samedi 26 novembre 2011

On obedience having limits. Answering two faithful from the flocks of the FSSPX.


a child born to wicked parents owes them every bit of respect due to parents...including a broad modicum of obedience...excepting commands that ...contradict divine positive law"

- or the law of the land (human positive law) or the law of human nature. Or commands that exceed the natural authority of parents. For instance, if I were to marry a fourty year old maid (to take an instance which is not the case), I might be obeying my father, who might have a kind of modern hysteria about pedophilia, but I would be doing so against my inclinations to marry in a way that gives hope for children, and in ordering me to do so, he would exceed his rights according to divine, natural or positive, or human positive law.

[Main subject of the discussion, but digressive here:]So, Abe Lincoln had no right to impose on anyone to celebrate the arrival of the Mayflower (and as Chesterton said, English would have the right to celebrate its departure), but Catholic Bishops having with Leo XIII (condemner of Americanism) ruled that Thanksgiving is not equivalent to "Mayflower Day" - a day to be shunned if ever it were so named - it is quiet licit to celebrate Thanksgiving, and I think one should. It is also a reminder to Prots that if even the state can institute a day of public Thanksgiving, year after year, the Christian Church can do so which preceded the US of A.

‎"the child born in a Roman province was born under roman law"

- not quite, he was certainly born under Roman Administration, but not automatically under Roman Law. Or rather a mere provincial was born under the administration but not the law, a citizen under the law but not the administration. Our Lord was thus under Roman Administration, as his fosterfather showed when registering for taxes in Bethlehem, but St Paul was under Roman law and could not be crucified, only beheaded.

"The base of your studies should be the encyclicals of the Popes and also the books of Archbishop Lefebvre, which are very precise summaries and explanations of the Popes' teaching. Be careful of all theories which may distract you or lead you away from this teaching, and look to the priests for guidance and help in understanding; formation is their direct responsibility."

- No, formation of intellect is the intellectual's direct responsibility. The one formation which is the direct responsibility of priests is formation of conscience, in admonitions in confession, and formation of faith and conscience in sermons and catechism. But asking your priest to direct your studies is up to you, no priest has any right to class you as an heretic or to refuse you the sacraments because you study on your own and do your own formation.

Also, the priest could be, and the priests in St Nicolas du Chardonnet are in ascertained fact deficient in parts of social morality. There is a field where they have done great deeds, reminding of Mirari Vos, but when it comes to the rights of the poor, they are sometimes simply led by their noses by modernist administrators. And, quite obviously, they are impoverishing this here writer by treating my blogs as forming part of those "all theories which may distract you or lead you away from this teaching". Their attitude seems to be: if Hans-Georg agrees with us, he is superfluous, and we have expressed it better, if he does not, he is not Catholic and should not be read. As a result my blogs are not read by the one public that might appreciate them.

Because Modernist Catholics are against them due to my Creationism and Geocentrism, Jews have again and again been given access and obviously "forgotten" - because I am a Christian and on top of that a Catholic, claiming there is a visible Church succeeding the older Israel and they are not its visible successors, Muslims are put off by the fact that I compare Mahomet to Joseph Smith, Mormons are not quite thrilled by my comparing Joseph Smith to Mahomet, Orthodox dislike my defense of filioque and my defense of St Robert Bellarmine against the calumnies of a Paul Ballaster - ex-Franciscan, defrocked, died stabbed by a Catholic as Greek Orthodox archbishop of Mexico city and both Americas - nor are they too fond of my defending Cardinal Stepinac, besides they are cosntantly asking themselves whether it is proper "for a monk" - I am not a monk - or "a prophet" - I am not a prophet - to ask for money.

So, St Nicolas du Chardonnet and similar advising formation only under a priest's advice and priests disadvising from my blogs, that is a bad stab in the back to my livelihood as a writer and essayist. If they condemned part of its contents, they would have to do so publically, and therefore publically acknowledge, if not my doctrine, at least the fact that I expressed it. They do not want that. They prefer, up to now, backstabbing. And if they told you what you say, they are erecting a principle which is not true. Of course, priests may have indirect responsibility for formation, like Cardinal Newman said in his "Idea of a Catholic University". That is another thing.

A typical example of their attitude to me, in St Nicolas du Chardonnet is the way they pray for me. Now, a few months ago, I was writing to Mgr. Williamson saying "I am a writer, I want to be paid for my writing, do not block me, do not pray for God's providence to block me" and he obviously took it as meaning "I want to be a writer in the future" since next hour, day or week I found on the internet a course of writing. Or on how to improve writing.

