Unapologetic Catholic

Why apologetics is so wrong

Sometimes a picture really  is worth a thousand words.

What are we trying to accomplish by this kind of apologetics? How does this help our witness to (1) persons who don't believe in God, but who could be persuaded; (2) non Christians who could be persuaded to be Christians?; (3) Christian non-Catholics who could be presuaded to becme Catholic?

Personally I wouldn't want to be part of a religion that thinks this issue is remotely important.

Apologetics does more harm than good.

Link through Ut Unum Sint, thanks!

Torturing bad drivers

I thought I was a good driver.

One thing I observed this Christmas season was the widespread incidence of poor driving.  People speeding, cutting others off, unsafe lane changes, and it seemed there was more than the typical number of serious accidents on the nearby freeways and byways.  I, of course am a good driver, not like all those other fools.

Now, I didn’t say I was a perfect driver, just better than all those other fools.  I freely confess that I have rarely committed the following driving sins in the past:  exceeding the speed limit by a prudent amount on the freeway, following too closely when necessary, executing rolling stops late at night on empty streets, entering the intersection when the light was “orange” and mild inadvertence in making lane changes without a signal. All of these venial sins have gone unnoticed by our local law enforcement personnel and I’ve never been behind the wheel in a traffic accident.  My teenage children call me “old Granny” because I insist on driving 65 on the freeway. A full list of drivng sins is here.

I have never committed any of the big 3 mortal driving sins:  Running a red light, parking in handicapped spaces or driving too slowly in the fast lane.  There is a special place in hell for those sins especially driving too slowly in the fast lane. I am certainly better than other drivers—even my insurance company tells me so.

Until yesterday.  I was driving to an appointment, on time, observing speed limits and alert to young children in wheelchairs. Traffic was holiday light. Of course, I was driving slowly in the right lane .In fact there was only one other car visible. He was also driving in my direction in the faster left lane and exceeded the speed limit as he passed me coming to a stop at the intersection ahead.    I only briefly noticed him at a complete stop in the left lane as I passed him doing the 45 mph speed limit on the right.  As I entered the intersection I wondered why he was at a complete stop.  Then I saw that big honking red light dangling down right in front of me!  I had completely blown a red light—a driving mortal sin.  Fortunately, there was no cross traffic whatsoever, so my zero accident record remains intact. Not so my driving ego. I am, alas, not better than those other drivers at all. Just luckier.  Shook, I paused, recollected myself and completed my safe journey.

I think the same thing holds true for Catholics, too.  Some of us know we are more orthodox than all those others and ridicule those who practice “catholic lite” becasue we are not like those cafeteria types. Yet here’s a weblog that disdains "Catholic lite" that has difficulty understanding the Catholic teaching on, of all things, torture.  Several commenters apparently conclude that church teachings authorize torture as long as it’s not too painful.  Oh, and it must be infallibly declared to be intrinsically wrong before we have to pay attention to the teaching (this by a priest). Furthermore, a Catholic actually says it’s both legal and  “just” to simply execute people.

This is the religious equivalent to blowing the red light.  This is an issue that’s not even close, yet people dissect the Catechism in these discussions in an effort to justify torture.

I point this out to suggest that we all “run the red light.”  I don’t think any of us really have all the Catholic Answers and we all have our own blind spots. I hope those who sneer at those Amchurch VOTFers or liberal  (or conservative) dissenters will take this to heart.  And don’t torture anybody. We don’t need an infallible pronouncement to know that it’s intrinsically evil. We are all on a journey to better understanding of our Faith, its very difficult teachings and how we can better live those in our lives. Never underestimate how easy it is to blow a red light both on the road and in the practice of our religion.

Updated

New clarification at the same blog. Apparently the choice is:

Should we torture detainees, or give them candy?

and the Catholic blogger's response is: "I gave my personal opinion: that we should have extracted whatever information we could from the detainees, then executed them, as customary international law allows."

There went that red light.

  WWJD.

