Faithful Dissent, Part 3

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Continued from here.

So the first spin through, I asserted that I can legitimately dissent faithfully based upon a clear understanding of conscience as defined in the Catechism.

On the second spin through I examined up close the Catechism's definition, and came to the conclusion that we have the right to exercise conscience, the responsibility to exercise conscience, and the responsibility to educate our conscience, that is, to develop it towards rigorous and objective standards.

This post will probably be the shortest so far, and only resort minimally to scriptural citation. By way of argument, it is semantically simple.

In a very insightful comment following the first of these posts, Damien called attention to the differentiation between belief and actuation. Conscience, he expressed, is exercised and adjudicated as measured in deeds, not beliefs. Beliefs, he said, cannot be efficiently regulated and attempts to do so typically misfire.

My tack, then, has been that conscience is ultimately expressed in deeds and that this only strengthens the principle of faithful dissent; we must act in accordance to the kernel of divinity embedded within our psyche. This, perhaps, raises a very legitimate concern that someone following their misguided conscience could cause a lot of damage; this does not enter into the argument itself, and really belongs in a separate discussion.

The question now, as I see it, is the least problematic in our present conversation. If we are allowed to dissent from church doctrine in our beliefs, and our actions as determined by our heartfelt beliefs, what then should we believe? It's a dissenting, counterpoint of a question, but here there's some weight as well. I think it's pretty self-explanatory that Catholicism, that Christianity, is a collection of beliefs. If conscience gives us free reign (again, stamped "moral relativism," though I've already argued that conscience isn't inherently relative) to determine our beliefs independently, that what does it mean to be Catholic or Christian. This, by the way, is the "secular" fear expressed by the upper ranks of Church heirarchy... that the meaning of religion is gradually eroded by, among other things, excessive individualism.

There is a response, and it isn't an excessively individual or relative response. If it's theologically and logically sound, it will rely on fundamentals. So I'm going to make two statements. The first will be close, and the second will go even a little closer.

First: What is a Catholic obliged to believe? Candidates for answers could range from anything your deacon opined at the parish picnic through infallible statements popes have made (which, as Damien points out, St. Thomas Aquinas didn't buy) and on down from there. It seems to me, though, that the church, guided by the Holy Spirit, has come up with a convenient list of omniponent beliefs, and even encourages us to say it once each week:

We believe in One God, the Father Almighty...
...
We believe in One Lord, Jesus Christ...
...
We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the Giver of Life...

Note that it says nothing in here of priestly celebacy or homosexuality or artificial contraception, or most of the other issues that divide the Church today. In my humble opinion, this omission is telling. Knowing that humans are inherently fallible and given to sin, the Creed has stuck to what's most important. This, then, is the component truth of the Catholic church. It identifies what we definitionally believe. If I say, "I'm a Catholic who is opposed to the Holy Spirit," many of you could quite justifiably ramark, "maybe you should rethink your faith of choice?"

Such a criticism is valid.

Let's delve even a little deeper. It is possible, you know, to delve deeper than the Council of Nicea. The Apostles' Creed is even more succinct and distilled, but I'm not even talking about that. The gospels are at the heart of it all, and we justifiably center the Liturgy of the Word around them just as we center the Liturgy of the Eucharist around communion. We recite the Nicene Creed after we've heard the gospel.

Here's one of the more quoted parts.

Mark 12:28-34
28. One of the scribes, when he came forward and heard them disputing and saw how well he had answered them, asked him, "Which is the first of all the commandments?"
29 Jesus replied, "The first is this: 'Hear, O Israel! The Lord our God is Lord alone!
30 You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.'
31 The second is this: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no other commandment greater than these."
32 The scribe said to him, "Well said, teacher. You are right in saying, 'He is One and there is no other than he.'
33 And 'to love him with all your heart, with all your understanding, with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself' is worth more than all burnt offerings and sacrifices."
34 And when Jesus saw that (he) answered with understanding, he said to him, "You are not far from the kingdom of God." And no one dared to ask him any more questions.

It is noteworthy that Jesus is not asked what are the greatest two commandments; he volunteers the second, the "golden rule," on his own, and following the argument that we're all made in God's image, there's a clear, correlative logic to the statement.

There are other candidates of course... I find, for example, that the Ten Commandments are a reasonably objective filter for my desires and vicissitudes. Even the Ten Commandments, however, do not invoke, imply, or even hint at most of the issues that divide the Catholic church: homosexuality, abortion, birth control; however one feels about these issues, and however one draws their boundaries, they fall very far outside the explicit pale of our most sacred readings and traditions.

The short answer, then, is that our beliefs aren't all up to individual conscience, which is fallible. There are some things one has to believe to honestly call oneself either Catholic or Christian. Those beliefs are made clear to us, identified in striking passages and statements emphasized by the church for the last 1600 years.

It's telling to me that many of our church leaders today choose to not to bring their own statements to bear on such beliefs.

Next up... what does or what did the U.S. Conference of Bishops think about all that I've been saying?

As usual, comments and criticisms welcome!

END OF POST.