Criticism of the Catholic Church includes the observations made about the current or historical Catholic Church, in its actions, teachings, omissions, structure, or nature. Criticisms may regard the concepts of papalprimacy and supremacy, or aspects of church structure, governance, and particular practices. Since the Catholic Church is the largest Christian church representing over half of all Christians[1] and one sixth of the world's population,[2] these criticisms may not necessarily represent the majority view of all Christians and non-Christians.
Criticism of the Catholic Church in previous centuries was more closely related to theological and ecclesiological disputes. The Protestant Reformation (16th-century Europe) came about due to abuses of church practices by corrupt clergy in addition to these same theological disputes.[3] Political disputes compounded the theological grievances between Protestants and Catholics and to this day the debate begun at the Reformation has been reflected in the diversity of Christian denominations. Some contemporary criticisms of the Catholic Church relate to philosophy and culture e.g., Christianity vs. humanism.
Before the reforms from Vatican II in the late 1960s the Catholic Church was best-known outside the church for the Tridentine Mass, said mostly in Latin with a few sentences in Ancient Greek and Hebrew.[4]
Since 1970, the Mass has been celebrated in the local language of where it is celebrated and the Mass in Latin less frequently. A minority of Roman Catholics however prefer the Mass to be celebrated in Latin, generally arguing that the Latin text is more authentic, and truer to scripture and doctrine than the Mass of Paul VI. However, in 2007, Pope Benedict XVI loosened some restrictions on its use with the aim of healing the rift that had come about between advocates of the Novus Ordo Mass and those of the Tridentine Mass.[5]
Traditionalist Catholics see the Church's recent efforts at reformed teaching and (liturgical) practice (known as "aggiornamento"), in particular the Second Vatican Council, as not benefitting the advancement of the Church. Some groups, such as the Society of St. Pius X, saying the Church has betrayed the core values of Catholicism, have rejected some of the decisions of the Holy See that they see harmful to the faith.
In the Catholic Church priestly celibacy is seen as a charism bestowed by the Holy Spirit, enabling one to make a total commitment of oneself in service of the kingdom of God.[6] The scriptural basis for this is found in Matthew 19:12 and 1 Corinthians 7:32-35.
Married men can be ordained to the permanent diaconate, but only unmarried men may be ordained priests. As celibacy is a discipline rather than doctrine, it can be abrogated in particular situations, as when, for example, married Anglican priests are ordained to the Catholic priesthood to minister in personal ordinariates. Some Eastern Rite Catholic Churches, such as the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church allow the ordination of married men as priests. Only unmarried men may be ordained to the episcopate.
Priestly celibacy continues to be the subject of a good deal of discussion. Proponents who view this as something that should be revisited say that it precludes otherwise qualified candidates from the priesthood, noting a shortage of priests in some areas.
The teaching of the Catholic Church on ordination, as expressed in the Code of Canon Law, the Catechism of the Catholic Church, and the apostolic letterOrdinatio Sacerdotalis, is that "only a baptized man validly receives sacred ordination"[7] According to Roman Catholic thinking, the Priest is acting 'in persona Christi' (that is, in the Person of Christ). In 1979, Sister Theresa Kane, then president of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious challenged Pope John Paul II from the podium at Washington, DC’s Shrine of the Immaculate Conception to include women “in all ministries of our Church.”[8]
In his Apostolic Letter Ordinatio sacerdotalis (1994), Pope John Paul II, said the "Priestly ordination, which hands on the office entrusted by Christ to his Apostles of teaching, sanctifying and governing the faithful, has in the Catholic Church from the beginning always been reserved to men alone."[9] He cited the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith's, (under Pope Paul VI) Declaration Inter Insigniores on the question of the Admission of Women to the Ministerial Priesthood,[10] and declared that “the Church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women and that this judgment is to be definitively held by all the Church's faithful.”[11] The reasons given included: "the example recorded in the Sacred Scriptures of Christ choosing his Apostles only from among men; the constant practice of the Church, which has imitated Christ in choosing only men; and her living teaching authority which has consistently held that the exclusion of women from the priesthood is in accordance with God's plan for his Church."
