Pope Benny is on a Roll: "Other Christians not true churches"

Great Debates
81

If you believe (and I’m not suggesting anyone shouldn’t) that apostolic succession is, in fact, unbroken from Jesus to the current pope, than it certainly exists for the Anglican communion as well. Those bishops and the Archbishop of Canterbury were ordained and elevated prior to England’s break with Rome. A pronouncement by a man wearing a miter doesn’t un-lay-on the hands. If, however, it’s all just a matter of club rules, then yes, we were kicked out of the club, are no longer Roman Catholics and gladly so, and are quite happy with our women priests, gay bishops and our charismatics dancing in the pews.

*We’re happy, I tell you! See the grins on our faces!? Yes, of course you can speak in tongues, because we’re happy to be all-inclusive! Happy? Happy? Damn you, of course we’re happy! *

BTW, big thanks to Tom for a very informative post.

82

In other news, Pope Catholic, scandal rocks the Straight Dope Message Board!

83

The issue of married priest is a bit peripheral, but. . .

Priestly celibacy is a matter of discipline, not doctrine, for the Roman Catholic Church. It was not always a requirement for the priesthood, historically speaking. The uniate churches (Eastern rite churches in communion with Rome, who acknowledge the Pope), or at least some of them, permit their priests to marry. And the Orthodox churches have always permitted their priests to marry (although their bishops are celibate, and usually, I believe, drawn from monastic orders).

So the celibacy thing isn’t a hard and fast rule, although it is the norm. The Church does permit married Anglican priests who wish to convert to Catholicism to continue to be priests even though they’re married. I don’t know what the situation is with regard to married Orthodox priests who convert (if there are any) but it seems logical that it would be the same.

84

interesting… in some languages (eg slovanic, used in slavic areas) the literal translations of the place where services are held is “temple”, or “holy place”. so the pope may be translating literally for orthodox christians.

and yeah… memories are long in the mid-east. orthodox from that area are not very happy with either catholics or moslems as they got pounded in the middle. hagia sophia is a very sore spot.

85

The way I read it, the requirement was instituted – during Europe’s feudal period – for purposes of organizational control. A priest who has a wife might also have a legitimate son, and want to pass his parish, with its attached lands, on to his son; and then every parish and diocese would become one more hereditary fief. Celibacy kept the appointment of priests and bishops in the pope’s hands.

86

The tomndebb really short history of celibacy.

87

That’s an awful lot of territory to cover. I checked on my own small denomination. As long as the person has been baptised in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, then that person’s baptism is accepted. I really think that Mormon baptism is accepted in more churches than you might think.

88

If Mormons baptise using the Trinitarian formula, then I would think most denominations would accept it as valid baptism.

Orthodox and Anglican married priests who become Catholic can become Catholic priests while being married. Celibate clergy is discipline, not doctrine, and the RCC sees no pressing reason to change the rule. I haven’t read any compelling arguments about how rescinding that rule will cause applicants to flood in.

I don’t think the Orthodox allow married bishops, do they?

89

orthodox hierarchy don’t usually have living spouses.

a married man may become a priest (there are marriage rules involved ). if during his time as a priest he becomes unmarried, due to death or divorce, he can not re-marry and remain a priest.

some times a priest who becomes unmarried will join a monestary and become a monastic. at that point he may go up the ranks to bishop, metro, etc. he may indeed have children and grands.

i have know one who was a widower personally. they are few and far between.

90

This is becoming a little more common in the RCC. The priest who married me & my husband is a widower with children. It’s a little startling to hear a priest talking about his kids! :slight_smile:

91

I am so sorry I didn’t see this post before now. I was so focused on lookiing for Tom’s post I didn’t see your’s. And yes, in the past few days I’ve talked with the local Episocpal priest, and what you described is exactly the case – there was a more liberal atmostphere and, with the Vatican distracted by South America, U.S. priests experimented with some ecumenical communion. That apparently included a lot of them in rural areas, and it’s possible the reason may have been to fill pews at a time when attendance was falling.

92

As an atheist, I find it amusing but sad to follow a debate like this. It is like listening to mental parients in a hospital, one of whom believes he is Napoleon, one of whom believes he is the Duke of Wellington, debating the Battle of Waterloo.

“I have Apostolic Succession so I am a real Church and you are not.”

“Your Baptism is valid if it is triune, but not your other sacraments, because those need someone with a valid ordination.”

It is like watching the aforementioned mental patient who thinks he is Napoleon holding up a bread stick in the cafeteria and telling the “Duke of Wellington”: This rifle will decimate your troops." The Iron Duke answers: “Those rifles are known to jam repeatedly, Bonaparte.” Finally, a fight breaks out and burly big guys in white coats pull them apart and sedate them.

The only trouble with this analogy is that when it comes to religions in the real world, the mental patients are not confined or controlled when they get violent. No big guys in white coat are there to subdue Muslims who stone women to death or fly jets into the World Trde Center yelling “God is Great”; nobody was there to stop the Christians from torturing and burning people for heresy and witchcraft. Nobody was there to stop Catholic Spaniards from baptizing and immediately killing Indians in order to send them to Heaven. Nobody was there to stop Jean Calvin in Geneva from “increasing his prestige” by burning a Spnish scholar who disagreed with him.

