Traditional Catholics and secular culture

[Chestertonian]

"Après nous, le déluge," might as well have been spoken by the last of the Jansenists as they were hounded to their deaths by the new ultramontanist establishment, under which we still live.

[Mono no aware]

Please then do explain  in the Apostolic Age or in the Early Church how these communities specifically mirror the rejection of worldliness of  those early Christians?  I am somewhat familiar with the the writings and history of that Age and don't see it myself.

We may be getting astray from my original point.  I don't claim that the Old Believers or the Amish are in every aspect the mirror image of the Early Christians.  I was simply saying that if you take the examples from the Early Church on modesty in dress, jewelry, and make-up, you will find Early Christianity better reflected in Mennonites than Catholics.  I am by no means saying that the doctrines and every last practice of the followers of Menno Simons represent authentic Early Christianity.  I am saying that where the Catholic Church abandoned the Fathers on these particular things, various Protestant sects recovered them simply by reading scripture.  The Fathers themselves were following the gospels and epistles.  I don't think that's controversial.

[Jayne]

Jayne,

It is in a human's nature to be self-interested.

I'm honest enough to admit that I have/adopt/accept moral values for my own benefit and the benefit of the society around me which in turn benefits me.  If God is not there to benefit me, then I have no motivation to love God.  It's a two way street.

God created you and the entire universe that you enjoy.  God became man and suffered and died that you might be saved.  God gave the Church, the Sacraments and too many blessing to say.  Why is that not enough motivation to love God and to obey him to the best of your ability? 

[Greg]

The other explanation for this is that Christianity is a false cult and after 2000 years, and with the freedom to study it and hold such a view the west is now abandoning it.

That would also explain how it can go though so many transformations of what good Christian behavior is and isn't and end up where we are today.  Only a true religion established by an all powerful being has any rational requirement to be consistent in praxis, doctrine and belief since the reasonably assumption is that the all powerful being wants the same things from humans over time.

A false one can claim any old bollocks and people will just accept it because it helps them marry, do business, feed themselves or not get thrown off a building.

If I had a time machine and could look to the year 2500 and see that Christianity was a tiny cult centered in Sub-Saharan Africa and secularism had won for the next 500 years I'd lapse.  I'd be disappointed though because I was looking forward to seeing those perverts in Rome slaughtered.

[Jayne]

If I had a time machine and could look to the year 2500 and see that Christianity was a tiny cult centered in Sub-Saharan Africa and secularism had won for the next 500 years I'd lapse. 

And it would make almost no difference to the way you live your life.

[Chestertonian]

Jayne,

It is in a human's nature to be self-interested.

I'm honest enough to admit that I have/adopt/accept moral values for my own benefit and the benefit of the society around me which in turn benefits me.  If God is not there to benefit me, then I have no motivation to love God.  It's a two way street.

God created you and the entire universe that you enjoy.  God became man and suffered and died that you might be saved.  God gave the Church, the Sacraments and too many blessing to say.  Why is that not enough motivation to love God and to obey him to the best of your ability?

how do we know we are loving God with or whole heart

how do you know you are doing enough how w do you know if you love godenough.  there is no enough.  do we chase ideals that we know are impossible for our state in life.  you can never be prepared enough to receive holy communion for example this has led to me going years without receiving

you can never do enough penance.  we can never beat ourselves hard enough or fast enough or suffer enough.  suicide is a mortal sin yet the ascetic ideal is to teeter totter on the verge of death.  The scriptures tell us to be joyful but then then there are saints who preach against taking pleasure in anything worldly.... even being sexually attracted to your spouse.  We have to be completely without attachment to prepare our souls for death but how do we live in the meantime without forming attachments to our children--somwthibg the human body is wired to do.  Either way life is a miserable vale of tears and then you die and 99% of people never make it to heaven.

[nmoerbeek]

I am going to make my reply in line so I can respond to your points.

