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Post by Voxxkowalski on Jan 23, 2024 17:25:06 GMT -5
And the question is still there Does the Church and Islam worship the " same" God? And there is no other answer I can find but no...not at all. Despite the nuances of the sources. Islams God is not Triune...not Merciful..can lie if needed..obsessed with degenerate sexual practices....and Im sure I can find more issues with" Allah" I understand your point, but the nuances are important. The issue here is that there are not two Gods existed in the Old Covenant who created the world, or two Gods that created Adam, sent the prophets, etc. These people are specifically professing that this is their God who did these things and they are worshipping him. Obviously, this does not mean that their teaching about him are correct and it may be perverse, but they are still naming the God they worship as the same God who revealed Himself in the Old Covenant, which is the same God we adore. They are a sect that received teaching through a man claiming to be a prophet. This false teaching still does not change who the object of their worship is through their public profession which is the one God who created the world, and revealed Himself in the Old Covenant. The Pope, Gregory VII, never said that they are worshiping God correctly or that their understanding of God is correct. If you ever read Luther's teaching, many things based on his perverse teachings on the Bible would make God unrecognizable to us, but the label of heresy has always remained on the Lutherans, and the Church has never accused them of following a false god. Look up Luther's many ideas on these matters, that he attributed to God, which I cannot say on our G rated forum, and you may find many similarities with the other sect under discussion. Despite this, the Church has never considered him or his sect anything more than heretics. Heresy is no small matter, and that is why it is dealt with so strongly by the Church. To say these people are professing heresy, is not exonerating them in some way. It's being accurate as to their status. Pacelli their book is a complete fabrication...it is not inspired at all so no facts can be drawn from its contents. I just got thru listening to an old Canon Gregorious Hess tape...and he says nearly the same thing about " allah" it bare no resemblence to the True God and the koran has nothing trustworthy in it
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Post by Voxxkowalski on Jan 23, 2024 17:25:49 GMT -5
And again never said he was being heretical.
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Post by Pacelli on Jan 23, 2024 19:00:35 GMT -5
Have you read St. Alphonus or Belloc yet? It may give you far more perspective on this matter than Fr. Hesse.
Btw, I agree on the point you just made about inspiration, but no one is saying that it is inspired. The question is do they adhere to the one true God since they profess that they do. The Catholic authorities I gave would be in the affirmative, but they are heretics, with Ven. Peter saying it's an open question.
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Post by Pacelli on Jan 24, 2024 8:33:53 GMT -5
This thread opened up something far bigger than I thought, so I am going to post my thoughts below to hopefully bring this to at least a provisional resolution:
1. There are two acceptable opinions on this sect, one that they are not believers in the one God, as they so distort who God is that makes their profession of Him a false belief in God, therefore essentially making them Pagan.
2. The other opinion is that they do believe in the one true God, as they say they do in their professed beliefs that they worship the one God and clearly identify God as the God of the Old Covenant, while rejecting the Trinity itself, Our Lord as Divine, the Church, the sacraments, and more. The question in theology is this: since this sect accepts the revealed truths of the Old Covenent, and there were many such as the belief in one God who created the world, who rewards and punishes, the existence angels, etc., does that make them heretics? A heretic believes in God but rejects the authority of the Church to teach them and denies part of revelation. The definition seems to fit.
3. Since the members of this sect, and really it's many separate sects, as they are not one, are not baptized, they would not be canonically labeled as heretics. The question we see facing is whether their beliefs are heretical or whether they are complete unbelievers altogether. Until this discussion, my opinion was just, in line with St. Alphonus, to treat them as a heresy, not as unbelievers, as he labels them as a heresy by putting them in his book on heresies.
4. It seems though, in light of the explanation Ven. Peter of Cluny (quoted above), also a renowned theologian, and specifically an expert on this very matter, that he didn't opine either way on this point, clearly indicating that at his time there must have been opinions on both sides each with good arguments as to whether this sect was heretical or that of unbelievers.
5. In my opinion, we don't have to settle this, and honestly I think there are none of us here to do this, if even the theologians have not yet resolved it, as the threads purpose was to look at the charge of heresy against Pope Gregory VII. Since it is an acceptable Catholic position to treat them as a heresy, not as Pagan, the Pope's letter makes perfect sense presuming he was of that opinion, and we have no reason to think otherwise.
6. He may have been of the opinion that they believed in the one God, therefore the same God, as there is only one, and that they worshipped Him. He never said their beliefs on God were correct, or that their worshipping of Him was correct or authorized. He never said anything heretical in the letter. People that say that are reading into the letter, not reading it for what he actually said, and more importantly what he did not say.
