How can anyone consider Roman Catholicism, post-Vatican II?

I spent a lot of time trying to rationalize the pope. I never went to the sede view cause with out a pope how can there be a catholic faith. So i was stuck with the idea that there is a pope and he keeping making errors. We had bad bad men as popes in the past so this makes since.
It just became harder and harder with Francis.
Than i did research on the other side of the pope question. I saw i can be Catholic without a pope. So here I am. The church i go too is more catholic than most catholic church.

 

From what I understand, Roman Catholics see the church and its bishops, popes, body, etc. as a continuation of the old testament priesthood, and they say that just as God was revealed over time and laws changed in the OT, they say this can be true about the teachings added by the RCC. I heard RCC apologists claim that the reason it took so long for the RCC to dogmatically declare papal infallibility is because the Holy Spirit wanted to wait until they could show that the popes were consistent most of the time as teachers of faith and morals for the whole church, then say, "We've been right on these matters within this criteria the whole time, and now we're making people aware of it, and the teaching official." Thing is, you know the controversy with Honorius and others that gets brought up. Problem is, by Vatican I's definition, which is extremely broad about the Pope, Honorius and several others who were accused of heresy could be argued to have indeed made heresy as their critics have said. Vatican I just says the Pope declaring a doctrine as official for the whole church is enough, and never mentions that the councils are required to be in agreement. In order to defend it, you have to accept that Vatican II, which changed it to include the Pope plus the council speaking on faith and morals only. However, this contradicted Trent which was ex-cathedra by VII's standards, and denied the universalist claims made by Vatican II. Attempts to defend it include the view that Vatican II's statements on that subject were pastoral, that is, in regards to how the church should engage the world and not actually dogma, and that there are parts which are and which aren't dogmatic statements. But then that takes you back to the Vatican I statement which makes the criteria for the Pope's infallibility and authority very broad. Another defense is that Peter had the keys to bind and loosen and so did the Roman church in terms of adding and deleting requirements for holiness and salvation. But how that can be reconciled with the scriptures which speak of 'the faith delivered once and for all to the saints' is one matter that's up for debate.

 

A few times I was interested. At one point I was practically forcing myself to be Catholic (I'm weird, what can I say). I couldn't get over the rejection of sola fide and sola scriptura. The contradictions in the church are vast and yet they claim to be one, even perfect. Even pre-vaticn II, still a ton of doctrinal diversity. Then we have indulgences, liturgical abuses, much more.

A common objection I get is "well you anglicans have women bishops and.. and..uh support abortion!"
I usually come back with

1. these people aren't true anglicans. Just like how common politicians claim to be catholic (i.e. nancy pelowski or however you spell her name and quite a few more. Mike pence is an exemption because he seems virtuous)

2. At least us Anglicans can disagree and temporarily separate from that corrupt Church (until they return to Orthodox doctrine)

 

The perceived wisdom is that" Honorius' grimoire "was most probably written in 18th century

 

I was tempted a few times to go on my own Tiber swim but the claims of the Roman Church, even giving it leeway with Cardinal Newman's arguments, do not stand up to historical scrutiny. While it is comforting to belong to one single church that claims to be the One True Church (as opposed to the "33,000 denominations"), from the inside it is clear there is nothing of the sort. The RCC in America is merely 20 years behind the ECUSA. No there isn't 33,000 denominations just 33,000 interpretations of V2 or other similar statements and rulings.

I have a lot of respect for our Roman brothers and sisters as a high churchman but it is not a way forward for any disappointed Anglicans.

 

I had some RCs tell me Protestantism was a fraud because there are more Catholics doing charity to show that it 'works'. I honestly don't know how true it is. It does seem that way because there are more RCs, but in all honesty, even the 'holiest' Catholics I have met have not necessarily been holier than the holiest Protestants. Being able to achieve that kind of state without the 'valid priesthood' of the RCC and its sacraments troubles many of them in terms of the claims that salvation only exists in the RCC. That may be why so many of them are more ecumenical today because of the lead that the evangelical protestants have in missionary work. When Pope Francis says to RCs not to convert Protestants because they've succeeded at making more converts in the last 100 years than the RCC did in the last 500 is not heresy, but simply reiterating a lot of the Vatican II doctrine, and is true from the way I see it. Even if a lot of Protestants misunderstand 'salvation is not by works' to mean 'do not do any works', that fact that anyone could profess that doctrine and still attain an equal level of holiness is enough to challenge the belief that RCs are the only ones who have salvation or can be holy in the Christian sense.