Some groups, nonetheless, say the matter should still be open for discussion. Dissenters do not regard Ordinatio sacerdotalis as definitive Church teaching. In June 2018 Pope Francis said, "We cannot do this with Holy Orders (women priests) because dogmatically we cannot. Pope John Paul II was clear and closed the door and I'm not going to go back on that. It [John Paul's decision] was serious, it was not a capricious thing."[12]
Since Vatican II, women have taken an increased role in the Church. In 1994, the Vatican Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments formally interpreted the 1983 Code of Canon Law, stating that women could assist at Mass as acolytes or altar servers. Women also serve as lectors and extraordinary ministers. Still many people see the Church's position on the ordination of women as a sign that women are not equal to men in the Catholic Church, though the Church rejects this inference.[13] In a separate but related issue, Pope Francis set up the Pontifical Commission for the Study of the Diaconate of Women to study women deacons in the early church, to help answer the question of whether women could also serve as deacons today. The Commission submitted its report to Pope Francis in January 2019.
Interfaith
Anglicanism
In 2011, Pope Benedict XVI established the Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham,[14] for groups of former Anglicans in England and Wales while also preserving elements of a "distinctive Anglican patrimony".[15] Members of the Anglican hierarchy found it "insensitive". Bishop of Lincoln, John Saxbee, said that "I can't judge the motives behind it [the offer], but the way it was done doesn't sit easily with all of the talk about working towards better relations" and that "Fence mending will need to be done to set conversations back on track."[16]
Russian Orthodox
In 2007, then Orthodox Patriarch Alexei II of Moscow objected to what he termed "proselytizing" by clerics of the Eastern Rite of the Catholic Church. Catholic officials replied that their efforts in Russia were not aimed at Orthodox believers, but were reaching out to the vast majority of Russians who are not churchgoers. The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith rejected the characterization of "proselytizing" and said that respect towards non Catholic Christians must not negate the possibility of conversion, if an individual should so chose.[17]
Harvey Newcomb, in his 1833 The Great Apostasy: Being an Account of the Origin, Rise and Progress of Corruption and Tyranny in the Church of Rome criticized the Catholic Church because he believed that the latter allowed the Roman traditions back into the church.[18] Likewise, Mormon James E. Talmadge's 1909 The Great Apostasy Considered in the Light of Scriptural and Secular History, stated that to conciliate Pagans to nominal Christianity, the Catholic Church took measures to combine the Christian and Pagan festivals.[19] Talmadge's book is based on B. H. Roberts' 1893 Outlines of Ecclesiastical History.[20] Both writers borrowed heavily from the writings of Protestant scholars who argued that Roman Catholicism had apostatized from true Christianity.[21]
Newcomb and others say that Easter derives from (a celebration of the Germanic goddess Ēostre) as a 'substitute' for Passover, though no record of Christian celebrations have necessarily yet been found that indicate that the celebration of Easter was observed as importantly before the second century.[18][19][22] In most European languages Easter is called by some variant of the late Latin word Pascha, which in turn derives from the Hebrew pesach, meaning passover.[23] Ēostre is attested solely by Bede in his 8th-century work The Reckoning of Time, where Bede states that during Ēosturmōnaþ (the equivalent of April), Anglo-Saxons had held feasts in Ēostre's honour, but that this tradition had died out by his time.
