BY JOHN MARTIGNONI
Question: I have some friends who are Catholic who say that you don’t have to believe everything the Church teaches, whether it’s in the Catechism or not. Is that true?
Answer: No, not really. If you want to call yourself Catholic, but you want to pick and choose for yourself which of the Church’s doctrinal teachings to accept and which to reject, you give everyone else who calls himself Catholic the right to do the same thing.
For example, you believe women should be priests. Looking at the Catechism of the Catholic Church, paragraph 1577 states, “Only a baptized man validly receives ordination...For this reason the ordination of women is not possible!” You don’t believe that? Well, that’s fine - I’ll tear that page out of the book [RIP] - I just made it a Catechism of your Catholic Church, but not mine.
Remember, though, if you can throw doctrines out, so can everyone else who calls himself Catholic. That gives Joe Parishioner over at St. Doubting Thomas Catholic Church the right to throw out the Church’s social justice teachings - he doesn’t feel like feeding the hungry, caring for the poor, and all that other “bleeding heart” stuff (Paragraphs 2401 -2463), [RIP] I just made it a Catechism of his Catholic Church, but not mine.
You believe contraception is okay? Paragraph 2370 says contraception is intrinsically evil! [RIP] Joe Parishioner doesn’t like what the Church teaches on the death penalty (Paragraphs 2364-65) [RIP]. You don’t like what it teaches on pages 220-226, [RIP]. Joe Parishioner doesn’t like what it teaches on pages 334-356 [RIP].
Can you see what’s happening? I heard it said once that while there may be a shortage of vocations to the priesthood in the United States, there is no shortage of vocations to the Papacy in the United States. If we don’t believe in all of it, if we each appoint ourselves Pope and throw out a doctrine here or a doctrine there, then our faith is no longer Catholic.
Question: I have some friends who are Catholic who say that you don’t have to believe everything the Church teaches, whether it’s in the Catechism or not. Is that true?
Answer: No, not really. If you want to call yourself Catholic, but you want to pick and choose for yourself which of the Church’s doctrinal teachings to accept and which to reject, you give everyone else who calls himself Catholic the right to do the same thing.
For example, you believe women should be priests. Looking at the Catechism of the Catholic Church, paragraph 1577 states, “Only a baptized man validly receives ordination...For this reason the ordination of women is not possible!” You don’t believe that? Well, that’s fine - I’ll tear that page out of the book [RIP] - I just made it a Catechism of your Catholic Church, but not mine.
Remember, though, if you can throw doctrines out, so can everyone else who calls himself Catholic. That gives Joe Parishioner over at St. Doubting Thomas Catholic Church the right to throw out the Church’s social justice teachings - he doesn’t feel like feeding the hungry, caring for the poor, and all that other “bleeding heart” stuff (Paragraphs 2401 -2463), [RIP] I just made it a Catechism of his Catholic Church, but not mine.
You believe contraception is okay? Paragraph 2370 says contraception is intrinsically evil! [RIP] Joe Parishioner doesn’t like what the Church teaches on the death penalty (Paragraphs 2364-65) [RIP]. You don’t like what it teaches on pages 220-226, [RIP]. Joe Parishioner doesn’t like what it teaches on pages 334-356 [RIP].
Can you see what’s happening? I heard it said once that while there may be a shortage of vocations to the priesthood in the United States, there is no shortage of vocations to the Papacy in the United States. If we don’t believe in all of it, if we each appoint ourselves Pope and throw out a doctrine here or a doctrine there, then our faith is no longer Catholic.
 | About John Martignoni John Martignoni is the Director of the Office of Evangelization for the Diocese of Birmingham in Alabama and also the President of the Bible Christian Society. John's column, Apologetics 101, appears regularly in the diocesan newspaper, the One Voice. If you have a question about the Catholic Faith, please send an email to: jmartignoni@bhmdiocese.org. And check out John's free audio and written apologetics materials at: www.biblechristiansociety.com. |
2 comments:
Posted on behalf of John Vorel:
It was good to read this post... last Friday I got into a strong disagreement with members of my Charismatic Prayer Group... I shared with them this situation with a relative of mine... I warned my relative that she is in danger of eternal damnation if she does not go to
confession. I know she needs to confess that she helped teenage girls get abortions as part of her job as a teen counsoler. She drove them to
the clinic to get the abortions. That is to say, she herself is as much to blame for those abortions as the doctors who did them. So she has mortal sin on her soul. According to the Catichism of the Church a person can only remove the stain of mortal sin by the Sacrament of
Reconciliation.... But the prayer group disputed that teaching of The Church entirely. I was the only one who stood up for that teacing. And
so they got angry at me. They tried to create a "gray area" of "well God may be merciful at the moment of death etc. etc." "True", I said,
"but the only way we can be certain is to go to confession and receive Absolution". My relative is no longer practicing the Catholic faith and
I feel like she seems very much like a lost soul nowadays even though she goes to born again churches. But, frankly not sure if she is even
attending that either?
Good article for us. Our MOSJ chapter has been working on this issue for over a year.
Thanks for sending it.
Jerry Scott
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