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Author Topic: Baptism of Desire not defined dogma, per theological consensus  (Read 39758 times)

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Offline ByzCat3000

Re: Baptism of Desire not defined dogma, per theological consensus
« Reply #10 on: February 19, 2021, 07:16:00 PM »
Quote from: Ladislaus on February 19, 2021, 06:49:58 PM
That's precisely my guess also.  Some but not all theologians felt that Trent defined it.  I bet of these 25 theologians, only about 10 of them do more than mention it in passing, simply taking it for granted that BoD is there in Trent.

One of the arguments I've heard against my intepretation of Trent is that well, all the theologians hold that Trent taught it.  It would appear not, based on this.
I'm definitely not a theologian, and I haven't been to seminary, so I could just be wrong/dumb, but I kinda agree with you on Trent (even though I believe in BoD) for the same reason I *disagree* with sedes on the whole "if anyone says the vestments and ceremonies of the Church are incentives to impiety" thing.

Here's the thing, from my perspective.  Councils are called to address *specific* issues that are troubling The Church.  Trent was predominately convened to deal with Protestantism.  Protestants (at least some of them) were saying *faith alone* was sufficient to save.  So the Council is saying no, you've got to have baptism, or you've *at least* got to have the desire/intent to go for baptism.  So I don't think its intending to anathematize people who don't believe in BoD, its just saying you have to *at least* desire baptism (ie. its not faith alone, in the Protestant sense.)  So neither "Feeneyites" or not are being anathematized, Prots are.

In the same way, when I say "whoever says the vestments, ceremonies, etc. are incentives to impiety", I'm, again, seeing thata as an anathema on Protestants who think the *Tridentine* mass or *any* mass is an incentive to impiety.  They think worship is supposed to be "simple" with no liturgy, but instead centered around some Protestant preacher preaching a sermon and maybe symbolic bread and wine.  There are plenty of Calvinists and Anabaptists who think like this "liturgical garments and ceremonies bad."  I *don't think* the intent of Trent was to rule out the idea that infiltrators could screw with the mass and promulgate a bad, Protestantized mass through large segments of the Church for a few decades, regardless of whether such people think the infiltrators are *bad* popes *or* non popes.  I don't see how either is what Trent had in mind.  Trent had Protestants in mind who were against the mass and liturgical garments en toto.

Do you see what I'm saying here?  Lemme know if that makes sense and then lemme know where you think I'm off base.
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Offline forlorn

Re: Baptism of Desire not defined dogma, per theological consensus
« Reply #11 on: February 19, 2021, 07:42:03 PM »
Quote from: ByzCat3000 on February 19, 2021, 07:16:00 PM
I'm definitely not a theologian, and I haven't been to seminary, so I could just be wrong/dumb, but I kinda agree with you on Trent (even though I believe in BoD) for the same reason I *disagree* with sedes on the whole "if anyone says the vestments and ceremonies of the Church are incentives to impiety" thing.

Here's the thing, from my perspective.  Councils are called to address *specific* issues that are troubling The Church.  Trent was predominately convened to deal with Protestantism.  Protestants (at least some of them) were saying *faith alone* was sufficient to save.  So the Council is saying no, you've got to have baptism, or you've *at least* got to have the desire/intent to go for baptism.  So I don't think its intending to anathematize people who don't believe in BoD, its just saying you have to *at least* desire baptism (ie. its not faith alone, in the Protestant sense.)  So neither "Feeneyites" or not are being anathematized, Prots are.

In the same way, when I say "whoever says the vestments, ceremonies, etc. are incentives to impiety", I'm, again, seeing thata as an anathema on Protestants who think the *Tridentine* mass or *any* mass is an incentive to impiety.  They think worship is supposed to be "simple" with no liturgy, but instead centered around some Protestant preacher preaching a sermon and maybe symbolic bread and wine.  There are plenty of Calvinists and Anabaptists who think like this "liturgical garments and ceremonies bad."  I *don't think* the intent of Trent was to rule out the idea that infiltrators could screw with the mass and promulgate a bad, Protestantized mass through large segments of the Church for a few decades, regardless of whether such people think the infiltrators are *bad* popes *or* non popes.  I don't see how either is what Trent had in mind.  Trent had Protestants in mind who were against the mass and liturgical garments en toto.