Further  Update

Typically, Disputations has excellent thougthful posts, Parts 1, 2 and 3 on wthis subject

"Bad Catholics"

A lot of times I hear people accused of being “bad Catholics”  People sometimes accuse others of being “apostates” when they themselves are apparently ignorant of the Catechism definition of that term. [2089 Incredulity is the neglect of revealed truth or the willful refusal to assent to it. "Heresy is the obstinate post-baptismal denial of some truth which must be believed with divine and catholic faith, or it is likewise an obstinate doubt concerning the same; apostasy is the total repudiation of the Christian faith; schism is the refusal of submission to the Roman Pontiff or of communion with the members of the Church subject to him."^11] Apparently there’s no need to be accurate if you’re going to be uncharitable. Of course the harm this kind of name calling has done to he Church through the centuries is incalculable  [CCC 817].

Now, I hate to be called a bad Catholic mainly because I know I am one.  In fact, I am my own worst critic in that regard, so it feels like “piling on” when unqualified people also chip in.  My Pastor, Bishop and Pope are “qualified” to comment on my religious health, but I’m usually under that radar of the last two.

With all that in mind I Googled “bad Catholic” and of course found interesting websites. Both are intriguing and worth checking out: A Bad Christian and Bad Catholic. I hope they don’t mind the links. Both sites had great observations about religion and what being Christian means.

A Bad Christian has this observation:

I think it can be broken down to this: Progressive and liberal Christians want to have conservative Christians to say to them, "I respect your viewpoints, and I maintain that there is a place for you within Orthodox Christianity."

I think that's it. Simple, eh? Then we want to be treated like those conservative Christians believe what they say. That's it. I don't need conservative Christians to quit being conservative. I just want to be a part of the 'Christian' club sometimes...or at least treated like I'm a welcome member.

For Catholics, this is a bit more complicated. Nevertheless, on the vast majority of issues this is just as applicable to Catholic discussion.  As I’ve said before, almost all Catholic web bloggers and commenters have misapplied the Catholic faith or expressed some teaching inaccurately or incorrectly.  In that sense, we’re all bad Catholics, so it’s counter productive to make the charge that we are all guilty of.

VOTF rolls continue to grow

According to a leading Catholic psychologist, now we know why.

Of course when it's "your" favorite Catholic organization, it's persecution.  When it's the "other guy's" favorite organization, it's "episcopal spine."

I got it, completely.

A Ridiculous Challenge

Amy Welborn has a very interesting observation regarding the Pope's position on the Iraq war. Some Pro-war Catholics (yes, a contradiction in terms) argued that the Pope never explicitly condemned the Iraq war.

She says in response:

No, we don't find (on the Pope's part) an explicit condemnation. But what we do find is a completely different mindset than the Bush administration or even most of us have, and one at the time, if we're honest, drove many observers nuts.

The post is excellent and the comments are alternately comical informative foolish and wise.

Since I focus on misuse of apologetics in particular, I can say that such challenges are ridiculous.  According the these pro-war Catholics, the challenge is "to quote a statement of the Holy Father which condemns the United States in its conduct of the war Iraq commencing 3/2003 or supports the continuity of the Saddam regime."

Of course, those of us who were conscious in 2003 and 2004 remembered comments by a number of Vatican officials who clearly thought the U.S. resort to force did not meet the requirements of the Catechism. There are several papal encyclicals enjoining war. None of this is good enough for these particular Catholics who must reside in a remote corner of Missouri, a state that officially teaches over the top skepticism.

Note that statements made by the Vatican Secretary of State don't count. Neither do statements made by Cardinal Ratzinger, the prefect of the Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, even though comments by both were within their "job description" and not dis affirmed by their "boss." Also not counting are any papal denunciations of war in general--the only thing that counts is a statement by the POPE that condemns the WAR in IRAQ.

Got the picture?  To show how ridiculous this is, I'd like someone to show me where the POPE (not a Cardinal) condemns (or otherwise declares evil) women's ordination.

[Inter Insigniores? not by the Pope...Ordinatio Sacerdotalis?  Not a condemnation, simply an observation that the Church presently has not power to ordain women....get the picture now?

Do you have any doubt about the Church's teaching on women's ordination?  I didn't think so. Any doubt about what the Pope thinks about the U.S. prosecution of the Iraq war?

