Invalid Catholic Baptisms?

[poptart]

2 hours ago, 3DOP said:

Thank you bluebell. Sorry for the delay. A reply has been on my mind. I hope this helps.

One would not expect for this action to be a common occurrence. Presumably, it would only happen if someone who was wishing to be baptized was somehow in danger of death and no Catholics were around. And so, a dying person who wants to receive baptism can be consoled by the fact that in extreme circumstances, anyone of good will, who merely wants to comfort someone who is dying, can take the place of a priest. "To do what the Church does", in this case would not require any Sacramental theology on the part of the extraordinary minister. All that would be necessary would be a good intention to merely try to do what those hard to understand Catholics do when they baptize. It seems unlikely that all Catholics understand very well, the idea that the actual minister is Christ Himself. Much less would a Good Samaritan of another religion or no religion. It would not be blasphemous. Indeed, it might be a real good thing to having unknowingly cooperated with Christ in a baptism on the day when such a non-Catholic meets Jesus Christ. Surely, this "minister of baptism" did far more for a neighbor than give a cup of cold water to one who was thirsty! One would have to hope that this single act would go very far to winning the mercy and grace of God for a non-believer.  

Even though one receives the grace of the Sacrament with mere desire, it is important to make every effort to receive it sacramentally. One cannot say, "Oh I desire to be baptized", and then make it a low priority. That would not be baptism of desire! There is an inspiring history of scattered communities which had accepted the Catholic faith in Japan beginning from a short but fruitful period of missionary outreach. This speaks to another reason why the minister of baptism can be other than a priest in extraordinary circumstances. About the time that the great Jesuit missionaries were evangelizing the Far East in the 17th Century, the Japanese people and their Emperor suddenly concluded that Japan did not approve of western influences. All Europeans, including the Catholic priests were required to leave. Japan did not open back up to the West until in the 19th Century, when the country found that it had fallen behind other Asian nations technologically. Along with European merchants and other westerners, the Catholic priests returned as well, and to their joy and amazement, found small, but thriving pockets of Japanese Catholics who for more than two centuries had handed down the faith that their fathers and grandfathers had embraced long before, having baptized their own in the absence of the priests. I imagine what a comfort it must have been for these priest deprived Catholics, to have the first and most important Sacrament, knowing that it united them with the faithful in all parts of the world, even as they maintained the truths of the Gospel without a priest, without Confession, and without the Mass, from generation to generation.

I link to a video I have not seen, but behind the moderator on his bookshelf is my beloved Liturgical Year of Dom Gueranges which I am so fond of quoting. I will take my chances in thinking that this will be a pretty good presentation that I will have to wait to see later. I am going to be in a ping pong tournament in less than an hour! More tomorrow hopefully. Wish me luck!

God bless,

Rory         

>island nation

>dictators of various last names.

Ahh, white privilege. 

 

[3DOP]

On 2/20/2022 at 12:30 PM, Saint Bonaventure said:

In my perspective, Catholicism is not, and never has been, monolithic. In the sense that the Christian Church is the body of Christ on earth, and that the Catholic Church has all seven sacraments, the Catholic Church certainly isn't "just any organization."

However, I see any distinctions within the Catholic Church as being intrinsic to the parts of the Body of Christ (1 Cor. 12:27). I would only use a term like "divisions" in reference to schismatic brothers and sisters in the Orthodox Churches and to "separated" brothers in sisters in the Protestant Churches--as being intrinsic to the parts of the Body of Christ (1 Cor. 12:27). I won't bore everyone by parsing the SSPX from the PFSP, the differences between the Jesuits and the Dominicans, TLM and the Ordinary Form of the Mass, etc. but suffice it say, I wouldn't consider any distinction within the Catholic Church as a "sect."

All priests have a vow of obedience, and all have a vow of chastity (although the vow of chastity is different for the few married priests).

There's a tendency amongst those who leave a religious organization to think of that organization in monolithic terms. I suspect that those who leave the LDS Church, for example, might tend to consider the LDS as monolithic. That doesn't, of course, make it such.

I'm trying to keep this short, but hope you get the gist.

 

St. Bonaventure, hi.

