Given Roman Catholic teaching regarding the valid operation of the sacraments, everyone will acknowledge the need for a priest: without him (or without a “him” on call from someplace or other) you can’t have Holy Communion and a few other incidental things that the old folks especially want. So they need a priest around, and if he just sticks to his minimal Sunday duties he’ll be all right. But it's strange; this ignoring of the priest's role in quantum homo, as a father and leader of his flock, tends not to exalt his supernatural calling in quantum imago Christi, but to debase it to the level of a brute superstition. In other words, when we sever the idea of ordained ministry in quantum imago Christi from its foundation in human nature, we revert to the barbaric idea of the minister as magician or ritual functionary. He is a father no more, but the sacerdotal equivalent of a sperm donor.
Not long ago, I thought about how rarely I have ever looked upon the pastor at any parish where I've been worshiping as any sort of spiritual father, or an authority figure in all but the minimal sense. That is, I've only been able to take him seriously as "magician or ritual functionary," because there is very little if anything fatherly about him. Clerics these days -- and I'm not just talking about Catholic priests, so cool your jets, you usual suspects -- too often comport themselves as Best Buddies, or mere Therapists. Maybe it's just me, but I've always thought that there was something really wrong, and ultimately undermining, about being part of a spiritual community that had no spiritual father. Esolen puts his finger on what's so destructive, over the long haul, of the attitude that so many Catholics (like me) have of just gritting their teeth and saying "ex opere operato," and trying to console themselves with the fact that the Eucharist is valid, no matter what the priest is like. That kind of thing gets you through this Sunday, and next Sunday, and the Sunday after that. But what about the next 20 years?
Do any of the rest of you, of whatever church or confession, have the same sense about church leadership?
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M_David,
My lack of an answer has more to do with the lack of ability to answer than ignoring you (I cannot be a constant presence on these boards). :-)
Hehe...to further go off from the original topic of this thread...
I see and agree with your fundamental point: a person 'married' without their consent or affirmation given via free will would not be a sacramentally valid marriage, as I am asssuming your example of affirmation by gunpoint is taken to be. As others have pointed out, you gave a rather extreme example and a very slim minority of how the policy is actually practiced. Here are the primary reasons that the RCC sites as grounds for annulment (among others they did not list). Now understand that I lifted this off a RCC parish web page and may or may not necessarily reflect official Church teaching (since I am an outsider to the RCC):
(1) Was the marriage ceremony legally acceptable to the Catholic Church?
(2) Were both spouses free to marry each other?
(3) Was each spouse adequately prepared to understand, accept and fulfill the rights and obligations of marriage?
(4) Did each spouse intend to accept and fulfill what, in the Church's tradition, has been taught as the divine plan for marriage?
(5) Was the marriage physically consummated after the wedding?
(6) Were both spouses baptized Christians either before or during the marriage?
While (1), (2), and (6) are pretty definitive, the others leave a heck of a lot of 'wiggle' room and is likely the primary reason that otherwise sacramentally valid marriages are allowed to become annulled.
I am not here to debate RCC doctrine, though. My original point that I am sticking with is that annulments, in practice, are many times no different than a divorce for other faiths--end result is the same in an otherwise sacramentally valid marriage. The RCC theory on annulment is good though...if only it were applied more rigidly.>
justin:
Does holding a gun to a person's head constitute an invalid marriage? I would think so, but I think we can also agree that such situations are exceedingly rare.
So you do agree that there can be an annulment, even in the Orthodox religion, and this is different than a divorce. We agree!!!
I'll just ignore the other anti-Catholic stuff there as it is not relevant to this issue.
Now...why don't you answer mine re Western agnostic theology. Can you ever really know that you're married? In the East, I can--the Church said it and it is.
Obviously, for Catholics or Orthodox, a person can never know. You said it yourself - if your bride was under an unknown threat to marry you, you already agree the marriage would not be valid.
The Orthodox, Catholics, and Protestants agree on this issue.>
Basileus:
My lack of an answer has more to do with the lack of ability to answer than ignoring you
My apologies.
(RC doctrine)...leave a heck of a lot of 'wiggle' room and is likely the primary reason that otherwise sacramentally valid marriages are allowed to become annulled...
The RCC theory on annulment is good though...if only it were applied more rigidly.
I agree with you 100%.
There is a LOT of spiritual corruption in the American Catholic Church, especially when it comes to pelvic issues.>
Bruce:
an annulment...is different than a divorce...
In theory? Yes. In practical practice? It doesn't appear so.
I cannot speak to specific abuses of doctrine. If you are saying it exists, I agree.
I would add that Christ knows the validity, and he will judge. I would not want to be a priest/bishop that puts his stamp on the breakup of a valid sacrament - Catholic or Orthodox. Sacraments are forever.>
"You said it yourself - if your bride was under an unknown threat to marry you, you already agree the marriage would not be valid"
This is exactly what I was talking about--taking an extreme example and applying it where it should not be applied. When opposing counsel starts arguing like this, I know that I'll be putting food on the table for a while longer.
When Christ through His Church says we are one, we are one.
If what I said is anti-Catholic, you folks have thinner skins than I thought.
You have not answered my question, except to mock it. Either you entirely missed my point, or you are unwilling to deal with the consequences.
I find it sad to think that there are folks out there who think that it is part of God's sacramental plan for us to never know if we are actually receiving grace. That's not a loving God, but a trickster.>
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