Per Christum Catholic Blog

I have made some comments over at Kendall Harmon’s blog related to whether women’s ordination and sexuality issues are “first order” or “second order” issues, and whether you can simply “believe the creed” and be considered catholic.

My first comment states that I don’t believe you can divide belief from morality. The ante-Nicene church had far more developed and uniform moral standards than doctrinal ones, so the early precedent emphasizes that both faith and action are essential to being Catholic. The idea that one can simply believe certain tenets and not worry about things like sexuality and valid orders is foreign to a Catholic way of thinking. Since our souls and bodies are joined, and since we are not Manichean, who we are, and what we do with our bodies, matter. For Catholics and Orthodox, simply mentally assenting to a truth doesn’t mean one has been, and is being, transformed into someone more like Christ. Now, I will grant that a case can be made for women’s ordination and for the blessing of same-sex unions. However, to say that since neither is mentioned in the creed, neither are important, misses the point.

My second comment relates to the fact that it is not just conservatives that believe women’s ordination and human sexuality are “first order,” church dividing, issues. It is common to blame conservatives for “overreacting” to developments in mainline Protestantism, and get on them for trying to “divide” various churches based on their opposition to recent developments. However, I think this is unfair, although I admit conservatives can be an angry and loud lot, but so can progressives. As I mention in my comment, many progressives have pushed and pushed for the acceptance of women’s ordination and the acceptance of same-sex relationships, even openly defying canons and rules of their respective churches for years. This shows that who can preside at the Eucharist, and what we do sexually, are, in reality, “first order” issues for both sides. Both sides get worked up over them; it is just that acceptance of WO and gay clergy is now the status quo in many mainline churches, so who is doing the protesting has changed. Perhaps there are a few moderates and latitudinarians left who truly do believe such issues are “second order,” but let’s not blame conservatives for taking a page from the progressives and angrily and adamantly believing their views are correct!

This entry was posted on Thursday, December 3rd, 2009 at 6:35 am and is filed under Anglican and Episcopal, Mainline Protestant. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.