"Catholic" parish discusses Bible as "false idol"

A reader alerted me to the Web site of St. Joan of Arc Church in the St. Paul-Minneapolis archdiocese.

The site is loaded with left-wing material, but this item caught my eye: The parish's weekly Bible study group held a discussion on a book titled Misquoting Jesus: The Story Behind Who Changed the Bible and Why, by Bart D. Ehrman.

One of the group's facilitators wrote:...Since God did not see fit to preserve the original manuscripts, as an all-powerful God presumably can do, that is a pretty good sign that the Bible is not inerrant, much less a foolproof guide to the questions of the present age, such as abortion, women's rights, gay rights, religious supremacy, Western-style democracy, etc. We can't set up the Bible as a false idol....And the "Discussion questions" for this topic?

Why, if our beliefs are more profound and more rational, do we need to denigrate the gullibility and obstinacy of Bible literalists? Why does their faith appear to be more intense than ours (or does it)?

If the Bible is not the inerrant word of God, what value does it have?

Has our experience with the Bible led to any faith journey changes of course among us, as happened to the author?Oh, and St. Joan of Arc Church even has a "Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender" group. Go figure.

We also get an item advertising an ACLU baby-killing protection campaign, courtesy of the Evergreene Digest, "a web-based monthly journal of progress for the rest of us and hosted on the St. Joan of Arc website":

The American Civil Liberties Union launched a Web site, TakeIssueTakeCharge.org, as part of a national grassroots campaign to protect reproductive freedom.

'In recent years we've witnessed an unprecedented attack on our civil liberties, with reproductive freedom as a prime target,' said Louise Melling, Director of the ACLU Reproductive Freedom Project. 'It is time to push back and say, 'Enough is enough.' The right to life, liberty and reproductive freedom you save may be your own.'

In the coming months, Take Issue, Take Charge will sponsor activities aimed at stopping government funding of ineffective and harmful abstinence-only-until-marriage programs and at promoting responsible sexuality education, the ACLU said.

Meanwhile, good priests such as Father Robert Altier are persecuted for their orthodoxy. A sad sign of the times.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Who is the Bishop of this diocese??? He should crack the whip, or else it should be cracked on him!

-Anony

Shaun Pierce said...

There's another problem! The Archbishop is Harry Flynn. He has welcomed militant homosexual activists into his cathedral.

He issued a letter in 2004 banning priests faithful to the teaching of the Church from working in the archdiocese.

Despite many requests, Flynn has not taken any action against St. Joan of Arc, whose promotion of homosexuality has been directly censured by the Vatican!

Archbishop Flynn has also welcomed the "Rainbow Sash Movement," a group whose publicly staged anti-Catholic protests have seen them barred from participating in Catholic services even in the Washington diocese.

Anonymous said...

Oh dear Lord, I say the Pope should "encourage" him to join the Church of England and be done w/ it.

-Anony

Thomas Dodds said...

Anon. - clarify your comment. If indeed you are saying what I think you are saying - then cease and desist, or in the future be prepared to have your own beliefs raked through hot coals.

Granted there is error ... but you seem to take the view that to remove a splinter from a afinger one must cut off the arm, instead of taking teezers and a magnifying glass and gently working the issue out. Now to be fair - we both then do see the 'splinter' and do see the need for it to be removed. But one method is widley and unabashedly silly.