Send CathInfo's owner Matthew a gift from his Amazon wish list:
https://www.amazon.com/hz/wishlist/ls/25M2B8RERL1UO

Author Topic: Adiaphora  (Read 456 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Offline DirigeNos

  • Supporter
Re: Adiaphora
« Reply #10 on: July 25, 2026, 07:25:07 AM »
If I may add just another, in my opinion, poignant example, many a trad will have no problem with someone or even themselves watching Braveheart, The Name of the Rose, Apocalypto, The Sopranos, etc. despite containing very explicit sex scenes or nudity. But let a tradcath say he's a brony and likes to watch My Little Pony and they will react as if he just admitted to being a Calvinist!

I think you need to get away from the television set and get away from all that pop culture! It's okay, I was raised on the TV set too! Im a millennial. All the disney movies, cartoons, video games, etc. popular movies when I was in my 20s. The 'classics' from the 70s 80s 90s through 2010s. At some point you discover that it cripples you spiritually and intellectually. It's making people stupid and filling heads with filth. It colors how you think and perceive. You just get to a point in your life where you throw it all away, and decide to be really Catholic - not tradcath inc. i know it's hard. Habits are hard to break and watching movies is enjoyable. There are movies I wish I hadn't watched even though other traditional Catholic friends of mine were talking about them.

If a movie has a nudity scene in it, then yes you need to avoid it like the plague because it's mortally sinful. If it has stuff like immodesty it's at least putting yourself in occasion of sin. Would you go into a strip club for a cup of coffee and say, I just wont look at anything? no, you sin by putting yourself in occasion of sin. There's nothing to be gained out of these movies. I dont even care if all my friends or coworkers have seen such and such movie and Im the only 'dopey wet behind the ears' one. I dont need friends like that

Re: Adiaphora
« Reply #11 on: July 25, 2026, 08:17:25 AM »
I think you need to get away from the television set and get away from all that pop culture! It's okay, I was raised on the TV set too! Im a millennial. All the disney movies, cartoons, video games, etc. popular movies when I was in my 20s. The 'classics' from the 70s 80s 90s through 2010s. At some point you discover that it cripples you spiritually and intellectually. It's making people stupid and filling heads with filth. It colors how you think and perceive. You just get to a point in your life where you throw it all away, and decide to be really Catholic - not tradcath inc. i know it's hard. Habits are hard to break and watching movies is enjoyable. There are movies I wish I hadn't watched even though other traditional Catholic friends of mine were talking about them.

If a movie has a nudity scene in it, then yes you need to avoid it like the plague because it's mortally sinful. If it has stuff like immodesty it's at least putting yourself in occasion of sin. Would you go into a strip club for a cup of coffee and say, I just wont look at anything? no, you sin by putting yourself in occasion of sin. There's nothing to be gained out of these movies. I dont even care if all my friends or coworkers have seen such and such movie and Im the only 'dopey wet behind the ears' one. I dont need friends like that
This is actually one of the stronger points.

I guess where I would push back is this: if all of your leisure time is spent on praying, doing crochet and talking with friends, then more power to you, but if you ever watch old movies, listen to audio dramas or audiobooks, read novels, or listen to old music, then I struggle to see what makes that so substantially different.

Re nudity: I actually agree with you, my intention wasn't to justify stuff like The Sopranos, quite the opposite, it was to highlight the hipocrisy and how for many trads subcultural norms trump actual Catholic morality. If as Worldsaway says nobody here would do that, then praise be to God, but I think you can agree with me that there's many trads who if you said "I watched Braveheart yesterday" they'd say "Oh man I love that movie it's great!" but if you said you watched My Little Pony they'd first react with disgust and then start moralizing their disgust after the fact with Catholic terms (worldly, occasion of sin, distracting, scandalous)

P.S. I have never watched MLP it's just a perfect example of a harmless oddity.


Re: Adiaphora
« Reply #12 on: July 25, 2026, 09:28:28 AM »
P.S. I have never watched MLP it's just a perfect example of a harmless oddity.

