Posted on 02/26/2005 7:55:08 PM PST by lrslattery
I'm not analylizing you. I'm just going by your posts on Freerepublic. You are not being consistant on this subject.
like in freepmail?
Huh? I have no idea what you are talking about. Was there a problem with the parish finances or did people just think there must have been because the priest was socially active?
Please point out where I have strayed from my position on the errors of "blind obedience".
The priest never allowed anyone to know how much money the parish took in. He never published an operating budget or accounting as the previous pastor did. He also overlooked certain irregular situations such as remarriage without annulment, baptism of those children, Holy Communion, etc as long as those individuals made significant financial contributions. He refused to give Anointing of the Sick to people dying in the hospitals because he couldn't be bothered to show up.
There are many more stories of his personal corruption. He was a friend of Mahony.
Nothing to do with blind obedience. Just this: on the one hand, you continually decry the state of the Novus Ordo and have mentioned Polka Masses as blaspheming the Mass. So, here we have a parish who performs 'Polka Masses' and you are defending them.
I know a monsignor here who takes fairly frequent trips (fishing, camping, international stuff) but he has family money... the only son of a fairly well to do family and his mother left it all to him. Glad he doesn't gamble like your guy though.
Both.
Just curious if any parishioner ever asked him about the finances and if he refused.
Many people protested his corruptions. Many complained higher up. Nothing ever changed.
That's a lie and I call you on it.
The term "blind obedience", properly understood, is not an obedience of errors as suggested in your post. St. Ignatius taught, in his Letter on Obedience, a "blind obedience", which almost resulted in a condemnation by Pope Sixtus V.
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At this critical moment, St. Robert Bellarmine was appointed to write a defense of St. Ignatius' Letter, which he did in such masterly fashion that it remains to this day a "theological epitome of religious obedience." Since the center of attack was on blind obedience, Bellarmine limited himself to this concept, proving in a series of five chapters that obedientia caeca is as old as Christianity and perfectly consonant with the Catholic Faith. Several points in the apologia are specially worth noting: the clear definition of "blind obedience," the Patristic evidence in its defense, and Bellarmine's favorite “argument from analogy.”
At the outset, St. Robert explains that “the name ‘blind obedience’ means nothing else than obedience which is pure, perfect, and simple, with no discussion of what is commanded or why, but remaining satisfied that a command had been given.”
In Patristic support of this virtue, Bellarmine traces the exact places where St. Ignatius found his arguments, illustrations and examples. The term "blind obedience" was explicitly used by at least two great leaders of Christian monasticism, John Climacus and St. Bernard. Climacus says that, "The Lord gives His light to the blindly obedient, to see the virtue of their superior, and mercifully hides from them his faults." And St. Bernard describes perfect obedience as “a blessed blindness, by which the eyes of those who once were sinners, are now happily shielded from the dazzling glare of sin.”
But even without using the expression caeca obedientia, the Fathers of monasticism from the earliest centuries described its equivalent whenever they spoke of the perfection of this virtue. Thus St. Augustine:
For religious obedience to be pleasing to God, it must be prompt without delay, faithful without servility, willing without complaint, simple without discussion, constant without cessation, orderly with no deviation, joyous without perturbance, strenuous without scrupulosity, and universal with no exception. For in the measure that we listen to our superiors, God will also listen to our prayers.Bellarmine concludes in typical controversial style by answering the most serious objection which even Catholics sometimes make to the blind obedience of religious. "It is dangerous," the argument runs, "for religious to trust their superiors so blindly, because the latter as fallible men are often mistaken, and therefore what began as obedience may end as a widely propagated error, or even as heresy."
You are right, and I apologize. I got you mixed up with another poster on something (I post a partial of it below) that I scanned here the other day. Again, I apologize, obviously you disagree with the poster.
The saddest part is that the few priests who are inclined towards financial mismanagement and the few priests who are inclined towards sexual sin have absolutely no idea how much scandal they cause. It is a perfect illustration of sin... like a pebble (or a rock in some cases) thrown into the ocean and the ripples go on forever. It's a blessing that most of us can go on and not question our faith in the Church - are able to separate the man from the Church Christ founded. I don't know how some do go on and some aren't able to..... it must be a grace from God.
It is precisely because this interdict is over a property dispute that Burke does indeed look silly.
It would be quite another thing if the interdict was over a matter of heresy....a faith & morals issue. But that is not he case here.
And whatever milage Burke may have in re the pro-abort polticos, he has lost in this very stupid decision.
The laity were given the deed to the parish in 1891 by the Archbishop. How is refusing to give up something which was legally given to them an act of apostasy or dissent? Granted, the situation is irregular, but God did not give bishops the authority to take what does not belong to them. That is stealing, and using sacraments as leverage could be considered a form of simony.
If Burke and Rigali before him were so concerned about the laity, why didn't they crack down on the liturgical abuse of the polka Mass?
This interdict was NOT sanctioned over a property dispute. One who states otherwise fails to understand the proper nature of the issue. The Board members exalted themselves by defiantly opposing a lawful directive of legitimate ecclesiastical authority (the Archbishop) and even refused the directives of the Church of which they claim to be members. Further, they encouraged others to participate and engage in acts of disobedience and rebellion. This is the reason for the interdict.
Archbishop Burke described the interdict:
When a member of the Church has knowingly, deliberately and publicly damaged seriously the unity of the Church, his or her bishop has the pastoral responsibility to impose a sanction, in order to call the offending person to repentance and to restore the unity of the Church.SourceIf Church authority were not to address a public violation of Church unity, then scandal would be caused by those who present themselves as devout Catholics, when, in fact, they are not in full communion with the Church.
In the case of St. Stanislaus Kostka Parish, the offense committed by the members of the board of directors of the civil corporation of the parish is the public refusal to obey legitimate Church authority, namely the Holy Father’s Congregation for the Clergy and the archbishop of St. Louis, and the incitement of others to such disobedience. The applicable canons of the Code of Canon Law are canon 1371, paragraph 2, and canon 1373.
The sanction of interdict, as defined in canon 1332, prohibits the member of the faithful: 1) from any ministerial part in the celebration of the Mass or any other ceremonies of worship; and 2) from celebrating the sacraments and sacramentals, and from receiving the sacraments. Interdict does not prohibit the offending party from assisting at Mass or other sacred rites. Receiving the sacraments, above all the Holy Eucharist, requires that a person be in full communion with the Church. For that reason, the sanction prohibits the reception of the sacraments.
The censure binds the member of the faithful everywhere and until the offending person has been reconciled with the Church. The censure is lifted when the offending party has repented of his or her disobedience and has submitted to Church authority. In the case of the interdict imposed upon the members of the board of directors of the civil corporation of St. Stanislaus Kostka, the archbishop of St. Louis has the authority to lift the censure and must lift the censure, as soon as the offending party has made known his or her repentance to the archbishop.
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