We versus I (Catholic baptism)

[DreamerGirl]

7 minutes ago, Murphy101 said:

But she didn’t point them out.

She claims the church is made of people but then rants about things “The Church” has done as though it isn’t comprised of people making choices.  I mean is she ticked the church is demanding accountability or not?  Is she suggesting that because bad things happened in the past we should just drop the bar entirely and not bother anymore? To be a good priest would mean to do the duties of his office accurately and with due diligence and reverence - it appears he failed at this.   Maybe he is a nice guy but that’s not enough to be a good anything, including a priest. 

I tend to ramble, but I will answer this before I bow out.

The crux of my disgust was the church even now fails to act in cases of abuse like in my country of origin. But is quick to act when it comes to the sacraments and traditions of the church. It matters where the bar is set. Abuse or words used in a sacrament

Part of being a good priest is not being abusive and being a shepherd to the people like this priest was. Yet he was made to resign while others were forgiven. 

We set the bar by forgiveness. We set the bar by defining what a good priest is. That is my definition. People matter over dogma. In this case, people did not. 

I will bow out now for real.
 

[Frances]

7 minutes ago, Murphy101 said:

But she didn’t point them out.

She claims the church is made of people but then rants about things “The Church” has done as though it isn’t comprised of people making choices.  I mean is she ticked the church is demanding accountability or not?  Is she suggesting that because bad things happened in the past we should just drop the bar entirely and not bother anymore? To be a good priest would mean to do the duties of his office accurately and with due diligence and reverence - it appears he failed at this.   Maybe he is a nice guy but that’s not enough to be a good anything, including a priest. 

 

1 minute ago, DreamerGirl said:

I am sorry @Murphy101. It was not my intention to attack you. 

I came across a little strong because something about this hits a little closer than it probably should. I always look at Christianity through the lens of my country of origin because that is where most of my experience is.

In my country of origin, we do not differentiate between Catholic and Protestant. All are christian because we are less than 5%.

There are huge basicallas but many of the Churches are small and priests there are barely educated. There are uneducated people who cannot read the word of the Bible, but who are so faithful. Who knows what language they use to baptize people.

There are secret christians even now who will be murdered because they convert. Yet they are baptized secretly. If words about sacrament are so important than the act that it is invalidated what about all these people.

I still by what I said about the RCC. There are so many things which are happening in my country of origin and the church does nothing. Yet, the church does this to a faithful priest because of a few words. Faith is a choice. A belief in the goodness of an unknown God which is demonstrated chiefly by his church on earth. This does not demonstrate Christ or his teachings to me. 

Again, I am sorry @Murphy101. I am sorry my words hurt you. I will now bow from this thread. 

I’m a little confused about what you think happened to the priest. According to the FAQs @Murphy101linked, he has resigned from his parish job, but is still a priest. He’s working to help fix the problems he created for those who need and want it. Now as someone who is no longer a practicing Catholic, I could think of lots of better ways for him to be spending his time. But for Catholics who believe as @Murphy101does, I would think they’re very happy the Church is having him devote his time to this. At the same time, I would hope most, if not all, Catholics continue to be disgusted by the Church’s past handling of the sexual abuse scandals.

[Frances]

5 minutes ago, barnwife said:

So I emailed our (RCC) priest about this story. He's fairly new to our parish (he was assigned to our parish during the pandemic), so I don't know him super well. But he seems like a fairly neutral priest, neither super conservative nor super liberal. 

He seems baffled by the CDF's ruling (that's the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith). He points out that the priest was actually using a formula that is valid in many of the other 23 Catholic churches (friendly reminder that Roman Catholics aren't the only Catholics). He also reminded me about ex opere operato. St. Augustine wrote about it, and it's basically all about how Sacraments give grace just by being done, and are not based on the perfection of the minister, the recipients, the words, or the stuff used.

However, he also talked about how the most recent Codes of Canon Law are pretty obsessed with "form" (words) and "matter" (stuff) being "correct.".  So if a Baptism is deemed invalid, it invalidates any other sacraments that followed. 

Just thought I'd add some thoughts from a current RCC priest for anyone who is interested.

 

And this is exactly what I would expect. There is profound disagreement within the Catholic Church, among both laypeople and ordained people, on all sorts of important issues. So it’s not surprising to hear a different view point. Thanks for sharing.

