Father Isaac Mary Relyea

[Ice_nine]

Listen to his Mission meditation on Hell, towards the end Father Isaac emphasized that we should not fall into despair because we have the amesome (a favorite word of his) love of Mother Mary. So he kind of balances things (judgment-mercy). 

 

I noticed this and was appreciative. Nonetheless, it's still hard to grapple with. I find many sermons of st. john vianney have the potential to lead to despair.

 

I think people like Father Isaac are needed. For sure.

[MarysLittleFlower]

Ice_Nine, I think for sure this is something to balance with God's Mercy and Our Lady's prayers as has been said... :) I find the Divine Mercy devotion very helpful here.

I think some homilists try to help people remember God's Justice to help them repent, because the reality of sin gets forgotten so easily. They may still talk much on God's mercy to despairing or (correctly) repentant souls.

Have you ever read the book 'little Catechism of the Cure of Ars'? Its his sermons too but other ones like on prayer, love of God, etc, and they are very beautiful moving even poetic. They read like something I inspired in prayer. He preached on different topics :) probably just like Fr Relyea.

[Oremus Pro Invicem]

That's also what I think goes on in the Old Testament destructions- it's not that God sent it as much as they turned from God, to satan, and satan was able to have his way to kill and destroy because, really, that's all he wants. In the OT such events are recorded as being sent by God or angels because that is how it would seem to people living at that time as they didn't quite understand the person of satan or the nature of God yet. Anyways, it's not a Catechism question and I think his view is valid and can be held, I just don't agree with him so I'm putting out my 2 cents. My main beef is with the Muslim/heretic thing. I'll respectfully disagree and stick with the Church on that.

I disagree that Satan was the cause of the Typhoon.  God is clearly in charge of the weather, not Satan, and I believe we need to keep away from judging His actions and look to Him as a Father who knows best. 

Matthew 5:45 That you may be the children of your Father who is in heaven, who maketh his sun to rise upon the good, and bad, and raineth upon the just and the unjust.

God does not bring sun only to the good people on earth, and likewise he does not always bring natural disasters to the unjust.  Sure there are times when punishments are given by God by way of a natural disaster, however, until God reveals this then we should not jump to conclusions. What we do know is that God wills all things for our sanctification.

[Maggyie]

God is not a giant wind machine. That is Pat Robertson nonsense and comes from the days when people had no explanation for the weather other than that it was the Angels bowling in heaven etc. No doubt God could control the weather if he wanted to. But really. Do we think God is up there thinking "how can I make them sorry. I know, I will make them suffer with a hurricane." Tell me after Hurricane Katrina was there a big religious conversion? Mission not accomplished, Lord.

If if he sent the typhoon to punish for the child sex trade, I would tell him with respect, you missed a spot. 

Luckily that is not Catholic dogma just outdated theological speculation. This priest probably also believes in Limbo, another discredited theory.

in Scripture we are told "a bruised reed he will not break, and a dimly lit candle he will not quench." And also, "mercy triumphs over judgment." Keep that in mind when you are told to imagine a God who is angry at the human race and driven to vengeance.

 

[Nihil Obstat]

Luckily that is not Catholic dogma just outdated theological speculation. This priest probably also believes in Limbo, another discredited theory.

 

​Hardly discredited.

"This theory, elaborated by theologians beginning in the Middle Ages, never entered into the dogmatic definitions of the Magisterium, even if that same Magisterium did at times mention the theory in its ordinary teaching up until the Second Vatican Council. It remains therefore a possible theological hypothesis."

http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/cti_documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_20070419_un-baptised-infants_en.html

 

[dUSt]

That is Pat Robertson nonsense and comes from the days when people had no explanation for the weather other than that it was the Angels bowling in heaven etc.

 

​Wait. Are you saying that thunder is not angels bowling in heaven? I literally can't even!

[PhuturePriest]

I started with the prelude and it didn't sound to scary to me (and I scare easily lol). I haven't listened to part 1 so maybe that's where it gets scary or Calvinistic or something. Anyways, my main concern was 10 minutes into the Prelude. He says- and I'm almost exactly quoting here- that anyone who says that Muslims worship the same God [as Catholics] is a heretic [is heresy]. I agree it's a very perverted (as in wrong) religion and there are so many things wrong with it, but according to the Catechism...

That's probably the only thing they have correct, and according to the Church not a heretic for saying so. But according to him I am. Hum.

 

Another thing I think could be understood differently/is wrong is the Typhoon "example."  A bit before the Muslim/heretic thing he talks about how Indonesia was leveled by a Typhoon, and it was God's punishment for all the terrible things happening in that country (mainly the sex trade on children). I see it differently- I think Satan is the source of all destruction and the source of that Typhoon. Satan was able to "get his way" with the country due to the terrible things going on there, which is where I agree with Fr. However, I don't think God was the direct cause of the Typhoon- I don't think God wanted the Typhoon to happen. Many young children and innocents perished in the Typhoon. Was that what God wanted? No, that was what Satan wanted, and as soon as he got his way (when the people turned to him) he went for it and sent the Typhoon. And God uses the Typhoon as an opportunity to get people to repent and turn to Him (if they will).

 

That's also what I think goes on in the Old Testament destructions- it's not that God sent it as much as they turned from God, to satan, and satan was able to have his way to kill and destroy because, really, that's all he wants. In the OT such events are recorded as being sent by God or angels because that is how it would seem to people living at that time as they didn't quite understand the person of satan or the nature of God yet. Anyways, it's not a Catechism question and I think his view is valid and can be held, I just don't agree with him so I'm putting out my 2 cents. My main beef is with the Muslim/heretic thing. I'll respectfully disagree and stick with the Church on that.

