Maybe my "mother bear" instinct is kicking in. Mother bears aren't particularly good at quietism. Monks and priests have different vocations and will have a different response than parents of large families. : )

I still don't see the problem with calmly discussing current church events, which is what I thought I was doing. People on this forum get a whole lot more stressed out and panicky over things like parishioners complaining and pastors harassing them and having to play Michael Joncas music than I am about the prospect of the Pope dissolving the Papacy and the very real possibility of The End Of The Church As We Know It (hereafter referred to as the TEOTCAWKI).

Remember, the Church is guided by the Holy Spirit. Give over all your worries on this matter to God and trust in Him. They will do what is right for the Church.

Very funny, Charles, but sometimes Chicken Littles (and moms) are right.

Spiritual Tornado Supplies: (not particularly in this order)

1. The Sacrament of Confession (if it is even available)
2. The Mass (if it is even available)
3. Rosary (get one now!)
4. Faith, Hope and Love

Miscellaneous
5. Beer

Gavin has a point. I know several musicians who have left the church over marriage issues. Most of them divorced and remarried and ended up in Protestant churches. Now we know no one would ever leave the Catholic church because of low salaries, don't we. ;-)

Some would come back if they were welcomed and their new marriages accepted. Some would not, but most would.

That's so kind of you, bh. Thanks.

There was a medical doctor, a member of the Romanian-Greek Catholic Church (another Byzantine Catholic church in full communion with the Holy See) and of the Association of Catholic Doctors in Bucharest, who spoke at length the other day. Her parents grew up in the Communist era, and her mother waited seventeen years to marry her father, even though she (the mother) did not even know if he was still alive. Now there is a prime example of faithfulness many of us could learn from.

"Repent, for the kingdom of God is at hand."

This is the message the physician wants the Catholic bishops (the physicians of souls, I will add) to warn the world. Not to give into the spirit of the world and its sexual revolution. At the end of her talk, she said that not only Catholics but also many Orthodox are praying for the synod, for if the Catholic Church gives into the spirit of the world, it will be very hard for everyone else to resist it.

There you have it. We must get it right, even if people aren't willing to accept the truth. We cannot adjust Church teaching--Christ's teaching, we believe it to be, even if we may get one or two or more people back, and since we are on a sacred music forum, even if we get a busload of musicians back. I cannot play the organ or even the piano, but if need be, I could probably conduct a choir (granted, it may not be Sistine Chapel quality, but it will do) and keep a parish music program afloat in the event of a mass resignation of directors of music (worst case scenario, purposely made up to make a point). So, even though this is a music forum, I am more concerned about the divine honor and the overall salvation of souls. And if all the world's Catholic organists resign their posts because they do not agree with Catholic teaching, so be it.

Now, now, Mr. Osborn,

In desperate times, we can't be too picky, can we? :)

It seems to have improved, and recently released a new recording. Audio at:
http://www.deutschegrammophon.com/us/cat/4795300

I just checked out some of their videos on YouTube. They sounded relatively good to me. Were they really that bad before? I must have missed something. I thought this was the world famous....Sistine Chapel Choir?

Well if Melo becomes the Holy Father, who will be the college of cardinals? I'm assuming of course he would do the proper thing and install ALL OF US. Not that I have an opinion...

Original in Italian
http://press.vatican.va/content/salastampa/en/bollettino/pubblico/2015/10/24/0816/01825.html

Google translate
https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=it&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http://press.vatican.va/content/salastampa/en/bollettino/pubblico/2015/10/24/0816/01825.html&edit-text=

Given all the news about this Synod,
how many could possibly know it was about

The vocation and mission of the family in the Church and in the contemporary world

In the perspective of faith there are excluded:

GoogleTranslate often gets things wrong, sometimes terribly wrong. A good example is this clause, in which the Italian for "they are not excluded" has become "there are excluded." The original Italian:

Nell'ottica della fede non ci sono esclusi:

I wonder how much else is not an accurate translation.

I think that very much depends upon the definitions of "we" and "won". I'm not ready to break out the champagne yet.

My first reaction is that the conservatives "won" on the issue of homosexuality which has allegedly been kicked down the road, while the progressives "won" on the issue of Communion for the divorced/remarried since they were able to create a small opening, by way of the phrase "pastoral discernment".

