Hey, guys, hate to let you in on a little secret, but it's already been done.
Oh, and, P.S.. . .
Why don't you go over there with all the like-minded loony tunes and just leave faithful Catholics alone?
Posted on 08/21/2006 7:29:46 AM PDT by NYer
I've come to a conclusion about dissenting Catholics and how they compare to their more faithful counterparts. Here it is: Faithful Catholics start families. Dissenting Catholics start organizations.
If you need proof for the second point, I give you Take Back Our Church, the newest dissident group on the block. Started four months ago by former Jesuit and Newsweek contributing editor Robert Blair Kaiser and California businessman Robert Miller, the group joins an already crowded gaggle of dissenting organizations.
So, what differentiates Take Back Our Church from Call to Action, or FutureChurch, or Voice of the Faithful, or The Association for the Rights of Catholics in the Church, or any other similar group?
Good question.
Take Back Our Church's Web site is stuffed with the same nonsense you've read before: the Catholic Church is authoritarian; current Church leaders have turned their backs on Vatican II; the faithful need to reclaim their Church, and reshape it to match their needs.
And so on.
None of this is terribly surprising, given Kaiser's involvement in the project. He came out with a book earlier this year entitled, A Church in Search of Itself: Benedict XVI and the Battle for the Future.
If you don't have time to read it, let me give you a quick synopsis: The Fathers of Vatican II ushered in a golden age of openness, tolerance, and progressive action. Unfortunately, the dark forces of John Paul II and his diabolical collaborator, Josef Cardinal Ratzinger, clamped down on this movement of the Spirit, dragging the Church back to the Dark Ages. In light of this, thinking Catholics need to reclaim their Church — and maybe even start an American Catholic Church of their own (more on this in a moment).
Sound familiar? This is the same tired song we've heard from all the other grey-haired dissidents of Kaiser's generation. Of course, there's an added note of desperation in this latest entry. The years are starting to thin the ranks of Kaiser's allies, and even liberal commentators acknowledge that younger Catholics are noticeably more orthodox than their elders.
So if you're Robert Blair Kaiser, now is the time to act, before the dissident generation is no more.
And here's where it gets really interesting.
You see, Kaiser's organization is calling for more than just reform; they want an autochthonous American Catholic Church. An autochthonous Church isn't the same as an autonomous Church, as Kaiser is quick to point out on the Web site. Rather, an autochthonous Church is a native Church, an ecclesial body organized and run by people in that specific country.
In the autochthonous Church of Kaiser's dreams, the faithful would elect their own bishops. But that's not all:
We will write a Declaration of Autochthony, one that will challenge our priest-people and our people-people to work out a constitution for the American Church that carefully puts aside the Rome-based secretive, half-vast, culturally-conditioned legalisms codified in canon law in return for the kind of servant Church envisioned at Vatican II.So a democratic Church with elected bishops and a national ecclesial constitution. If all of that sounds more political than spiritual, it's no coincidence. According to Take Back Our Church's July 4 email to supporters,
This will be a political battle in a Church that has gotten us used to the idea that there's something shady, maybe even something sinful, in trying to overturn the old pyramidal structure. We plead "not guilty" to that charge. But we do plead guilty in our wish to overturn — at least in the United States — what the last pope called "the divinely instituted hierarchical constitution of the Church.”At least they're honest. They don't want a hierarchical Church that disagrees with them, so they need to overthrow it.
Right now, we'd like each of you, 580 of you, to scour your e-mail address books and urge your twenty closest friends to go to our website and sign in. Do it now.Okay, so maybe they need to work on their growth strategy as well.
Hey, guys, hate to let you in on a little secret, but it's already been done.
Oh, and, P.S.. . .
Why don't you go over there with all the like-minded loony tunes and just leave faithful Catholics alone?
It's a serious problem.
Campaigning for full vastness is a moral imperative.
LOL. You're right, half-vast is for weak-kneed pansies. I demand a full-vast Canon Law. I'm writing a letter to the pope right now.... BWAH-HA-HA
If you haven't already, I strongly recommend that you read Peggy Noonan's John Paul the Great.
Loved it!!
The priest at a local parish here said in one of his homilies a while ago that "it used to be that when people had a problem with the Catholic church....they left. We call them Protestants. Now, they stay, and they complain and they want the Church to change. If you don't like the doctrine of the Catholic church, you shouldn't campaign to have it changed."
HOOCH is an implacable foe of anybody and anything which rankles or upsets me/us. Kaiser and his take-back-the-church types, and fake women priests, and Catholics for Free Choice, and the Call-To-Action-Voice of the Future With Fidel Fans.
I am holding my first meeting tonight and I wouldn't be surprised to discover a lot of anger, bad language, imprecations, insults, invective and poorly-reasoned responses will be generated to combat the dire threats posed by these bathetic groups.
I mean, they represent, what, nearly 1/100th of 1% of all Catholics in America? They must be taken seriously.
Weapons must be cleaned, ammo stocks refreshed, wine ordered, huge hunks of meat must be bathed in some sort of garlic, olive oil, bitter herbs and wine marinade and lump charcoal must be hauled home in a van...
Then, demonstrations must be planned, placards painted and whatnot. Oh, and ice for the beer...
However, some of their ministers are excellent golfers. That can not be denied
I sense you have exemplary ideas about Apostolic Succession and intimate knowledge about the internal processes twixt Venice and Vatican and so I am anxious to read your opinions
What is your understanding of authority? When the New Testament tells Christians to hear the Churcvh or be treated as heathens in how many ways is that bad advice?
I can't even tell what they're trying to say there. "Half-vast"? It's not even a Typso if I don't know what it's supposed to mean!
Surely they can't mean "half-@$$ed," since the Code of Canon Law is extravagantly complete and comprehensive (if nothing else).
With all due respect. I don't believe you can compare marriage and the doctrine of the church. It's apples and oranges. I happen to agree with this priest. I don't think the church should compromise. Some of the issues that dissenting catholics want changed are things like accepting homosexuality. Should the church change even when it goes against scripture? No way.
It is a filial relationship.
The Church as a loving parent makes the rules and the obedient child obeys the rules.
Period.
I guess he doesn't know how to use a search engine, he wants to re-invent the autochthonous wheel:
A PROPOSED CONSTITUTION OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH
Quit yammering about it and get on with it, dude. Hire some rent-a-priests and womenpriests and get on with it!
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