Do you see what I'm saying here?  Lemme know if that makes sense and then lemme know where you think I'm off base.
Seems a bit iffy. Dogma is what it says on the tin. Sure the context is helpful for understanding what exactly they meant, but you can't use context to make it say something it doesn't either. For example, just because I said "2+2=4" in opposition to people asserting it equalled 3, that doesn't mean you can turn around and say I just said it to condemn the 2+2=3'ers and not necessarily the 2+2=5'ers who came about centuries after my statement. Now, I get that the examples you cited aren't as clear cut as my absurd scenario, of course, but the funny business in the example I gave is exactly the kind of stuff you see modernists try to do with dogma. And it's a slippery slope starting from where you're standing and ending with full-on Vatican 2 "dogma evolves" nonsense.

When Trent says the ceremonies of the Church can't incentivise impiety, it means exactly that. It doesn't refer to any explicit kind of impiety, or to a teaching that all ceremonies are impious, etc. It means what it says: anyone who teaches that the ceremonies of the Church incentivise impiety is condemned. Just because they were making the statement in response to a very specific teaching doesn't mean the dogma refers to only that narrow slice; if the dogma speaks broadly, it teaches broadly.
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Offline Ladislaus

  • Supporter
Re: Baptism of Desire not defined dogma, per theological consensus
« Reply #12 on: February 19, 2021, 07:50:52 PM »
Quote from: ByzCat3000 on February 19, 2021, 07:16:00 PM
I'm definitely not a theologian, and I haven't been to seminary, so I could just be wrong/dumb, but I kinda agree with you on Trent (even though I believe in BoD) for the same reason I *disagree* with sedes on the whole "if anyone says the vestments and ceremonies of the Church are incentives to impiety" thing.

Here's the thing, from my perspective.  Councils are called to address *specific* issues that are troubling The Church.  Trent was predominately convened to deal with Protestantism.  Protestants (at least some of them) were saying *faith alone* was sufficient to save.  So the Council is saying no, you've got to have baptism, or you've *at least* got to have the desire/intent to go for baptism.  So I don't think its intending to anathematize people who don't believe in BoD, its just saying you have to *at least* desire baptism (ie. its not faith alone, in the Protestant sense.)  So neither "Feeneyites" or not are being anathematized, Prots are.

In the same way, when I say "whoever says the vestments, ceremonies, etc. are incentives to impiety", I'm, again, seeing thata as an anathema on Protestants who think the *Tridentine* mass or *any* mass is an incentive to impiety.  They think worship is supposed to be "simple" with no liturgy, but instead centered around some Protestant preacher preaching a sermon and maybe symbolic bread and wine.  There are plenty of Calvinists and Anabaptists who think like this "liturgical garments and ceremonies bad."  I *don't think* the intent of Trent was to rule out the idea that infiltrators could screw with the mass and promulgate a bad, Protestantized mass through large segments of the Church for a few decades, regardless of whether such people think the infiltrators are *bad* popes *or* non popes.  I don't see how either is what Trent had in mind.  Trent had Protestants in mind who were against the mass and liturgical garments en toto.

Do you see what I'm saying here?  Lemme know if that makes sense and then lemme know where you think I'm off base.

Absolutely, and I think you're right on target.  Trent was teaching against the Protestant errors that faith alone is necessary for salvation and that the Sacraments are not necessary.  In this interpretation, it's saying effectively "if you think that the Sacraments are not necessary at least through desire, then you're a heretic."  In other words, it's saying nothing more than that the MINIMUM you can believe without heresy is that the Sacraments are necessary at least in desire.

Let's say that Trent had taken up the Immaculate Conception and taught if you don't say that Our Lady was free from Original Sin at least from her quickening in the womb, you're a heretic.  Does that necessarily intend to exclude going back to her Conception?  Of course not.  It's defining an acceptable RANGE of belief, with the lower limit being at least from her quickening.  One might say that same thing about this passage in Trent.

If Trent had intended to define BoD, it would have clearly described what it is that must be believed about it, and you wouldn't have about a dozen different notions of BoD floating around.

Also, not every word of the expository texts of a Council are meant to define or propose things for belief.  I think some people imagine that every word of Trent was inspired like Holy Scripture was.  That's precisely why Trent distilled into CANONS all the items that it intended to define.  BoD is not in there.