How about watching The Flintstones? The old TV show from the 1960’s, not the movie from the 1990’s.
It was my favorite cartoon because I liked the appliances and machinery. Fred worked in a sand and gravel pit where he operated a dinosaur for an excavator. The record player was a wind-up with a bird with a pointy bill for the stylus and needle. Their hot water heater was an elephant beside a caldron on a fire, who stuck his trunk through various holes in the house for the shower, bathtub, kitchen sink, etc. They drove a “manual” car that was started and stopped by their feet. There were two holes in the floor for the driver to extend their legs and feet.
The lawn mower was two alligators mounted beneath a little trolley. They chewed up the grass as the operator pushed the trolley. At the airport, pterodactyls served as airplanes. It was cleverly inventive.
I haven’t watched the show in years, but I’ll look for it later on YouTube. (Unless my fellow trads can prove that it’s a grave mortal sin!) 

Re: Adiaphora
« Reply #13 on: July 25, 2026, 09:35:29 AM »
I don’t understand what you mean by Trad culture. What is that? Traditional Catholic recognize that the Faith is inherently attached to Tradition. Therefore, since they let Faith run through every part of their lives, they let Traditional standards, disciplines, teachings, etc, influence them in every detail. We don’t watch bad movies, don’t expose ourselves to occasions of sin around the opposite gender, recognize that men lead and women follow, follow pre-Vatican II disciplinary practices, etc.

If you don’t like certain aspects of Traditional culture, like the smoking cigars and drinking hard alcohol, then that’s okay. I would personally expose my voice to smoke, either. But one cannot comply brush aside “Traditional culture” because they’re comfortable with their place in the world. I notice it a lot in Sedevacantists, where they’re very strong in the area or doctrine, and very adamant about holding the True Faith, but extremely lax in areas of modesty, having gentlemanly or ladylike comportment, etc. This is not something we should do. Of course the Traditional Faith is essential. But how much better is the Faith if it’s lived in every aspect of your life?

Nobody is saying that we have to live exactly as we did in the 1950s. Literally no Traditionalist can because we all have computers, phones, modern cars, etc. We are normal people, not in the sense that we fit in with secular society in all its evil, but in the sense that we just live our lives  the way humans should with a very keen eye for how every aspect of our lives ought to be. We are modern Catholics, not in the sense that we’re modernists, but in the sense that we’re Catholics living in the 21st century. We live in the modern world, during the Crisis in the Church, because that’s the age God put us in. 

We shouldn’t just go with the flow of the 21st century mainstream culture, though. We can treat them with charity, and pray for them, but we need to root out every little aspect of our lives that is attached to modernism. That means disciplines, too. Is that not how one grows in virtue, after all? Not just by obeying God in doctrines and rooting out major sins, but also the minor flows which weaken our souls little by little.

If you don’t like the 1950s aesthetic, then that’s fine. The Catholic standards are unchanging, but the Catholic application of standards has always changed in Catholic society within the realm of acceptability. If I wear jeans and a polyester shirt now, I’m still fitting the standards of Catholic modesty. But if I wore that in the 50s or before then, they would consider my outfit immodest, despite the coverage. But consider that people in the 50s would be considered immodest by people in the 1850s, as well. 

We can recognize ideals versus standards in disciplinary areas. The ideal may be for me to wear a collared button shirt with some nice pants, instead of my jeans. Because the fabric is better, it’s more gentlemanly, etc. But I don’t sin by choosing the jeans and polyester shirt, because both outfits fit the standards of modesty. I understand that some Traditional Catholics attach sin or moral unacceptability to ideals which they wrong view as the standard, or the level that ought to be reached, but one must be patient with them. You can’t chalk that up to being every Traditional Catholic and therefore all of “Trad culture”. Yes, of course Traditionalists aren't Puritans. But that's because we aren't heretics. Heretical sects getting moral questions wrong doesn't mean we should ignore the standards and principles the Church has always laid down. We an recognize that the application of those principles changes within the realm of Catholic acceptability, but the standard always remains the same.

Re: Adiaphora
« Reply #14 on: July 25, 2026, 10:08:08 AM »
I don’t understand what you mean by Trad culture. What is that? Traditional Catholic recognize that the Faith is inherently attached to Tradition. Therefore, since they let Faith run through every part of their lives, they let Traditional standards, disciplines, teachings, etc, influence them in every detail. We don’t watch bad movies, don’t expose ourselves to occasions of sin around the opposite gender, recognize that men lead and women follow, follow pre-Vatican II disciplinary practices, etc.