I'm not saying George Bush, a non-Catholic, had any requirement to observe the Catechism regarding just war. In fact, a very good argument can be made that the teaching is a little idealistic. Furthermore, what does it say about our country that the U.S. even considers the question of the justness of a particular war it is about to wage? I'm thankful I live in such a country and I think it says a lot about Americans to even consider the issue.

I just object when the very same Catholics who want to excommunicate Kerry voters pull semantic shenanigans when their own oxen are being gored. This kind of apologetics will cover a multitude of sins and deserves to be scrapped.

More thoughts on bad apologetics

My pet peeve, in case you haven’t figured it out, are those who practice apologetics to the point of being uncharitable.  This lack of charity is based on a faulty logical syllogism, which works like this:

1. The Teachings of the Church are always correct.
2. I am a good catholic and believe the teachings of the Church.
3. There is only one way to correctly understand the teachings of the church
4. My understanding of the teachings of the church is correct

Conclusion:  Those who don’t agree with my understanding of the Church’s teachings are essentially heretics.

What follows is the all too typical historical pattern is an effort to first exclude the heretic as some “cafeteria Catholic,” “CINO,” or the like, then to condemn the heretic through doctrines such as extra ecclesiam nulla salus, next, leading to impatiently killing heretics and witches to demonizing heretics and supporting doctrine such as Catholic anti-Semitism.  (Thanks to Mr. Cork’s scholarly efforts) and ultimately genocide. There is no principled place to stop on this slippery slope. So even if the syllogism is true in a particular instance that another person is in conflict with church teachings, the emphasis has to be on reconciliation not exclusion. Exclusion of others is contrary to Church teachings.

Now, it’s important to observe that syllogisms only need to be internally logical.  If the premises are not accurate, the syllogism retains its internal logic yet leads to an illogical result. Many people construct a syllogistic argument thinking it is logically unassailable because it’s internally consistent. They’re wrong—that’s only half the battle. The syllogism is usually not true at all.

There are subtle errors in the syllogism example above, specifically at numbers 3 and 4. As a matter of fact, there is often room for several equally valid understandings of many Church teachings, and any individual’s understanding is often incorrect or incomplete. Premises 3 and 4, then, are frequently false. Especially on Catholic blogs, I have heard nearly everybody, at least 99% of the bloggers and commenters, at one time or another state a belief that is not in accord with Church teachings. If you are reading this, you’re in that group. (The sole exception to the general rule doesn’t read this blog.) Hell, I’m in that group! First sometimes, I consciously don’t agree with a Church teaching, and other times, I think I know what the teaching is, and I agree with it, but I’m objectively wrong! Note that I will be utterly incapable of knowing I’m in error. I don’t mean to be, but I am. Everybody falls into one of these two situations at one time or another.

Catholic apologetics really screw up badly when they are in error, yet accost another person from a position of righteousness.

Here are some difficulties that often interfere with clearly understanding what a person is saying:  I used the term “Church teachings.” I intentionally did not refer to magisterial teachings. Most people make errors in assuming what teachings are magisterial and what are not.  Furthermore, what is meant by the term “Church?” Is it the pilgrim Church of Vatican II? Or, do we mean the indefectible “Bride of Christ?” If we are speaking of the Church in the sense that the Church is all of us, we can’t be too surprised that the Church is frequently in error and always in need of reform. How you are using the term “church” affects your view of error in church teachings. It’s clear that the term “church” as used by Catholics can mean several equally valid things. At different times a different meaning is meaning assigned to that word. It would always be useful to ask whether another person is using it in the same way I would or is it possible to make the other person’s statement accurate by merely assigning a different meaning to the word “Church” instead of unnecessarily taking umbrage.

Finally, whether you call it “development of doctrine,” or distinguishing between magisterial and non-magisterial teachings, or even determining what is meant by “Church” the position of the church on many issues has changed over the years, and those advocating a specific church position have gone from heretic to hero in relatively short time intervals.