​The Catechism doesn't state that they worship the same God, it says they profess to worship the same God. Very different. Also, the Catechism is not infallible. It can in theory be wrong. Many people cite issues in the Baltimore Catechism, for instance.

[Maggyie]

​The Catechism doesn't state that they worship the same God, it says they profess to worship the same God. Very different. Also, the Catechism is not infallible. It can in theory be wrong. Many people cite issues in the Baltimore Catechism, for instance.

Errrrr.... It says "together with us they adore the one, merciful God, mankind’s judge on the last day." 

How do you spin that?

The number of reputable Catholic theologians who accept the theory of limbo is minuscule. Key word: reputable. Non crank. Not heliocentric. That's why the Vatican addressed it. Because some of the public (wrongly) was under the impression that Limbo was part of mainstream orthodox Catholic teaching. In fact it a theological musing. It does not hold any more weight for being an old-timey theological thought experiment. No serious academic believes that babies get trapped in Limbo. 

[AccountDeleted]

 

 

VATICAN LETTER Dec-2-2005 (840 words) Backgrounder. xxxi

Closing the doors of limbo: Theologians say it was hypothesis

By Cindy Wooden
Catholic News Service

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- An international group of Vatican-appointed theologians is about to recommend that the Catholic Church close the doors of limbo forever.

Many Catholics grew up thinking limbo -- the place where babies who have died without baptism spend eternity in a state of "natural happiness" but not in the presence of God -- was part of Catholic tradition.

Instead, it was a hypothesis -- a theory held out as a possible way to balance the Christian belief in the necessity of baptism with belief in God's mercy.

Like hypotheses in any branch of science, a theological hypothesis can be proven wrong or be set aside when it is clear it does not help explain Catholic faith.

. . .

Redemptorist Father Tony Kelly, an Australian member of the commission, told Catholic News Service "the limbo hypothesis was the common teaching of the church until the 1950s. In the past 50 years, it was just quietly dropped.

"We all smiled a bit when we were presented with this question, but then we saw how many important questions it opened," including questions about the power of God's love, the existence of original sin and the need for baptism, he said.

"Pastorally and catechetically, the matter had been solved" with an affirmation that somehow God in his great love and mercy would ensure unbaptized babies enjoyed eternal life with him in heaven, "but we had to backtrack and do the theology," Father Kelly said.

A conviction that babies who died without baptism go to heaven was not something promoted only by people who want to believe that God saves everyone no matter what they do.

Pope John Paul II believed it. And so does Pope Benedict.

In the 1985 book-length interview, "The Ratzinger Report," the future Pope Benedict said, "Limbo was never a defined truth of faith. Personally -- and here I am speaking more as a theologian and not as prefect of the congregation -- I would abandon it, since it was only a theological hypothesis.



. . .

http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/0506867.htm 
 

[Ark]

Errrrr.... It says "together with us they adore the one, merciful God, mankind’s judge on the last day." 

How do you spin that?

The number of reputable Catholic theologians who accept the theory of limbo is minuscule. Key word: reputable. Non crank. Not heliocentric. That's why the Vatican addressed it. Because some of the public (wrongly) was under the impression that Limbo was part of mainstream orthodox Catholic teaching. In fact it a theological musing. It does not hold any more weight for being an old-timey theological thought experiment. No serious academic believes that babies get trapped in Limbo. 

Who are these reputable theologians you refer to as there is a consensus among Fathers and scholastic theologians on this matter. The prudent perspective is that that the modern theologians are in error. 

http://iteadthomam.blogspot.com/2006/05/disputed-question-on-limbo-positive.html

 

[PhuturePriest]

Errrrr.... It says "together with us they adore the one, merciful God, mankind’s judge on the last day." 

How do you spin that?

The number of reputable Catholic theologians who accept the theory of limbo is minuscule. Key word: reputable. Non crank. Not heliocentric. That's why the Vatican addressed it. Because some of the public (wrongly) was under the impression that Limbo was part of mainstream orthodox Catholic teaching. In fact it a theological musing. It does not hold any more weight for being an old-timey theological thought experiment. No serious academic believes that babies get trapped in Limbo. 

​I say yet again: The Catechism is not infallible. It has never claimed to be. There can, in theory, be error within it.

Good to hear such a proclamation from a non-theologian academic. I don't know what theological academia would do without people such as yourself declaring what it is "serious" academic theologians believe and don't believe.

[Ark]

​The Catechism doesn't state that they worship the same God, it says they profess to worship the same God. Very different. Also, the Catechism is not infallible. It can in theory be wrong. Many people cite issues in the Baltimore Catechism, for instance.

​The modern catechism is dangerously ambiguous at best, for this reason it's best to avoid. 

[PhuturePriest]

​The modern catechism is dangerously ambiguous at best, for this reason it's best to avoid. 

​I have no issue with the Catechism. I do have an issue with people who think something is true just because it's in the Catechism when that thing is not doctrinally defined. A passage in the Catechism is only as infallible as the Doctrine to which it refers to. If it is not referring to a Doctrine, it is not infallible. Pure and simple.

[Nihil Obstat]

Errrrr.... It says "together with us they adore the one, merciful God, mankind’s judge on the last day." 

How do you spin that?

The number of reputable Catholic theologians who accept the theory of limbo is minuscule. Key word: reputable. Non crank. Not heliocentric. That's why the Vatican addressed it. Because some of the public (wrongly) was under the impression that Limbo was part of mainstream orthodox Catholic teaching. In fact it a theological musing. It does not hold any more weight for being an old-timey theological thought experiment. No serious academic believes that babies get trapped in Limbo. 

​Would we rather call this "poisoning the well", or "no true Scotsman"?

[PhuturePriest]

​Would we rather call this "poisoning the well", or "no true Scotsman"?

​Somehow, it is a mixture of both. Quite impressive, really.