Tag: catholic church

Gay Marriage Cake Debacle

Posted on By Margot

Thursday 6th November

Today the battle between the Belfast baker and gay rights rumbles on.

I am not too sure about what annoys me more about this story. First there is the assertion by so many that this baker was standing up for Christian values. Next is the entrapment by the gay rights organisation – that cake itself was not a wedding cake, but a vehicle for a political slogan.

First the Christian values. Jesus was remarkably quiet about gay marriage, given that so many Christians feel that making a stand on this issue is a testimony of faith. What does Jesus say? Love your neighbour as yourself – does that not encompass "accept your neighbour for who they are"? Jesus also taught "Do not condemn; and you will not be condemned. Pardon and you will be pardoned". Jesus' harshest words were often reserved for those who thought they understood the law and the scriptures "you load men with intolerable burdens and will not lift a finger to lighten the load" (Luke 11:46). Be careful, all of you who preach against the Gay community, for you may be called to judgement yourselves. Our faith as Christians does not encompass demonising others, but rather we care called to embrace and accept all for who they are. As Christians, we are called to bring the Good News of Jesus to others, not to enforce a moral code that can be tenuously drawn out from a few verses in Scripture. It would not be against our faith to bake and decorate a cake for a gay couple who wish to celebrate their marriage. Neither would it be breaking faith for a Christian Registrar to officiate at a ceremony for a gay couple. It would be against our faith to condemn whole groups of people to living in misery just because they are who they are.

Second point. The cake. It is within the gift of the state to determine what relationships can be determined as marriage. For instance, in the UK first cousins can marry. But Canon Law in the Catholic Church decrees that first cousins cannot marry. In the UK, divorced parties can remarry, in Ireland this is a comparatively recent phenomenon. And so it is with gay marriage. It is the state which decides on this matter. In Northern Ireland, the State has decreed that the only marriage recognised is between one man and one woman. To change the mind of the state is a political act. And so, the slogan "Support Gay Marriage" serves a political end, to change the mind of the state and to enable gay marriage. Should a cake bearing a political slogan, for a campaigning event be treated, in the same way as a real wedding cake or other celebratory cake that would celebrate the union between a gay couple. The gay activist was asking the baker to produce a cake with a political slogan he did not agree with. Suppose the slogan was "Support Joining the Euro" and the baker was a well known UKIP supporter. Would anyone be surprised that the bake would turn down this commission?

 

The modern day Scribes and Pharisees of the Catholic Church

Posted on By Margot

Saturday 18 October 2014: Breaking news – Synod of Bishops reject “welcome to Gays” and also reject accepting divorced and remarried Catholics.

The conservative bishops in the Catholic Church have won, and Pope Francis’s attempt to “modernise” the Church has failed. A triumph for the old order. But only just. At stake was the acceptance of homosexual relationships and the end to the permanent excommunication for those who had divorced and then remarried. What was needed was a two thirds majority for these proposals. There was a majority, that is the good news, but not a sufficient majority to bring about change.

This though is just the start of the battle. The Catholic Church has a problem with sex and gender; the symptoms are for all to see, from paedophile priests to the bizarre ban on all forms of “artificial” contraception, as well as the issue of women’s ministry in the Church. Our bishop has resigned, a good bishop, because he could not cope with the demands of a celibate life. These bishops and archbishops and cardinals have been appointed by conservative popes – the miracle is that so many are willing to look again at Catholic teaching and practice and to vote for change.

There is another problem. An arch- conservative faction of the laity, now gathered under an umbrella called “The Voice of the Family”. There are other organisations, such as the Association of Catholic Women. A faction that sees itself as the guardians of the true Church, ready to write to the bishop each time there is a deviation from the “true” teaching of the Church.