This is where I am at now with this discussion. I ask anyone on here that wants to discuss this further to please read the sources provided above, St. Alphonsus, Belloc, Ven. Peter, and feel free to provide any other approved sources you have found from pre-Vatican II writings to shed more light on this. Otherwise we are just wasting valuable time.
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Post by Voxxkowalski on Jan 25, 2024 1:41:36 GMT -5
its not a waste of time. Its content Im going to try a simile If I convince a bunch of people that my comic book is directly from God...and the god in this comic book happens to hold ONE thing in common with the true God ( he is one) can the people I convinced actually be worshipping the true God when the comic book is their only source about their "god"
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Post by Pacelli on Jan 25, 2024 7:03:15 GMT -5
its not a waste of time. Its content Im going to try a simile If I convince a bunch of people that my comic book is directly from God...and the god in this comic book happens to hold ONE thing in common with the true God ( he is one) can the people I convinced actually be worshipping the true God when the comic book is their only source about their "god" That's the unsettled matter. Are they actually doing this as you explained or are they not doing this? Clearly, minds greater than ours did not resolve with certainty which way this falls. The same argument can be made about many of the Protestant or other heretical sects in Church history that you are making here as they deny truths about the Trinity, Our Lord's Divinity, the Church, the sacraments, etc., yet, they are regarded as heretics, not unbelievers in God. I don't really see the essential difference, and it only favors the opinion that hey should be regarded as heretics. Aren't these heretical sects just making up their own comic book version of God and then worshipping him too? Why they did the Church label them as heretics and not as atheistic unbelievers? My point about a waste of time, is that it's not worth discussing highly complex topics in theology without the rigorous use of sources. If you are going to swim in very deep water with currents pulling you all around, don't you think the safest course is to have s floatation device as the risk of drowning is high?
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Post by Voxxkowalski on Jan 26, 2024 18:13:40 GMT -5
I prefer common sense...it has never let me down spiritually
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Post by Pacelli on Jan 27, 2024 9:29:47 GMT -5
I prefer common sense...it has never let me down spiritually Yes, common sense is good, but there are minds greater than ours that have applied principles to these matters. The authorities matter, and it's to them we must rely on, while distrusting ourselves. Over the years, as I study theology deeper and deeper, I only realize how pathetic I really am and how great these theologians were with minds trained to distinguish matters at a level most people would never even begin to grasp. We are like young children before them, no matter how much we study and research. Their minds were formed by the Church's magnificent universities and trained for a level of complexity that most people in our times cannot grasp, which is why there is so much error among Catholics in our day. People have dived in too deep and are over their heads and don't know what they are doing. It's too complex for most minds to grasp.
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John Lewis
Full Member
Reviewing the Knowledge
Posts: 373
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Post by John Lewis on Jan 30, 2024 17:59:29 GMT -5
I prefer common sense...it has never let me down spiritually Common sense leads to NUCism, denial of apostolic succession and the belief that the Church has defected BECAUSE it relies too much on the human senses which are very limited in what they can perceive. Church teaching doesn't always alight with what humans deem to be "common sense" for she sees the world through a spiritual lens and most of us are not particularly advanced in the spiritual life enough to see things the same way.
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Post by Voxxkowalski on Jan 30, 2024 20:47:02 GMT -5
I prefer common sense...it has never let me down spiritually Common sense leads to NUCism, denial of apostolic succession and the belief that the Church has defected BECAUSE it relies too much on the human senses which are very limited in what they can perceive. Church teaching doesn't always alight with what humans deem to be "common sense" for she sees the world through a spiritual lens and most of us are not particularly advanced in the spiritual life enough to see things the same way. Um ok...Ill have to watch for that...Im sure to succumb any moment
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Post by Voxxkowalski on Jan 30, 2024 20:49:40 GMT -5
To be clear I meant MY common sense ( infused by grace and prayer) not common sense as the general concept...and yes both are fallable but this is hardly a soul damaging controversy. None of us is converting to Islam anytime soon
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John Lewis
Full Member
Reviewing the Knowledge
Posts: 373
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Post by John Lewis on Apr 24, 2024 19:09:10 GMT -5
Fr Jenkins of What Catholics Believe Ohio recently raised the issue of Novus Ordo clerics claiming that the Muslims worship the same God as Catholics. I took the time to bring this thread up with him and he has responded to it. The video below starts at his response:
I thought his views were very helpful and show that this is an unsettled matter as to whether the Muslim religion is a Heresy or whether they believe in a different God. He used Arianism as an example of a heresy which changes the idea of who God is, but is also considered a heresy. In no way was Pope Gregory VII teaching that the muslims worship the same God as Christians, but only that they worship a creator whose properties can be determined from natural reason.
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