And I thought there could be nothing that I could agree with Xtian fundies on

[gipper]

Pooch, the praise was intended to endorse your intelligence (and Romney's), not necessarily your sanity.

[_JS]

There are many faiths who preach that anyone who, through no fault of his own, never hears the gospel is condemned to hell, or at the least to "limbo."

That is not what limbo is and that is a misrepresentation of Catholic doctrine.

Domer, I was not saying that there aren't brilliant Mormons or that BYU isn't a fine Univiersity. My point was that there is a strong academic tradition in Catholicism and it tends to accept varying viewpoints. This is especially true of theology.

[gipper]

The acceptance is a variable commodity, and the limits of acceptance, though perhaps somewhat elastic in the fullness of time, for the most part become rigid when challenged and certainly do not countenance what can be termed the full range of valid intellectual discourse. These present times, perhaps still reacting to the abominable ideologies of Nazism, Stalinism and the whole host of modern offshoots or standalones insulting to both God and humanity, have spawned a reactionary drive, led by the last two Popes, to retrench Catholic teaching and thought. You're fooling yourself if you think you can eke out an imprimatur for a truly free intellectual journey, especially in theology.

[_JS]

You can read from Rahner to Ratzinger. You can read theology from von Balthasar to Pimental.

That covers quite a range of views Domer, whether you'll admit it or not. Rahner and von Balthasar are universalists and definitely on the theological left. Ratzinger has ranged in his career and Pimental is a covenantal theologian of the conservative view.

There are occasions where the Church does not accept one's theology, as in the recent case of Father Sobrino, but the reasons for doing so are clear (denying the divinity of Christ, questioning the salvific value of His death).

[gipper]

Hans Kung? and many others. And your last observation proves my point. Where would those lines of inquiry lead? I guess we'll never know, in the context of a Catholic theological inquiry. In a Talmudic system, I imagine, they could gain expression, and be argued to death or retirement.

[_JS]

Hans K?ng is a Catholic Priest Domer. The Vatican removed his right to teach Orthodox theology, but he remains a professor to this day.

You can purchase his books right now. He can perform the Mass right now. In his books he'll tell you that he doesn't like the celibacy rule for priests and that he believes women should be ordained. He doesn't like papal authority and he's a huge fan of science.

He has never been excommunicated, defrocked, or removed.

Even in the case of Father Sobrino, who comes very close to completely denying the divinity of Christ and the salvific value of His death in one of his books, he has not been condemned or censured. He may still teach and lecture and perform all of his priestly duties. The nihil obstat was removed from some of his works.

I think you are being a bit overly critical. I doubt that all of the Jewish traditions allow anything to be written by their rabbis either.

[gipper]

Censorship is quite offensive enough in my book. It tends to ghettoize Catholic education, reinforcing a closed system that at its heart is authoritarian rather than inquisitive, let alone creative.

[Xavier_Onassis]

My experience has been that while Catholics and Jews can argue on and on about transustanciation, kosher, the meaning of baptism and a hundred or more theological positions, most Protestants don't really think about more than one issue per sect at most. Baptists think baptism but immersion is really important, Seventh-Day Adventists are insistant on the Sabbath being Saturday, but other issues are just not worth fighting over for anyone but the preachers. Jehovah';s Witlesses are the exception: they have dozens of disputes with tradition.

Mormons mostly only want you to know that they are not polygamous anymore: the days of Bigamy young have ended. The weirder bits of Mormon theology seem to be rarely discussed.

Mitt Romney might or might not be a great president, but I don't think his being a LDS would have much to do with how he'd run the country if he were elected. It might, however, provide a huge warchest that would help him get elected, or an "expose" of the LDS Church (Jon Voight is making a film of the Mountain Meadows Massacre, due out very soon) might cause many to vote against him.