A final observation:  When someone criticizes a church teaching and they are criticizing a teaching that is not magisterial and not the “official teaching of the bride of Christ, it is not good apologetics to claim the teaching was made only by members of the Church and therefore distinguishable as an act of the church as a whole.  That statement is both incorrect and correct and, consequently useless as an apologetic response. Any teaching by a fellow member of the Body of Christ is in some sense a “teaching of the Church.”  That’s why our poor daily witness is so harmful to evangelization. Our daily witness of charity (or lack thereof) is a “teaching of the Church” regarding charity, no less. It always seemed to be better apologetics to simply accept the error, and point out that the Church, composed of humans, does make mistakes and it constantly seeks to bring itself close to the ideal of Jesus Christ

Cats and calculus Part II

Continued from earlier.

ID reflects our yearning, based on weakness in faith, to “prove” God. We see that same yearning in the search for the Holy Grail, the True Cross, and the Shroud of Turin. Without addressing the authenticity of any particular relic, we all feel that it would be wonderful if there was some physically confirmation of our beliefs that we could use to strengthen our own faith and persuade others to believe. Nevertheless, we have to listen to the words of Jesus:

So the other disciples said to him, "We have seen the Lord." But he said to them, "Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands and put my finger into the nailmarks and put my hand into his side, I will not believe."

Now a week later his disciples were again inside and Thomas was with them. Jesus came, although the doors were locked, and stood in their midst and said, "Peace be with you."

Then he said to Thomas, "Put your finger here and see my hands, and bring your hand and put it into my side, and do not be unbelieving, but believe."

Thomas answered and said to him, "My Lord and my God!"

Jesus said to him, "Have you come to believe because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed."

Unfortunately, we are those who have not seen the physical evidence of Jesus. Unfortunately some would search for that evidence today, and in their efforts they aren't impartial, instead they ignore countervailing evidence  insist their own efforts have been successful, accusing those who don't see things the way they do as "unbelieving naturalists." They are not interested int he impartial scientific search for truth--they have become religious apologists, shading the evidence, and ultimately the truth as well.

It is damaging to the faith to strain for scientific “evidence” for God.  We would be like cats trying to solve a calculus problem.  We don’t know enough about God to make a meaningful search and it is presumptuous to think we do. When we do that, we have erected a false god in place of the real One.

But ID is intended to be a method of apologetics —to prove the existence of God to doubters and nonbelievers through science. The problem is that all reputable biologists (Catholic, Christian, or other) reject Intelligent Design, although many are theistic evolutionists. Consequently, ID advocates have to argue that there is a vast conspiracy in the orthodox scientific establishment to support the prevailing “dogma” of evolution and conceal the true facts that evolution is somehow in jeopardy. This claim bears a remarkable resemblance to conspiracy theories in general, such as those regarding UFO abductions, cold fusion, the AIDS virus (yes, the same Phillip Johnson who promotes intelligent design), the fact that Jesus had a child, and denials of the holocaust.  Catholics apologists even argue this scientific conspiracy conceals the true fact that the sun revolves around the earth. All of these have the same common denominators:  There is a monolithic orthodoxy that proclaims conventional wisdom as “dogma.”  The orthodoxy has a vested interest, usually financial, in concealing the truth.  There is a vast conspiracy to conceal the truth, requiring a complex web of interconnected conspirators in industry, science, higher education and government. These conspirators are often linked to communism, nazis or some other criminal enterprise to keep a "strangelhold on political power." There is a small band of skeptics willing to keep an open mind about the “controversy.” Finally, the keepers of the truth are prevented from publishing their truth by the conspiratorial network. Intelligent Design has all of these elements.

It seldom dawns on these conspiracy theorists that there is a reason that they are routinely rejected—they are justly perceived as “kooks.” When Christian apologetics begin to argue conspiracy theories to oppose solid science--evolution, for example, we all lose.  These tactics recognizable distort the truth. In short, the proponent is foisting a lie upon potential converts and those wavering in their faith. There are many intelligent, resourceful people searching for Christ through the Church. What do they think when they hear a famous Catholic apologetic proclaim that the sun revolves around the earth? What do these people think when they are approached by a conspiracy theorist/evangelist? They think they want no part of a religion that insults their intelligence. These friends are our own worst enemies in true evangelization efforts.

