Question For The Theologians Out There

[CatherineM]

We discussed Rahner today in Pastoral Theology. The issue of female ordination has been deemed by the Holy See as closed for discussion. Therefore those who wish to debate about it and push for it, can not call themselves orthodox.

[Madame Vengier]

[quote name='CatherineM' post='1668715' date='Oct 2 2008, 08:24 PM']We discussed Rahner today in Pastoral Theology. The issue of female ordination has been deemed by the Holy See as closed for discussion. Therefore those who wish to debate about it and push for it, can not call themselves orthodox.[/quote]

That's exactly what I said to this Sister. Almost word for word. She insists the Magisterium doesn't have a right to tell Catholics what they can and cannot discuss. In any case, this is all very, very old and played out. Liberal theology is tired, played out and has nothing to offer. All it does is make these liberals miserable and unhappy all the time.

[CatherineM]

[quote name='Madame Vengier' post='1668732' date='Oct 2 2008, 07:44 PM']That's exactly what I said to this Sister. Almost word for word. She insists the Magisterium doesn't have a right to tell Catholics what they can and cannot discuss. In any case, this is all very, very old and played out. Liberal theology is tired, played out and has nothing to offer. All it does is make these liberals miserable and unhappy all the time.[/quote]

The church can certainly tell us what is closed for discussion. I mean we don't discuss whether Jesus was divine anymore. That was settled, and we've moved on. There are so many things in theology to discuss, why bother with settled things? You're right, they do seem really miserable. They remind me of old cranky guys who put signs up on their lawns complaining about something weird, or the ones that disrupt city council meetings all the time.

[mortify]

I don't understand the sister's argument about baptism effacing our gender and that suddenly the sacerdotal priesthood becomes available to all.

[CatherineM]

[quote name='mortify' post='1668765' date='Oct 2 2008, 08:18 PM']I don't understand the sister's argument about baptism effacing our gender and that suddenly the sacerdotal priesthood becomes available to all.[/quote]

You don't understand it, because it's gobbledygook. It's good that you don't understand it. That is your little voice telling you that something is against the rules.

[eagle_eye222001]

This "baptism" argument sounds like a typical argument a non-Catholic would use.

An argument where your evidence does not really support what you want it to support but you pretend it supports it. In the case of a bible verse, you make the verse say something it is not really saying.

[Madame Vengier]

[quote name='mortify' post='1668765' date='Oct 2 2008, 08:18 PM']I don't understand the sister's argument about baptism effacing our gender and that suddenly the sacerdotal priesthood becomes available to all.[/quote]


She didn't say (and I didn't say she said) that she believes Baptism "effaces" our gender. You said that. She believes that through Baptism we have complete gender equality and that as such there is no right in denying women certain ministries in the Church. The great problem here is that "equality" never means "we all can do the same thing". I called her attention to the Scripture which talks about how many members have different gifts. She still doesn't see that as evidence of why only men can be priests. It really doesn't matter--she's in rebellion, period. And the Bible has something to say about people in rebellion, too.

[Madame Vengier]

[quote name='eagle_eye222001' post='1669097' date='Oct 3 2008, 12:59 AM']This "baptism" argument sounds like a typical argument a non-Catholic would use.[/quote]

How could you know, since when you posted this I had not yet even gone into detail or clarified the sister's Baptism argument?

[Madame Vengier]

[quote name='CatherineM' post='1668873' date='Oct 2 2008, 10:15 PM']You don't understand it, because it's gobbledygook.[/quote]

It is, it really, really is. When you listen to them talk and try to make sense of what they are saying it's just arguments built on sand. The thoughts just float in and out of their mouths with no foundation or substance. And they are so angry. And miserable in their dissent. It's sad--I said that before and I really mean it--it makes me sad.

[Pio Nono]

JMJ
10/3 - Twenty-sixth Friday

I don't know if this will help, but this is the first draft of a VERY short assignment on Karl Rahner's method. I hope it gives some of the background to his thought, especially his concern to be "supratemporal" or "transhistorical".