Yes, faith, not morals in which we are all in agreement that was universally taught and lived correct? I illustrated disagreements on morals.  I could illustrate more disputes on morals as well beyond the example of Chess.  I agree that not coveting your neighbors wife has universally been taught, but whether that means that young monks must not read sections of scripture to stir up passions I don't know.

Questions of faith can be easily developed through the kernel of praxis, and other saints who have more of a developed sense of the divine. I'm not advocating apokostatasis because enough Fathers taught it so.  St. Gregory the great teaching on the question of gluttony is exceptionally strict beyond that of other peoples and illustrates a lack of uniformity when it comes to questions of morals.  The same thing with Augustine on certain sections of the Goods of Marriage.  Theology can be quite nuanced as to particulars which can mean a great deal and do not violate the laws of nature. But this is a distraction from the argument which is a pretext for your next argument which was woven a bit disingenuously to be upfront with you as you conflated several topics to make a pretext for the next.  You used one example with far reaching implications.  I thought all of my points touched about the implications of what you said.  St. Augustine comes down harshly on those who continue to have relations after the women can no longer bear children, and this from reason seems to be in conformity with the laws of nature.  Yet, later authors including St. Alphonsus strongly disagree on this point.

In regards to morals you have clear text and practice. I don't know what you mean by that Unless man has changed the moral law cannot change. Yet, their is a lack of harmony between the Fathers on certain Moral Points, Medieval Pentitental Manuals, and Moral Theology Manuals on many points We aren't discussing finer soteriological points but aspects of lust, avarice, etc.. Which once again is my overall point, lust is always bad how we specifically avoid that path of damnation is going to be have to viewed from certain points

Again, not to beat the path of nudity, you have to point to particular individuals I thought you had wanted specific examples, but not the culture because both culture and history are against you Who said I am in favor of nudity?  I am just not prepared to condemn tons of people and say that I am right and they are wrong.  Rather I acknowledge the tension and leave the matter to peoples conscience. This is the antithesis of common sense in these debates which I find to be unfair. Sure one could point to a guy committing adultery too who was pious and maybe Amoris Laetitia could be the end result where God wills the adultery 1700 years later. I think it is unfair for you to compare this debate of nudity in sacred art that is in tons of Church's in Europe and many I have visited myself to the sin of adultery.  What moral parameters you have for it, is it okay if the genitals are covered, or is it only okay if they are mostly clothed Like I said moral theology has become time + reason = anything My friend I am sorry you have reached that conclusion but while their are tensions between the Fathers and perhaps the moral manuals of the 20th century there is a great deal more harmony than disagreement.

Particulars don't make general laws or culture, that's faulty logic.  If we are arguing about how early Christians lived then we have to be able to evaluate early Christian evidence for what their beliefs are, if the Early Christians in Rome had nudes in the Catacombs that is an important consideration. 1 woman who is a saint committed accidental suicide to avoid being raped It was intentional and that was why it was so debated and why St. Augustine addressed it in City of God, certainly I'm not advocating suicide either are you? Of course notThat's why I only want to discuss the general praxis, not particulars which is usually 1 "gotcha" moment after another. Forgive me if you thought I was engaging in this.

Also, you did the "all" trick which is also a bit unfair as well. Certainly I would exclude 90 yr old women. I never said all Christians ripped down nudes, but many men did and many did not survive antiquity and to avoid the clear case of this happening throughout the Roman empire is to avoid history. But you must admit, and I assume you know as well that this is a poor piece of evidence to make a point as many of those nudes where destroyed because they represented pagan gods. 

I think in order not to have this to go from menstruating women (which had nothing to do with the moral law, but temple purity) the same standard should be set:

-Would you recommend Our Lady to be used as an example and ask her to be a model for the artist in a nude? No If not her how about your mother? No  Would you show your friends afterwards?

