“From this time, indeed, the circuмcision of the flesh was abolished, 
and its obligation ceased, baptism being instituted in its place, 
which is a sacrament of more extensive grace, 
and less repugnant to nature, as being void of pain.”

Article 4. Whether since Christ's Passion the legal ceremonies can be observed without committing mortal sin?

Objection 1. It would seem that since Christ's Passion the legal ceremonies can be observed without committing mortal sin. For we must not believe that the apostles committed mortal sin after receiving the Holy Ghost: since by His fulness they were "endued with power from on high" (Luke 24:49). But the apostles observed the legal ceremonies after the coming of the Holy Ghost: for it is stated (Acts 16:3) that Paul circuмcised Timothy: and (Acts 21:26) that Paul, at the advice of James, "took the men, and . . . being purified with them, entered into the temple, giving notice of the accomplishment of the days of purification, until an oblation should be offered for every one of them." Therefore the legal ceremonies can be observed since the Passion of Christ without mortal sin.


Reply to Objection 1. On this point there seems to have been a difference of opinion between Jerome and Augustine. For Jerome (Super Galat. ii, 11, seqq.) distinguished two periods of time. One was the time previous to Christ's Passion, during which the legal ceremonies were neither dead, since they were obligatory, and did expiate in their own fashion; nor deadly, because it was not sinful to observe them. But immediately after Christ's Passion they began to be not only dead, so as no longer to be either effectual or binding; but also deadly, so that whoever observed them was guilty of mortal sin. Hence he maintained that after the Passion the apostles never observed the legal ceremonies in real earnest; but only by a kind of pious pretense, lest, to wit, they should scandalize the Jews and hinder their conversion. This pretense, however, is to be understood, not as though they did not in reality perform those actions, but in the sense that they performed them without the mind to observe the ceremonies of the Law: thus a man might cut away his foreskin for health's sake, not with the intention of observing legal circuмcision.

But since it seems unbecoming that the apostles, in order to avoid scandal, should have hidden things pertaining to the truth of life and doctrine, and that they should have made use of pretense, in things pertaining to the salvation of the faithful; therefore Augustine (Epist. lxxxii) more fittingly distinguished three periods of time. One was the time that preceded the Passion of Christ, during which the legal ceremonies were neither deadly nor dead: another period was after the publication of the Gospel, during which the legal ceremonies are both dead and deadly. The third is a middle period, viz. from the Passion of Christ until the publication of the Gospel, during which the legal ceremonies were dead indeed, because they had neither effect nor binding force; but were not deadly, because it was lawful for the Jєωιѕн converts to Christianity to observe them, provided they did not put their trust in them so as to hold them to be necessary unto salvation, as though faith in Christ could not justify without the legal observances. On the other hand, there was no reason why those who were converted from heathendom to Christianity should observe them. Hence Paul circuмcised Timothy, who was born of a Jєωιѕн mother; but was unwilling to circuмcise Titus, who was of heathen nationality.

The reason why the Holy Ghost did not wish the converted Jews to be debarred at once from observing the legal ceremonies, while converted heathens were forbidden to observe the rites of heathendom, was in order to show that there is a difference between these rites. For heathenish ceremonial was rejected as absolutely unlawful, and as prohibited by God for all time; whereas the legal ceremonial ceased as being fulfilled through Christ's Passion, being instituted by God as a figure of Christ. 

No other feature was added to the religious ritual until about 140 AD when a second step to the ritual circuмcision procedure was introduced [Periah].  .  After performing "milah", the cutting back of the end of the infant's foreskin, a second step, Periah was then performed. Periah consists of tearing and stripping back the remaining inner mucosal lining of the foreskin from the glans and then, by use of a sharp finger nail or implement, removing all of the inner mucosal tissue, including the excising and removal of the frenulum from the underside of the glans. The objective was to insure that no part of the remaining penile skin would rest against the glans corona. If any shreds of the mucosal foreskin tissue remained, or rejoined to the underside of the glans, the child was to be re-circuмcised.  This is a much more radical form of circuмcision. It was dictated by man, and is not the biblically commanded circuмcision rite. Its introduction has a bizarre history. The rabbinate sought to put an end to the practice of youths desiring to appear uncircuмcised…By introducing the painful and debilitating "Periah" they would obliterate the foreskin completely such that a circuмcised Jew could not disguise "the seal of the covenant.”


Periah is a man-made barbaric form of circuмcision practiced today.  There is nothing holy, or beneficial in it as it represents a more vicious form of Judaism.  God has released man from the obligation, required His Church to end the practice and still men defend it and carry on doing it.  Mind boggling.
This is echoed by Dr. David Lang in his article on Circuмcision in “Social Justice Review” (March-April 2011, Vol. 102, No. 3-4, p. 53-56):

“But how could non-therapeutic circuмcision be forbidden by the natural moral law? Didn’t God command routine circuмcision for all males in the Old Testament, even for infants who could not consent? So how could such an operation be intrinsically unethical? The answer, according to many researchers, is that the Abrahamic-Mosaic circuмcision rite mandated in Genesis 17 is not the same procedure as the modern form…The Old Covenant rite, though painful, involved only what is called brit milah: a token cut (prophetically symbolic of the blood to be shed by the promised Redeemer and a foreshadowing of Baptism) that clipped off merely the overhang flap or tapered neck (akroposthion) of the prepuce…Now this curtailing, though visibly detectable, left sufficient skin to cover the glans, thus maintaining normal male physical function.  Around the middle of the second century A.D., however, the rabbis instituted a much more drastic version…This total uncovering is called brit periah, accomplished by cutting, tearing, and ripping away the whole preputial sheath.  The Jєωιѕн Encyclopedia, in its article on Circuмcision, makes clear that the Muslim practice (essentially milah) differs from the Judaic radical version (periah).  The latter is the brand of surgery performed in modern times with the use of various surgical instruments (probes, forceps, clamps, scalpels).  Without precedent in Christendom, it was adopted in the West by the medical establishment of several English-speaking nations in the nineteenth century, but recently in vogue only in the USA, which for a century has had a high rate of (non-therapeutic) routine male infant circuмcision (RMIC).”

He's not "arguing against the Church".  Again, you're only proving Pax's point that you're incapable of making distinctions.  What I'm saying, and it sounds like Pax agrees, is that the Church was condemning circuмcision under the formal aspect of being a religious observance.

"If you want to dominate women to retrieve the masculinity you're lacking ..." ... this is a puerile comment, and should disqualify you from any further input on this issue.

http://www.newadvent.org/summa/2103.htm#article4

While it may be true that women often have our rational faculties impaired by emotion, you were using it as a personal attack that was irrelevant to the topic.

In the end, my argument and distinctions were thoroughly vindicated by St. Thomas.