Well, I'd have to agree with you about the one world religion. I'm not sure I "see" it. I can't imagine anything that would be able to bring mankind together that way, anyway...we do tend to argue.
As for the other issues...let me mull this out a little, if you will? You say the Pope is "bound to follow Catholic social teaching". And yet that link sent me to a place that says that: "No official list of documents exists" of such teachings and that "Clearly, the expression CST is elastic."
Sorry, I have no idea what you are referring to.[/quote]
I'm not saying this to attack Catholicism, but because I struggle to see how anyone, even the Pope, can function adequately within a set of rules that are obviously broad, vague, elastic and not clearly written. Please correct me if I'm wrong about this...I'm only going off the page you linked me to.[/quote] It must be a bad link. I regret posting it.
But that does bring me to the communion issue...let's use that as our case in point that perhaps the article that kicked off this thread may not have been 'silly'.
Catchy tabloid type headlines are always silly, and rarely does it reflect the content of the article.
[/quote]Pope Francis, I believe, has been suggesting that allowing people who have been divorced and remarried to receive communion should be a matter of conscious. He has not made it a doctrine. He did promote Cardinal Kevin Farrell, who agrees with the Pope, and described the reception of communion by the divorced and remarried as a "process of discernment and of conscience.”
Now, being a Protestant, I agree! And I don't even suppose I'd mind a few bits of 'discernment and conscience' working their way into the Catholic Church. But the point of the thread and what I truly was wondering, is if Catholics see these things as "liberal changes" or not. I suppose, clearly you do not, while the author of the book (whom I take to be Catholic) does.
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And as for "fake news". The Gospel Coalition is eminently trustworthy, just not Catholic.[/QUOTE]
'discernment and conscience' have been in the Church for a long time., depending on the circumstances. Some books belong on the bottom of a bird cage. Douthat is a sensationalist column writer, and not a papal expert.
And there is no reason a liberalized Catholic Church would be any different from the Episcopal, Presbyterian, and Lutheran churches in demographic freefall.
Yes, we know. That's partly why contraception is so dangerous.
Little girls do not grow up dreaming of hopping from bed to bed and contraception. They dream of a man who will sweep them off their feet and love them forever, and of having his many children. A cynicism born of the sexual revolution has brought emptiness to the hearts, wombs and lives of far too many modern women. This emptiness and pain can be avoided or redeemed and healed by the love of Christ and adherence to His teachings. The Catholic Church believes in such dreams because God wrote them on the human heart. And there are men who long for such a woman to love and cherish.
Real lovers want to give without reserve in God's own superabundance creating more hearts and lives to love. Contraception is like kissing through a screen door and real love cannot tolerate obstacles. Contraception breeds selfishness and separation that drives a wedge between husband and wife that kills love. Real lovers want their love to explode into the posterity of future generations for all eternity. This is the kind of passion and fulfillment God wants for His children. Contraception limits what should be boundless. It spits in the face of this glorious passion and love's true abandon; and that is why it is a sin. It seeks to "tame" love, thus killing it. The Catholic Church is the last bastion on earth of true romance. The modern world has suffocated love and made sex a thing of deadness.