Whatever "pastoral discernment" is, I have no doubt it's a big enough opening for the progressives to drive a Mack truck through in time, and I think we're watching a re-enactment of the old "ticking timebomb" trick that was so effective in the wrongful implementation of the Vatican II documents.

I also believe the final report is enough of an essay on ambiguity to require further clarifications; its unsatisfactory conclusion is the perfect excuse for the progressives to demand that the "pastoral solution" ball be punted to the bishops' conferences so they may relieve all that suffering and woundedness out there by "inculturating" ---or perhaps "adulterating" is the better word---the principles of Catholic doctrine and changing pastoral praxis at their own discretion.

Those are obviously just my initial reactions, and I hope I'm totally wrong since I'm not feeling too optimistic right now.

(Genesis 3:1)
Did God really say ...
http://www.usccb.org/bible/genesis/3

And Eve put words in God's mouth.

As I have maintained for years, work truly is a curse. Here is the proof of it.

Cursed is the ground* because of you!
In toil you shall eat its yield
all the days of your life.

18
Thorns and thistles it shall bear for you,
and you shall eat the grass of the field.

19
By the sweat of your brow
you shall eat bread,
Until you return to the ground,
from which you were taken;

Or, none of the above.

The way it works is
http://www.ncregister.com/daily-news/vatican-outlines-family-synod-process

He takes that Relatio doc
(it is nothing more than a collection of notes),
and writes his Post-Synodal Exhortation
(who knows, maybe he and some of his hand-picked guys ghost-write it together)
and release it in 2016.

That Post-Synodal Exhortation (PSE) is the document to worry about.

Wander around the vatican.va website
and look for the PSEs from previous Synods.

ronkrisman

For clarification, please define 'adulterous union'.

Yes, Julie, I agree that "there are many possible configurations of married and divorced situations," and that is why labeling divorced and remarried Catholics - without providing any of the additional distinguishing information - as "adulterers" is so wrong.

As far as defining what an "adulterous union" consists of - what francis requested - your second paragraph comes close to such a definition of an objectively sinful union. But, of course, subjective culpability is another matter.

I would add to this important discussion that, from my experience of several years as a tribunal judge, I know that quite a number of irregular marriages (which bar the Catholic spouse from receiving communion) are first marriages for those Catholics, who happened to marry spouses who had been previously married once, twice - sometimes even three or four times. Such Catholics may be helped to regularize their marriages if all the previous marriages of their spouses are judged to be invalid by the Church. But what about Catholics married to spouses who adamantly refuse to have the Church make a judgment as to the validity of those previous marriages? I'm glad that the Church is seriously considering what additional pastoral care it can offer in these and other marriages.

Yeah, I know, so many of His statements are downright embarrassing; stuff like, "Do not worry about tomorrow," "Stop judging, that you may not be judged," "Beware of false prophets," and "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven."

So, Fr. Ron, with all due respect, is this what your argument has devolved down to:

Your side will keep the fluffy, merciful, "lite", crossless Jesus, and our side will have the "Jesus of hard sayings," ----you know, the Jesus of Whom it was said, "They walked with Him no more".

In other words, have we now been assigned the task of witnessing to the Jesus whose words Sts. Thomas More, John the Baptist and John Fisher died for because His words were perceived as too harsh and judgmental in their lifetimes?

But it seems that in the light of our new "get relevant now" hermeneutic, can't we say that John the Baptist too harshly judged Herod and didn't show him mercy? He certainly didn't take Herod's real-life circumstances into account, did he?

How about those harsh "doctors of the law" John Fisher and Thomas More who reign now in heaven and are judged to be heroic witnesses to the Truth (despite being such nasty Pharisees!)?

But think, how has history judged the Cardinal Wolseys and Herods and Henry VIII's? In fact, how has history judged every generation that has tried to re-write the Gospel in the image and likeness of their own lifestyles?

History has not judged them well.

Maybe a bait-and-switch where you take the Jesus of Whom the crowds said, "Hosanna, filio David!" while we get the one of Whom they said, "Crucify Him!" isn't such a theologically sound idea after all.

I'm not sure I understand, Father. What is your point?

I was just adding a few more SS passages in support of Julie's "in jest" reference to the teaching of Jesus as "soooo embarrassing . . ."

