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|  | Re: Ignorance of Catholic doctrine - Pat Buckley a
« Reply #60 on May 14, 2010, 1:43am » | |
John Cornwell has been launching more attacks on the Pope in relation to Cardinal Newman, this time in the Sunday Times. I must say he does raise some legit questions about whether the miracle on the basis of which Newman is to be beatified really deserves that name (it boils down to relief of back pain after surgery) but some of his claims about Newman's views are utter distortions which ought to be dispelled by the most cursory acquaintance with Newman's writings. The only explanation for this is that Cornwell is so obsessed with his own brand of liberal Catholicism that he automatically projects it onto Newman without realising how much the Cardinal differed from him. Here are a couple of rebuttals, with further links, including to Cornwell's article. Below I offer my own mini-fisk.
http://wdtprs.com/blog/2010/05/attack-on....-ven-jh-newman/
http://the-hermeneutic-of-continuity.blo....uote-again.html
EXTRCT FROM CORNWELL BEGINS
There are Catholics who fail to see the funny side of appropriating miracles to prove a person’s holiness. Clifford Longley, senior columnist and leader writer on the Catholic weekly The Tablet, is scathing: “The idea that God would demonstrate that a saint is truly in heaven by instantly healing someone’s fatal illness because he has been petitioned by the said saint — who is in turn responding to the petitions of the sufferer or those near to him — seems to me so simplistic, so credulous, so presumptuous, so mechanical and so manipulative, that it brings no credit to the Catholic religion and indeed confirms the worst prejudices of its enemies.” THIS SAYS MORE ABOUT THE CULTURAL PREJUDICES OF CLIFFORD LONGLEY AND CORNWELL THAN IT DOES ABOUT NEWMAN - IT AMOUNTS TO DOUBT ABOUT INTERCESSORY PRAYER AND DIVINE INTERVENTION IN THE MATERIAL WORLD. GOD IS NOT AN ENGLISH GENTLEMAN ANY MORE THAN HE IS A ROMAN ARISTOCRAT
Scientists argue that scientific explanations depend on current theories in science, which are valid only until falsified or proven otherwise. Highly placed Jesuits in Rome have long pressed the Vatican to abandon its quest for scientifically “tested” physical miracles and to look for “moral” and “spiritual” ones — the power of prayer to heal bereavement or cure an alcoholic or a drug-taker. They argue that it is more difficult to heal a hardened or broken heart than to cure a physical illness. IN OTHER WORDS, THEY DON'T BELIEVE IN MIRACLES AS PHYSICAL PHENOMENA. I MIGHT ADD THAT IT IS MUCH EASIER TO COUNTERFEIT A 'MORAL MIRACLE' But Benedict XVI, like his predecessor, John Paul II, is having none of it. The papal role as final adjudicator of the scientifically tested supernatural must stay. CORNWELL THUS SUGGESTS THAT THE PAPACY UPHOLDS BELIEF IN MIRACLES ONLY TO BUTTRESS ITS OWN AUTHORITY AND NOT FOR SUCH TRIFLING CONSIDERATIONS AS SCRIPTURE AND TRADITION. THIS ASSUMPTION THAT THE OPPONENT MUST INEVITABLY BE DISHONEST REMINDS ME OF ATTILA SINKE GUIMARAES [FOR WHOM SEE MY POST IN SSPX SCHISM UP TO DATE]
Cardinal Newman would have vehemently opposed the popes on the issue. He argued that the faithful should be prepared to accept that miracles occur within nature, not outside it. TRUE, BUT NEWMAN DID NOT MEAN BY THIS THAT PHYSICAL MIRACLES DO NOT HAPPEN AT ALL. HIS WORKS CONTAIN LONG DISCUSSIONS ON THE AUTHENTICITY OF RECORDED ACCOUNTS OF MIRACLES FROM MEDIAEVAL AND PATRISTIC SOURCES; WHILE NEWMAN WAS PREPARED TO WITHDRAW WHEN CONVINCED NATURAL EXPLANATIONS WERE POSSIBLE - E.G. FOR THE PHENOMENON OF CERTAIN CONFESSORS SPEAKING AFTEER THEIR TONGUES WERE CUT OUT - HE MAINTAINED THAT MIRACLES CERTAINLY DID AND DO OCCUR AND CANNOT RATIONALLY BE DISMISSED A PRIORI. ONE OF