Now, the past weeks I had the pleasure to read the Chardonnet. One thing that Fr. Chautard said was that jobs are getting more and more tied up to large companies, so getting a real meaningful job is less and less possible and therefore less important as a consideration for finding your work. He also stated that being an internet technician - "informaticien" - is a not very noble calling. I wrote him a letter in which I stated, again, that I am writing on the internet, and reminded him of fact that as much as a text can go from paid format on paper to free format on internet (like Bibles online), likewise can they go the other way, from the free form on internet to the payable form on paper. He must have taken that as an obstination in wnating to be an internet technician, for if not, and if he did not pray for that, how do you explain I found right today this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Op3QLzMgSY&feature=topvideos_education
Lecture 1A | MIT 6.001 Structure and Interpretation, 1986


That was, however, not a complete waste of my time. The thing about black box abstraction is that there is no such thing as an algorithm for turning electronic or chemic processes into understanding or for that matter any other kind of experience. There is an algorithm for turning simple understandings into chains of complex understaning so that the result is as sure as the simple understandings themselves, and that algorithm is called logic. But there is no such thing as an algorithm for turning non-experience into experience or non-understanding into understanding, non-cognitive into cognitive. A good thing to know. A good thing to write about.
Of course, "computer logic" is making an algorithm for signs to echo the algorithms of logic. It is in no wise any thing that makes computers understand anything whatsoever.

And that includes language. That is the profound reason why computer translations suck.

But sometimes having people pray for you according to their misunderstandings can be painful. I guess that week when I was thinking time after time of sodomitic acts that disgusted me was Fr Beauvais praying that I might get duly disgusted at sodomy. As if I were a homosexual. Which I am not. I am neither homosexual, nor homoliberal. But in St Nicolas I can be passed off as either, or could till recently, due to priests refusing to take direct note of what I write them or same priests insisting on reinterpreting it, as if I were unable to express my real needs and intentions correctly in a text not needing reinterpretation.

I suppose such praying for me instead of talking to me is a result of taking Mgr Williamsons advice "some people you can not discuss with, only love and pray for". For a man who was habitually naked and dirty and throwing imself in fire and water, I would agree. But for a man trying to have his blog articles reprinted as essay collections or his music scores played before paying audience, I think that is not an applicable advice. Any more than for 12 guys not washing their hands before every meal or picking wheat ears on saturdays.

Not that I compare myself to the Apostles in holiness of vocation, of course.

Hans-Georg Lundahl
Georges Pompidou library
of Beaubourg*/Paris
26-XI-2011

*It is in the gay district, but I go to the library to write on computers, not to make trysts with gay men. Actually the library would probably not be the best place in all Beaubourg to do so. It is much more a studentish, even to some extent a young Muslim and Immigrant studentish thing.

11 commentaires:

  1. Taken from the Catechism of St. Pius X: 1 Q: What does the Fourth Commandment: Honor thy father and thy mother, command?

    A: The Fourth Commandment: Honor thy father and thy mother, commands us to respect our parents, obey them in all that is not sinful, and assist them in their temporal and spiritual needs.
    2 Q: What does the Fourth Commandment forbid?

    A: The Fourth Commandment forbids us to offend our parents by word or by deed or in any other way.
    3 Q: What other persons does this Commandment include under the names of father and mother?

    A: Under the names of father and mother this Commandment also includes all our superiors, both ecclesiastical and lay, whom we must consequently obey and respect. Pax Christi Regis.


    My answer:

    "obey them in all that is not sinful" - should be taken as:
    - all that is neither
    sinful for oneself to do
    nor
    sinful for them to ask
    see thereon Summa Theologica, II-II, whatever the Question is that is about Obedience.

    Summa, II-II, Q. 104, A. 5:

    (a parallel is adduced for illustration in beginning of corpus, read it if you like):
    On like manner there are two reasons, for which a subject may not be bound to obey his superior in all things. First on account of the command of a higher power. For as a gloss says on Romans 13:2, "They that resist [Vulgate: 'He that resisteth'] the power, resist the ordinance of God" (cf. St. Augustine, De Verb. Dom. viii). "If a commissioner issue an order, are you to comply, if it is contrary to the bidding of the proconsul? Again if the proconsul command one thing, and the emperor another, will you hesitate, to disregard the former and serve the latter? Therefore if the emperor commands one thing and God another, you must disregard the former and obey God." Secondly, a subject is not bound to obey his superior if the latter command him to do something wherein he is not subject to him. For Seneca says (De Beneficiis iii): "It is wrong to suppose that slavery falls upon the whole man: for the better part of him is excepted." His body is subjected and assigned to his master but his soul is his own. Consequently in matters touching the internal movement of the will man is not bound to obey his fellow-man, but God alone.

    Nevertheless man is bound to obey his fellow-man in things that have to be done externally by means of the body: and yet, since by nature all men are equal, he is not bound to obey another man in matters touching the nature of the body, for instance in those relating to the support of his body or the begetting of his children. Wherefore servants are not bound to obey their masters, nor children their parents, in the question of contracting marriage or of remaining in the state of virginity or the like. But in matters concerning the disposal of actions and human affairs, a subject is bound to obey his superior within the sphere of his authority; for instance a soldier must obey his general in matters relating to war, a servant his master in matters touching the execution of the duties of his service, a son his father in matters relating to the conduct of his life and the care of the household; and so forth.

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  2. Obeidiance to ones parent's (authority) is the same as that owed to one's soveriegn. Instructions which are moral may be followed but those that would tend to lead to a sinful act or thought may be disobedied, because at the judgement it will be you who stands before Jesus alone. Therefore it is necessary to form a right conscience. No man has the right to make another sin.

