Latest U.K. Absurdity

Se4 So there's a news story from across the pond explaining how Parliament has just inserted a provision in a sex-ed bill that allows "faith schools" (i.e., Catholic ones, etc.) to tell their students that things like contraception are wrong.

Terribly nice of them, isn't it?

Mind you, they're not letting the schools refuse to teach how to contracept. Oh, no. Children must still have to have a full, robust course of the how-to's.

So the message that "faith schools" will be required to give is, "Contraception is wrong according to our faith. Now here's how you do it anyway . . . "

Satisfying compromise, eh wot?

Tea and scones, anybody?

GET THE STORY.

Oh, and homosexuality apparently gets similar treatment.

Prophecy Resources

Second_coming_anderson_l A reader writes:

Could you recommend some good materials on understanding prophecy in Scripture? I found myself in a discussion with a Seventh-Day Adventist who is delving into how Daniel and Revelation are both meant clearly for today. 

I'm familiar enough with SDA and their narrative in National Sunday Law to know that they're laser-focused on the Second Coming, but they weave the prophets together in such a complex narrative that it's tough to unweave for them despite the rhetorical errors. 

I pointed out that it's contrived and perhaps egocentric to think the Spirit would give prophecies to 3rd century BC Jews that would only become relevant for 19th century Americans, but he just throws more Scripture at me and then links to yet another retelling of the National Sunday Law. So I need to speak in their language in order to proceed.

The point you make contains a great deal of validity regarding when in history most biblical prophecy refers to. Though there certainly are parts that refer to the distant future from the viewpoint of the original audience, most of it–at least on the literal level–was meant to have its primary application either to their own day or within a generation or two of their own day. Unless the nature of a particular passage shows otherwise, the default assumption should be that the primary fulfillment was ancient.

This is not to say that prophecies can't have secondary fulfillments. They can, and many may have secondary fulfillments close to the end of time, but normally the primary fulfillment happened near the time of the ancient audience–because that was usually the driving force in biblical prophecy: Helping people know how to live in their own day (turn away from those idols! stop oppressing the poor and the widow and the orphan!) and how to deal with calamities that could result (the Babylonians are going to kick your behinds if you fight them! here's how you should do instead!).

In terms of where to read more, I can suggest several things I've written: HERE, HERE, HERE, and HERE.

Though not dealing with Adventism specifically, these do offer the framework of a Catholic way of viewing the issue (there is lots of room for other opinion, though).

Regarding Seventh-Day Adventism and how to respond to it, you can find more information HERE.

Hope this helps!

(NOTE: Image Source.)

“Contraception Is Wrong. Now Here’s How You Use It . . .”

That’s the message that British MP Ed Balls recently “reassured” the public Catholic schools would be forced to send to the children who attend them. According to the Guardian:

Ed Balls’s controversial amendment to the bill on sex education, allowing faith schools to opt out of new rules on teaching about issues such as homosexuality and contraception, was passed in the Commons yesterday by 268 votes to 177, giving the government a majority of 91.

The amendment, which was passed without debate due to a lack of time at the report stage, allows faith schools to teach personal, social, health and economic (PSHE) lessons “in a way that reflects the school’s religious character”, and has been condemned by teaching unions and the National Secular Society, which said the government had betrayed children in faith schools.

Balls insisted there was “no watering down”. “There’s no opt-out for any faith school from teaching the full, broad, balanced curriculum on sex education,” he said. “Catholic schools can say to their pupils that, as a religion, we believe contraception is wrong, but what they can’t do is say they are not going to teach about contraception.”

This is just jaw-dropping.

So . . . Catholic schools in England get to say that contraception is wrong, but they have to go ahead and teach kids how to procure and use it?

And that’s supposed to be allowing them to present the matter in a way “that reflects the school’s religious character.”

I wonder if Mr. Balls would view this as a legitimate way of acting if the shoe were on the other foot . . . e.g., “As a state-sponsored, secular school, we believe it is wrong to tell people what religion they should be. Now here are some very detailed instructions about how to become a Catholic.”

Of course, the “compromise” that this measure represents is just hypocritical window dressing.

I suppose that it’s possible that, after the next election in England, this could be reversed . . . but I don’t hold a lot of hope for that.

England seems hell-bent on literally being hell-bent in its social policy these days.

And, as always, anything bad that happens in England is a cautionary tale for what could happen in America if we aren’t active and vigorous in opposing it.

GET THE STORY.

MORE HERE.

Filed under contraception, england, moral theology, politics, sex ed

NEWSFLASH! The Catholic Church Is DYING! (Right?)

The faithful are abandoning the Church in droves!

The number of priests is plummeting!

The number of seminarians is spiraling downward!

