Reply #13: I think you're missing the entire point. What you have is a group of people [View All]

[hedgehog]

calling themselves Catholics. The group is agreed that there was an event in which the transcendental Creator, the One who is behind everything, the ultimate unknowable, became a man and dwelt among us. We are agreed that he left us in some sort of union with Him called Church. There are a set of basic beliefs that were organized back in the 4th century called the Nicene Creed that we all agree on. Now, one group claims that a small group of self selecting celibate males has a direct line to God and therefore can tell the rest of us exactly what the will of God is. Another group claims that that all of us are in contact with God in the Person of the Holy Spirit and that all of us share that knowledge. What really confuses the matter is that the hierarchy is often referred to as "the Church" when in fact "the Church" is all the members. So when someone says "the Church teaches", they may be referring to the accepted beliefs outlined in the Creed or specific teachings authorized by a select group of certain bishops.

My disagreement with the bishops currently in control of the worldly assets of the Church does not make me a bad Catholic or non-Catholic. It merely means I am a Catholic at odds with certain members of the hierarchy. I say "certain members" because there are in fact bishops such as Geoffrey Robinson and Thomas Gumbleton who themselves are standing up to the Vatican bureaucracy. Oscar Romero, accepted by the common people as saint and martyr, was also on the outs with the Pope.