And where would Jesus be in all this? What would he say, he who turned on those trying to trap him saying “Alas for you lawyers also! You load men with intolerable burdens, and will not lift a finger to lighten the load” (Luke 11:46 – from the Gospel read on Wednesday 15th October 2014). What would Jesus say to those wishing enforce “Church teaching” in all its rigidity? Such teaching that denounces all gay relationships, bars those who are divorced and remarried from the life of the Church, or prevents couples resorting to IVF when this is the only hope of having a healthy child and demands total celibacy from a 100% male clergy? Would a modern day Gospel have Jesus dining at the home of Zechariah and his partner? Would the marriage at Cana be between a man and a woman who have both been divorced?

Pope Francis is to be commended for his efforts to bring the compassion of Jesus back into the pastoral teaching of the Catholic Church.

And for this who oppose this, the Scribes and Pharisees of the Catholic Church? Did Jesus really say at the Last Supper “take this and eat, but only if you obey the letter of the law”?

Links

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-29678751#

The death of a liberal – Cardinal Martini (1927 – 2012)

Posted on By Margot

As the Synod of the Family is underway in Rome (October 2014), perhaps the words of Cardinal Martini should be remembered by all the Bishops in an interview just before his death:

“Our culture has aged, our churches are big and empty and the church bureaucracy rises up. The Church must admit its mistakes and begin a radical change, starting from the Pope and the bishops. The paedophilia scandals oblige us to take a journey of transformation” (‘ADDIO A MARTINI, “Chiesa indietro di 200 anni”, L’ultima intervista: “Perché non si scuote, perché abbiamo paura?” Corriere della Sera, 1 Settembre 2012)

Like Pope Francis, Cardinal Martini was a man who was in touch with ordinary people.

Carlo Mario Martini was born in Turin in 1927, he joined the Jesuits at the age of 17 and was ordained 8 years later. Carlo Martini was primarily an academic, a world renowned biblical scholar and later Rector of the Pontifical Gregorian University. In 1979, Pope John Paul II appointed Martini as Archbishop of Milan, one of the largest diocese in the world, a post which he held until he retired in 2002. Martini became a cardinal in 1983. For several years after his retirement, Martini battled with Parkinson’s disease, the same illness that incapacitated PopeJohn Paul.

Controversy

Cardinal Martini was regarded by some as a liberal (and therefore, it is sad to say, suspect). However, I found that he spoke with a great deal of common sense. For instance, on the debate on where does a human life begin. The absolutist position of official Church teaching is that human life begins at the point of fertilisation. Martini begged to differ, that a distinct human life comes later. As you can see, Martini was verging on the point of heresy against today’s orthodox Catholic teaching.

The reason why the death of Cardinal Martini hit the headlines is because of his last interview recorded just weeks before his death and published the day after in the Italian daily Corriere della Sera, saying “Our culture has aged, our churches are big and empty and the church bureaucracy rises up, our rituals and our cassocks are pompous..”

Martini was a good man, and deserves our prayers. May he rest in peace.

Links

http://www.mmhawkes.co.uk/belief-or-nonbelief-by-carlo-martini-unmberto-eco/

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-19451439

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/01/world/europe/cardinal-carlo-maria-martini-papal-contender-dies-at-85.html

http://www.news.va/en/news/cardinal-carlo-martini-dead-at-85

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carlo_Maria_Martini

 

 

 

Dropping the Habit by Marion Dante

Posted on By Margot

“Have you read…” began the conversation and a frisson of excitement briefly took form as we discussed the merits (or otherwise) of a book written by a former Salesian nun. This was our annual get together for the class of 1970 of the former St John Bosco’s Convent Grammar School, Chertsey. It was not often that our former Alma Mater makes it into a published work. Would we recognise any of the people mentioned, would we even find ourselves in the pages of the book, and would it shed light on the lives of the women who educated us? And what scandals would be unveiled along the way?

And so I acquired the book on my eReader. The beginning started well enough, with the reminisces of a young Marion Dante in Ireland. There must be a guide somewhere that authors use for recreating the thoughtscape of a young child. The simple language and the half understanding of what is happening. Which is strange, because children, when they write, do not use this language.

As the book wore on, once I had got past Marion’s stay at the Sandgates convent in Chertsey, the book began to pall. There were points of interest, the lives of the nuns and the aspirants for instance and the changes wrought by Vatican II.