KINGSLEY'S CRITICISMS OF NEWMAN WAS PRECISELY THAT HE WAS UNDULY CREDULOUS ABOUT ACCOUNTS OF MIRACLES, AND HONESTY COMPELS ME TO ADMIT THAT KINGSLEY WAS NOT ALTOGETHER MISTAKEN ON THIS POINT. He preached, in any case, that “nothing is gained by miracles, nothing comes of miracles, as regards our religious views, principles and habits. Hard as it is to believe, miracles certainly do not make men better”. NEWMAN WAS ONLY TALKING ABOUT THE LIMITATIONS OF MIRACLES AS APOLOGETIC TOOLS - THEY DO NOT INSTANTLY CONVERT BELIEF INTO UNBELIEF. NEWMAN ALSO SAID THAT THE ANGLICAN CHURCH WAS NOT THE CHURCH OF CHRIST AND THAT MERE BELIEF IN GOD WAS NOT THE SAME AS CHRISTIANITY - THIS DOES NOT MEAN HE BELIEVED ANGLICANS WERE NO BETTER THAN PAGANS, OR THEISTS THAN ATHEISTS. The final irony is that Newman himself was utterly opposed to the idea of his own beatification. To thwart attempts to make a cult of his remains, he ordered that he be buried in a rich compost so that his corpse would decompose rapidly — an action that cheated the saint-makers. NEWMAN WS NOT OPPOSED TO THE VENERATION OF SAINTS PER SE AS HIS WRITINGS - E.G. ON THE ORATORIAN FOUNDER ST. PHILIP NERI AMPLY PROVE. HUMILITY IS NOT THE SAME THING AS BEING OPPOSED TO BEATIFICATION PER SE. IF NEWMAN HAD ANTICIPATED HIS OWN CANONISATION - A LA FR. MACIEL WHO GAVE INSTRUCTIONS ON HOW HIS ORDER SHOULD GO ABOUT PROMOTING HIS CAUSE - THIS WOULD BE A STRONG ARGUMENT THAT HE WAS NOT WORTHY OF IT. When the clerical gravediggers attempted an exhumation to retrieve his relics in October 2008, they found nothing except the coffin’s brass plate and handles.
END OF EXTRACT
Some more responses to Cornwell's claims - Hermeneutic of Continuity discusses Pope Benedict's rebuttal of the view that Newman means by "conscience" a purely subjective process. This is a very revealing quote:
EXTRACT
In this lecture, Ratzinger also made a point which is relevant to other attempts to smear him. He tells of a particular conversation with academic colleagues concerning the justifying power of the erroneous conscience. Someone countered that if this thesis were true, then the Nazi SS would be justified and we should seek them in heaven because "they carried out all their atrocities with fanatic conviction and complete certainty of conscience". Another colleague responded with assurance that this would be the case [I.E. THIS COLLEAGUE STATED THAT SS MEN WHO TORTURED AND MURDERED THE INNOCENT IN THE BELIEF THAT THIS WAS THE RIGHT THING WOULD IN FACT CERTAINLY BE SAVED.]. Ratzinger comments:
Since that conversation, I knew with complete certainty that something was wrong with the theory of justifying power of the subjective conscience, that, in other words, a concept of conscience which leads to such conclusions must be false.
END
Ian Ker argues that Newman's thought is the key to resolving the post-Vatican II crises
EXTRACTS
Where Newman anticipated the Council in his theology, he was always careful not to exaggerate, not to lose his balance. It is well known, for example, that Newman championed the cause of the laity, but he never conceived of some kind of lay as opposed to clerical Church. From his study of the Greek Fathers he understood the Church to be primarily a sacramental communion, the organic community that Vatican II embraced in the two opening chapters of the Constitution on the Church. The Church was not primarily hierarchical, as post-Tridentine theology assumed, but nor was it a lay democracy. Again, for instance, Newman understood Revelation to be primarily the revealing of God in Christ rather than the revealing of doctrinal propositions, but because his theology of Revelation was personal rather than propositional that did not mean that he did not think doctrinal truths to be essential for our apprehension of God in Christ...
