For The Love Of Pete(r)
The Holy Father Pope Francis desperately needs our prayers.
Minds greater than this blogger's have weighed in and have concluded that like earlier documents of this pontificate, Dignitas Infinita shows signs of a familiar flaw, namely imprecision.
The dignity of the human person, a finite creature made in the image and likeness of God, is not to be confused with the dignity that God alone possesses to an infinite degree. We share in that divine dignity by the grace of God. God shares His very life with us so that we may become like Him.
God does not act beneath His sublime and eternal dignity. We humans can, indeed, act against our dignity.
Some may imagine that by entering into the human condition God surrendered His dignity, and therefore that Being we call God could not be Almighty God. That conclusion would be an untenable and misleading assumption. A muslim and a heretic would make such a conclusion, a false conclusion at that. Non-Christian religionists lack the fullness of revelation, so it is understandable that, given an incomplete view or understanding, they would draw an inaccurate conclusion.
St John 1:1-5 | In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God; all things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.
Philippians 2: 6-11 | Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
The Eternal Word, the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, took upon Himself human nature and redeemed it through His death and resurrection. The Word made Himself vulnerable and was born to the Virgin Mary. Jesus, the Word-Made-Flesh, continues to be present to us by making Himself vulnerable in the Holy Eucharist so that we, partakers of the most glorious Body and Blood of Jesus Christ, may be made holy and become that to which God calls us.
The Word became flesh to make us “partakers of the divine nature”: “For this is why the Word became man, and the Son of God became the Son of man: so that man, by entering into communion with the Word and thus receiving divine sonship, might become a son of God.” “For the Son of God became man so that we might become God.” “The only-begotten Son of God, wanting to make us sharers in his divinity, assumed our nature, so that he, made man, might make men gods” (CCC 460).
God's grace does not destroy human nature but perfects it (Gratia non tollit naturam, sed perficit).
The consequences of sin which, when invited, continue to diminish in the human soul her likeness to God. Actual sins necessitate our participation in the Sacrament of Penance, so that we - freed of particular sin - may receive the Body and Blood of Jesus in a state of grace.
CCC 1415 | Anyone who desires to receive Christ in Eucharistic communion must be in the state of grace. Anyone aware of having sinned mortally must not receive communion without having received absolution in the Sacrament of Penance.
1 Corinthians 11:29 | For any one who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment upon himself.
The image of God in an unbaptized person remains. However, a soul's likeness to God has been marred by Original Sin. Baptism removes the stain of Original Sin, and the Sacrament of Penance provides the necessary relief from sins committed after Baptism.
Infinite dignity cannot mean impeccability, i.e., sinlessness, in this life. Jesus is the only sinless person, i.e., Jesus and His mother Mary, the Mother of God. He is the Divine Person, the Eternal Word-Made-Flesh. His Mother Mary, by a singular act of God, was preserved from Original Sin.
Roughly half of Dignitas Infinita is devoted to explaining the Catholic understanding of human dignity. This, the strongest portion of the text, cites a range of authorities ranging from the Church Fathers through the Second Vatican Council to Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI. The philosophical and theological groundwork is carefully laid.
But the purpose of this text is to apply that conceptual framework to contemporary problems. And there Dignitas Infinita falls short.
First, the familiar “seamless garment” approach of the text—providing a long list of affronts to human dignity, including war, poverty, exploitation, and human trafficking—blunts the force of the document’s condemnations of abortion, euthanasia, and sex-change mutilation. As Pope John Paul II explained in Evangelium Vitae and Veritatis Splendor, not all of these public issues are commensurate. Some issues involve prudential judgments, on issues such as how best to help the poor. Other issues involve intrinsically immoral acts such as abortion. No political candidates today are advocating violence against women, the way some are promoting unrestricted violence against the unborn.
The “seamless garment” approach makes it too easy for complacent Catholics to escape the sting of authentic Church teaching, drawing whatever lessons they like from the document while passing over unwelcome challenges. There are so very many problems on the list; the world is far from ideal. But Dignitas Infinita does not help us to sort out which problems deserve top priority.
Another problem with the latest document might be that it's teaching could lead one into the trap of the "once saved always saved" heresy. Can we lose the dignity God restored to us in Baptism? One can if one so chooses. Loss of that dignity is hellish. Complete loss of that dignity actually puts one in hell. Eternal separation from God is possible.
CCC 1035 | The teaching of the Church affirms the existence of hell and its eternity. Immediately after death the souls of those who die in a state of mortal sin descend into hell, where they suffer the punishments of hell, "eternal fire." The chief punishment of hell is eternal separation from God, in whom alone man can possess the life and happiness for which he was created and for which he longs.
God does not interfere with our freedom to choose lesser gods, gods that feed on innocence and consume one's dignity. That tendency to choose idols over icons is concupiscence.
As a result of original sin, according to Catholics, human nature has not been totally corrupted (as opposed to the teachings of Luther and Calvin); rather, human nature has only been weakened and wounded, subject to ignorance, suffering, the domination of death, and the inclination to sin and evil (CCC 405, 418). This inclination toward sin and evil is called "concupiscence" (CCC 405, 418). Baptism, the Catechism teaches, erases original sin and turns a man back towards God. The inclination toward sin and evil persists, however, and he must continue to struggle against concupiscence (CCC 2520). WP
No one can take away another's dignity. One can only surrender it.
The Catholic Church recognizes, based on the clear teaching of the New Testament, that it is possible for Christians to lose their salvation. St. Paul explicitly warns Judaizing Christians, “You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the Law; you have fallen away from grace” (Gal. 5:4). He also tells his audience of Corinthian Christians, “Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived,” and he goes on to list multiple sins, warning that those who commit them will not “inherit the kingdom of God” (1 Cor. 6:9–10).
The prodigal son (Luke 15:11–32). In this parable, the father of the family represents God, and one of his sons leaves the family and embarks on a life of sin. Yet he repents and is welcomed back by the father, who declares that the son “was dead, and is alive; he was lost, and is found” (v. 32). It thus is possible for us to be children of the Father, to leave him for sin and become spiritually dead, and to return and be restored to spiritual life.
The Catholic Church thus acknowledges that it is possible to regain salvation after mortal sin, and that Christ instituted the sacrament of confession for this purpose (John 20:21–23; cf. Matt. 9:8). Therefore, “There is no offense, however serious, that the Church cannot forgive. There is no one, however wicked and guilty, who may not confidently hope for forgiveness, provided his repentance is honest. Christ who died for all men desires that in his Church the gates of forgiveness should always be open to anyone who turns away from sin” (Catechism of the Catholic Church 982).
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