Undoubtedly, Marion’s life as nun was hard. And yes, the Church does have some hang ups about sex. The Manichean Heresy is not dead, even after 1700 years. Bodies are bad and sex is even worse. Only the spiritual world is good. But we live in our bodies and in Marion’s story is the suffering that results in such a negative view of the world.

However, I lost interest. The life of Marion drones on. Marion has a difficult childhood (her mother is chronically depressed – post natal depression?), the family is poor. Marion becomes a nun (to escape?). Marion has a breakdown and eventually leaves the order. And in her state of depression she fails to see she is not alone, for she has the remarkable gift of always finding a friend or two to help her, to give shelter and advice. So I ask, is this a story about a woman maltreated by a religious order or is it a story of a woman whose life is blighted by mental illness – first her mother’s and then her own breakdown.

Belief or Nonbelief by Carlo Martini & Unmberto Eco

Posted on By Margot

This was originally published August 2012

What are the dividing lines between Catholic Christians and secularists? Eco (author of Name of the Rose) and Cardinal Martini (in the Catholic corner) discuss four issues: abortion, why women cannot be ordained, hope and the future of mankind and the basis of ethics. Perhaps not the burning issues that many today would think need to be answered, but this book was written in the context of the impending millennium where some predicted this would bring in the end of civilisation as we know it. Today the burning issues would be child abuse, homosexuality, Darwinism or even the environment. Perhaps another age (not too long ago) would have included the just war or nuclear weapons.

The discussion is in the form of correspondence and the reader is left with the impression of two men with deeply held beliefs who are compassionate, sincere and humane. Both represent the good qualities of good men. What divides them, apart from faith in God? This question is of supreme importance, for not only does it address issues of common ground in the public arena but also a much more interesting question – what drives altruism? Why would one human being lay down his/her life for another?

The problem that Eco faces is that he was a Catholic, he grew up in a Catholic community, that he is inheritor of the great panoply of Christian thought and ethics just like most of us from the western European world (including North America and other corners of the English speaking world). We share a common set of values that includes the concept of human dignity. And what are the ultimate values, the values that one would lay down one’s life? There are surely two questions that need to be answered, what constitutes the values of the philosopher’s good life – and the second, why should I sacrifice my life for these values? Eco cannot distance himself sufficiently from his Catholic heritage to answer these questions.

For our society, as inheritors of Western European culture, the ultimate values are arrived at as a dialogue between the Christian tradition and the humanist/secularist challenge. Both challenge and refine each other. This book is one part of that dialogue.

eBook: from BooksOnBoard, publisher SkyHorse Publishing Inc.

Jesus of Nazareth by Joseph Ratzinger

Posted on By Margot

At last I have been able to get a legitimate copy of this as an eBook – at one stage I thought I was going to have to resort to downloading a pirated copy.

There are some things that I disagree with, such as the absolutism of Ratzinger’s position on the role of women and the priesthood. But in general Ifound the book thought-provoking and definitely has deepened my understanding of my faith.

For some very obscure reason, I could buy this as an audio book, which is how I first came across the book, but not as an ePub book (or even a Kindle book) – it can be sold to residents in Germany, the Netherlands or USA but not in the UK.

Originally this was my Lenten task, to listen to Jesus of Nazareth as I drove to work. I was not expecting too much – after all, this was written by the man known as God’s Rottweiler. But gradually it blew my mind and I can see why he was elected Pope. Gradually Cardinal Ratzinger unfolded the mystery of Jesus, showing how the Crucifixion is the right at the heart of the salvation story. He shows how Jesus is the total fulfilment of all the prophets before.

Jesus is the Son of God. But sons of God were not unknown at that time – the claim to deity was taken up by the Roman emperors. As the centurion at the foot of the cross declares “Truly this man was the Son of God” we have a statement of faith so deep that it cuts through the political world. To declare Jesus as Son was to deny the deity of the Roman emperor.

Jesus is shepherd – so many kings were seen as shepherds of their people – but Jesus takes this one step further.

I think the next book I need is a study guide.