If you don’t like certain aspects of Traditional culture, like the smoking cigars and drinking hard alcohol, then that’s okay. I would personally expose my voice to smoke, either. But one cannot comply brush aside “Traditional culture” because they’re comfortable with their place in the world. I notice it a lot in Sedevacantists, where they’re very strong in the area or doctrine, and very adamant about holding the True Faith, but extremely lax in areas of modesty, having gentlemanly or ladylike comportment, etc. This is not something we should do. Of course the Traditional Faith is essential. But how much better is the Faith if it’s lived in every aspect of your life?

Nobody is saying that we have to live exactly as we did in the 1950s. Literally no Traditionalist can because we all have computers, phones, modern cars, etc. We are normal people, not in the sense that we fit in with secular society in all its evil, but in the sense that we just live our lives  the way humans should with a very keen eye for how every aspect of our lives ought to be. We are modern Catholics, not in the sense that we’re modernists, but in the sense that we’re Catholics living in the 21st century. We live in the modern world, during the Crisis in the Church, because that’s the age God put us in.

We shouldn’t just go with the flow of the 21st century mainstream culture, though. We can treat them with charity, and pray for them, but we need to root out every little aspect of our lives that is attached to modernism. That means disciplines, too. Is that not how one grows in virtue, after all? Not just by obeying God in doctrines and rooting out major sins, but also the minor flows which weaken our souls little by little.

If you don’t like the 1950s aesthetic, then that’s fine. The Catholic standards are unchanging, but the Catholic application of standards has always changed in Catholic society within the realm of acceptability. If I wear jeans and a polyester shirt now, I’m still fitting the standards of Catholic modesty. But if I wore that in the 50s or before then, they would consider my outfit immodest, despite the coverage. But consider that people in the 50s would be considered immodest by people in the 1850s, as well.

We can recognize ideals versus standards in disciplinary areas. The ideal may be for me to wear a collared button shirt with some nice pants, instead of my jeans. Because the fabric is better, it’s more gentlemanly, etc. But I don’t sin by choosing the jeans and polyester shirt, because both outfits fit the standards of modesty. I understand that some Traditional Catholics attach sin or moral unacceptability to ideals which they wrong view as the standard, or the level that ought to be reached, but one must be patient with them. You can’t chalk that up to being every Traditional Catholic and therefore all of “Trad culture”. Yes, of course Traditionalists aren't Puritans. But that's because we aren't heretics. Heretical sects getting moral questions wrong doesn't mean we should ignore the standards and principles the Church has always laid down. We an recognize that the application of those principles changes within the realm of Catholic acceptability, but the standard always remains the same.
I agree with most of this. I didn't mean to apply it to all trads, just a big number. If you've never experienced what I'm talking about then God bless. And also of course I think Traditional Catholicism should permeate every aspect of your life

Trad culture I think is pretty self-explanatory, go to any big trad parish and you'll notice a distinct subculture quite beyond just believing and practicing the Faith, just like goths or Italo-Americans have their own subculture.

Where I would push back is against what I have bolded:

1. This can be taken in good meaning and that's the one I presume, but it often doesn't, the concepts of pre-Vatican II discipline, modesty, gentlemanliness, ladylikeness, maturity, masculinity, femininity, scandal, fitingness, apropiateness, etc. get used as social conformity and peer pressure tools rather than their genuine meaning as general and broad principles and concepts that can be quite divorced from their mid-20th century American and European expressions or from their current "trad" expressions.

2. Modernism and modern are not the same, who says we should root out every modern thing? From a Catholic perspective, why is Mozart acceptable but not Skrillex, outside of "one is old"? Modernity as we know it started arguably in the the industrial revolution, or if you want to, you can say Vatican II. Should we ignore every cultural product produced after then? Why, per Catholic doctrine?

3. That's exactly what I'm pushing back against, a suit is only the ideal of trad culture, not of Traditional Catholicism. It's like how wearing a green shirt could the ideal of the meetings of the Chicago Irish-American Club. Now that's fine for a club, but it's not fine to turn the Faith into a social club / clique and conflate it into that, so that if you break the rules of the social club / clique, you're treated as breaking the Faith.