On the contrary, people suffering from the God Delusion get to abuse children by indoctrinating them with their nonsense from an early age, and have enormous an growing influence on the political scne all over the world. What is more, we have to show “respect” for religious belief.

You believe that there is an invisible being who forbids you to turn your light switches on on Saturdays and wants you to wear black hats and curly sideburns, Mr. Goldberg? Geee, I sure respect your wonderful belief system. It would be rude of me to ask if you are fucking crazy.

So you and your priests have the exclusive power to turn crackers into the body and blood of a rabbi crucified by the Romans 2000 years ago, Your Holiness? How absolutely wonderful! Nothing insane about that claim.

So the Prophet Joseph Smith found golden plates and magic translating stones that give a history of a millions of Christians having existed in America until 500 CE? And you blieve this in spte of there not being a shred of archeological evidence to support you? Geeeeee, I sure respect your belief system.

The lunatics are runing the asylum, so to speak. But we have to respect their “faith” (which mean a willingness to believe absurd, improbable ideas without supporting evidence, just like the mental patient.)

But ask that atheism be shown equal respect, and see how far it gets you. In the 1960s, Nixon said in the Nixon-Kennedy debates that Americans should only be concerned with religion in politics if a candidate has no religion. Atheists cannot be trusted to lead a country, obviously.

A few months ago, Mit Romney, a Mormon, was challenged by a Chrsitian and said that a politician’s faith is not important as long as he has a faith.

If you are not a mental patient, you cannot aspire to running the asylum :smiley: .

93

Actually there is not much debate among the believers in this thread; certainly not much acrimony. AFACT, the people saying that the Pope’s remarks are shocking and offensive are not Christians.

94

Here I am with my mop and bucket! This thread seems to have got shit all over it, I’ve no idea how.

95

What would be the point of asking. It’s pretty obvious.

96

If Xtinianity is true (a big If) & if Apostolic Succession is so important (another big If on top of that), then of all the Apostolic churches, I find the Catholics to be the most notoriously non-credible. It’s not like they’ve had unassailable constancy since the Great Schism. When compared to all the nonsense Western Xtianity has gone through, Eastern Xtianity doesn’t seem irredeemably corrupt. The only thing, then, keeping the Orthodox Churches “out” is their refusal to bow down & kiss the Pope’s ring & name Rome supreme ruler of all. And by that definition, why would any serious Eastern Christian want to be in?

Of course, it’s Rome that walked out on Christendom. Rome can’t be part of the communion of Eastern churches until they admit that they’re on the outside, swallow their pride, & humbly ask to be let back in, as equals not as rulers. Until, in short, they stop being the RCC.

Of course Benedict says these things; it’s what makes the RCC the RCC instead of just another part of Apostolic Xtianity. And it deserves to be taken exactly as seriously as the claims of primacy coming from the Mormons or Sun Myung Moon.

I’m not convinced that it’s the episcopal lineage of the church you’re in that’s important. But if it were, then it seems to me that the RCC were less Holy Mother Church than Whore of Babylon, & the desirable Succession were non-Papist, & Eastern.

97

Just my wacky two cents, but statements like these are making me reconsider my choice to be a Catholic. It seems like a hard case of judging others unfairly in my opinion. There are rituals and words spoken in the Catholic church that I can’t find in the bible, much to my dismay. Going simply by what Jesus himself said saying crap like that is just wrong.

98

You’ve only recently realized that the RCC isn’t based 100% on the Bible? (KJV, preferably?)

I learned that in my Catholic Girlhood. Taking The Holy Writ too seriously can lead to Fundamentalist excess. (That was a Catholic Girlhood in the Bible Belt.)

99

I have not encountered the ideas expressed in the last paragraph; perhaps it is a Bible Belt defense.
However, the particular reason for the presence of doctrine not found in scripture is that the RCC perceives that scripture arises from faith, not faith from scripture. Sola scriptura was a belief pretty much invented by Martin Luther in the 16th century, (despite the fact that he had to violate it to assert it).
Luther said a great many profound and correct things about scripture–and he observed a great many legitimate criticisms of the RCC, but he had an interesting error at the core of his belief.

Anyone who argues against the RCC for beliefs that are not dictated by scripture is going to find that the RCC simply denies their major. (Issues regarding belief that are contradicted by scripture are open for any sort of brawl, of course.)

100

This sums up the issue- The RCC considers all other Christian bodies to be to some degree deficient in authority, belief & practice since they aren’t properly submissive to the Papacy. Orthodox, Reformational & other churches consider the Papacy’s claims to be pretentious and authoritarian, and various RCC doctrines & practices to be extra-Biblical & even at times anti-Biblical.

I’m with the non-RCC crowd, BUT I also recognize that many in the RCC, including many Popes, including this one, do love God/Jesus, care for people, and try to abide by their understanding of the Scriptures. If Pope Benny isn’t calling me a Christ-denying heretic who is ripe for the burning, but just thinks I worship in a defective non-Church body, I’m OK with that. And I know that as long as I’m not
calling Catholics wafer-worshipping denizens of Mystery Babylon, most Catholics are OK with me considering the RCC as too authoritarian & excessively dogmatic.