The number of nuns has dropped!

Right?

Well, the number of nuns has dropped, but the rest of that is just wrong.

I remember back in my Evangelical days, it was a well-accepted fact that the Catholic Church was on its last legs, with people abandoning it in droves, losing more and more ever year.

Funny how things change when you check the facts.

Certainly, there are problems in the Church (always have been; cf. Epistles of St. Paul). The Church did take a big hit after Vatican II. And we’re a long way from where we should be.

But we’re actually growing. Worldwide.

As is the number of priests and seminarians.

The evidence for this—or rather, a summary of it—is found in a work the Holy See produces each year called the Annuario Pontifico (Pontifical Yearbook). Among other things, it collects Catholic statistics from around the world. The newest edition of it came out last Saturday.

So what did it say?

Globally, an increase in the Catholic population of 19 million, for a total of 1,166,000,000 Catholics, or 17.4 percent of global population.

“Yes,” you say sagely, “but 19 million is just a raw number, and the number of Catholics could be going up and yet the Church could still be shrinking in terms of percent of global population.”

But it’s not. The previous year’s Annuario showed the Church at only 17.33 percent of global population, so the increase was not just an increase in raw numbers but in percentage of overall population as well. In other words: The Catholic population is growing faster than the world population.

“Good!” you say, ‘but surely the Catholic population is shrinking here in the U.S.”

Noooo. Though I don’t have numbers from the new edition of the Annuario, according to the 2009 Official Catholic Directory (the Kenedy directory) for the U.S., the number of Catholics in this country increased by a million over the course of the year, maintaining the overall Catholic percentage of the population here.

“What about priests and seminarians?”

They’re up, too, worldwide. According to the new Annuario there were an additional 4,000 priests worldwide between 2000 and 2008 (the most recent year of the Annuario’s data), for a total of 409,166 priests. And in just one year (2007-2008) the number of seminarians jumped by 1,000 (total: 117,024).

The number of consecrated religious, of both sexes, did drop from 2000 to 2008, hemorrhaging 40,000 and dropping the total to 739,067.

There are still lots of problems the Church has to face, but imminent extinction isn’t one of them.

GET THE STORY.

Filed under catholic, church, decline, nuns, population, priests, seminarians, statistics

“Substantial Observance”

Holysee  One of the interesting phrases in Paenitemini occurs in this norm:

II. 1. The time of Lent preserves its penitential character. The days of penitence to be observed under obligation throughout the Church are all Fridays and Ash Wednesday, that is to say the first days of "Grande Quaresima" (Great Lent), according to the diversity of the rites. Their substantial observance binds gravely.

So the substantial observance of the days of penitence binds gravely. What does that mean?

Clearly the inclusion of the word "substantial" is meant to qualify what is being said. (The word "substantial" is a qualifier. Duh!) Pope Paul VI could have simply said "Their observance binds gravely." But he didn't. He included the word "substantial."

This suggests that it would be possible to fail to observe the days of penitence in some lesser degree and it would not result in a grave sin.

This would not be worth pointing out if we were talking about people who forgot it was Friday and ordered a hamburger for lunch and ate it without realizing. In that case we have innocent ignorance preventing the commission of a mortal sin. 

It also would not be worth pointing out in the case of someone who forgot it was Friday, ordered a hamburger, and realized it was Friday only after having taken a bite out of it and then quickly swallowing the bite, not knowing what else to do. In that case we would have lack of full consent preventing the commission of a mortal sin.

Finally, it would not be worth talking about this in the case of necessity–e.g., someone with a medical condition–because the necessity would excuse from the obligation to observe the elements of penitential law they impinge on.

In the first two cases we would have mortal sin averted because one of the conditions needed for mortal sin (knowledge or deliberate consent) would be lacking. In the third case the obligation itself would cease.

So Paul VI could have simply said, "Their observance binds gravely," and the ordinary application of the principles of moral and pastoral theology would have allowed for inadvertent, non-deliberate, or necessary failures to observe the law to be non-grave.

But he included the word "substantial," suggesting that there could be some degree of knowing, deliberate, non-necessary failure to observe the penitential days and yet it would not result in mortal sin.

Only "substantial" failure to observe them would be grave matter and thus potentially mortally sinful.

Then there would be the question of whether substantial failure of a single day of penance or of the whole complex of penitential days would be gravely sinful.

So it's understandable that people would wonder exactly what Paul VI meant here. I haven't tried to determine the answer in detail, but I have noted that the inclusion of the word "substantial" is meant to have a softening effect, in keeping with Paul VI's overall relaxation of penitential discipline. I don't see how it could be otherwise since he could have just said, "Their observance binds gravely," and left it at that.

