TCA Questions of the Day for the Week of Feb. 11-15, 2008

Question of the Day for Friday, February 15, 2008

Participation in Protestant Services?

Q. I sometimes attend Baptist church services with relatives, and I’ve read that Pope John Paul II himself sometimes took part in Protestant services. But the old Baltimore Catechism says that Catholics should not take part in Protestant services. Has the rule changed? Why were American Catholics once given that rule?

G.G., via e-mail

A. Here’s a reply from our TCA columnist Father Francis Hoffman, J.C.D.:

I find no statements in the old Baltimore Catechism prohibiting Catholics from participation in a Protestant service. Nor will you find such prohibitions from the Plenary Councils of Baltimore, for that matter. That’s not to say, however, that the Church was not concerned about Catholics losing their faith and becoming Protestants.

In fact, the documents just cited clearly discouraged Catholics from entering into mixed marriages and even prohibited marriage before a Protestant minister. Years ago you could be excommunicated for that. Moreover, the Baltimore Catechism taught Catholics why Protestant sects are not the true Church. It’s common sense, then, that you shouldn’t worship there. Furthermore, the bishops decreed at the First Plenary Council of Baltimore (1852) that the faithful should pray for the conversion of non-Catholics.

In 1866, the bishops warned Catholics in the United States about the danger of “indifferentism,” or the idea “that one religion is as good as another provided one is honest and just to his neighbor.” And that’s the real issue here. For that reason every parish was encouraged to have a school so Catholics would pass on their faith. In general, there was an atmosphere of caution regarding Protestantism in order to safeguard Catholics from error.

Today, in the wake of the Second Vatican Council, there is a greater openness to conversation with non-Catholics in an effort to win trust and sympathy that, in turn, hopefully, will lead more souls to interest in the Catholic faith and thus facilitate their salvation. While a Catholic can no longer be excommunicated for a marriage before a Protestant minister, if he does not have the proper dispensation from canonical form, that marriage is invalid.

I don’t think it’s accurate to say that the Pope has taken part or worshiped in Protestant services, but rather he has prayed together many times in what could be called “ecumenical prayer services” in his pastoral visits to other countries with Protestants (who are Christians after all) — many times in Catholic churches, and other times, I believe, in Protestant settings, such as the Anglican Canterbury Cathedral during his apostolic voyage to Great Britain in 1982.

Catholics cannot attend Sunday worship in Protestant churches as a substitute for Sunday Mass. But they may attend weddings, funerals and, on occasion, attend a Protestant service — for example, with a relative — if they make it clear that they do not share all Protestant beliefs. Obviously, they could never pretend to take Protestant communion.

Question of the Day for Thursday, February 14, 2008

St. Valentine?

Q. Was there really a St. Valentine, or is that just a myth? If so, how did St. Valentine’s day come to be associated with romance?

 R.V., via email

A. Yes, there really was a St. Valentine—in fact, there were three of them, and a Pope Valentine as well!

 At least three St. Valentines who were martyrs are associated with February 14 in the ancient martyrologies. All we know about one of them is that he was put to death with a number of companions in Africa. A second one was a priest of Rome and the third was a bishop of Interamna (modern Terni, Italy).

Apparently these latter two were both martyred in the second half of the third century and were buried (at separate locations) on the Flaminian Way, a road that leads into Rome. In the twelfth century, what had been known in ancient times as the Flaminian Gate of Rome was called the Gate of St. Valentine. (It’s now called the Porta del Popolo or “Gate of the People.” That name seems to have come from a church in the immediate neighborhood that was dedicated to the saint.

Some Acta (“Acts”) of these two saints have been preserved, but the texts are of a relatively late date and are historically unreliable.
 In medieval England and France there was a common belief that on February 14, birds began to pair. The fourteenth-century English poet Chaucer, for example, once wrote of “St. Valentine’s Day, when every bird comes there to choose his mate.” (I’ve modernized the language and spelling here.)

The popular customs associated with Valentine’s Day today no doubt undoubtedly had their origins in this belief. The day came to be dedicated to lovers and viewed as the proper occasion for writing love letters and sending romantic tokens of affection. People who engaged in this practice custom were called by each other their “Valentines.”