You can turn this over a half dozen ways, but there's just no DEFINITION of any kind here in Trent.  St. Alphonsus was just wrong here.  He was also wrong in saying that one letter from Innocent II makes it dogma.  Innocent II was writing a letter to some unknown individual but not addressing the entire Church.  There was no language in there to suggest that he was teaching something definitively vs. proposing his own personal opinion.  In a similar letter, Innocent III clearly taught the error that transubstantiation would occur even if the priest merely thought the words of consecration.  St. Thomas excoriated him for that.  There's also a letter which says that BoD allows the soul to "rush immediately without delay to [its] heavenly reward" ... contradicting a position held by St. Alphonsus.
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Offline Ladislaus

  • Supporter
Re: Baptism of Desire not defined dogma, per theological consensus
« Reply #13 on: February 19, 2021, 07:57:31 PM »
Quote from: forlorn on February 19, 2021, 07:42:03 PM
Seems a bit iffy. Dogma is what it says on the tin. Sure the context is helpful for understanding what exactly they meant, but you can't use context to make it say something it doesn't either. For example, just because I said "2+2=4" in opposition to people asserting it equalled 3, that doesn't mean you can turn around and say I just said it to condemn the 2+2=3'ers and not necessarily the 2+2=5'ers who came about centuries after my statement. Now, I get that the examples you cited aren't as clear cut as my absurd scenario, of course, but the funny business in the example I gave is exactly the kind of stuff you see modernists try to do with dogma. And it's a slippery slope starting from where you're standing and ending with full-on Vatican 2 "dogma evolves" nonsense.

When Trent says the ceremonies of the Church can't incentivise impiety, it means exactly that. It doesn't refer to any explicit kind of impiety, or to a teaching that all ceremonies are impious, etc. It means what it says: anyone who teaches that the ceremonies of the Church incentivise impiety is condemned. Just because they were making the statement in response to a very specific teaching doesn't mean the dogma refers to only that narrow slice; if the dogma speaks broadly, it teaches broadly.

I believe that his interpretation of the ceremonies is on target also.  It would be as if Trent had re-condemned iconoclasm.  "If anyone says that images are incentives to impiety, let them be anathema."  Now, if some rogue priest later introduced an image in a Church which depicted, say, Mary Magdalene engaged in some of her pre-conversion activity, someone would not fall under the anathema if he called out that PARTICULAR image for being an incentive to impiety.  If some priest at a parish whipped out some vestments with rainbow flag colors, would you be anathematized for objecting to that?

Now, on the other hand, I do think that if we were talking about the ceremonies PROMULGATED by the Church for official use, you would at least tangentially fall under this anathema.

But I see the point ByzCat is making and I think he's not off target.
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Offline ByzCat3000

Re: Baptism of Desire not defined dogma, per theological consensus
« Reply #14 on: February 19, 2021, 08:04:11 PM »
Quote from: Ladislaus on February 19, 2021, 07:57:31 PM
I believe that his interpretation of the ceremonies is on target also.  It would be as if Trent had re-condemned iconoclasm.  "If anyone says that images are incentives to impiety, let them be anathema."  Now, if some rogue priest later introduced an image in a Church which depicted, say, Mary Magdalene engaged in some of her pre-conversion activity, someone would not fall under the anathema if he called out that PARTICULAR image for being an incentive to impiety.  If some priest at a parish whipped out some vestments with rainbow flag colors, would you be anathematized for objecting to that?

Now, on the other hand, I do think that if we were talking about the ceremonies PROMULGATED by the Church for official use, you would at least tangentially fall under this anathema.

But I see the point ByzCat is making and I think he's not off target.
I think this is a gray area.  I think it would be also a gray area (although we certainly know how the Church would've judged it) if somebody was to argue some weird position, like, say, that the Liturgy of St Chrysostom was the only legitimate form of Mass or something.  Granted, if that was floating around I think the Church would've shot it down, but I could see the argument even there that Trent wasn't really intending to target that guy and you'd need another bull or council to rule it out.

If Vatican III started Novus Ordizing images (and had similar "pastoral" caveats that V2 does leaving us all confused), idk, would we start using Nicaea II to condemn people who condemned *those* images?  Seems like a stretch.

I of course get the problem forlorn is pointing out, but I think his analogy is a little bit off too.  2 + 2 = 4 is a definitive statement.  Even if its intended to rule out 2 + 2 = 3 at that specific moment, its still intended to be definitive and thus to rule out 2 + 2 = 5.  Is this statement in Trent like that?  I have no idea honestly.  I feel like the guys at Trent would've thought something like the NO would never happen, that nobody should treat a pope the way SSPXers treat the Pope, *and* that nobody should question the legitimacy of a pope without there being an alternate claimant with substantial numbers of Catholics behind them somewhere in the world.  
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