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  3. An answer, and, an answer that is beside the point. You and I are agreed on the one limit that if the content of the order is for the ordered person to sin, he must and therefore can disobey. But my point is if order passes out of the competence of the one giving order, it may also quite licitly be disobeyed.

    Like neither parent nor state has the right to mistreat children or subjects by imposing pseudo-cures for supposedly abnormal ire by the method seen in "Anger Management" (Hollywood) - and anyone imposing such a cure directly is in fact sinning and therefore that side of the order can and should be disobeyed, but the point is, even if I were not sinning by presumption in submitting to such a thing, I would not need to, since it is not for either state or parent of a grown man to decide he has problems managing his anger. That is up to him and God, and nobody else, except father confessor, if such be consulted.

    Look very well at this link:

    http://newadvent.org/summa/3104.htm#article5

    The first instance of a man not always being bound to obey a superior is "nobody must obey a superior who orders a sin". But the second is the one that is being missed: no man is bound to obey a superior in a thing in which he is not superior to one. Neither father nor state has the right to use force to impose this marriage or deprive one of marriage. Nor to decide what a man eats. And of course not to decide what medical cures he submits to.

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  4. Nous devons consentir sur ce point. Oui,
    mais, le soveriegns d'histoire avec le conivance d'Eglise envoyé leurs enfants être épousés pour le bon du royaume.



    I apollogize for my poor french.

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  5. In such a case, obedience is voluntary. The Church did not force a Prince or Princess to obey the royal parents about a marriage chosen for reasons of state. The prince or princess in question would have obeyed for:
    - not objecting to marriage as opposed to celibacy (confer Libussa, martyr for chosing to be Christ's bride)
    - not objecting in favour of someone else
    - and not objecting by disgust for person chosen.

    The mother of St Francis of Sales was 14 when she married a man aged 43 or 63 (I've found both ages in different sources), and that could not have happened if she had very much not wanted to marry such an old man. Not among Christians.

    St Hedwig married Jagiello, and that could not have happened if she had seriously objected to marrying a recent Pagan, a warrior, and someone older than herself too.

    The will of the person in question was not simply overridden.

    As with a very other kind of ring than wedding rings, the Council of Elrond forces noone to take it who is not willing.

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  6. I am afraid some seminary directors may have had an incomplete education in history.

    The fact that Gustave Thibon could get away with quoting Maurras as saying - and being right to say - the the Roman Emperors were right to persecute the first Christians as being too anarchic shows a certain lack in historic factuality and Church related apologetics.

    I actually read a book by Thibon (or the relevant part for that quote). If he had been alive I might have had to tell him that Maurras and Fustel de Coulanges being better at history than Michelet does not make them infallible.

    But if there really was a case of Royal and Catholic parents overriding roughhandedly their children's will, first of all I've never heard of it (the father of Frederick II of Prussia was a Protestant), and if I ever do, I expect to hear either the Church was not at all involved, or the Churchmen who were were bad Churchmen.

    Even in voluntary obedience, there is so much you can ask for royalty, who are few and have been raised to take care of the realm, and it would be wrong even to ask such obedience of a private citizen.

    France however had a legislation which was more parentalist than Catholic teaching. Part of the Council of Trent was not regisered by the French Parliaments, and that part was the consent of both husband and wife being sufficient even without parental consent. In French law a man taking away someone's daughetr to marry her against her father's will counted as a rapist up to the Revolution. Both Church and Monarchs have asked of parents the obedience to not insist on that privilege.

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  7. I was right now reading some things which might very well have been secretly meant as answers from TFP and SSPX to above.

    1847 Our Lady appeared to St John Bosco. As far as I know he was already a priest. His only concern with youth cannot therefore have had any legitimate inclusion any more of marriage, as for instance St Francis of Sales at one point could have married a girl of fourteen legitimately.

    The second is Mgr Lefèbvre's principle, ONLY when the faith is at stake may one refuse obedience to the public authority of the Church.

    Note two things:

    1,a) I am neither priest nor subdeacon
    1,b) priests do not necessarily know if I have been showed a path or not.

    2,a) If FSSPX or any other part of the Church pretends to know the right way for me and that it does not include marriage, they lie;
    2,b) Their lie even concerns the faith, like the limits of ecclesiastical infallibility. St Robert Bellarmine says Popes are infallible ONLY when speaking to all of the Church, not when speaking on one particular person or case;
    2,c) Therefore should they want to oblige me to celibacy on pretence of knowing more about me than I know myself, I am very much entitled to refuse obeying them, even if they should publically tell me so;
    2,d) Any telling me so or any other pretence I have been disobedient has either not been public or if public not openly about me, and therefore it would not even be the public authority but only the secret goadings I would so far oppose.

    Reference for St Robert Bellarmine can be found on one of my blogs, where I cite the chapter that Paul Ballaster MISQUOTED or GAVE A MISQUOTE FROM, link to that message, with Latin text straight from second edition and my own English translation can be found on this short link: http://o-x.fr/nfmkc

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