That’s why the Pope’s observation that Truth cannot contradict Truth  is so important. He’s right. We run a serious risk of damaging our faith by setting needless limits on what science will discover in the future. Peole essentially "bet their faith" that science will not accomplish something. When it does, faith is needlessly shaken. The truth of science will never contradict the truth of our Faith. Sometime that truth will lead us into uncomfortable places, but when we insist on making our own religious beliefs about how God maintains His creation more important than truth, we have erected an idol in violation of the First commandment. And when we pretend to be truth seekers and then refuse to face the truth, we are poor witnesses as Christians.

Form time to time, I end up doubting God’s existence. I believe that many, perhaps most, people who are devoutly religious, doubt their faith now and then. And that makes sense.  If you’re not religious you can’t very well doubt your faith.  When believers do fall into doubt, they have to re-find their faith. I know I have to re-build mine from scratch, one faithful brick at a time. During those dark times, when I hear apologists spouting nonsense about subjects that they know nothing about, I am offended by their arrogance--in effect, their lying for God.  Martin Luther is quoted famously, “What harm would it do, if a man told a good strong lie for the sake of the good and for the Christian church ... a lie out of necessity, a useful lie, a helpful lie, such lies would not be against God, he would accept them." In this context Luther speaks for all of us as a  Christian, not as a Protestant. And the harm lying for God does is that doubters and non-believers find these apologetic lies as good reasons to reject the Faith. This idea that it’s OK to lie for God should be disapproved and apologetics should be scrupulous with the truth at all times. To do anything else damages the faith. That’s why I object to Mr. Sugenis. That’s why I object to Feenyism and that’s why I object to proponents of Intelligent Design who claim that Intelligent Design can prove God’s existence.  It doesn’t. God is beyond our understanding. Ask my cat.

My Cat knows calculus: Intelligent Design Part I

My cat likes to play with ping pong balls. I toss a ball, which bounces along on the floor as the cat gives chase.  The cat knows exactly where the ball will be on any particular bounce and it’s great entertainment to watch the cat leap right to the spot the ball will be so the cat and ball arrive simultaneously.

Now, Newton’s laws of motion describe the ball bounces, how many and how far the ball travels.  The ancient Greeks assumed such a ball might bounce forever, but  Calculus, which can solve a number of useful problems gets us to the correct answer.  Calculus also predicts the position of the ball at any time during the bounce sequence. Since my cat gets to the position of the ball before the ball arrives there, the cat has some concept of the laws of motion and of calculus itself. I spent two years in college learning calculus. My knowledge of calculus is rusty, but I know calculus on a philosophical and fundamental basis far beyond my cat’s knowledge. Does my cat know calculus? In some dim fuzzy way, my cat has a glimmer of some natural regularity that it applies to bouncing balls. It does, in some sense, know calculus.

Probably in the same limited way I can “know” God. In some dim fuzzy sense I can know God. I know what's written in the Bible, I know what the Church teaches, but I suspect this is a very, very small fraction of what any human being can know about God.  Why did God decide to give us free will?  Is that related to suffering and evil?  Why is there evil?  Why does God appear so capricious in our daily human lives? Does God keep my car running?   Why do evil people do so well during this lifetime? Exactly how provident is God, really? Where was He when my sons old watched their mother die?  I don’t think we will ever have satisfactory answers to these questions and all proposed answeers I have heard sound like weak rationalizations.  The most satisfactory answer I have heard to these questions is, "I don't know." That's why I truly believe that God is at least as far beyond my understanding as calculus is to my cat.  I can grasp enough of His love for me and enough of His guidance to for me to know how to live my life, but beyond that, I doubt we can know much more.

That’s why I’m critical of Intelligent Design arguments. A couple of blogs  have recently linked to the creation/evolution dispute in Cobb County. Clearly, religious sympathies are not on the side of the ACLU. But this time the ACLU is right. We should not allow general opposition to the ACLU to cloud our thinking the two times a day that particular stopped clock is accidentally right. Inevitably, Intelligent Design comes up in the discussions as some substitute or euphemism for creationism. I do think Intelligent Design is bogus science, no different than UFO abductions, ESP or cold fusion.