Deep in history, Newman understood very clearly that Councils move "in contrary declarations.... perfecting, completing, supplying each other". Vatican I's definition of papal infallibility needed to be complemented, modified by a much larger teaching on the Church, so, Newman correctly predicted, there would be another Council which would do just that. But equally Vatican II needs complementing and modifying. Newman keenly appreciated that Councils have unintended consequences by virtue both of what they say and what they don't say. The tendency is for the former to be exaggerated, as happened in the wake of Vatican II, when one might have supposed that the Church had no other business except justice and peace, ecumenism, inter-religious dialogue, and so on. But what Councils do not deal with, and therefore neglect, is also of great significance: thus Vatican II was deafeningly silent about what was to become the main preoccupation of the pontificate of John Paul II: evangelisation.
END
http://www.catholicherald.co.uk/features/opinion/o0000315.shtml
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hibernicus
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| | Re: Ignorance of Catholic doctrine - Pat Buckley a
« Reply #61 on Jul 13, 2010, 4:24am » | |
BTW the American traditionalist John Zmirak has produced a comic-book called THE GRAND INQUISITOR which is founded on the Ratzinger remark about good faith cited above: in this riff on the Dostoevsky story the "Grand Inquisitor" (a powerful liberal cardinal) decides that faith and the church are bad things because those who have faith and nonetheless sin will go to Hell, and therefore works to destroy the Church and extinguish the faith in the belief that when they are gone sinners cannot be held responsible for their sin and will all be saved through invincible ignorance.
I must say this taps into one of the major differences between the mid-century church and our own. There was a widespread sense - seen at its best in someone like Frank Duff, that as Catholics we had something good, that we ought to feel pity for those who did not have it or had lost it, and that we ought to reach out to bring faith, and with it hope and charity, to society as a whole. There was much about that vision that was flawed, overconfident, self-deceiving - but on that central point it was correct and that is one of the most precious things we have lost.
On the Catholic Literature thread I have been discussing the remark on the Irish Chesterton Society blog that Chesterton is the antidote to the sort of despair we find in the portrayal of modern Ireland in films like ADAM AND PAUL and GARAGE. I do not think Chesterton by himself can be the antidote to that (not least because Chestertonian optimism can sometimes be debased into unreasoning denial - as for example in GKC's eulogies of Mussolini in THE RESURRECTION OF ROME at a time when the Duce was already a tyrant stained with the blood of his opponents) but when we watch those films we ought to have a sense that Jesus has what these people are lacking, and we ought to yearn to reach out to them and seek means to do so. We must not let the blunderers featured on this thread, and the knowledge of our own past blunders and sins, deprive us of hope.
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hibernicus
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| | Re: Ignorance of Catholic doctrine - Pat Buckley a
« Reply #62 on Aug 10, 2010, 11:12pm » | |
The IRISH TIMES has given the theology professor James Mackey - a nominal Catholic and laicised priest - from Edinburgh a five-week series every Tuesday to promote his views on Catholicism. He began last Tuesday with a piece arguing that Jesus' rebuking St Peter after giving him the "keys of the kingdom" amounts to deposing Peter from the leadership which Jesus had just conferred on him, and that there was no evidence that Jesus had reinstated Peter as leader before his death. Yesterday (Monday 9 August) the IRISH TIMES published a letter by a Fr O h-Ealaithe from Dingle who pointed out just how tendentious this analysis was (amongst other things it excludes Luke 22:32 in which Jesus tells Peter that He has prayed for him so that his faith may not fail, and when he is converted he is to strengthen his brethren, and it silently dismisses the passages in which the post-Resurrection Jesus affirms Peter's mission.)
