re: Catholic California univ to host Pelosi as commencement speaker despite abortion stance

quote:

---

Many other Catholics who post here do make those arguments.

---

Are you still trying to convince people around here that the Roman Catholic Church is just as fractured as the many different Protestant denominations, including your own Presbyterian-brand of church?

We must be talking about two different things. You insist on keeping the conversation strictly within the context of the various theological beliefs held by various individuals, who privately hold doctrinal beliefs that are not aligned with the Official Theology of their church. This is a form of Disunity, and, in that sense, you may argue that the Roman Catholic Church is fractured because various individual Catholics hold theological beliefs that are not aligned with the Catholic Catechism.

However, in this discussion, I'm talking about something different. I'm talking about how fractured Official Theological Doctrine has become within the Protestant movement, over the centuries.

I point out as an example how your own Presbyterian church is fractured, by definition, because the various Official Theological Doctrines held by the various fractured parts of that church are not the privately-held theological beliefs of some individual laity members of the church, but, rather these opposite and opposing theologies are the Official Publc Doctrine of these component fragments of what once was a unified church, but is no longer unified.

Roman Catholicism, by this standard, is not fractured and is unified, because we have published our Official Theological Doctrine in the form of this comprehensive Catechism.

Here's the Catechism on-line.

LINK

Look how fractured the Presbyterians are today, and I'm not talking about privately-held opinions that don't align with the Preacher's church, I'm talking about Offical Theological Doctrine of these fragmented parts of what was once the Presbyterian Church. Check out GROK. The list of fragment churches is more than a dozen; and this is JUST the fragment parts of Presbyterian churches.

"Key Examples of Theological Branches/Denominations (Primarily U.S.-Focused, as That's Where Most Diversity Exists)
Here are the most commonly referenced ones, grouped roughly by theology (with approximate recent membership figures where available):

Liberal/Mainline:
Presbyterian Church (USA) — PC(USA): The largest U.S. Presbyterian body (~1 million members). Theologically diverse/progressive on many issues.

Moderate/Evangelical:
Evangelical Presbyterian Church (EPC): Allows some flexibility (e.g., women's ordination as a non-essential issue); evangelical with charismatic openness in some congregations.
ECO: A Covenant Order of Evangelical Presbyterians: Formed as a conservative-leaning split from PC(USA); emphasizes evangelical renewal but allows women's ordination.

Conservative/Confessional:
Presbyterian Church in America (PCA): Largest conservative U.S. body (~400,000 members); evangelical, Reformed, complementarian (no women's ordination).
Orthodox Presbyterian Church (OPC): Highly confessional and conservative (~33,000 members); strict on Westminster Standards.
Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church (ARPC/ARP): Conservative, with Scottish roots.
Reformed Presbyterian Church of North America (RPCNA): Very conservative; practices exclusive psalmody (no hymns) and has a strong covenanting tradition.
Others: Bible Presbyterian Church (BPC), various smaller Reformed Presbyterian groups, Korean-American Presbyterian Church (conservative evangelical).

Other/Notable Variants:
Cumberland Presbyterian Church: More Arminian-leaning (less strict Calvinism) and historically more liberal on some issues.
Continuing or tiny splinters (e.g., Reformed Presbyterian Church in the U.S., Covenant Presbyterian Church): Often ultra-conservative or separatist.


In Scotland (the historic heartland of Presbyterianism), there are about 10 denominations, ranging from the large Church of Scotland (more mainline) to smaller conservative/free/church bodies like the Free Church of Scotland or Reformed Presbyterian Church of Scotland."

quote:

---

I agree with you that you aren't a practicing Catholic if you aren't regularly attending Mass, but I don't think that helps the case of the claim of unity. They are still nominal Catholics and are part of the one apostolic church according to Rome, so whether they are faithful Catholics or not, they are still included in this claim to unity.