It’s also bad theology. Intelligetn Design begins with the assumption that we can know the mind of God. The argument from design for God’s existence is old, but the evidence to support it has had to change over the years. Once, angels were required to push the planets in their orbits. Now, with an understanding of the same rules governing my cat's bouncing ball, plants orbit without any divine assistance. As fast as arguments from design are made, they are overcome by scientific progress. Now Intelligent Desing proponents must squeeze God into the molecular level, because science has explained all other aspects of evolution. Intelligent Design concedes, as it must to maintain any superficial plausibility, that evolution proceeds almost completely without the need for divine intervention. Nobody seriously disputes that. ID proponents acknowledge that the theories of common descent and evolution of species are essentially correct, because that’s what distinguishes ID from “creationism.”  ID makes the argument that, at the molecular level only, and only in a few instances, God had to supernaturally intervene to keep things on track and create a few enzymes from scratch so that the overall evolutionary process could continue.

They just crammed God into a might small gap. According to ID, God didn’t need to supernaturally intervene to create galaxies, solar systems planets and the evolution of life on earth. No, instead He needed to intervene to supernaturally create a means of mobility for a particularly virulent germ. He also had to intervene to make sure that primates’ blood would clot, but whales, fish and sea urchins all evolved their blood clotting mechanism without His help. At once, God is omnipotent, and at the same time incapable of allowing evolution to solve germ mobility issues and primate blood clotting. Intelligent Design proponents would have God intentionally interfere with the natural course of evolution only to create particularly virulent forms of bacteria to inflict untoward pain and suffering upon His creatures, and to cause primates blood to clot and to detectably intervene at no other time. God’s scientifically detectable miracle turns out to be a disease germ. That doesn’t sound like an awesome God at all, it sounds like God the  tinkerer, and it detracts from His greatness for no purpose. Intelligent Design proponents are just unwilling to imagine that God created and maintains this entire universe as we know it in ways we can neither imagine nor detect. Just as the cat doesn’t really need to know or understand the details of calculus to get that ball, we don’t need to knew and are incapable of knowing the awesome extent of God’s creative majesty.

ID assumes that we can understand the mind of God. If ID is correct, it demonstrates conclusively that God would refuse to intervene on a grand scale, ignoring the widespread suffering of animals and people, only to create a few enzymes necessary to develop a tail on a lethal form of bacteria. ID coyly claims not to be able to identify the “designer.” Perhaps ID is right in that regard. Perhaps that’s not actually God at all, only a a Marcion-like demurrage would individually create desease causing germs while passignup the opportunity to create a previously unknown orchid. Or worse, what if it wasn’t really any form of supernatural being after all?  Finally, the most thoroughly scientifically valid Intelligent Design concept establishes that there must be multiple cosmic designers! There cannot be just One. Intelligent Desing unavoidably leads to weird understandigns of God.

Neither science, nor ID, can differentiate between that demurrage, Raelians or “gods.” To do so, you must know the characteristics of the designers, which we can’t do, if God is the Designer. Attempts to make a scietific theory out of God's creation are just like cats doing calculus. Alternatively, we must accept our limitations and concede for purposes of science that all Intelligent Desing can tell us is that, yes, Raelians could well have done it.  If we attempt to use science to understand the mind of God, we will have committed the same sin as the builders of the Tower of Babel.  In this sense, Intelligent Design is the Twenty First Century Tower of Babel.

Two Great Unapologetic Posts

After my post below I  managed to visit some of my favorite blogs.  Two had excellent posts better describing what I was trying to say, Todd at Catholic Sensibility had this post and Steven Riddle at Flos Caremelli had this post. Both are thoughtful.  Mr. Riddle also has a bonus post practicing what I was  unsuccessfully attempting to preach. Todd observed that dissent with fellow blog commentators is not necessarily dissent from the magisterium, and merely contrasting the teaching with personal experience isn't dissent either. he's right.