 

This is literally false on its face, because while the RCs have 1.2 billion people, collecting all that money every week and distributing it via organizations, they still have only a dozen million dollars in givings every year, which amounts to like 1% of their total. Protestants have around 300 million people, and they have double that in giving every year. America, the most Protestant country in the world, is giving away a fortune every year, whereas neither Italy, nor France, nor Spain, give practically any money at all. This matches the weekly pew donation statistics I've been anecdotally seeing here in the US, where the orthodox Anglicans are expected to give 10% of their annual salary, whereas I know that during the Catholic collections people give like $1-5 or even nothing most of the time.

So in short, while yes, there are a few extremely wealthy people in RC circles, and by the sheer scale of numbers they can add up the total money to something significant, per person their giving and charity is essentially non-existent. Without huge congregations their churches just can't sustain themselves, which explains why they're shutting down dozens and hundreds of parishes here in the US every single year. Conversely, Anglican new church plants (post-war with TEC) start with 10, 20, 50 people, and they're thriving because the people give everything they've got.

 

Question: I've heard Catholics saying that V2 was a pastoral statement, and that the aspects which supposedly would be harmful to Papal Infallibility are only the parts that are pastoral and do not affect papal infallibility. Allegedly, there was an addendum after the council was held that stated this. However, some of the changes included altering ordination rites considered sacred, and this would invalidate most post-V2 popes, as sedevecantists claim, because they've accepted it and been ordained under the revised rites since V2. I'd think this would fall under the faith-and-morals camp. Not to mention the death penalty changes as of late, coming after the church had already previously declared it differently. Is this true?

 

Just a thought experiment: Vatican II was a rejection of tridentine theology and practice, in favour of a return to patristics. In my experience, what is usually called "traditional catholicism" is in fact more accurately called tridentine catholicism. The liturgy, the aesthetics, the theology, the music: it all seems to be stuck in a 1600s time warp.

Just to give you an example: most traditional RC churches have a preference, or require that the tabernacle be placed either on top or behind the High Altar. From what I've read, this is largely a renaissance practice. In the medieval period, the tabernacle was usually in a separate area from the altar.

 

That is such a good point. We need to remember that the Catholic Church dates back to Apostolic times and that the popular image of the Church for traditionalists is largely one dating from the Renaissance up to the 19th Century (admittedly a lengthy period of time).

The Catholic Church of 500 AD, or even 1000 AD, didn't look like the church of 1500 (or, for that matter, 2000). The Church has evolved over time; traditionalists (and this is true of the Orthodox as well) tend to view the church through a narrow lens, time-wise.

 

This is a good point. Romanists often want it both ways, they appeal to ostensible historicity but then also turn around and cite Manning/Newman's power of "development" as proof that their doctrine need not be in line with the consensus of the historic Church.

 

Erasmus and Thomas Moore both sought change in the Catholic Church from within. Many of the Reformers sought change from without, and a good number of them were thrown out so had no choice but to work from without. Erasmus and Moore were both important influences on Henry VIII and indeed Anglicanism as we have come to understand it, and indeed they are both still in evidence in the matters of Vatican II - as indeed were Manning and Newman.

In a number of areas in Vatican II Rome did move closer to both Canterbury and Constantinople, and yet it probably goes against their grain to acknowledge that reality.

The Samaritans and the Jews were close cousins in ancient days and the discussion with the woman at the well (John 4) and the Parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10) when applied to this leave us all with many challenges.

 

Father Mark never explained to me how the current Catechism and the Baltimore Catechism conflict in terms of whether or not people outside the church can be saved was a teaching pre-Vatican II. The Baltimore Catechism has a passage that suggests this, and that was prior to both V2 and the 1993 John Paul II Catechism. Some say Baptism by Desire was taught by the church long before Vatican II and was not a novel teaching, which basically said supreme ignorance of the church grants people outside the possibility of salvation. There's also the whole fiasco with Feeney vs. the Vatican II council on this matter. Thing is, Lumen Gentium suggests that Protestants and Orthodox are already united in a particularly stronger sense to the church than the religions mentioned in the following paragraph, but that, supposedly, if the Roman Church really offers the fuller grace it advertises, those sects will not have it, yet they do not deny that God can in some sense offer grace to them in one way or another. Also, I think the 1993 JPII Catechism repeats the statement of Baltimore and VII, that salvation outside the church is possible. As much as I appreciate Mark's input on these matters, his grammar and reading comprehension is somewhat poor, as well as his attempts to explain things which always end up vague, therefore I may not be able to rely on him fully for a clear an concise rendering of the Roman church on this matter, as much as I hate to admit it.

 

Vatican II worship is very broad church. No difference between the Novus Ordo and the liturgies printed in UCC, UMC, ELCA, PCUSA books of worship, really. You're lucky if the priest wears a chasuble these days; many stick with alb and stole. It was a love of liturgy that actually got me out of the RCC. Unless the subject in question joined an Anglican Uniate parish.