Today we have Mackey Part Two on the Eucharist, in which he declares that the eucharist simply consists of sharing in a meal, that every family meal is an eucharist with the presider as paterfamilias, that in celebrating Eucharist in this sense Jesus did away with the concept of sacrifical cultic priesthood and that the concept of sacrificing priesthood (which Mackey describes as "cruel") was unknown among Christians until it was taken over from the Roman religion at the time of Constantine.
This is quite unbelievably tendentious. For one thing, it omits to mention that the concept of sacrificial priesthood was found among the Jews as well as the Romans, and that the Epistle to the Hebrews (whether or not one accepts it as Pauline, it certainly long pre-dates Constantine) is devoted to the argument that Jesus is the true High Priest and His death the definitive sacrifice. But of course a large section of the IRISH TIMES readership will lap it up because it represents what they want to beleive, and the neglect of catechesis and apologetics in the Irish Church is such that many will be led astray in good faith by Professor Mackey's mere assertions from the pulpit of Tara Street.
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Askel McThurkill
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| | Re: Ignorance of Catholic doctrine - Pat Buckley a
« Reply #63 on Aug 17, 2010, 2:17am » | |
Mackey should know better.
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hibernicus
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| | Re: Ignorance of Catholic doctrine - Pat Buckley a
« Reply #64 on Aug 24, 2010, 12:55am » | |
Mackey seems to be operating in part from some sort of Giradian perspective, though not that of Girard himself - the idea that Jesus came to abolish sacrifice certainly sounds Girardian, and Girardians also have a much-noted tendency to ignore any Biblical text which doesn't suit their pre-formed interpretation. But the core mindset is Liberal Protestant - vaguely Quaker or Unitarian would be the nearest equivalent.
Part 3 last Tuesday, having denounced the Papacy and the sacrifical interpretations of Eucharist as betrayals of Jesus, is mainly about women's role in the Church. Amongst other precious gems he declared that HUMANAE VITAE was an example of moral evil and that the view that everyone, just or unjust, should be admitted to Eucharist (ie that there should be no such thing as excommunication) was fundamental for Jesus; he proclaimed that HUMANAE VITAE was an example of positive moral evil and quoted St Columbanus to the effect that the Pope's authority ceases when he teaches evil, and proclaimed that while women should have leadership roles in the church this should not take the form of joining "the present priestly caste, for that is so much part of the problem, it could never even be part of a solution". We have two more weeks of this to look forward to.
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hibernicus
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| | Re: Ignorance of Catholic doctrine - Pat Buckley a
« Reply #65 on Aug 25, 2010, 11:57pm » | |
Mackey Part 4 on celibacy was actually a bit less simplistic than his previous position - for one thing he covers his back by acknowledging that the tradition of monastic celibacy goes back to patristic times and that religious orders are a different matter from diocesan clergy. When it comes to celibacy for diocesan priests he acknowledges that the view that the monastic model should apply to them as well has been put forward and mentions the view that a cellibate priest can devote himself entirely to his people - but he then dismisses this view out of hand and adopts the standard liberal view that it was all due to mediaeval popes' desire to keep clerical dynasties from appropriating church property, adding his own pet rendition that the REAL papal reason for opposing this was to prevent the creation of independent power-bases which could challenge Papal power!
Two points come out, minor and major:
(1) Does he really think that the Church has no legitimate interest in preventing the alienation of property, given to support its mission, to other uses? This is like arguing that the abolition of patronage and corruption in civil services represents a power-grab by a caste of bureaucrats. (BTW, given the howls and wails Professor Mackey emanates about a "clerical caste", has he not realised that a non-celibate clergy might very easily produce a clerical caste in the literal sense of the term?)
(2) This article brings across to me more strongly than any of the others that Professor Mackey begins by assuming the truth of the thing he purports to prove - that the history of the Papacy should be seen exclusively as driven by desire for power for its own sake, quite devoid of any theological/moral considerations. (Exactly the same reductionism could be used to "prove" for example, that all marriages are simply a form of prostitution, or that trade unions have always existed to benefit their leadership and have never had any other function.)
