Organization: Ryerson Polytechnical Institute
Distribution: na
Date: Wednesday, 18 Nov 1992 23:36:13 EST
From: Linda Birmingham <ADMN8647@RyeVm.Ryerson.Ca>
Newsgroups: talk.abortion,talk.religion.misc
Subject:    New Catholic Catechism: A first in 426 years

Copied from the Globe and Mail, Tuesday November 17, 1992
(no deletions, no comments, any spelling errors blame spell check)

Revising Catholicism became a matter of faith
  Desire to formulate uniform guidelines led to overhaul of
  centuries old catechism
Associate Press and Reuter

PARIS - The Roman Catholic Church unveiled its first new
catechism in 426 years yesterday, upholding church teaching
against divorce, abortion and homosexuality but updating the sin
of theft to include low wages.

The 676 page catechism, issued in French but eventually to be
released in six languages, is the most comprehensive revision of
the faith issued to the world's 900 million Catholics since the
Reformation.

"This is a great event that will be inscribed in the history of
the church," said cardinal Jean Marie Lustiger, archbishop of
Paris.  "This catechism addresses the diversity of the
multitude...It's a world much bigger than was thought of four
centuries ago".

Basic doctrine - the division between Heaven and Hell, a
tripartite deity comprising Father, Son and Holy Spirit - are
unchanged.

Three thousand bishops worked for six years on the project,
discussing 24,000 amendments.

The work is the church's first overhaul of its master catechism
since the Council of Trent in 1566, when the church was under
severe attack by Protestantism.  The old text had since been
modified with individual decrees and national texts.

The new catechism grew out of a call in the 1980s from bishops
worldwide for uniform guidelines after the radical reforms of the
Second Vatican Council in the 1960s.

Here are some excerpts translated by Reuter.

On Jews
The Jews were not collectively responsible for the death of
Jesus...Once cannot attribute responsibility (for the trial of
Jesus) to all the Jews of Jerusalem...All sinners were
responsible for Christ's Passion...The Church has no hesitation
in allocating to Christians the gravest responsibility for Jesus'
suffering, a responsibility they have too often attributed solely
to the Jews...

On the Ordination of women
Only a baptized man may legitimately receive Holy Ordination.
The Lord Jesus chose men to form the college of the 12 apostles,
and the apostles did likewise in choosing the collaborators who
succeeded them in their task...The Church acknowledges that it is
bound by this choice of the Lord Himself.  That is why the
ordination of women is not possible.

On various forms of theft
Taking or unjustly confiscating the property of others in any
way, even if it does not contradict the tenets of civil law, goes
against the Seventh Commandment, including deliberately holding
on to borrowed or lost property; trading fraudulently; paying
unfair salaries; raising prices by speculating on the ignorance
or distress of others.

Still morally illicit are: speculation by which one makes the
value of goods vary with a view to profiting to the detriment of
others...appropriation and private use of the assets of a
company; poorly executed work, tax fraud, forging cheques or
invoices, excessive spending, waste.

On abortion
Human life must be totally respected and protected from the
moment of conception.  From the first moment of his existence, a
human being should enjoy the rights of the individual, including
the inviolable right of all innocent beings to life...Formal
participation in abortion is a grave error.

On war crimes and genocide
Deliberate actions contrary to human rights and their universal
principals are crimes, as are the orders of those in command.
Blind obedience is not enough to excuse those who carry them out.
The extermination of a people, a nation or an ethnic minority
must be condemned as a mortal sin.  One is morally obliged to
resit orders to carry out genocide.

On drunk driving
The virtue of temperance implies the avoidance of excess in all
its forms - eating, alcohol, tobacco and medicines.  Those who,
because they are drunk or because they have immoderate taste for
speed, put the security of others and themselves in danger on the
roads, are gravely in the wrong.

On drug use
The use of drugs inflicts very grave damage on health and human
life. Beyond strictly therapeutic use, it is a grave error.  The
secret production and traffic of drugs are scandalous
practices...

On euthanasia
Whatever the means and the motives, direct euthanasia consists of
ending the lives of the handicapped, the sick or dying.  It is
morally unacceptable...

On birth control
Methods to regulate birth based on self-discipline and recourse
to infertile periods conform to the objective criteria of
morality...Any action that, either ahead of the conjugal act,
during it or as a result of its natural consequences, envisages
as a means or as an end to make procreation impossible, is
intrinsically bad.

On masturbation
Following the line of a constant tradition, both the Church
fathers and the moral sense of the faithful have declared without
hesitation that masturbation is an intrinsically and gravely
disorderly act.  Whatever the motive, the deliberate use of the
sexual faculty outside of normal conjugal relations contradicts
the finality of that union.

On pornography
It gravely offends the dignity of those who submit to it (actors,
distributors, public)..It plunges all of them into the illusion
of a make-believe world...

On genetic engineering
It is immoral to produce human embryos destined to be exploited
as though they were disposable biological matter.  Certain
attempts at engineering of chromosomatic or genetic matter are
not therapeutic but are intended for the production of selected
human beings according to sex or other pre-established criteria.
This engineering goes against the personal dignity of the human
being and his unique, unrepeatable identity.

On homosexuality
Referring to the Holy Scripture, which presents them as grave
depravations, tradition has always declared that homosexual acts
are intrinsically disorderly.  They go against natural law....
(Homosexuals) do not choose their homosexual condition; for most
of them it is an ordeal.  They should be treated with respect,
compassion and sensitivity.  All manner of unjust discrimination
should be avoided with respect to them...Homosexuals are urged to
be chaste.

On artificial insemination
Techniques that entail a dissociation of the parents, by the
intervention of a person outside the couple (donation of sperm or
egg, loan of uterus) are gravely dishonest.  These
techniques...go against the right of a child to be born of a
father and mother known to him and mutually bound by
marriage...Practised by the couple themselves, these techniques
(homologous artificial insemination and fertilization) are
perhaps less worthy of condemnation, but they remain morally
unacceptable...

On immigration
Better-off nations are obliged to welcome, within their
capacities, the foreigner in search of security and vital
resources that he cannot find in his country of origin.  Public
authorities will ensure respect of the natural law that places
the guest under the protection of those who receive.
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