When one thinks of the Catholic Church, one thinks of the universal church. Then one begins to study and converse with others. One finds that the Church has many variations: Eastern Rite Orthodox Traditionalists Progressives Thomasists Augustinians Followers of St. Francis Etc,etc.etc. One gets bogged down with this and that.

I am reading the books of Thomas Merton now, (inspired by by Skoobuy (sic) on another thread.)

Thomas Merton (a Trappist monk, priest, wonderful philosopher) wrote in "The Seven Story Mountain" a phrase that hit me with a force only the Holy Spirit could have used.

I have agonized for some time on our disagreements over the Church's various factions. And yes, I have been as guilty as anyone.

In discussing the various philosophies, Thomas Merton, described the Catholic Church as having "VARIGATED UNITY". (my emphasis).

No truer statement has been made.

God bless,

-- john placette (jplacette@catholic.org), October 21, 2003

Answers

Eastern Rite, Orthodox, Traditionalists, Progressives, Thomasists, Augustinians, Followers of St. Francis?

Talk about mixing apples, oranges, and bananas!

Thomists and Augustinians are simply individual members of the One True Church who revere the teachings of specific Doctors of the Church. As long as they do so within the context of current Church teaching and subject to the Vicar of Christ, that is no problem at all, and in fact can provide a firm foundation of appreciation of current teaching.

The Eastern Rite is a specific branch of the One True Church, expressing a particular spiritual and liturgical tradition, subject to the current teaching of the Church and the authority of the Vicar of Christ.

Followers of St. Francis are individual members of the One True Church who are drawn to a specific form of spirituality, within the context of current Church teaching and subject to the Vicar of Christ. Many valid approaches to spirituality exist within the Holy Catholic Church. Such diversity is among the great strengths of the Church.

Orthodox are NOT members of the One True Church, but are members of a schismatic tradition which rejects the divinely endowed authority of the Vicar of Christ.

"Traditionalists" and "progressives" range from reasonably orthodox members of the One True Church who would prefer to see certain things done differently ... to blatantly schismatic individuals who claim to be members of the One True Church, yet reject both the teachings of the Church and the authority of the Vicar of Christ, insisting that the Pope and the Magisterium bow to their personal interpretations of Church teaching.

-- Paul M. (PaulCyp@cox.net), October 21, 2003.

Traditionalists are said to range as far to be

"...blatantly schismatic individuals who claim to be members of the One True Church, yet reject both the teachings of the Church and the authority of the Vicar of Christ, insisting that the Pope and the Magisterium bow to their personal interpretations of Church teaching."

It can't be blatant if you can't say exactly how so. Unless it's a privately held, personally blatant interpretation.

What teaching does a traditional Catholic reject?

-- Emerald (emerald1@cox.net), October 21, 2003.

What teaching does a traditional Catholic reject?

A "traditional Catholic" (such as Eugene, Moderator Paul, or paul h) doesn't reject ANY teaching.

But a traditionalist non-Catholic (like the questioner) feels free to reject almost any Catholic teaching. Why not? He's a Protestant, of course.

-- (Answer@Man.com), October 21, 2003.

Wait guys, You're missing my point!!

Please don't argue about this. I was trying to say something that would help us all see our unity.

Maybe we should all become more contemplative and spiritual.. a la Merton.

God bless,

God bless,

-- john placette (jplacette@catholic.org), October 21, 2003.

Emerald,

What Traditionalists group are you a member of?

-- Steven S (steven@schneider.net), October 21, 2003.

"But a traditionalist non-Catholic (like the questioner) feels free to reject almost any Catholic teaching. Why not? He's a Protestant, of course."

I reject no Catholic teachings.

"What Traditionalists group are you a member of?"

The Catholic Church.

-- Emerald (emerald1@cox.net), October 22, 2003.

I reject no Catholic teachings.

Yeah, like Fr. Richard McBrien rejects no Catholic teachings.

-- (Answer@Man.com), October 23, 2003.

Apparently Fr. Richard McBrien leans heavily on Karl Rahner's thinking, who in turn, relied heavily upon the philospopher Kant and the Existentialist philosophy that serves to bury the things of our Holy Catholic Faith. Existentialism is pretty much the modern philosophical mistress (as opposed to a classic philosophical handmaiden) to the Faith that the modernist theologians have been using in the post-conciliar Church.

These Existentialists are the enemies of the Catholic Faith. They want to destroy Her. Karl Rahner was a master of ambiguity and an arch-modernist; he was actually the editor for a time of Denzinger's Enchiridion Symbolorum. How he got that far while his ideas were condemned by Pius XII is beyond me.

If you've got any ideas, AnswerMan, about how that could possibly have happened, then let me know. Or in fact in general about how it is that the enemies of the Church are allowed to trample all over Her unchecked.

Or maybe it's not a mystery that these people undo us from inside out; maybe chronologically we are in The Passion stage of our Church's history. Maybe this is where the Church experiences the blows of the enemy and ultimately a crucifixion like a lamb led to the slaughter.

Karl Rahner and what he thought are close to the very source of the cancer that has been eating away at the Mystical Body in modern times. McBrien seems attached to this somehow.

This is the stuff of modernist poison, and I complain about it ad nauseum. And somehow, there's a comparison with me and a modernist, AnswerMan?

lol.

-- Emerald (emerald1@cox.net), October 23, 2003.

john placette, tell me more about Thomas Merton and what he says about this Varigiated Unity.

I found this site; in your opinion, does this site seem consistant in it's tone with what you've read so far from Merton?

On that site I found this at the top:

"We are people from diverse philosophies and faiths who find common ground in the nonviolent struggle to bring about a more peaceful and just society by instilling a consciousness of values and raising the moral questions involved in the issues of war, poverty, racism, and oppression."