---

Don't agree. A "Republican" that has voted for every Dem candidate for president the last 25 years is no longer a Republican and shouldn't be considered when defining characteristics of Republicans. He's a Democrat that hasn't gotten around to changing his party affiliation. Likewise, someone who answers the question, "are you Catholic, Protestant, Jewish or Muslim?" with, "well, I'm none of the above but was baptized Catholic 40 years ago, so I guess put my down for Catholic even though that was the last time I was in a church" - that ain't a Catholic.

quote:

---

I do know anecdotally that there are at least some Catholics that disagree with the official teachings. Most of the Catholics in the Democrat party are this way.

---

I'm not even sure that's the case. I think there are shite loads that say something like this, "I agree abortion is a sin, but don't think we should be foisting our religious beliefs on others." I have heard, "I believe adultery is a sin but I don't support laws making it illegal, same goes for abortion" about a dozen times from Catholic libs.

quote:

---

Are you still trying to convince people around here that the Roman Catholic Church is just as fractured as the many different Protestant denominations, including your own Presbyterian-brand of church?

---

Yes, because you are not using balanced measures. You are trying to say that the RCC is unified around one set of doctrines while pointing to many different organizations with different sets of doctrines and claiming yourself superior for that reason.

If you get a little more narrow, you can talk about a particular denomination and compare it to Roman Catholicism. My denomination does not hold to contradictory teaching standards, but to one set of standards summarized by the Westminster Confession of Faith and Larger and Shorter Catechisms. We do not hold to other Confessions or statements of faith that other churches and denominations may hold to, so you can't lump us in with all Protestants and then compare us to yourself.

quote:

---

We must be talking about two different things. You insist on keeping the conversation strictly within the context of the various theological beliefs held by various individuals, who privately hold doctrinal beliefs that are not aligned with the Official Theology of their church. This is a form of Disunity, and, in that sense, you may argue that the Roman Catholic Church is fractured because various individual Catholics hold theological beliefs that are not aligned with the Catholic Catechism.

---

I'm trying to discuss the same thing you are discussing, but you keep equivocating and changing definitions.

You want to talk about Protestantism as if we are one organization with many competing and contradictory beliefs, and then you compare that to the RCC as one organization with one consistent set of beliefs. You are comparing apples to oranges, which is why I'm trying to something more common when talking about unity.

You claim that sola scriptura is not good standard because it leads to differences of beliefs, and you again refer back to the various Protestant denominations as an example of this, where different denoms and individuals within them believe different things because they become their own interpreter of the Bible, and if they only had an infallible interpreter like the Roman Magisterium, there wouldn't be so much variance in belief.

However, as I keep pointing out, you do have an infallible interpreter (so you claim), and yet you still have a variance of beliefs in spite of that interpreter. If it were so clear and definitive as you claim, then all Catholics would simply submit to it or be excluded as not being truly "Catholic". The end result is that you do have a lot of variation of beliefs and practices within Catholicism in spite of your "infallible" Magisterium, just like various Protestant churches have a lot of variation of beliefs and practices in spite of our belief in an infallible Scripture. I'm calling out not just the double standard but the lack of practical unity in Catholicism that you claim you are protected from over and against Protestantism.

quote:

---

However, in this discussion, I'm talking about something different. I'm talking about how fractured Official Theological Doctrine has become within the Protestant movement, over the centuries.

---

I could talk about how "fractured" the Catholic doctrines have been over the centuries, as well. The "infallible" Magisterium has been updated over the centuries to reflect changes in positions, which shouldn't happen if she receives one single thread of teaching from the apostles and interprets it for clarity for the masses.

quote:

---

I point out as an example how your own Presbyterian church is fractured, by definition, because the various Official Theological Doctrines held by the various fractured parts of that church are not the privately-held theological beliefs of some individual laity members of the church, but, rather these opposite and opposing theologies are the Official Publc Doctrine of these component fragments of what once was a unified church, but is no longer unified.