Oh, and here's . . . 

THE BIG RED DISCLAIMER: I'm just trying to explain the law here. That doesn't mean I personally favor the content of the law. I'm just trying to be clear and honest about what the law is. If you think my understanding of the law is wrong, fine. Feel free to show evidence to the contrary. If you don't like the law itself, feel free to say so, but bear in mind that I'm not the one who made the law.

Recently I was reading in Canon Law Digest, and in the volume (vol. 6) that covers the year Paenitemini was released (1966), I found a couple of items of interest.

The first is that, at the front of CLD's presentation of the norms of Paenitemini, there is a footnote which says,

A notable commentary by Bertrams on what constitutes substantial observance was published in L'Osservatore Romano of 20 Feb, 1966. See Note following the reference at the end of this document.

"Bertrams"–who is not otherwise identified except as a priest–I believe to be Wilhelm Bertrams, S.J., a noted canonist who taught for many years at the Greg and who was active in this period.

L'Osservatore Romano, at the time, was much more of a house organ than it is today. If something was printed in it, you could treat it as a significant indicator of the Holy See's thought. 

Now they'll take anything. Reviews of The Simpsons, top ten lists of rock albums, kissy-kissy pieces for President Obama, anything! They're so into being "hip" and "relevant" now that they've jettisoned their gravitas and converted from being a reliable indicator of Vatican thought to just an orthodox Catholic publication that the Vatican happens to own.

But back in 1966, publishing a commentary on a papal document in L'OR meant something–and it especially meant something if it appeared February 20th, just three days after Paenitemini was signed on February 17th. Given the lag between signing and publication, it very well may have appeared in the same issue of L'OR as a companion commentary on the main document (something the Holy See often does).

So let's look at what Fr. Bertrams said in his note:

We think that the word "substantial" was chosen designedly, especially in order the better to show the personal responsibility of each one before God, so that every one may practice penance in spirit and in truth, without insisting too much on the traditional distinctions of casuistry between grave and light matter in the violation of the law. Consequently, a single violation could not be considered a grave sin, but the repeated and habitual violation would certainly be grave.

Hence the more serious and sincere is the will to practice penance on the days and in the manner prescribed by the church, the less inclined one should be to consider a partial violation as grave. The more serious the reason which prevents the observance of the law, the less grave will be the transgression. If the reason is really proportionately grave, it is certain that all obligation ceases. This may occur in case of illness, where one cannot take other food because of infirmity, where meals must be taken in common, in travelling when there is no choice, and so on. but when these excuses occur, there remains the obligation of divine law to practice penance in some other way according to the particular condition of the person.

It is clear that Fr. Bertrams, and thus L'OR before it decided to try to be hip, sees Paenitemini as trying to get away from the traditional manual theology way of (e.g., "This particular violation would be light matter and so a venial sin; this other violation would be grave matter and thus could be a mortal sin"). Rather than having people try to cut the pie that way, the message is: Just be serious and sincere in your intent to observe the laws regarding penance and don't worry so much about an individual infraction. As long as you mean to do what the Church does, an individual infraction won't be mortal.

In the second paragraph, though, Bertrams starts talking about cases where there would be partially or fully excusing reasons, which would have applied even before Paenitemini, so this introduces an element of confusion.

Perhaps not surprisingly, a year later the Sacred Congregation for the Council (predecessor of the modern Congregation for Clergy) published a dubium on this issue, which is found in the same volume of Canon Law Digest:

Questions: I. Whether the substantial observance of days of penance, which is declared to be of grave obligation in the dispositive part of the Constitution Paenitemini, II, § 2, of 17 February, 1966, refers to the individual days of penance which are to be observed as a matter of obligation in the whole Church;

II. Or does it refer rather to the whole complexus of penitential days to be observed with the penances attached to them.

Replies: The S. C. of the council replied, with the approval of the Supreme Pontiff Paul VI:

I. In the negative.

II. In the affirmative; that is, one sins gravely against the law, who, without an excusing cause, omits a notable part, quantitative or qualitative, of the penitential observance which is prescribed as a whole.

Given at Rome 24 February 1967.

I find this less helpful than it could be, but it again seems to be backing off the idea of focusing attention away from the individual penitential day to the observance of penitential discipline as a whole. So if, "without an excusing cause, one omits a notable part . . . of the penitential observance which is prescribed as a whole"–not apparently on a individual day per Fr. Bertram and the answer to question I–then one sins gravely.

There is still a lot that is obscure here, but it does seem that by the inclusion of the word "substantial" before "observance," Paul VI was trying to do something encouraging people not to focus so much on the scrupulous fulfillment of particulars and more on the overall spirit of doing penance.