-Would you take Our Lady to see such art? St. Augustine thought that the Saints in Heaven walked around in the Naked, so I guess it wouldn't matter.  However, I did go with Our Lord and Our Lady when I went to the various Churchs and Shrines in Europe to prayer at Various Altars and in front of certain relics.  So, yes.
-What would the saints we revere think of it?  I suppose it would depend on the painting Can you think of any father or doctor of the Church in particular?  I think every Doctor or Saint worth his salt always yielded to the judgement of the Church

I have a few questions of my own

Would you not enter a Church in Rome because of nudity in Sacred Art?
Would you not allow a Priest in your house who was in charge of such a Church?
If you were a priest would you instruct your faithful not to visit certain Church's in Rome because of the Nude Artwork?
Would you hold as a public sinner a person who had posed nude or partially nude for the sake of completing a piece of sacred art?
Would you view someone who held a different opinion to have a hardened heart or having a reprobate sense?
Would you cease friendship with someone who kept in their house a piece of Sacred Artwork that had nudity in it?  Such as the Last Judgement?

[Greg]

"The Church" has defected.

If you wish to define "The Church" in some nebulous fashion such that no defection can EVER be pinned on it, then sure it 'hasn't defected'.  No True Scotsman has ever defected either.  Nor can you show me any evidence he has.

But I don't see how 'The Church' gets to both define its mission and its four marks and then fail in that mission and then lay claim that is hasn't defected.  If you or I are defining what "the Church" is, then that is really no different than the True Scotsman defining himself.

Surely the thing in Rome that defines itself as the Roman Catholic Church has the natural right to define itself.

Does it practice, believe or teach consistent to the past or the diametric opposite of the past?

[Greg]

How do we know we are loving God with our whole heart?

If you are not, Jayne will tell you.

[Arvinger]

Jayne,

It is in a human's nature to be self-interested.

I'm honest enough to admit that I have/adopt/accept moral values for my own benefit and the benefit of the society around me which in turn benefits me.  If God is not there to benefit me, then I have no motivation to love God.  It's a two way street.

God created you and the entire universe that you enjoy.  God became man and suffered and died that you might be saved.  God gave the Church, the Sacraments and too many blessing to say.  Why is that not enough motivation to love God and to obey him to the best of your ability?

Yes, but that is the point - we love God because He created us, gave us all these wonderful gifts and died for our salvation. Therefore, in all honesty, we love Him and practice our faith because it brings benefits, so are responding to incentives to love Him. If God did not give us all these graces and possibility of salvation, practicing Christianity would be pointless.

I remember a Calvinist on a Protestant website saying that if it turns out he is not elect but a reprobate, it is still OK, and he would still want to glorify God by his suffering in Hell. This is of course nuttery - if Calvinism were true and I somehow had an infallible knowledge of being a reprobate, there would be zero reason for me to love God. One of my secular friends said to me recently that to him Christianity is like a stick and a carrot, since you receive Heaven for obediance and Hell for disobediance. Of course, there are people who are able to achieve perfect contrition and love God unconditionally, but for great many Catholics it is indeed sort of stick and carrot I think (i.e. they are practicing the faith because it promises benefits such as Heaven, and warns about severe penalties for failure to do so). At the end of the day, love between man and a women is, to some extent at least, transactional as well. It is human nature and the Church recognizes that - which is why imperfect contrition (i.e. out of fear of Hell) is sufficient for valid confession, and thus salvation.

[Jayne]

We may be getting astray from my original point.  I don't claim that the Old Believers or the Amish are in every aspect the mirror image of the Early Christians.  I was simply saying that if you take the examples from the Early Church on modesty in dress, jewelry, and make-up, you will find Early Christianity better reflected in Mennonites than Catholics.  I am by no means saying that the doctrines and every last practice of the followers of Menno Simons represent authentic Early Christianity.  I am saying that where the Catholic Church abandoned the Fathers on these particular things, various Protestant sects recovered them simply by reading scripture.  The Fathers themselves were following the gospels and epistles.  I don't think that's controversial.