---

What does it matter what the official teachings are if they are not enforced? I keep drawing you back to this, because your claim for unity is hollow, since the end result is that Catholics vary greatly from one to another just like Protestants. If my denomination had an infallible interpreter of the Bible but allowed us to believe whatever we wanted, what's the point of the interpreter? The result would look exactly like it does for our standard of Scripture alone being our infallible standard.

quote:

---

Roman Catholicism, by this standard, is not fractured and is unified, because we have published our Official Theological Doctrine in the form of this comprehensive Catechism.

Here's the Catechism on-line.

LINK

---

While I am a Protestant, I and actually a Reformed Presbyterian Protestant, which means I hold to a denomination that has particular standards of belief. We adhere to the Westminster Standards.

You can find them here.

LINK

quote:

---

Don't agree. A "Republican" that has voted for every Dem candidate for president the last 25 years is no longer a Republican and shouldn't be considered when defining characteristics of Republicans. He's a Democrat that hasn't gotten around to changing his party affiliation. Likewise, someone who answers the question, "are you Catholic, Protestant, Jewish or Muslim?" with, "well, I'm none of the above but was baptized Catholic 40 years ago, so I guess put my down for Catholic even though that was the last time I was in a church" - that ain't a Catholic.

---

I think you need to define what a Catholic is, then, because otherwise it sounds like the No True Scotsman fallacy. You need to have an objective standard to compare to.

I'm sure you're right that many professing Catholics are not Catholic in terms of their total agreement with all of Rome's teachings, yet you need to define a cut-off, then, because I keep hearing argumentation that you don't have to believe 100% of what the RCC teaches in order to be Catholic.

We were having this discussion already, where you were saying that it's nuts to count disunity where there is not 100% agreement:

"There needs to be 100% agreement amongst 1.5 billion people on every aspect of Catholic doctrine, or there is no unity in the Church? That's crazy."

LINK

So again, in one thread, you are arguing that Catholics don't have to agree on everything in order to be unified (as Catholics), while in this thread, you are arguing that not everyone who claims to be Catholic is one, because they don't agree with the teachings of the RCC. It seems to me that you are using different standards based on the argument presented, but of course, I could be wrong.

quote:

---

I'm not even sure that's the case. I think there are shite loads that say something like this, "I agree abortion is a sin, but don't think we should be foisting our religious beliefs on others." I have heard, "I believe adultery is a sin but I don't support laws making it illegal, same goes for abortion" about a dozen times from Catholic libs.

---

Yep, there are many who do that, yet the poll I posted before was talking about whether or not abortion was moral or immoral, not just whether or not it should be legal or illegal.

quote:

---

We adhere to the Westminster Standards.

---

Do all 8,000 members of your church in the whole USA believe these standards? There are only about 8,000 members of your church in the whole USA.

What about the rest of the Presbyterian sections of your church?

Do Southern Baptists believe in the Westminster Standards?

quote:

---

Do all 8,000 members of your church in the whole USA believe these standards? There are only about 8,000 members of your church in the whole USA.

---

They may not believe every bit of it, no. Members are only required to submit to the teachings, not subscribe to every jot and tittle. Officers must subscribe to it all.

quote:

---

What about the rest of the Presbyterian sections of your church?

---

Probably not.

quote:

---

Do Southern Baptists believe in the Westminster Standards?

---

Definitely not.

It's OK if not everyone in my denomination or other denominations agrees 100% with these standards, because we believe that sin confuses people and blinds people from the truth. We also believe those standards are not infallible, though we believe they are a faithful summary of what the infallible Scriptures teach.

But again, this is OK for us, because we don't claim to have perfect unity like Rome does over and against all else. We don't claim to have an infallible Magisterium like Rome does that determines the truth in all ages. We also don't believe we are the only church, like Rome does. We're OK with being as we are, knowing that Christ will continue to expand His Church and protect her, even if we are not infallible. It's Rome that sets the bar too high for herself.