You just know when you see a headline that begins "Vatican Says" that you're about to read something that almost certainly does not represent an official statement on the part of the Holy See but instead simply represents something that somebody who works there said in an interview.
Same thing is true when the headline starts with something like "Vatican Laments," which is how the piece starts in THIS CASE.
It's a pretty lame, little piece, but it does have one particularly interesting sentence:
[Archbishop Mauro Piacenza, secretary of the Congregation for Clergy] says the Vatican plans to publish this year a kind of handbook on confession to drum up enthusiasm among Catholics toward the sacrament.
One can never be sure with a story as imprecise as the ones the AP cranks out, but the use of the word "handbook" could mean that a new vademecum is being prepared, in which case it might be an actually useful document.
There’s only ONE WAY to increase the frequency of the use of the Sacrament of Reconciliation — it must be regularly preached from the pulpit on Sundays, in a clear, confident, loving manner, and in terms that highlight its necessity, its beauty and its desirability, and its eternal and practical benefits.
I have almost no recollection of ever hearing this in any parish church that I have attended — so little anyway, that I’m surprised people go to Confession at all.
Be careful what you wish for. Where I am, confession lines are always very long.
Off topic: Why do some people take 10 or 15 minutes in the confessional? I don’t get it. Are they just chatty?
The two synods of Hippo (393 AD) and Carthage, (397 AD) were under the jurisdiction of what would become the Orthodox church. How can the Roman Catholic church claim they determined the Canon?
If the Roman Catholic church, “by her own inherent God given power and authority” gave the world the Bible, why did she not get it right the first time? Why did the Roman Catholic church have to wait until 1546 to officially add the Apocrypha?
Similarly Confession is another doctrine adopted from pagan practiced designed to enslaved those who prefer Catholic mysticism over sound doctrine.
Question: Prove to me that Christ created a Ministerial Priesthood, and second that Christ commanded confession before such a Priesthood.
francisco
if you are not trolling look here
http://www.catholic.com/thisrock/2001/0110sbs.asp
Oh brother. Here we go.
Welcome, Francisco. You can stay and ask all the hard questions you can think of that you can ask without being unnecessarily offensive. Why don’t you take a moment to look over Da Rulz?
Apparently you mean to say that the patriarchate of Carthage centuries later would go into schism. Well, all right. What’s your point?
What do you mean by “determined”?
You mean the Catholic Church, not the Roman (Latin) Catholic Church. Which “not getting it right” would that be?
Because that’s when she got around to defining the Old Testament. Prior to that general timeframe it wasn’t a huge issue, because there weren’t any Protestants around who needed confuting on that particular point (or any other).
“Similarly” to what? Sorry, assertions aren’t arguments. If you want to throw around inflammatory claims, you have to back them up.
Easy. The Holy Spirit permitted the universal proclamation of these doctrines without anywhere raising up a single contrary witness in the Church, which is the pillar and foundation of truth. Heresy is always answered in its own day; the Holy Spirit never permits fundamental error contrary to the essentials of faith to triumph completely in the Church without any witness to the truth. That would be contrary to Christ’s declarations about being always with the Church, the Holy Spirit leading her into all truth, the gates of hell not prevailing, etc.
Or did you mean “Prove it to me from the Bible alone”? First you prove that the Bible alone is the sole authoritative source of Christian doctrine.
The two synods of Hippo (393 AD) and Carthage, (397 AD) were under the jurisdiction of what would become the Orthodox church. How can the Roman Catholic church claim they determined the Canon?
If the Roman Catholic church, “by her own inherent God given power and authority” gave the world the Bible, why did she not get it right the first time? Why did the Roman Catholic church have to wait until 1546 to officially add the Apocrypha?
Actually the Catholic Church specified the canon for the universal church at the Council of Basel/Ferrara/Florence which lasted from 1431 to 1445. All that Trent did was declare anyone not accepting the canon, to be anathema.
Since the NT canon was compiled at the same local and general/ecumenical councils that compiled the OT canon, why accept 27 books of the NT, if the OT list is in question?
Similarly Confession is another doctrine adopted from pagan practiced designed to enslaved those who prefer Catholic mysticism over sound doctrine.
“Therefore confess your sins to one another”
“Whose sins you forgive, they will be forgiven”
We “adopted” the doctrine from Jesus and James, not pagan practices.
Question: Prove to me that Christ created a Ministerial Priesthood.
http://www.cin.org/users/james/files/ntpriest.htm
http://www.cin.org/users/james/files/priest.htm
JohnD: sometimes the priest has to sask us to repeat what we’ve said beacause we are sobbing too hard.
Sometimes it seems like it’s not the people’s fault when confessions go long. The dear old priest who heard my confession yesterday kept probing to try to combine all of my sins into one general pattern and psychoanalyze my whole life, when actually I thought they were pretty cut and dried. I left thinking, “So that’s why I had to stand in line for half an hour!”
You know, I used to hardly ever go to confession except during Easter or Christmas. I go much more frequently now.
I used to notice that if I went during some other time of the year, nobody was there. Now there are lines.
Seems like something must be going on.
“drum up”
Hmmm. I really don’t need to read the rest of the article to know the tone of it. That pretty much says it.