I would disagree with it.  (Although that might not be proof that it is controversial. )

Sometimes Scripture gives moral principles illustrated by the practices of the culture in which it is written.  One approach to Scripture (this tends to be the Catholic one) is adopt the underlying principle, while not necessarily imitating the practice of the past. Another approach is adopt practices at the time Scripture was written even though the cultural significance may have changed (which is common among Protestant sects). For example, an injunction to be modest might be illustrated with a prohibition against wearing pearls in a culture in which pearls were worn primarily by prostitutes.  Those taking the first approach to Scripture would follow it by striving after modesty, but would not necessarily have a problem with wearing pearls.  Those following the second approach would forbid pearls.

The Early Church, being chronologically soon after the time Scripture was written, shared most of the cultural assumptions, so there would not be a question of taking the first approach.  This only becomes an issue as we get farther away in time.  I, therefore, do not think it is fair to describe those who take the first approach as abandoning, either Scripture or the Fathers.

[obscurus]

What an interesting topic!

I was just transcribing a personal letter by Carol Jackson where she touches on the question of rigorism in association with The Grail Movement. In the mid to late 40s, she wrote a letter describing the effects of this rigorism which relied more on human efforts than the grace of God. She made a curious statement that usually this type of rigorism ended up in mediocrity. I'll try to finish transcribing it and post it here.

The Grail is, I think, "Integrist", they have set up a perfect, little Christian community, but isolated -- especially psychologically.... The two errors in the apostolate are to accommodate yourself too much to the world (at the expense of Christianity), or to be Christian in your culture, mores etc. (not holy necessarily), at the price of separating yourself. Anne, having tasted one error, may be surging into the opposite one by reaction.

....There is another thing, that so far it seems as though all the splendor of the Grail ends in mediocrity. This is as it would be expected from a movement which depends too much on humans rather than grace.

[Jayne]

God created you and the entire universe that you enjoy.  God became man and suffered and died that you might be saved.  God gave the Church, the Sacraments and too many blessing to say.  Why is that not enough motivation to love God and to obey him to the best of your ability?

how do we know we are loving God with or whole heart

how do you know you are doing enough how w do you know if you love godenough.  there is no enough.  do we chase ideals that we know are impossible for our state in life.  you can never be prepared enough to receive holy communion for example this has led to me going years without receiving

Enough for what?

We can never love God as much as He deserves.  My constant prayer is that I love Him more each day, knowing that it will never be as much as I ought. 

I explicitly stated that we should love and obey to the best of our ability and yet you are asking about doing what is impossible to one's state of life.  Obviously one does what is appropriate for one's state of life.

Your ideas about Holy Communion come from a troubled mind and not from the teaching of the Church.  Most of know that we do not receive because we are worthy but because God is merciful.  We do not approach the Blessed Sacrament because we have earned it by perfect behaviour but because God wishes to heal us.  It is relatively simple to prepare to receive.  If one is in a state of mortal sin, go to Confession.  Pray for help to receive with as much reverence and devotion as possible.  Then trust in God.

[Mono no aware]

Sometimes Scripture gives moral principles illustrated by the practices of the culture in which it is written.  One approach to Scripture (this tends to be the Catholic one) is adopt the underlying principle, while not necessarily imitating the practice of the past. Another approach is adopt practices at the time Scripture was written even though the cultural significance may have changed (which is common among Protestant sects). For example, an injunction to be modest might be illustrated with a prohibition against wearing pearls in a culture in which pearls were worn primarily by prostitutes.  Those taking the first approach to Scripture would follow it by striving after modesty, but would not necessarily have a problem with wearing pearls.  Those following the second approach would forbid pearls.

Were pearls primarily worn by first-century prostitutes, though?  Maybe the high-class hookers of the Roman Empire wore pearls, but pearls have always been seen as pretty costly (and "cast not your pearls before swine" seems to indicate that pearls were considered precious at the time of the New Testament's composition).  I would be surprised if pearls were typically associated with your average trollop.  The examples that St. Paul uses in the bible aren't really things you'd associate with prostitutes necessarily but with flash and dazzle and showoffiness in general.  Essentially he is talking about "finery."