BTW Mackey declares that Jesus said nothing about sex except to condemn divorce and the adultery that goes with it (clearly Mackey wishes St Paul's statements to be dismissed out of hand - and as I recall the late Doris Manly pointed out that Jesus never explicitly condemns cannibalism, but that doesn't mean He approved of it) and Mackey then states that Matthew, Paul, and the church's canon law again betrayed Jesus by making provision for divorce. Professor Mackey of course is dismissing out of hand the distinction between annulment and divorce, and between a general statement of principle and its exceptions such as the Pauline and Petrine privileges (i.e. the provision that a valid marriage contracted before conversion with an obdurately unbelieving spouse may be dissolved). Furthermore, I wonder which is more likely - that Mackey is advocating a rigorist position on divorce, or that he is implying that since the Church disregards even Jesus' words when it suits it, "Go do thou also and do likewise"?
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Beinidict Ó Niaidh
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| | Re: Ignorance of Catholic doctrine - Pat Buckley a
« Reply #66 on Aug 26, 2010, 12:04am » | |
One feature of the Orthodox Churches and, if the Barchester Chronicles are any indication, the Anglican Church is the emergence of an inter-related clerical caste. When clerics marry, it is understandable that they gravitate towards other clerics' daughters and they will prefer sons of clerics as candidates for ordination.
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hibernicus
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| | Re: Ignorance of Catholic doctrine - Pat Buckley a
« Reply #67 on Aug 26, 2010, 4:10am » | |
The Anglican Church in the Victorian era (which was fairly different from what it was today) was seen as one of the learned professions and a lot of the younger sons of the gentry went into it; there were of course promotional opportunities. They used to boast that their clergy were a cut above their Catholic equivalents (except for some aristocratic Continental senior clergy).
Orthodoxy has a much stronger tendency to produce a hereditary clerical caste of parish priests, because of the monastic/parochial divide and the fact that only celibates can be bishops. The Russian Orthodox parish clergy used to have a pretty sorry reputation under the Tsars. (Incidentally, a lot of nineteenth-century Russian revolutionaries were priests' children, just as quite a few Irish literati in the same era were the lapsed children or grandchildren of Church of Ireland clerics.)
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hibernicus
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| | Re: Ignorance of Catholic doctrine - Pat Buckley a
« Reply #68 on Aug 30, 2010, 11:19pm » | |
In the SUNDAY TRIBUNE of the Sunday before last (i.e 22 August) Una Mullaly had a column defending civil partnership/gay marriage legislation and ridiculing calls for a conscience clause on the grounds that it was never shown that anyone actualy wanted to make use of a conscience exception. (Nice piece of circular reasoning there.)
She then proclaimed that it was rubbish to say that gay marriage would destroy marriage since the greatest damage being done to marriage at present was by heterosexuals divorcing and remarrying. This is pretty rich coming from a representative of the sector of Irish public opinion that fought tooth and nail to legalise divorce in Ireland and heaped ridicule and contempt on the mere suggestion that legalising/normalising divorce would undermine marriage. Now we see the evil fruits of earlier liberalisation being used as an argument for further liberalisation, with the same prophesy that things can't get any worse than they are already!
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hibernicus
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| | Re: Ignorance of Catholic doctrine - Pat Buckley a
« Reply #69 on Aug 31, 2010, 10:51pm » | |
Mackey Part 5 ends up by sneering at the "Continuity Papal Church" (i.e. the orthodox) as a "fossilised" pack of dupes and idiots "there will always be a majority who prefere a judgmental God for whom punishment is the primary instrument of love (as the Archbishop of Dublin would put it)" [Poor Dermo can't satisfy Professor Mackey and gets denounced as a sadist with all the rest] and at the Pope as morally blind for not admitting his own culpability in all the scandals.
Mackey advises his sympathisers to join other Christian grouping (he proclaims there is no one true church) though he suggests they might prefer to remain nominally Catholic while engaging in intercommunion as often as possible. He even suggests they might consider conversion to Judaism or Islam "For Jesus was a prophet in and for Judaism [I suspect Mackey means EXCLUSIVELY - i.e that the creation of a separate Christianity was a mistake] and Muhammad received him as a prophet on a par with himself... both these sibling religions retain some features more faithful to the faith of Jesus than are their current Roman Catholic counterparts.] He winds up by declaring the same is true in varying degrees of other world religions, of other "primal spiritualities" [i.e. animist religions] and the "personal spiritualities of those disenchanted with any organised religion".