Mr. Riddle actually captioned his entry, "Lessons Learned" which is as close as I can expect anyone to come to just outright saying, "I could be wrong."  He finds himself asking this question:

(1) Did I read what the person wrote, or did I misread it with my own agenda? Moreover, did I read what was intended or what flat words end up sounding like when they achieve print?   

I often find, upon second reading and reflection that something was lost in transmission.

He also makes this observation: If you are asking yourself if you might be being a jerk either (1) you are not being a jerk; or (2) you are well on your way to becoming not a jerk.  I don't think this question is asked frequently enough in these quarters.

Finally he admits something which bothers me too, a lot. It is this fact, among others, that makes reconciling Church teaching with appropriate attitude extremely difficult. Compassion tends to overwhelm and reason tends to take a back seat. If I truly believe such conduct is a sin (and I do) then real compassion would dictate that I would confront it in the same manner as I would any sin. However, for some reason, perhaps because of past experience and wide acquaintance with the homosexual community, this is very, very difficult.

I feel similarly situated. I know a number of gay people who lovingly live out their lives and who have practiced incredible acts of charity towards me. It is difficult to reconcile that lived experience with the teachings of the Church.  I just say that for the fact that it is. I'm not on any crusade or advocating, as if I could any change in Church doctrine. I'm not gay, I have no family members who are gay And all people I know who are gay are usually kindly amused at my Catholicism. They won't become Catholic if the Catholic Church suddenly became the Jesus Metropolitan Church . I just admit that I struggle with Church teachings that clash so strongly with my own experience. I accept Mr. Riddle's wisdom that this doesn't have to be resolved today and this kind of wrestling with the issues can be a learning experience. Am I cooperating in sin by not confronting it?

Two great blog sites, check them out.

“They’ll know we are Christians by our flame, by our flames”

Perhaps the least likeliest thing we’d ever hear on Catholic blogs is a reference to “blessed Francis Kissling.”  Certainly, as others have noted, there’s a conservative flavor, so there’s not likely to be heavy discussions about events at last nights Voice of the Faithful meeting.

It is more common hereabouts to hear the word “Gumbleton” associated with swear words and “dissent” than the word “Bishop.” Opinion is not monolithic, however, and arguments sometimes rage between more progressive and more conservative Catholics. The point of my own blog is that sometimes our online criticisms are the Catholic version of flame wars and are not charitable, damage the body of Christ and, to use the vernacular, are “not very Christian.”

I don’t expect to soon read about the many virtues of Fr. McBrien, but the absolute last thing I ever expect to hear in these parts is: “You know, you could be right. That’s a good point, I’ve changed my mind.”

Instead we hear such: I'm not trying to judge your soul. You may be stupid or insane, which mitigates the guilt of sin. BTW - Did you get the blood of 1.3 million abortions per year off your hands yet? said to a fellow Catholic whose pro life bona fides are beyond reproach.

I think the basic problem is one of certainty.  The Church teaching are certain. That’s the advantage of a catechism after all, and the word “dogma” means something. Many posters are very certain in their faith. Problems surface when another Catholic expresses a different opinion about religious matters.  They are then accused of dissent or their Catholicism is put in quotation marks.  I find these people aren’t necessarily right—they’re just certain.

I believe on the other hand that the Church is right, but that all of us, due to limitations of language, education, patience and even personality types, misunderstand the fullness of the teachings of the Church, to a greater or lesser degree. A few saints are perhaps exempt from this effect, but not too many saints maintain blogs.  Peoples' understandings of the teachings of the Church are often not quite accurate, but they, in all honesty, believe their incorrect understandings to be correct. Certainty is a block to true understanding in such cases

I am not so certain about many things.  First I am not so sure I actually do understand the Church teaching accurately. Second, even if I do understand the words of the teaching, limitations of language may prevent a full transmission of the truth—through nobody’s fault.  Third, there is a limit to the time and effort I can put into understanding of the Church’s teachings without being a full time theologian. As we experience how people misunderstand church teachings, the Church, through theologians can refine the teaching to better explain the truth. Historically, this appears to be the case as the Church responds to the various heresies throughout the ages. Fortunately for people like me, we don't need to be professional or amateur theologians to merit salvation. How you live appears to be more important than how much you think you know.