Pope Valentine, by the way, was by all accounts a devout pontiff who died in 827 after reigning on St. Peter’s throne only a few weeks.

Question of the Day for Wednesday, February 13, 2008

Canon Law

Q. Please inform me where I can purchase a book explaining canon law, as I see canons frequently noted in your publication. Also, what is the difference between a reference to “Canon 1374” and simply “No. 1374”?

C.P., Harbeson, Del.

A. I would recommend two books: Surprised by Canon Law: 150 Questions Laypeople Ask About Canon Law by Peter Vere, Michael Trueman and Patrick Madrid (Servant, 2005; click here)  and Surprised by Canon Law, Volume 2: More Questions Catholics Ask About Canon Law, also by Vere and Trueman (Servant, 2007; click here).

You might want to look at the full text of the Code of Canon Law published by the Midwest Theological Forum (click here).

It has the Latin and English version of the Code, as well as excellent and reliable commentary. The Code is also available in English translation online at the Vatican website; click here. 

Canon lawyer Dr. Edward Peters hosts an excellent canon law-focused website and blog; find it here. 

Each canon law has its own number and is called a “canon’; “Canon 1374” and “no. 1374” are thus alternate  forms of citation for the same law.

Question of the Day for Tuesday, February 12, 2008

Preparation for Immaculate Conception?

Q. We are looking for answers about the Immaculate Conception. Did God just prepare Mary’s parents for that, or did it come all the way down the line?

J. H., via email

A. Here’s a reply from TCA columnist Father Ray Ryland:

The parents of the Blessed Virgin had nothing to do with God’s having preserved the Virgin, from the first moment of her conception, from all stain of original sin. There was therefore no “preparation” in Mary’s parents for this miraculous intervention by God.

God chose to redeem the world through the life, death and resurrection of His incarnate Son. In his book “Miracles,” C.S. Lewis gives a helpful rationale for the Virgin Birth. He explains why God dispensed with a human father in the conception of His Son.

The Incarnation was to be the beginning of a new creation, free of the stain of original sin. So, says Lewis, since the father is a carrier of original sin, He dispensed with human fatherhood and created in a virgin a Man who was to be God himself.

If there were to be a true Incarnation, God could not dispense with a human mother. But an ordinary human mother is also a bearer of original sin. How was God’s Son to be preserved from original sin when He took a body from His human mother?

God could have intervened at the moment of His Son’s conception to shield Him from original sin. Yet in that case, Jesus would not have been “a man like us in all things but sin,” as our liturgy and the whole of the Catholic tradition testify. His conception would have been entirely different from ours.

The only other possibility for a true Incarnation was for God to preserve the mother of His divine Son from the stain of original sin. Then and only then could His Son take flesh in the same way you and I do — that is, from a human parent — after we have been conceived.

So, you see, that new beginning to which Lewis points (and with which I think Protestants in general would agree) necessarily presupposes the Immaculate Conception. We do not know whether Lewis actually accepted this teaching.

Question of the Day for Monday, February 11, 2008

Lourdes

Q. In light of the celebration today of the 150th anniversary of Our Lady’s first appearance to St. Bernadette at Lourdes, I’m curious to learn more about the “continuing story” of Lourdes. I’m familiar with the events immediately surrounding and following the apparitions, but what about the century and a half since then? Is there a book out there that gives an “update”?

 C.S., via email

A. In commemoration of this anniversary, a marvelous new book is coming out soon entitled The Wonders of Lourdes (Magnificat USA, 2008). I just read the galleys, and I think you’ll want to read it for sure.

The book offers 150 chapters that tell short stories about St. Bernadette, the visions, the development and background of the shrine and its traditions, and the dramas in the lives of dozens of people who have been certified as miraculously cured of illness or injury as a result of their visit to Lourdes. The stories deal with a selection of people and events related to Lourdes in various ways all the way up to the present time.

The 22 contributing writers worked in close collaboration with the official archives of Lourdes to ensure historical accuracy. The book has been approved by Bishop Jacques Perrier of Tarbes and Lourdes, who has contributed a foreword to the book along with Magnificat’s publisher, Pierre Dumont. (These are the same folks who publish the lovely pocket-size spiritual guide and aid to worship called Magnificat; click here.) 

When details about the book’s publication are available, I’ll post the information here.