Thank you for your reply to Navidad. I fear I was eager to emphasize why I think there are apparent troublesome differences of opinion in the Catholic Church of our times when I used Navidad's expression, monolithic. I hesitated about using that word. Using it as I did made for a possible misconception of Catholic aims. Catholics should not claim or even wish, to be monolithic. I would rather say that the Church has always had important and even essential differences in one unified Body of Christ. The beauty of the Catholic Church is seen in the harmonious expressions of different liturgies, religious orders, and spirituality. The Eastern churches don't pray the Rosary like we do in the West. We in the West do not do fast and and abstain as rigorously as they do in the East. A faithful child of the Eastern Church or the Western Church will not condemn one or the other. Rather than monolithic, the Church is polyphonic, if you will.

I do fear that cacophany can be heard in our times in a louder way than what might be expected from the one true Church. The question that might be asked, would be about who that claims to represent the Catholic faith, is singing in harmony with what Catholic Tradition has taught everywhere and at all times.  

Regards,

Rory

[3DOP]

On 2/20/2022 at 4:41 PM, InCognitus said:

It's quite interesting to compare the different views. 

So from a Catholic point of view, which (if any) of the sacraments that are administered by the Church require apostolic authority from an ordained priest?   And for any that may require divine authority, are there ways of providing those sacraments to individuals that have passed on, or are they out of luck?

I'm sure you know our views on this, as this is the reason we perform baptisms for the dead and do temple work.  But your concept of "intending to do what the Church does" with respect to baptisms seems to handle situations where a person is baptized into another denomination (making sincere followers of Jesus from other Christian denominations part of "the Church" in a sense), but I don't know how that works out for those who are dead already and haven't received baptism. 

InCog. Hi.

After explaining why it is needful in extreme circumstances for others than priests to be allowed to baptize, the Church affirms that it is unlawful to do so when a priest could be found:

"Beyond this case of necessity, no one is permitted to admimister the Sacrament of Baptism; the priest being, by virtue of his sacred character, the dispenser of holy things and the minister of religion."

---The Fountain of Catholic Knowledge, published 1900 AD, Office of Catholic Publications, p. 101.

Except in the case of necessity for baptism, a priest, authorized by his bishop, is necessary for all the other Sacraments, except Holy Orders, which the bishop cannot designate to a priest. In that respect, a bishop is necessary for all of the Sacraments except baptism. Only in cases of emergency, are priests permitted to give Sacraments without the authority of the bishop of the place.

--------------------

The Church teaches that after death, the human soul, like the angelic spirits, loses the ability to repent, to change their minds. This is more easily understood with regards to the happiness of eternity. Nothing could make those who go to heaven change their minds. Essentially it is not because they enjoy heaven. It is because they love God. Likewise for the souls that die outside of God's friendship. One would think that a soul would do anything to get out of hell. But only souls who love themselves and hate God go to Hell. If only by loving God, could such a soul in Hell find relief in Heaven, they will not do it. The love of God is contrary to the very existence of the damned. Everything has been done by God, as will be seen at the Last Judgment, to help every human soul turn to God during life. After death, it is too late. (Heb. 9:27)

In a sense, one can think of Hell as a mercy for the damned. Heaven would be even worse. The damned are absolutely unfit and have no desire for Heaven. No one finds any difficulty with the idea that those who are in heaven never leave. The same justice and mercy that is at work in heaven is also at work in hell.

I am sure it needs to be emphasized that we believe that only those who prefer Hell to Heaven can ever go there. We do not always recognize the malice that burns in our own dark hearts. We should not imagine that ignorance and innocence are compatible with going to Hell. Only an almost unimaginable malice could justify an eternal Hell. Only a malice that prefers Hell to the alternative. In Dante's Inferno, we see this teaching, where the lost souls are impatient to begin their punishment:

"And they are ready to cross the river, the divine justice urging them on, so that their fear turns into desire."

---Inferno, III, 124-126

One author explains a reason for this phenomenon:

"The lost souls dislike being lost because it is a radical disorder in their being, which latter has missed out on the prize it was offered. But they desire their punishment because, at least extrinsically, it brings some order to their radical disorderliness. St Catherine of Genoa says: 'if the soul did not find at that point an order proceeding from the justice of God, it would be in a greater hell than it is, due to the fact of finding itself outside that order.' In this sense even hell itself is a work of mercy."

---Iota Unum, Romano Amerio, Sarto House, Kansas City, (2004), p. 704

Rory

 

Edited February 26, 2022 by 3DOP

[3DOP]

Okay...so the ping pong I talked about above is tomorrow. With my wife babysitting this afternoon, and tomorrow unavailable, I am glad to have been able to try to reply to important questions and observations that were directed toward me, and which I appreciate, this afternoon. 