Some Food in the Morning & Evening

To wrap up our treatment of the law of fasting, let's look at a question that has occurred to lots of people upon reading Paenitemini's provision that:

The law of fasting allows only one full meal a day, but does not prohibit taking some food in the morning and evening, observing—as far as quantity and quality are concerned—approved local custom.

The question that occurs to people is how much this constrains when people can eat their full meal and their two lesser amounts of food. Do they have to confine one of the smaller portions to the A.M. hours, eat a big lunch as their full meal, and then have only a small amount in the evening (whenever that starts)?

On its face, the passage seems to reflect the eating practice of having only a small breakfast, a big midday meal, and a small evening meal. This practice is common in Italy, and in some other parts of the world, such as (formerly) in the American South (I remember as a boy that my family in Texas referred to the larger midday meal as "dinner" and the evening meal as "supper") and other places where agriculture was a key means of making a living (you need those calories while you're still working, not when you're done or near done for the day). 

Is the pope mandating this eating pattern for Catholics all over the world on days of fast, regardless of their culture and what their bodies are used to?

This does not seem plausible.

First, as we have noted (and will see further in my Monday post), the overall project here is one of relaxing the legal requirements regarding penance. This is obvious just from looking at the dramatic drop in the number of days on which fasting was required. Prior to Paenitemini there were waaaaay more days of fast on the calendar than afterwards. This document dropped it from dozens to two.

Combine this with the following passage from the 1917 Code of Canon Law regarding the law of fasting and an interesting situation results.

Can. 1251 §2. It is not forbidden to mix meat and fish in the same meal; or to exchange the evening meal with lunch.

The first part of this refers to a prior requirement (prior to the 1917 Code) that prohibited mixing meat and fish during the same meal on days of fast (but not abstinence) during Lent.

The second part expressly permits exchanging lunch and supper as the full meal (I'm avoiding the word "dinner" to avoid confusion).

This was part of the law up until Paenitemini, when the Church's laws regarding penance were integrally reordered.

Ordinarily when something expressly allowed in the former law is not repeated in the newer law, it could be a signal that this allowance is revoked, but that seems remarkably implausible in this case, given Paul VI's unmistakable intent to relax legal requirements and allow even greater adaptation to local situations and the exigencies of (rapidly changing) 20th century life.

It seems much more plausible that he simply took it as obvious that the two meals could be exchanged.

One reason is that, even before the 1917 Code expressly allowed the switching around of the meals, it had already become a recognized and accepted practice. See the article on Fasting in the Original Catholic Encyclopedia, which predates the 1917 Code.

Also note this: He doesn't identify when the full meal can be taken. He doesn't say anything about lunch or noon or midday.

Given only what he says, you could have the full meal at 12:01 a.m. or 11:59 p.m. (eat fast if you want to get it done before midnight!) and then also have "some food in the morning and evening."

Another thing to keep in mind is that Italians themselves don't eat the midday meal exactly at noon. Depending on the region of the country you're in, they may start it around 12:30 p.m. to 2:30 p.m., and they may finish eating it as late as 4:30 p.m. So there is considerable flexibility there as well.

The subject of when evening begins is a thorny one in canon law. You hear different starting times for it, ranging from noon to 5:30 p.m. In the absence of a legal definition, and in keeping with the trend of the foregoing considerations, the broader interpretation (i.e., any time after noon) may be presumed in terms of legal requirement (per can. 14).

So, while Paul VI may have been thinking in terms of the normal Italian eating pattern of the time, it does not seem plausible to think he was legally mandating it on days of fast for Catholics the world over.

I consequently don't see any reason why one could not legitimately do any of the following eating patterns on days of fast:

  • (AM) full meal + some food; (PM) some food
  • (AM) some food + full meal; (PM) some food
  • (AM) some food; (midday-ish) full meal; (PM) some food
  • (AM) some food; (PM) full meal + some food
  • (AM) some food; (PM) some food + full meal.

That's assuming you exercise the full amount of eating. You don't have to do that, of course.

What is less clear is the status of patterns like this:

  • (AM) nothing; (PM) some food + full meal + some food
  • (AM) full meal + some food + some food; (PM) nothing

In other words, if you're going to have "some food" twice in the day, does one of the instances have to be AM and the other PM?

I can see opinion legitimately diverging here. My sense of the legislator's intent isn't strong enough. 

I could see one legitimately holding that Paul VI is simply being illustrative and not normative regarding the times, in which case you could have "some food" twice in either the A.M. or the P.M. (but not both).

I could also see one saying, "No, he says 'morning and evening' and means it; if someone has a really compelling reason to need to eat in a different way then that reason itself will excuse from the law of fast."

So I could go either way on that question, at least at the present state of my thought.