Some Evangelical Lutherans have questioned the Catholic Church's reliance on what it calls "Sacred Tradition", handed down from the apostles, whether orally or in writing (cf. 2 Thessalonians 2:15 – "Therefore, brethren, stand fast, and hold the traditions which ye have been taught by us, whether by word, or our epistle"), and which the Church distinguishes from human traditions or customs.[24] Regarding 2 Thessalonians 2:15 and the term "tradition", Evangelical Lutherans interpret the verse as Paul strengthening the Thessalonians by encouraging them to hold on tight to the gospel that he "had once handed down by preaching and teaching". The Lutheran apologists conclude that within the context "tradition" was referred to the divine gospel handed down (v. 14), not human traditions.[25]
The Catholic Church holds that the gospel was transmitted by the apostles by their oral preaching, by example, and by observances handed on what they had received from the lips of Christ, from living with Him, and from what He did, or what they had learned through the prompting of the Holy Spirit; as well as by those apostles and apostolic men who under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit committed the message of salvation to writing.[26] "This living transmission, accomplished in the Holy Spirit, is called Tradition, since it is distinct from Sacred Scripture, though closely connected to it."[27] The first generation of Christians did not yet have a written New Testament, and the New Testament itself demonstrates the process of living Tradition.[28]
On the basis of their doctrine of sola fide (faith only), Some Protestants have questioned and criticized the Catholic Church's teaching regarding salvation through faith and good works. There has been disagreement between Catholics and Lutherans on these two matters.[29]Confessional Lutheran teach that the whole context of the Epistle of James and the Bible rather show that good works are a result of justification, not a cause:[30] "[We] strongly teaches good works, but not as a cause of our forgiveness. We do works not to be forgiven, but because we have been forgiven. St. Paul strongly teaches the importance of good works, but he also clearly says that salvation is by faith, not by works."[31] Lutherans interpret the verses in the Epistle of James: "we are justified/declared righteous by people when they see the good works we do as a result of our faith and they conclude that our faith is sincere."[32]
Some scholars of Early Christianity are adherents of the New Perspective on Paul and so believe sola fide is a misinterpretation on the part of Lutherans and that Paul was actually speaking about laws (such as Circumcision, Dietary laws, Sabbath, Temple rituals, etc.) that were considered essential for the Jews of the time.[33]
The Catholic Church teaches that it is the grace of God, "the free and undeserved help that God gives us to respond to his call", that justifies a person,[34] a grace that is a prerequisite for a free response of "collaboration in justification through faith, and in sanctification through charity",[35]Augustine of Hippo said, "He who made you without your doing does not without your action justify you. Without your knowing He made you, with your willing He justifies you, but it is He who justifies, that the justice be not your own" (Serm. clxix, c. xi, n.13).[36] "With regard to God, there is no strict right to any merit on the part of man",[37] so that "we can have merit in God's sight only because of God's free plan to associate man with the work of his grace. Merit is to be ascribed in the first place to the grace of God, and secondly to man's collaboration. Man's merit is due to God."[38]
Section 8 of the Second Vatican Council's Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, Lumen gentium stated that "the one Church of Christ which in the Nicene Creed is professed as one, holy, catholic and apostolic ... subsists in the Catholic Church, which is governed by the sole successors of Peter the Apostle and by the Bishops in communion with him".[43] (The term "successor of Peter" is here used of the Bishop of Rome, the Pope; see Petrine theory.). The Catholic Church likewise teaches that the "true Church of Jesus Christ ... is the One, Holy, Catholic, Apostolic and Roman Church",[44] and that "the Mystical Body of Christ and the Roman Catholic Church are one and the same thing".[45]
It is also Catholic teaching that the one Church of Christ is present and operative also in those Churches that are not in full communion with the Catholic Church but that have preserved apostolic succession and a valid Eucharist and are therefore true particular Churches; and that the members of the ecclesial communities that lack apostolic succession and a valid Eucharist and are thus not Churches in the proper sense "are in a certain communion, albeit imperfect, with the Church".[46][47]
Other Christian denominations, notably Protestant ones, who hold rather that the Church of Christ is the universal gathering of all believers,[48] disagree with these teachings.
The supremacy of the Pope, the usage of the term 'Holy Father' to refer to the Pope, and belief that he can make infallible pronouncements have been subject to criticism by other Christian denominations.[citation needed]
In Catholic theology, papal infallibility is the dogma that the Pope is preserved from error when he solemnly promulgated, or declared, to the Church solely on faith or morals. This doctrine has a long history,[citation needed] but was not defined dogmatically until the First Vatican Council of 1870. In Catholic theology, papal infallibility was one of the channels of the Infallibility of the Church. The Church teaches that the Papal infallibility on limited theological matters does not signify that the Pope was a man specially exempt from liability to sin. Critics say that this statement is self-contradictory.[49]