It seems Professor Mackey thinks orthodox Catholicism the worst of all religions. As they wrote on the gates of Bandon in Penal Days "Turk, Jew, or atheist may enter here - but not a Papist".
His basic mindset is shown by his endorsement of the following description of the Mass by a "women priests" group" - "We have long given up on the idea of God having his innocent son ritually killed by a priest for the sins of the race". ["By a priest" shows they refer to the Mass, not specifically to Calvary.]
This creature presents himself as a great triumph for ecumenism, as the first Catholic to hold a chair of theology at Edinburgh previously regarded as Presbyterian; but I would say that the majority of the Presbyterian ministers who once held that chair, however anti-Catholic they may have been, were more Catholic than he. Come back John Knox - all is forgiven.
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hibernicus
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| | Re: Ignorance of Catholic doctrine - Pat Buckley a
« Reply #70 on Sept 1, 2010, 11:22pm » | |
One final thought before I leave Professor Mackey. A week or two back a letter-writer to the IRISH TIMES compared his articles to the rants of Ian Paisley. I thought at the time that this was a bit excessive, but I now see the parallel is quite good. The refusal to see Cathoic belief as anything more than a mask for papal/clerical power-lust, the unrestrained demonisation of the opponent, the belief that anyone who disagrees with him must be a fool or a knave, the presentation of Catholicism as uniquely evil (though I suspect Mackey would apply the same treatment to traditional Evangelical Protestantism, to Orthodox Judaism, observant Islam and any other religion that fails to meet his specifications) are indeed reminiscent of Ian Paisley at his worst.
I suspect the central inspiration is Hans Kung; it certainly reminds me of his desire to boil down the Abrahamic religions to a sort of Ethical Kantianity. Mackey's rejection of revelation in favour of pantheism is pretty much derived from German Idealism.
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hibernicus
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| | Re: Ignorance of Catholic doctrine - Pat Buckley a
« Reply #71 on Sept 8, 2010, 2:37am » | |
http://merecomments.typepad.com/merecomm....homeopathy.html
Here is a nice piece from TOUCHSTONE's blog on the need for holiness to save the church, and to save all of us individually. [For those who don't know, homeopathy is a pseudo-science which claims that ingredients retain their potency even when diluted to infitesimal proportions]. It has direct relevance to the strange ecclesiastical fauna explored on this thread.
EXTRACT
...Nothing else will do but holiness, which is just another way of saying that God wants all from us, because anything less is a sin against love. Yet we persist in thinking that something else will save. If only we had women priests! If only we could use the pill! Thus we practice what I call Ecclesiastical Homeopathy. You take up your shotgun, aim at your left foot, and fire. Then you pray that the Lord will make you whole. When no miracle is forthcoming, you declare that God really wants you to be lame, that in fact "lameness is a great gift of the Holy Spirit, in the New Pentecost." So you pick up the shotgun again and blow the other foot to splinters too, to make the cure complete.
"Be ye holy," said Jesus, "even as your Father in heaven is holy." That we cannot do, unless we accept the grace of God; but grace upon grace is given to us, if we would but humbly submit to it, knowing that on our own we can accomplish nothing, or rather we accomplish only destruction, but that we can do all things in Christ who strengthens us.
Nothing else will do but holiness, which is just another way of saying that God wants all from us, because anything less is a sin against love. Yet we persist in thinking that something else will save. If only we had women priests! If only we could use the pill! Thus we practice what I call Ecclesiastical Homeopathy. You take up your shotgun, aim at your left foot, and fire. Then you pray that the Lord will make you whole. When no miracle is forthcoming, you declare that God really wants you to be lame, that in fact "lameness is a great gift of the Holy Spirit, in the New Pentecost." So you pick up the shotgun again and blow the other foot to splinters too, to make the cure complete.