Your question is a good one, Kathy. Oh that you had asked it thirteen days ago.

Oh that you had asked it thirteen days ago.

Hmm. Now what is your point?

Thanks for the clarifications, Chonak, but I was already aware that insufficient knowledge and coercion, along with other diriment impediments, are factors which invalidate a marriage and are grounds for an annulment.

However, if a Catholic has a defective understanding of the indissolubility of marriage and believes his/her first marriage was invalid and thus enters a second relationship without obtaining an annulment, that Catholic is still living in an objective state of mortal sin and has violated the bond of the first marriage since the presumption always is that the marriage is valid until proven otherwise in a marriage tribunal.

Whatever his/her subjective guilt is, only God can judge, but that individual does not have an automatic right to receive Communion just because he/she decides on his/her own that his/her first marriage was invalid and therefore he/she is free to marry again.

Cardinal Burke, the former head of the Roman Rota, said today in his NCRegister interview:

"The exclusion of those in irregular matrimonial unions from the Sacraments does not constitute a judgment about their responsibility for the breakdown of the matrimonial bond to which they are bound. It is rather the objective recognition of the bond."

Read more: http://www.ncregister.com/blog/edward-pentin/cardinal-burke-final-report-lacks-clarity-on-indissolubility-of-marriage/#ixzz3pjO5ek6z

The terminology is really the key, when we hear the newly popular phrase "divorced and remarried Catholic", we need to ask what does this really mean? I suspect that a number of cases are being lumped together as suggested by Fr. Krisman in his 3 types elucidated above. But this is a problem as this also will include the Adulterer! and as Julie has clearly written above the definition of an adulterer is rather clear, and the Words of Our Lord do not give much if any wiggle room.

1) those who married in the Catholic Church both times;

This would be either by annulment of the first 'marriage' OR death of the spouse, there is no problem here. As long as everybody has been honest with the tribunal there can no argument about the annulment, the first marriage was not a marriage in the eyes of the Church.

2) those who married in the Catholic Church neither time;

This requirers more care, was the state of the first civil marriage? but this should all be taken care of in the 'marriage preparation' for the second civil marriage to be recognised by the Church.

3) those who married in the Catholic Church the first time, but not the second.

I think the words of Our Lord were pretty clear...

Well plenty of ink has already been spent on this topic... but what about in practice,

http://www.lmschairman.org/2014/09/cristina-odone-doublethink-on-divorce.html

http://gatesheadrevisited.blogspot.co.uk/2015/09/mitis-judex.html

http://www.catholicherald.co.uk/commentandblogs/2015/05/25/the-irish-churchs-failures-have-caused-its-people-to-choose-secularism-over-faith/

http://liturgicalnotes.blogspot.co.uk/2015/10/this-time-peripheries-without-irony.html

So we can see that many people in Ireland and a catholic journalist have no idea what marriage is. I also suspect that Fr. Brown will not be the only one with a smaller work load than expected. We also see a defective understanding of mercy as shown by Fr. Hunwicke (repeatedly!)

So some questions,
Can someone tell me when was the last time a sodomite, a fornicator, an adulterer etc. were refused Communion in a Catholic Church?

How many Extraordinary Ministers of Holy Communion are adulterers? sodomites? etc.

In my experience the average Catholic does not know what a mortal sin is, and everyone goes to Communion. Does anyone have a different experience of the average Catholic?

Masses for those of homosexual orientation, known as the The Soho Masses in England how many other places have Masses which especially and uniquely welcome homosexuals?

This Synod seems to be tackling yesterdays problems, Annulments (Christina Odone is not interested and she is not alone!) Marriage (well it is a temporary arrangement between two people, maintaining a quaint co-sanguinity exception?) Adultery (erm isn't this normal and not in anyway a crime in our modern times) Divorce (It's a Human right, happens all the time) Reception of the Sacraments (What is a Sacrament? Communion, well this is a communion meal, and our eating together is a sign of our community?)

Well I am sure that the German church is going to see an increase in Mass attendance next week...

Now that reminds me, where is the countdown showing when there will be fewer N.O. priests, than E.F priests in France, is there one for Germany?, Switzerland, Ireland etc. By their fruits you will know them, but not for long.