Adherents of the Church believe that only the Church can interpret the scriptures in the Bible; the pope may be the final arbiter if there are differences. But according to the church's interpretation of 2 Peter,[50] anyone can interpret the word of God (by His guidance).[51]
In January 2002, allegations of priests sexually abusing children were widely reported in the news media. It became clear that the officials of various Catholic dioceses were aware of some of the abusive priests, and shuffled them from parish to parish (sometimes after psychotherapy), in some cases without removing them from contact with children. A survey of the 10 largest U.S. dioceses found 234 priests from a total 25,616 in those dioceses, have had allegations of sexual abuse made against them in the last 50 years. The report does not state how many of these have been proven in court.[52]
Some of these reassignments were egregious, the worst leading to the resignation of Cardinal Bernard Law from the Bostonarchdiocese. Victims of such abuse filed lawsuits against a number of dioceses, resulting in multi-million dollar settlements in some cases. Similar allegations of abuse in Ireland led to the publication of the Ferns report in 2005, which stated that appropriate action was not taken in response to the allegations.[citation needed]
In response, in June 2002, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops initiated strict new guidelines ("zero tolerance") for the protection of children and youth in Catholic institutions across the country. The Vatican revisited what it regarded as the issue of homosexuality and a gay subculture within the clergy, because the vast majority of the cases consisted of males preying on male adolescents (over 90% of the sexual abuse victims were teenage boys rather than girls or prepubescents).[53]
There has existed a sometimes tense relationship between Jesuits and the Holy See due to questioning of official church teaching and papal directives, such as those on abortion,[54][55]birth control,[56][57][58][59]women deacons,[60] homosexuality, and liberation theology.[61][62] Usually, this theological free thinking is academically oriented, being prevalent at the university level. From this standpoint, the function of this debate is less to challenge the magisterium than to publicize the results of historical research or to illustrate the church's ability to compromise in a pluralist society based on shared values that do not always align with religious teachings.[63] This has not prevented Popes from appointing Jesuits to powerful positions in the church. John Paul II and Benedict XVI together appointed ten Jesuit cardinals to notable jobs. Under Benedict, Archbishop Luis Ladaria Ferrer was Secretary of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and Federico Lombardi was Vatican Press Secretary.[64] The current Pope, Francis, is himself a Jesuit.
The Jesuits were temporarily banished from France in 1594 after a man named Jean Châtel tried to assassinate the king of France, Henri IV. Under questioning, Châtel revealed that he had been educated by the Jesuits of the Collège de Clermont. The Jesuits were accused of inspiring Châtel's attack. Two of his former teachers were exiled and a third was hanged.[65] The Collège de Clermont was closed, and the building was confiscated. The Jesuits were banned from France, although this ban was quickly lifted and the school eventually reopened.[66]
Derek Wilson (2007). Out of the Storm: The Life and Legacy of Martin Luther. London: Hutchinson. ISBN978-0-09-180001-7.
References
^Marty, Martin E.; Chadwick, Henry; Pelikan, Jaroslav Jan (2000). "Christianity" in the Encyclopædia Britannica Millennium Edition. Encyclopædia Britannica Inc. The Roman Catholics in the world outnumber all other Christians combined.
^"Asia News". Archived from the original on 2007-12-15. Retrieved 2007-12-17. ((cite web)): Unknown parameter |dead-url= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
^Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod Topical Q&A: 2 Thessalonians 2:15 - Tradition, stating: Let's review the immediate context of this verse. Paul had just reminded the Thessalonian Christians that God had called them to faith "through our gospel" (v. 14). This was the gospel message Paul had preached to them. But now Paul was absent from these beloved brothers and sisters in Christ. So he encouraged them to stand firm against every attack on their faith and to hold on tightly to the gospel that Paul had once "handed down" to them by his preaching and teaching. It most definitely was not human tradition that Paul was encouraging the Thessalonians to hold on to. It was the divine gospel, the gospel by which God made them believers, the gospel Paul had the privilege of passing down to them.
^WELS Topical Q&A: Roman Catholic Faith and Works, saying: "...in Galatians Paul makes it clear that salvation by faith and works is really a form of salvation by works since salvation does not happen without the works...No Protestants that I am aware of say works don't matter. They do say that works do not have a role in obtaining forgiveness."
^Voltaire (1769), "XXXI", Histoire du Parlement de Paris, archived from the original on 5 February 2012, retrieved 30 November 2014, Châtel fut écartelé, le jésuite Guignard fut pendu; et ce qui est bien étrange, Jouvency, dans son Histoire des Jésuites, le regarde comme un martyr et le compare à Jésus-Christ. Le régent de Châtel, nommé Guéret, et un autre jésuite, nommé Hay, ne furent condamnés qu'à un bannissement perpétuel.
^Voltaire (1769), "XXXI", Histoire du Parlement de Paris, archived from the original on 5 February 2012,
^Fraser 2005, p. 448. sfn error: no target: CITEREFFraser2005 (help)
Catholic Church portal
