Update: 9 June, 2010 - a group of Catholic Truth readers visited the Pauline Books and Media shop in Royal Exchange Square, with leaflets warning about the dangerous writings of Thomas Groome, whose books were featured in a prominent window display. Scroll down to read the editor’s comment on this lunchtime venture.
A reader emailed today to tell us that the Pauline Sisters in Glasgow have been busy arranging a window display in their bookshop to promote Professor Thomas Groome’s books. The Sisters know that the Archbishop (Mario Conti) will be perfectly happy with their latest initiative to – literally – “sell” heresy, and the Archbishop can rest easy knowing that nobody in the Vatican will bother their heads one little bit. The brass necks are now of giraffe proportions.
To refresh memories, click here to read the previous thread on Professor Groome, now closed to comments. I’ve copied and pasted below, the final comment from blogger Augustine (who happens to be the young man who wrote to all the priests in three dioceses: the Archdiocese of Glasgow, Motherwell and Paisley, in an attempt to prevent them from attending the planned Lecture of Professor Groome in St Aloysius College, Glasgow, a few weeks ago.) Thankfully, the volcanic ash saw to it that there were no planes available to the land the “ex”-priest, Groome on Scottish soil, so the Lecture didn’t take place after all.
But, fancy the Daughters of St Paul – as was, before their feminist switch to “Pauline” bookshop – advertising his books so blatantly in their shop window? Groome is a very public dissenter, most notably with reference to the ordination of women. Tell us what you make of this scandalous book display once you’ve read Augustine’s comment on his correspondence with Professor Groome, who argues that Catholic teaching on male-only priesthood is not set in stone. Click here to find out why he’s plain wrong…
It occurs to me that the two readers who recently asked me to post threads on two specific topics can have their dreams come true on this thread. One reader asked for a thread on practical responses to scandals whether they occur in parishes or other venues within a diocese – a lecture to be delivered in a Catholic school by a known heretic, springs to mind! The other reader asked for a thread on humility. St. Bernard defines humility: “A virtue by which a man knowing himself as he truly is, abases himself.” And St. Thomas: “The virtue of humility,” he says, “consists in keeping oneself within one’s own bounds, not reaching out to things above one, but submitting to one’s superior” (Summa Contra Gent., bk. IV, ch. lv, tr. Rickaby). Seems to me that none of the church-people involved in the Groome scandal are submitting to the teaching of the Church but, conversely, display an arrogance, a pride that is extremely dangerous to their spiritual welfare.
So, feel free to explore all the issues surrounding this latest development in the Saga of the Scandalous Professor, but let me know folks, if you still want separate threads on “Catholic Action” and “Humility” – Catholic Truth at your service! Feel free to let me know your preference, by your chosen method, at your convenience, she said, oozing humility…
Blogger, Augustine writes…
Professor Groome contacted me by post last month and strongly requested that I “restore [his] good name in Scotland”. Since then we have been emailing back and forth about the subject in question i.e. the reservation of priestly orders to men. It’s quite clear to me that he simply doesn’t accept the Church’s teaching on this point. In fact, in one of his emails to me he stated:
However, no theologian that I know – and I work with some 60 of them at Boston College – would say that this is indisputedly an infallible teaching. The Pope, acting as the successor of Peter, i.e. speaking ex cathedra and in the name of all the bishops of the world, has never declared this an infallible dogma of Catholic faith.
Mr. Keane incorrectly insists that the Catholic Church’s negative decision on the ordination of women is an infallible teaching. This indeed was the position of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) as stated “Responsum ad Dubium” of Oct 28, 1995 and signed by then Cardinal Ratzinger. But theologically the CDF cannot teach infallibly on its own authority and its claim that Pope John Paul II in Ordinatio Sacerdotalis was merely confirming a teaching already taught infallibly by the bishops of the world has been challenged by many respected and faithful Catholic theologians. I repeat, a teaching of the ordinary magisterium cannot be considered infallible unless the Pope explicitly states so; this was a key condition for infallibility laid down by the First Vatican Council (1870).
I think Professor Groome seems very fixed on the idea that only ex cathedra statements possess the note of infallibility. In fact, Lumen Gentium 25 talks about the infallibility of the ordinary and universal Magisterium under certain conditions. Which is exactly whence the late Holy Father drew the teaching that priestly orders are to be reserved to males.
In fact, as far as I see it – and someone please correct me if I am wrong – we can say that certain doctrines are to be ‘held definitively’ and, thus, are infallible even though they have not been elevated to the level of a formal dogma. This – it seems to me – was the import of the CDF’s Commentary that came out 4 years after Ordinatio Sacerdotalis. End