But to be more accurate anyway it might be better to read “drum up enthusiasm among Catholics toward repentance.”
francisco:
If you are serious about looking at the issues, I won’t say seeking, because I don’t think right now you can even see the possibility that the “tradition” that you have been taught is in error; you have come to the right place. Jimmy Akin is one of, if not the premier Catholic apologist.
You raised a number of issues but in order to simplify it perhaps you might want to start with 1 Timothy 3:15 and then decide which Church St. Paul the apostle is talking about.
Here’s one place to get started. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Christian_denominations.
The reason that verse is a good place to start is because if you believe that the New Testament is the inerrant word of God as we Catholics do, then we already have common ground and that verse to which I referred needs an answer, that is, if we are all serious about following the light of scripture.
LJ: I have studied many of Jimmy Akin’s books and think they show a stilted explanation of many doctrines, historical events, and Old Testament exegesis. To list all the flagrant inaccuracies, twisting of church history and scripture is beyond the scope of a mere combo box. Reading Akin reminds me of what Jesus said to the Sadducees. Jesus answered them, “You are mistaken because you don’t know the Scriptures or God’s power, -Matt 22:29.
Secondly, the word church comes from the Latin, while the Greek word in the Bible is ‘Ekklesia’ which means assembly of believers or called out ones. Thus there are many independent local churches but only one Universal Church which is the bride of Christ.
So a serious scholar would understand Greek and Hebrew and understand that the Latin Vulgate is a poor translation of the original source material.
Enough for now!
Those are serious charges, Francisco.
Serious charges? Yes. Serious arguments? No.
“I have studied many of Jimmy Akin’s books”
Wow. Which of Jimmy’s many books have you studied? I know of only a few books he has authored.
“…and think they show a stilted explanation of many doctrines”
Examples? Just one?
“To list all the flagrant inaccuracies, twisting of church history and scripture is beyond the scope of a mere combo box…”
Oh, I see. You’re so overwhelmed with the sheer volume of Jimmy’s poor arguments that you can’t even think of *one* to begin with?
You might want to speak carefully when it comes to biblical languages. Jimmy knows them very well. Linguistics happens to be a minor specialty of his.
Francisco: I’ve already said this once. I’ll say it once more:
If you want to throw out inflammatory charges, you need to back them up. If not, you will be disinvited to participate on the blog.
To recap:
You came in here like a SNL comedian in ninja kindergarten, throwing darts wildly in every direction with no apparent pattern or care.
A number of people, me included, took the time to challenge you point for point.
Rather than responding on any of those fronts, your next salvo was completely unsubstantiated smears directed at your host, followed by wholly inadequate comments about the NT word translated as “church,” and a puzzling and irrelevant jab at the Vulgate.
What is wrong with your comments about Greek is this. “Ekklesia” does not “mean” “assembly of believers,” nor does it “mean” “called-out ones.” We can talk about what the word “means” in pre-Christian usage, but in early Christian usage, including the NT, it acquires a technical meaning that cannot be directly inferred by comparing to pre-Christian usage. (The same is true of other words in early Christian usage, such as “agape”, “baptism” and “eucharist.” When you have a new message not covered by existing vocabulary, you have to work with what you have.)
No lexicon in the world justifies your claim that the concept of the ekklesia of Christ permits “many independent local churches,” where “independent” is understood to imply radically different ecclesiastical structures, contradictory doctrines, etc.
Pick a subject, stick to it and debate it carefully. Keep up the way you’ve been going and you can take it somewhere else.
Incidentally, “combo box” is a malapropism. “Combox” is short for “comment box,” not “combination box.”
Thank you SDG for your intervention. I don’t pretend to be a Greek scholar but I still think francisco ought to put down his flame-thrower and think about this for a minute.
francisco: Even by your own definition of “church” you still have not answered the question.
Your initial foray here was to demand proof of ministerial priesthood and confession.
If you think that there is one Universal Church the Bride of Christ, I would agree with that statement insofar as Catholic means universal. If you then can accept St. Paul’s statement that the Church is the pillar and ground of truth, how then can you have any critique of the ministerial priesthood or confession? On what basis? If your understanding of the Universal Church is not a physical one, but simply the complete body of believers in Christ, that then would include Catholics and Orthodox who believe in in Christ and in the ministerial priesthood.
If you are going to suggest, as some do, that Catholics and Orthodox are not true believers in Christ, then you are already narrowing down the definition of that Universal Church, and so I would ask you again, which Church is St. Paul referring to? Only those people that agree with you? Some particular tradition that you have been instructed in?
If St. Paul was talking only about a local Church, as the pillar and ground of truth, hadn’t we better have a look at the historical record and find out exactly which one that was, and from there find out exactly what they specifically believed? Otherwise, how can we know what the truth really is? It is otherwise lost in the mists of the past. Unless, of course, you would concede that pillar and ground of truth that St. Paul was referring to was the Church Universal of the time under the leadership of St. Peter, and then a little historical research of the Church fathers would give you a better picture of what they believed, and what St. Paul tells us, in Scripture, is the reliable guide, the pillar and ground of truth.
Remember as well, francisco, that you cannot simply turn this back onto Scripture, and tell us that it contains all that is necessary to know, because Scripture itself tells us the it is the Church that is the pillar and ground of truth, regardless of how you define Church.