs, businesses shut down and kids with an unexpected 3 day break from school.  C'mon Phil, give us some hope!


Isn't it ironic that for the Ground Hog to predict spring, he must come out of his hole in the ground to a cloudy and overcast day.  If it is a beautiful sun shinning kind of day, the Ground Hog will see his shadow and retreat and that means more winter.  Seems backwards to me, but I didn't make the rules.


For you and me, we love to see the sun.  We are attracted to light.  In the light we find warmth and safety and brightness.


As people of faith, indeed we are drawn to the light; and that light is Jesus Christ.


February 2nd may be Ground Hog's Day and this year Super Bowl Sunday.  More importantly, February 2nd is the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord.  This day is also known as Candlemas Day, a Christian celebration of light.  On this date, the calendar arrives at the half way mark between the shortest day of the year and the spring equinox.  Perhaps we have taken notice that every day lately the sun is going down a little bit later.  On Candlemas Day it was expected that all the candles to be used in the church for the coming year would be blessed; another reference to light.  Whether we call it the Feast of the Presentation or Candlemas, today we recall the Scriptural event of Mary and Joseph presenting the baby Jesus at the Temple.  As devout and faithful Jews, Mary and Joseph would know that 40 days after the birth of Jesus, the ritual purification of Mary would be complete and the child must be presented for consecration at the Temple.  When Jesus was presented, the Holy Family encounter Simeon and Anna.  It is the words of Simeon that help us to celebrate the light on this feast: my eyes have seen your salvation, prepared in the sight of all the people, a light for the revelation to the Gentiles, and glory for Israel!!  These words are an encouragement for us today when we think of our relationship with Jesus: seeing salvation, a light for revelation and glory! 


Yes we should not forget that at this presentation, Simeon also foretold of the passion and death of Jesus telling Mary directly that a sword shall pierce your heart.  At that moment in time, could Mary possibly have known just exactly what this means?  Then Anna comes into the story and gave thanks for the child glorifying God.  Why did Simeon and Anna have this knowledge that Jesus, the light of the world, was the fulfillment of God's promise?  Because they believed!


Jesus may have been presented in the Temple some 40 days after his birth, but he is presented for us every time we gather to celebrate the Mass.  Jesus is presented in the Word proclaimed from this very ambo.  In a few moments, Jesus is presented to us when the simple gifts of bread and wine become, at the consecration, His Body and Blood.  Then that real presence of Jesus, body, blood, soul and divinity, are presented to us in the reception of Holy Communion.  Why have we been given the gift to see Jesus present in what appears to be common bread and common wine?  Because we believe, and we live in the light.  For those who do not believe and do not live in the light, they are living in darkness and a place of no hope.  Just as Simeon took the child Jesus into his arms and welcomes him as the Messiah, just as Anna immediately gave thanks to God upon seeing Jesus, we too are called to embrace and rejoice Jesus when He is presented to us, most especially in the Holy Eucharist.  May we too receive Him properly prepared and with an embrace of reverence, respect and love.


The words captured in the Gospel of Luke spoken by Simeon are now the words prayed every night by those who pray the Liturgy of the Hours.  Even if you do not personally pray the Liturgy of the Hours, you can recite this prayer first prayed by Simeon:  "Now, Master, you may let your servant go in peace, according to your word, for my eyes have seen your salvation, which you prepared in the sight of all the peoples; a light for the revelation of the Gentiles, and glory for your people Israel."   Pray this prayer every night before bed, at least this week, although it is a great prayer for every night all year long.  The Presentation is also remembered in the Joyful Mysteries of the Holy Rosary and the Rosary of the 7 Sorrows of Mary.  Offer a Joyful Mystery or 7 Sorrows Rosary this week as a reminder of Jesus; the light of my life!!! 


Did Punxsutawney Phil see his shadow today?  Did he see the light?  Do we long to see more light after these recent days of a cold, long winter?  Perhaps the bigger question for us to answer today is do we see the Light of Christ, burning brightly in our hearts and our lives? 

From Aggie Catholic: If Jesus was their Pastor

10 Reasons Why Many Catholics Would Stop Going To Church If Jesus Was Their Pastor

10 Reasons Why Many Catholics Would Stop Going To Church If Jesus Was Their Pastor

1. He expects radical commitment and he never will shy away from demanding it from those who say they follow Him.
   Here are just 2 examples:
   
   **“Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you." -Matt 5:11-12
   
   **"I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven" -Matt 5:44-45
2. His preaching can be very confusing. Seriously. We have heard so many homilies, try imagining what would you would do if you heard this as a homily:
   
   **"This generation is an evil generation; it asks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah. For just as Jonah became a sign to the people of Nineveh, so the Son of Man will be to this generation. The queen of the South will rise at the judgment with the people of this generation and condemn them, because she came from the ends of the earth to listen to the wisdom of Solomon, and see, something greater than Solomon is here! The people of Nineveh will rise up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it, because they repented at the proclamation of Jonah, and see, something greater than Jonah is here!" -Luke 11:29-32
3. He focuses most of his time on a small number of His followers. While He preaches and teaches the crowds, He invests the majority of His time in a small group that is close to Him. He spends years guiding them, teaching them deeply, instructing them in Scriptures, challenging them to live holy lives, etc.
   
   **"On their return the apostles told Jesus all they had done. He took them with him and withdrew privately to a city called Bethsaida" -Luke 9:10
   
   **"Now about eight days after these sayings Jesus took with him Peter and John and James, and went up on the mountain to pray." -Luke 9:28
4. Jesus wouldn't be found at church very often. He would be in the streets, talking to the lost, preaching the Gospel, curing the sick, and helping the poor. He might be seen around church a few times a week.
   
   **"A scribe then approached and said, “Teacher, I will follow you wherever you go.” And Jesus said to him, “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.”" -Matt 8:19-20
5. He hangs out with rejects, the outcast, the loser, and the untouchable. In fact, He doesn't just hang out with them, He seeks them out to bring them grace, love, and healing.
   
   **"A leper came to him begging him, and kneeling he said to him, “If you choose, you can make me clean.” 41 Moved with pity, Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him, and said to him, “I do choose. Be made clean!”" -Mark 1:40-41
6. Jesus hates status quo. If you want to just maintain 'the way it has always been done' or the prevailing church culture, He won't be happy about it.
   
   **"Then he said to them all, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me. " -Luke 9:23
7. He doesn't care about image, success, money, or trends. He cares about faithfulness, charity, hope, grace, peace, generosity, humility, etc. and He wants you to care about those things too.
   
   **"For what will it profit them if they gain the whole world but forfeit their life? Or what will they give in return for their life?" -Matt 16:24
8. He would focus on holiness, discipleship, preaching the Good News, and evangelizing the lost, not a bunch of distracting churchy activity. My guess is most activities at your average parish would be cancelled and He would focus on truly forming disciples and evangelizing individuals in relational ministry and then training others to do the same.
   
   **"When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you." -Matt 28:17-20
9. His continued demand that we serve the poor would become a nuisance to many. He valued the poor more than any other group of people. Our attitude, in our culture, is that our money is our own and we can do with it as we please. He reminds us all is from God and we have an obligation to help those in need.
   
   **""When you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. And you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you, for you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.”" -Luke 14:13-14
10. Jesus is willing to die for the message He preaches and expects us to do the same. Most of us, of course, won't have to die for being Christian, but we will have to learn to do the unpopular and difficult for Christ.
    
    **"If they persecuted me, they will persecute you; if they kept my word, they will keep yours also. But they will do all these things to you on account of my name, because they do not know him who sent me." -John 15:20-21