I'm no Rahnerian, by the way. I think he's faulty in many, many ways. And neither am I a good writer, so read at your own risk.

[quote]Rahner’s “Transcendental” Apologetics

Karl Rahner sets forth his method of apologetics in his work Hearer of the Word. This method, which can be called “transcendental,” is one which seeks to discover the necessary preconditions if man is to receive a revelation from God, assuming that man is capable of receiving such a revelation and God is capable of giving it.

Rahner uses this method in the context of a general transcendental movement in the philosophy of religion. The secular form of this movement, which was key to the Modernist controversy, held that no historical event had metaphysical value. Thus, no individual could say that he had received a definitive revelation from God. Dogmatic definitions, therefore, which were necessarily historical declarations, had no real binding force and could change over time.

This idea itself came out of the thought of men like David Hume and the continental rationalists of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Hume held that causality did not exist in itself, but was simply our conclusion derived from the constant juxtaposition of two events. For instance, hemlock does not cause the death of Socrates. I merely observe the juxtaposition of the events “Socrates drinks hemlock” and “Socrates dies” enough times to conclude, “Hemlock caused the death of Socrates.” In Hume’s mind, there is no causal connection between consuming poison and dying. The continental rationalists held a priori that man had no free will. The deterministic universe of Newton made it clear to these men that free will was an illusion. This presented philosophers with a twofold problem. On the one hand, causality was no longer regarded as true, making everything “without cause,” so to speak. On the other, the Newtonian, deterministic universe required causality if it were to function at all. Philosophy was nearing a dead-end, so to speak.

Immanuel Kant sought to reconcile these two views by providing a philosophy of free will that agreed with a Humian philosophy of acausality. Thus, he posited a bifurcated world of phenomena – the things we sense – and the noumenon – reality in itself. He and his disciples used this distinction to argue that God, who dwells in the noumenon, cannot reveal Himself to mankind, who dwells exclusively in the phenomenal world. Since man has no direct access to the noumenon, he cannot know God.

Karl Rahner seeks to maintain Kant’s distinction while holding that, indeed, God is capable of revealing and man is capable of receiving such a revelation. He seeks to set up a philosophy of religion, therefore, that is capable of validating epistemically the belief that, a priori, man has the capacity to listen to a revelation from God (cf. 5).[/quote]

[journeyman]

Sister's starting point might be the fundamental [u][url="http://www.vatican.va/archive/catechism/p2s2c1a1.htm"]text from the Catechism[/url][/u] - there is no distinction by gender . . . one distinction that might be made is that the priesthood of the Body of Christ is not synonymous with the priesthood of Holy Orders - just as a lay person with a master's degree in theology is not synonymous with a professed sister . . . even if both fill the position of DRE at a parish


1241 The anointing with sacred chrism, perfumed oil consecrated by the bishop, signifies the gift of the Holy Spirit to the newly baptized, who has become a Christian, that is, one "anointed" by the Holy Spirit, incorporated into Christ who is anointed priest, prophet, and king.41

1268 The baptized have become "living stones" to be "built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood."73 By Baptism they share in the priesthood of Christ, in his prophetic and royal mission. They are "a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God's own people, that [they] may declare the wonderful deeds of him who called [them] out of darkness into his marvelous light."74 Baptism gives a share in the common priesthood of all believers.

1273 Incorporated into the Church by Baptism, the faithful have received the sacramental character that consecrates them for Christian religious worship.83 The baptismal seal enables and commits Christians to serve God by a vital participation in the holy liturgy of the Church and to exercise their baptismal priesthood by the witness of holy lives and practical charity.84

1279 The fruit of Baptism, or baptismal grace, is a rich reality that includes forgiveness of original sin and all personal sins, birth into the new life by which man becomes an adoptive son of the Father, a member of Christ and a temple of the Holy Spirit. By this very fact the person baptized is incorporated into the Church, the Body of Christ, and made a sharer in the priesthood of Christ.


41 Cf. RBC 62.
73 1 Pet 2:5.
74 1 Pet 2:9.
83 Cf. LG 11.
84 Cf. LG 10.