"Be ye holy," said Jesus, "even as your Father in heaven is holy." That we cannot do, unless we accept the grace of God; but grace upon grace is given to us, if we would but humbly submit to it, knowing that on our own we can accomplish nothing, or rather we accomplish only destruction, but that we can do all things in Christ who strengthens us.
END OF EXTRACT
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loughcrew
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| | Re: Ignorance of Catholic doctrine - Pat Buckley a
« Reply #72 on Sept 8, 2010, 3:16am » | |
I don't get the Irish Times so I have never heard of Mackey until I read these posts but he comes form the school of laicised clergy who make a good living from bitching about their previous employer, another dingbat to join that growing army.
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hibernicus
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| | Re: Ignorance of Catholic doctrine - Pat Buckley a
« Reply #73 on Sept 8, 2010, 4:00am » | |
Mackey was one of the panelists on that WOULD YOU BELIEVE RTE programme as well.
His utter rejection and hatred of the Eucharistic sacrifice which he once offered himself strikes me as the expression of a well-known tendency for apostates to be driven by utter resentment of what they once believed. (This doesn't just apply to ex-Catholics, BTW; ex-communists are well-known for it.)
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hibernicus
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| | Re: Ignorance of Catholic doctrine - Pat Buckley a
« Reply #74 on Sept 22, 2010, 5:58am » | |
Here is another old post from John J Reilly's site - a review of a critique of feminist theology (GOD OR GODDESS? by Manfred Hauke). The resemblance between this description of its worldview and the views espoused by Prof Mackey, Mary Condren et al are not IMHO coincidental:
http://www.johnreilly.info/gog.htm
EXTRACT
The book is lucid and tersely persuasive, not least because its tone is fair and nonpolemical throughout. Better than any other source I know, the author shows through logic, scripture and tradition just how the fashionable systems of feminist theology undermine the basic dogmas of Christianity in general and Catholicism in particular. The book makes a good companion volume to Donna Steichen's Ungodly Rage, also published by Ignatius Press. The Steichen book is an excellent source of documentation; it damns Catholic feminism by letting it speak for itself. Fr. Hauke's book provides more complete analysis for this material. Among other things, he shows how feminist theology fits into the larger trends in 20th century philosophy, from Whitehead's "process" metaphysics to Sartre's existentialism. (He also makes clear the often overlooked point that feminist analysis is simply Marxist class analysis applied to gender.) Between them, the two books show pretty conclusively that feminist theologians (who are as likely to be men as women) do not want the Church reformed. They want her dead.
The debate over feminism in theology has become clarified to the point where it is hard to see how any informed person can be innocently deceived on the matter any longer. As Hauke makes clear, feminist theology is pantheistic in its essence. It rejects a transcendent God, because such a God would be in a position of hierarchical domination over this world. (Feminists depict this as a metaphysical projection of the system of "patriarchy," whereby men tyrannize over women.) It rejects Jesus as the incarnation of God, partly because feminists hold God to be already incarnate in the world, but mostly because the idea that history could turn on the life of a historical male human being is intolerable to them. Similarly, they reject the principles of the apostolic succession and of ordination as a sacrament because these things seek to extend this intolerable incarnation to the present day. The proposal to ordain women, in the minds of the people who have been most active in making the case for it, is a device for undermining the incarnational model of the priesthood. It is as simple as that.
Of course, there is a great deal else to be said about the specific schools of feminist theology and their tenets. Having rejected the teaching authority of the Church, feminist theology is fracturing in typical sectarian fashion, a process that feminists dignify with the formula of a "quarrel among sisters." Still, there are some nearly universal elements in the feminist critique of Christianity, such as the claim that the Church teaches the inferiority of women and the sinfulness of the body. Fr. Hauke explains the Church's true position on these matters with great clarity and freshness. However, the most important question, as he also makes clear, is more fundamental than the often spurious "justice" issues on which feminists prefer to dwell. If you believe what the feminist theologians say, then you no longer believe in a God worth praying to. Feminist liturgies seek to make it impossible to believe in such a God. That is what the arguments about things like "inclusive language" are really all about.
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Christ is the morning star who when the night of this world is past brings to his saints the promise of the light of life and opens everlasting day |
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