 

[Frances]

7 minutes ago, DreamerGirl said:

I tend to ramble, but I will answer this before I bow out.

The crux of my disgust was the church even now fails to act in cases of abuse like in my country of origin. But is quick to act when it comes to the sacraments and traditions of the church. It matters where the bar is set. Abuse or words used in a sacrament

Part of being a good priest is not being abusive and being a shepherd to the people like this priest was. Yet he was made to resign while others were forgiven. 

We set the bar by forgiveness. We set the bar by defining what a good priest is. That is my definition. People matter over dogma. In this case, people did not. 

I will bow out now for real.
 

While I agree with you that throughout history and to this day, the Catholic Church has often not chosen well when deciding which doctrines to be strict about and which to let slide, the priest in question is still a priest, no? He’s just not currently assigned to a parish and is instead working to fix the problem he created.

[Terabith]

21 minutes ago, DreamerGirl said:

I tend to ramble, but I will answer this before I bow out.

The crux of my disgust was the church even now fails to act in cases of abuse like in my country of origin. But is quick to act when it comes to the sacraments and traditions of the church. It matters where the bar is set. Abuse or words used in a sacrament

Part of being a good priest is not being abusive and being a shepherd to the people like this priest was. Yet he was made to resign while others were forgiven. 

We set the bar by forgiveness. We set the bar by defining what a good priest is. That is my definition. People matter over dogma. In this case, people did not. 

I will bow out now for real.
 

The RCC is BY NO MEANS the only church where child sex abuse is an issue.  I am not saying they handled it well (they did not), but I'm not sure it's super relevant to this topic?

[ktgrok]

7 hours ago, Baseballandhockey said:

As someone who spent a lot of time in the pediatric ICU during covid, that doesn't match my experience.  

 

Sorry, I was referring to people who are able to attend the parish in person, that they could have things fixed fairly quickly. Not referring to the problematic issue of Covid/hospital visitation. That's a whole other problem. 

7 hours ago, Terabith said:

I could totally have seen these baptisms being ruled illicit but not invalid.  That seems like it would have both honored the fact that the wording was not correct (and I do understand how important that is, and I think removal of this priest is almost certainly appropriate) and would have honored the experiences of the people who received baptism (and subsequently other sacraments) in good faith.  

I think that would have been the gracious thing to do.

That's what I would have thought as well. 

[Socalmom]

Father Arango worked for a brief time in San Diego. This is a statement from our bishop -

Statement by San Diego Bishop Robert McElroy regarding Baptisms by Fr. Andrés Arango

SAN DIEGO (Feb. 16, 2022) — Bishop Robert W. McElroy, of the Catholic Diocese of San Diego, issued the following statement today:

“The Diocese of San Diego has received inquiries about the pastoral situation of men and women who were baptized by Father Andrés Arango during the brief period in which he served in the Diocese of San Diego a generation ago. Since Father Arango utilized an invalid formula in baptisms in the Diocese of Phoenix in recent years, that diocese has taken steps to identify and re-baptize men and women.

“It is unclear if any invalid baptisms by Father Arango took place within the Diocese of San Diego. If any such baptisms did take place, it is impossible 20 years later to analyze the nature of each specific baptismal formula that was used in individual baptisms, find the person who was baptized, and re-baptize them.

“Fortunately, this is essentially a pastoral dilemma rather than solely a matter of church law. The theology of the Church teaches that God binds himself to the efficacy of validly celebrated sacraments. But that same theology states that God is not bound by the limitations of the sacraments. The bounty of God’s grace powerfully suggests that any men and women who were possibly baptized so long ago have received from the Lord the graces of baptism and all that goes with them in their lives. And thus, they should be at ease.

“If anyone who was baptized by Father Arango in our diocese wishes to discuss this personal pastoral situation in greater depth, I would ask them to please call me personally.”

source -

https://www.sdcatholic.org/bishop/statement-by-san-diego-bishop-robert-mcelroy-regarding-baptisms-by-fr-andres-arango/

[TravelingChris]

14 minutes ago, Socalmom said:

Father Arango worked for a brief time in San Diego. This is a statement from our bishop -

Statement by San Diego Bishop Robert McElroy regarding Baptisms by Fr. Andrés Arango

SAN DIEGO (Feb. 16, 2022) — Bishop Robert W. McElroy, of the Catholic Diocese of San Diego, issued the following statement today:

“The Diocese of San Diego has received inquiries about the pastoral situation of men and women who were baptized by Father Andrés Arango during the brief period in which he served in the Diocese of San Diego a generation ago. Since Father Arango utilized an invalid formula in baptisms in the Diocese of Phoenix in recent years, that diocese has taken steps to identify and re-baptize men and women.