Rory 

Edited February 26, 2022 by 3DOP

[Saint Bonaventure]

2 hours ago, 3DOP said:

St. Bonaventure, hi.

Thank you for your reply to Navidad. I fear I was eager to emphasize why I think there are apparent troublesome differences of opinion in the Catholic Church of our times when I used Navidad's expression, monolithic. I hesitated about using that word. Using it as I did made for a possible misconception of Catholic aims. Catholics should not claim or even wish, to be monolithic. I would rather say that the Church has always had important and even essential differences in one unified Body of Christ. The beauty of the Catholic Church is seen in the harmonious expressions of different liturgies, religious orders, and spirituality. The Eastern churches don't pray the Rosary like we do in the West. We in the West do not do fast and and abstain as rigorously as they do in the East. A faithful child of the Eastern Church or the Western Church will not condemn one or the other. Rather than monolithic, the Church is polyphonic, if you will.

I do fear that cacophany can be heard in our times in a louder way than what might be expected from the one true Church. The question that might be asked, would be about who that claims to represent the Catholic faith, is singing in harmony with what Catholic Tradition has taught everywhere and at all times.  

Regards,

Rory

Thanks for the thoughtful reply, Rory. Polyphonic sounds great to me.

I try to find beauty in both the singing of the ageing hippy sisters down the way and in my fellow parishioner who keeps insisting that my priest use the Douay-Rheims for his homily. I'm a Chesterton fan who enjoys EWTN, which pretty much makes me mainstream. I'm trying to imagine an LDS parallel just so that everyone can understand what we're saying. I'm not sure what the markers are for mainstream LDS. 

[3DOP]

On 2/26/2022 at 5:02 PM, Saint Bonaventure said:

Thanks for the thoughtful reply, Rory. Polyphonic sounds great to me.

I try to find beauty in both the singing of the ageing hippy sisters down the way and in my fellow parishioner who keeps insisting that my priest use the Douay-Rheims for his homily. I'm a Chesterton fan who enjoys EWTN, which pretty much makes me mainstream. I'm trying to imagine an LDS parallel just so that everyone can understand what we're saying. I'm not sure what the markers are for mainstream LDS. 

St. Bonaventure. Hey.

I have been here for about 18 years already. A fourth or fifth of many lifetimes. From my internet experience, I have hunches, but I don't know what is "mainstream LDS".

However, I would be very happy to know that "mainstream Catholics" liked EWTN and Chesterton. 

As one who likes his native tongue, I love Chesterton. But sometimes I have feared that I have been enchanted by poetic expressions, which might not be as profound as they sound. I am happy, very happy, to be wrong in my concerns.  I hope the truths proclaimed are as certain as the beauty of their expression. 

As for EWTN, other than Raymond Arroyo on YouTube, I have been away for awhile. We had a good priest at our last Novus Ordo parish, who spent a week with sisters in Birmingham. He was the pastor of the parish, and announced that beginning in Lent or Easter, I would guess Lent of 2004, that the sung Sunday Novus Ordo would be ad orientem. Somebody tattled to the bishop. That was the end of that. All to say...I have gone a little further perhaps than what Sr. Angelica would have approved. But God bless Sr. Angelica, and EWTN. If they were really "mainstream"? Well...I might be somewhere else today.

 

[3DOP]

On 2/26/2022 at 3:45 PM, 3DOP said:

Okay...so the ping pong I talked about above is tomorrow. With my wife babysitting this afternoon, and tomorrow unavailable, I am glad to have been able to try to reply to important questions and observations that were directed toward me, and which I appreciate, this afternoon. 

Rory 

Indulge me.

So...this ping pong tournament was sponsored by the Knights of Columbus. I was certain it was the local diocesan parish. So I am as ecumenical as the next guy. I don't disdain the local parish. I pray for our bishop, the ordinary of the place.

But come to find out, it was a bunch of Fraternity folks. They all roll in with many kids and moms in skirts and dads and I am feeling at home.

So I win the first five matches pretty easily. But in the the semi-final, this old man, me, has won one, lost one, and we are in overtime in the third and deciding game. I dump a pretty sharp cross court shot to this kid's forehand; he chases it down; it seems like he picked it up off the floor and mashed a topspin to my forehand that was impossible for me to get. He wins, 2 to 1, 28-26. It was the greatest defeat of my life. And it turns out that this very gracious kid winner named Joe, was the son of a friend of mine at work. Neither of us will ever forget that match. The best man won, but it was close!

Happy Quinquagesima Sunday!!!

Edited February 28, 2022 by 3DOP