Consistant in tone with what you've read or at variance? I'm not picking a fight, I'm just wondering.

-- Emerald (emerald1@cox.net), October 24, 2003.

I'm not picking a fight

Yeah, like Hamas isn't picking a fight.

-- (Answer@Man.com), October 24, 2003.

Thomas Merton became very socially involved in a number of causes in the years leading up to his death (quite something for a Trappest monk!, but I digress... ) Anyway, his later works have a lot of errors in them. Seven Story Mountain, however, normally is thought of as pretty traditionalist in tone.

In Christ, Bill

-- Bill Nelson (bnelson45@hotmail.com), October 24, 2003.

Let's just say; Emmie never ran away from a fight he won't start. He and Canvas Back Ed Richards were not fighters, they were lovers. Canvas Back packed up & left. Emmie is torn between two loves. Catholics and schizmoiditzes. He can't decide where to go.

-- eugene c. chavez (loschavez@pacbell.net), October 24, 2003.

Reject the teaching of the Church? Last count was 261 to....3

-- Tropicana (zilch@wilch.com), October 24, 2003.

I had not seen that sight, Emerald.

Thomas Merton's view, over time, may have been expanded more than he would have wished.

It has happened before i.e. St. Francis of Assisi.

My view of Thomas Merton is that he was a compassionate, intellectual, ORTHODOX Catholic.

When he said, "varigated unity", he was complimenting the Catholic Church on being able to house diverse, yet bonded philosophies.

I was trying to bring us together more by quoting Fr. Merton. I guess I did not succeed.

I know I have been guilty of trying to push my views as others have, but, really we have much, much more in common than we have differences.

God bless,

-- john placette (jplacette@catholic.org), October 27, 2003.

"When he said, "varigated unity", he was complimenting the Catholic Church on being able to house diverse, yet bonded philosophies. I was trying to bring us together more by quoting Fr. Merton. I guess I did not succeed."

Actually, I think there is something behind that diversity you alluding to, and I think is innocent and real. The same goes for the basic desire for a wholesome and visible Catholic unity.

But this "Variagated Unity" of Merton is a trojan horse. So many innocent recognitions of truths and realities are abused and so subtley twisted into their opposites.

It comes down to taking observable realities and making the appropriate distinctions and understanding the principles that go to make them up before pressing them into practical service or before drawing practical conclusions or courses of action; before applying them.

People will put these ideas into practice in reality... people will take this idea of Variagated Unity from Merton and they will begin to apply it in life. They will come to rest in conclusions about the way they relate to other people, and it will affect the things they say and do for others. Ultimately, it will effect their understanding and living of the Catholic Faith, if they take Merton at his word. That's why it's important to find out whether Merton's concept of unity leads to a proper understand of real unity or not. Question:

Unity: Unity in truth, or truth in unity?

Do we have unity because we believe and live the same things, or do we come to believe a common truth because we are presupposed to be unified as a postulate? Merton seems to tend towards the second, but the first is the way things are or should be.

Unity isn't the only idea with a two-edged interpretation, one used for good and truth, and the other used for evil and deception; there are several real ideas and truths that are readily twistable and pressed into the service of anti-truth and anti-life. It's easy to spit out a few:

Dialogue: that there is a way to seek invite people into consideration of deeper truths starting with lesser truths held in common, OR: a relinguishing or compromise of deeper truths in order to come to rest with others at the lower level or least common denominator?

Multiple Paths: Many paths do the same door and same way of salvation, OR: many paths or varied ways of salvation?

Freedom: The freedom to choose the good, the true and the beautiful OR: the freedom from adherence to goodness, truth and beauty?

Same goes for the ideas Love, Choice, Life, and tons more.

No doubt that you or I or anyone could say "we have this, we have that in common", but there always has to be that clarifying discussion that has to follow to rid ourselves of invalid conclusions that, if practically applied, become deception in practice.

The real answer to "why can't we all just get along" is that there's something called truth, which we are all, in diverse degrees, highly deviant from.

Not knowing his intentions, I see Merton as one who would do damage to the Faith by invoking this Variagated Unity in so far as it seeks the least common denominator, which consist of human similiarities, or in other words, the humanistic, and thereby edging out or setting aside our needed focus on the sanctifying and actual graces of the Catholic Church which call us out of this human existence, and would have us not reveling in it.

It's important to go so much further than the humanistic considerations, because if the discussion or practice of our Holy Faith stays in that arena, we would have to ask ourselves what makes us any different from the rest of the pagans. We would also have to ask why we needed a Savior.

We absolutely must have unity as Catholics, and the pontiffs have all regarded unity as something of the utmost importance, but it never was considered something humanistic in origin but always something derived from grace and always glued together by charity.

I believe that if we want unity in our Catholicism then we have to look to Christ and not Merton, because Christ has the Cross; that's where the unity is going to come from.

To be honest, Catholicism has unity implicit and explicit in it already, and it really can't be any other way.

There's certainly nothing wrong with your desire to foster unity, but it can't be had on the humanistic level; it has to be something supernatural. It has to be a common Faith and a common Cross.

-- Emerald (emerald1@cox.net), October 30, 2003.

Emerald, You missed my point by a mile.

We can have unity of purpose and unity of intent. Thats what Merton was stating. WE can do it without being clones.

There is way too much negative. Christ preached the Good News and love.

If you truly want unity, embrace diversity.

God bless,

-- john placette (jplacette@catholic.org), November 02, 2003.

"...embrace diversity"

Can you explain as precisely as possible what this phrase means? I see two interpretations, two ways to go, two different conclusions.

-- Emerald (emerald1@cox.net), November 02, 2003.