“It is unclear if any invalid baptisms by Father Arango took place within the Diocese of San Diego. If any such baptisms did take place, it is impossible 20 years later to analyze the nature of each specific baptismal formula that was used in individual baptisms, find the person who was baptized, and re-baptize them.

“Fortunately, this is essentially a pastoral dilemma rather than solely a matter of church law. The theology of the Church teaches that God binds himself to the efficacy of validly celebrated sacraments. But that same theology states that God is not bound by the limitations of the sacraments. The bounty of God’s grace powerfully suggests that any men and women who were possibly baptized so long ago have received from the Lord the graces of baptism and all that goes with them in their lives. And thus, they should be at ease.

“If anyone who was baptized by Father Arango in our diocese wishes to discuss this personal pastoral situation in greater depth, I would ask them to please call me personally.”

source -

https://www.sdcatholic.org/bishop/statement-by-san-diego-bishop-robert-mcelroy-regarding-baptisms-by-fr-andres-arango/

Yes, that was what I was thinking

 

[DreamerGirl]

19 hours ago, Frances said:

While I agree with you that throughout history and to this day, the Catholic Church has often not chosen well when deciding which doctrines to be strict about and which to let slide, the priest in question is still a priest, no? He’s just not currently assigned to a parish and is instead working to fix the problem he created.

I said I will bow out now and I am back. But I want to clarify why for me anyway, the most upsetting thing was invalidating of the sacraments of infant baptism, confirmation and marriage by this priest. The priest erred, but how are these people responsible ? Invalidating of sacraments is not just easy as ok let us go fix it by a bunch of documents.

In many countries, even now baptism record is what you apply for instead of a birth certificate. In my own case, my baptism certificate was used to apply for a birth certificate at a later date. I was born in a small, private clinic and apparently no one thought to apply for a birth certificate. But my birthday was recorded in the baptism certificate and was accepted as a valid thing to issue a birth certificate by a government agency. 

For some people, the fact that they existed or got married is simply the record of baptism  and their marriage that was conducted in a church. No certificate. No one signed anything. But it was recorded in the church register. That is the case even today in many small parishes. 

Thirdly and for me, the most upsetting was this priest was originally from a South American country, Brazil I think. Who knows what kind of training he would have had to become a priest ? Unlike an English Bible where you have several versions, translations, concordance and in this case, the language used in sacraments there are things translated in various languages mostly during colonization by people who did not have a firm grasp of the language. Their intention was to translate the Bible or the prayer book or the hymnal to the language as fast as they could. Who knows if his training was in his native language and how he was taught. No one was checking the work of the translator, often it was a lone person and very often that is the only thing that is available even now in many languages. I am not sure if that is the case here, but it could be. 

I come from a country where we have our own version of the Marion apparitions like Lourdes. There is a huge basicalla and the speciality is back to back to back mass said in multiple languages. They marry people all the time, people come all the way to baptize children. It is chaotic. I am fairly certain if you look very close at the language used in them, they might run the same issue. But the priests here are so humble, so faithful and they are truly shepherds of the people. What about all their sacraments ? 

Something like this sets a precedent. If it happened in some obscure diocese in a third world country it would not have an impact like an American one. Whatever the faults of the priest who gives the sacrament, those should not be messed with IMO.

Edited February 19, 2022 by DreamerGirl

[DreamerGirl]

19 hours ago, Terabith said:

The RCC is BY NO MEANS the only church where child sex abuse is an issue.  I am not saying they handled it well (they did not), but I'm not sure it's super relevant to this topic?

Answering this one thing and truly stepping off.

When I judge something, I judge by comparing it to something similar. In this case, I compared it to the sex abuse scandal to see how it was handled. It reminded me of the Publican and the Pharisee story by Jesus where the language used played a part. For me, that was the relevancy  for the comparison or the need to even bring it up.