As a point of fact, both the Early Church Fathers and the Mennonites did not take St. Paul on the specifics of the passage we're talking about (1 Timothy 2:9).  He doesn't mention make-up at all there, but the essence of the passage is that one should reject finery and glitz in favor of the plain and the simple.  St. Clement and St. Cyprian and the others were actually following the spirit of the injunction, if not the letter.  What has happened since is that the spirit of this exhortation has been abandoned, and replaced with a Pharisaical parsing of the letter: "St. Paul didn't mention make-up, so I can wear make-up."  "Pearls can't be verboten, I love my pearls; he was probably talking about prostitutes."  I mean, for crying out loud, prostitutes have always worn jewelry of some kind.  It's a profession where it pays to be noticed, and glittery shiny things have drawn the attention of human primates since the dawn of the species.  Saying St. Paul must've been referring to prostitutes is the most shameless blanket cop-out ever devised.  You can do better, Jayne.

The bottom line, though, is that as soon as you make it about "customs" you instantly lose the spirit, which is timeless, and you're doomed to Pharisaism and relativism.

[bigbadtrad]

-Would you recommend Our Lady to be used as an example and ask her to be a model for the artist in a nude? No If not her how about your mother? No  Would you show your friends afterwards?

End of story really unless you advocate hypocrisy. If something is objectively good shame never comes into play if what is to be done is made for the public forum. Anything made for the public should be decent for all in public.

-St. Augustine thought that the Saints in Heaven walked around in the Naked, so I guess it wouldn't matter.  However, I did go with Our Lord and Our Lady when I went to the various Churchs and Shrines in Europe to prayer at Various Altars and in front of certain relics.  So, yes. In the physical manifestation of her on earth you would have her look at her son naked? You do realize that tradition says she covered Him, so you go with afterwards to undo what she did?

-I suppose it would depend on the painting Because you can't point to one teaching from saint, or father you have to go back to ambiguity

-I think every Doctor or Saint worth his salt always yielded to the judgement of the Church Certainly not in every instance both in practice and belief. Many cardinals, bishops and priests thought Rome's nudes were disgusting. In fact when they came back it was to cover the pudenda. If they just agreed you might have an argument, but history again is in my favor. And when the popes didn't do so does that also mean they also agreed with the Church's judgement or does the judgement of the Church mean one does and does not do something at the same time? Are you also saying the saints always agreed with the Pope's personal decisions? That's a novel belief. I mean AL is now a teaching of the authentic Magisterium and ecumenism is something all Catholics "must" do

I have a few questions of my own

Would you not enter a Church in Rome because of nudity in Sacred Art?  Yes and I've left afterwards many times (I've stayed there for 2 weeks, I know the place)
Would you not allow a Priest in your house who was in charge of such a Church? 100%, but I would talk to him first about why
If you were a priest would you instruct your faithful not to visit certain Church's in Rome because of the Nude Artwork? 100%
Would you hold as a public sinner a person who had posed nude or partially nude for the sake of completing a piece of sacred art? 100%
Would you view someone who held a different opinion to have a hardened heart or having a reprobate sense? Confused because of poor leadership, but certainly down the wrong path and happy to tell them the truth of the saints and fathers which I could present to them. I'd love to see your documentation too.
Would you cease friendship with someone who kept in their house a piece of Sacred Artwork that had nudity in it?  Such as the Last Judgement? I already have.

(this is me and not Noah)
The point of the OP was this and I'll represent it clearly: when is the history of the faith of any importance if we can't present it as our own? You've used the magic of particulars, many of which I can do too but I refuse because it's an obfuscation of the point. When is a truth no longer a truth because time eradicates it? When is a common belief no more than an sheet of paper or an electronic image because people stopped caring or believing? Also when people use deliberate obfuscations based on emotional particulars to make a false narrative?

Without realizing it we make a mockery of our faith by doing this. The church has become nothing more than who's the pope and everything else is worthless. The "io sono tradizione" is now Catholicism. We see it rotting and dying and if our only response is the past shows this or that inconstancy therefore it's kinda worthless makes a mockery of the whole.