Permanence of Matrimony

Marriage has a lot of discussion going on right now, gay civil union is a big one. Apart from that, divorces are becoming more and more commonplace. Jesus Christ said that "To the married I give charge, not I but the Lord, that the wife should not separate from her husband and that the husband should not divorce his wife" (1 Cor. 7:10-11). Meaning that Jesus is not the one who said that sacramental marriage is permanent, it is the Father. The only way a true sacramental marriage can be broken is through death. Only then can a spouse remarry. 
Another route of splitting from a sacramental are annulments. An annulment is an understanding that a sacramental marriage never truly existed because the vows did not mean anything to the spouses. and that the spouses can move on and remarry. This is very technical. The couple must get approval of an annulment from a diocesan marriage tribunal. The tribunal has to find truth that the vows were not said with any sort of meaning from the spouse, and that the words were just words coming out of a mouth. The spouses can remarry because there was not a sacramental marriage in the first place. 
True sacramental marriages receive God's grace to carry on through the rest of the couple's lives. 

To read more, click here.

Women and the Priesthood

One of the most hotly debated Catholic issues of the twentieth century is the issue of male-only ordination. Throughout the centuries, only men have been allowed to become priests in the Catholic tradition. Nowadays, people are increasingly labeling the Church as a misogynistic institution for its suppression of female ordination. However, blindly accusing the church of misogyny blatantly ignores the reasoning behind keeping priests strictly male. The Church prohibits women from becoming priests, not for sexist reasons, but rather because it has no authority to change the tradition created by Christ.

The Church's authority comes exclusively from Christ, so to break with His teachings would mean that the Church no longer has authority. For example, consider a scenario in which my teacher gives me the authority to give detentions in his class only. If I begin to roam the halls and give detentions to whomever I please, those detentions are invalid because I acted  outside the authority granted to me by my teacher. I was given authority to hand out detentions in class, not outside in the hallway. Similarly, Christ gave the Catholic Church authority to proclaim and instruct others in His teachings and traditions; nothing more. So what the Church can do is constrained by what Christ did.

To accuse the Church of misogyny is to accuse Christ of hating women, which is clearly untrue. Christ broke all social norms concerning women and men's interaction with them. Christ associated with women in public, which was frowned upon; he accepted His women disciples, which was unheard of ; and he spoke with a Samaritan adulteress, which was a massive no-no in Judea during the first century A.D. For all these reasons, it's obvious that Christ by no means hated or wanted to oppress women.

Now that we've established that Jesus was, in fact, not a misogynist, the Church's teaching on female priesthood becomes very clear. Although he welcomed female disciples, Christ appointed 12 men to start up His church and proclaim the Word of God throughout the world. So the argument for keeping priesthood strictly male goes like this: The church is constrained by what Jesus did and said during His time on earth, and Christ only appointed men to be his apostles. Humans can't know the mind of God, so it is impossible to understand why Christ chose His apostles as He chose them. All we know is that Christ did choose twelve men to become priests, and the Church has no authority to change Tradition instituted by Christ its founder.

Laciano and How it Differs

The miracle at Laciano is a unique Eucharistic miracle. In many eucharistic miracles, the host starts to bleed or emit light. The miracle at Laciano changed the host into  heart tissue and human blood. Fresh human blood was found at the miracle. It matched the blood type at the Shroud of Turin, and it has the same protein proportions as regular human blood. As well as being human blood and heart tissue, it has stayed immaculate since the 800s. Many other eucharistic miracles are and emission of blood or light from the host. At Laciano, the host transformed into immaculate heart tissue and blood.

To read more about Laciano and other eucharistic miracles, click here.

The Miracle at Lanciano

The Miracle at Lanciano is widely considered the first and greatest Eucharistic miracle of the Catholic Church. This miracle occurred in reaction to an unnamed Basilian monk's doubt about the Real Presence of of Christ in the Eucharist. The Church teaches that the Real Presence of Jesus Christ is present in the eucharist, in the sense that the Eucharist's bread and wine become the body and blood of Christ. The Miracle of Lanciano took place in the 8th century A.D. in a small church called St. Legontian, on the Adriatic Sea in Italy. During the consecration of the host, the bread became live flesh from a human heart and the blood became real blood from the same body. The  blood type from the Miracle of Lanciano matches the blood type found on the Shroud of Turin, indicating that the Eucharist truly transformed into the body and blood of Christ.

Though it's very self-evident that the Miracle at Lanciano is connected to the Real Presence doctrine, it's equally obvious that an actual transformation (like the one that happened at Lanciano) does not occur at every celebration of the Eucharist. The actual transformation of the host to flesh and blood was a miracle to confirm believers' faith in the Real Presence doctrine of the Church. The difference between ordinary Eucharist and what occurred at Lanciano is that the ordinary transformation of the host is beyond sensory experience; Christ merely made it perceptible in one instance at Lanciano. However, just because we cannot see or feel this transformation does not mean that it doesn't happen. For example, we don't see our brains fire their neurons or see the stars burn up hydrogen as fuel, but we take it on faith that these phenomena  do occur.

http://www.catholic.com/magazine/articles/why-lanciano-matters

Baptism before the Church

Baptism is usually synonymous with a cleansing of some sort. It has been used as way to enter into a congregation. Many cultures before Christianity used baptism as a right of passage. Baptism was used in pagan cultures because of the purifying qualities of water. There are also symbolic baptisms throughout the whole Old Testament. The parting and crossing through the Red Sea was a symbolic baptism of the Israelites. If you look at Baptism as an entrance to the Church, circumcision was one of the requirements to enter into Judaism. Circumcision can be called a type of baptism in this way. In the Catholic sense, Baptism is symbolic of washing away our sins.

The Catechumenate

The catechumenate in the Catholic Church was the process by which new members became initiated into the Body of Christ in the early church. During the catechumenate, hopeful members were instructed in Christ's teachings and teachers prepared them to receive the Sacraments of Initiation, which are Baptism, Confirmation, and the Eucharist. The catechumenate was divided into three parts in the early church: the catechetical, the ascetical, and the liturgical. The catechetical portion dealt with instructing the initiate about official Church doctrine, usually by a question and answer method (http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05075b.htm). The ascetical portion of the catechumenate involved spiritual exercises to attain the virtues valued by Christians in the early church. The liturgical section taught initiates the liturgy and rituals of the Church, especially about the mass. The catechumenate relates to the Easter Vigil because the custom for the Church in its early years was, and still is, to initiate new members on the night before Easter.

The Sacraments and Human Nature

The Sacraments correspond to human nature because they help us understand truths that are not of this world. People have an instinctive need to understand, as the book puts it, "that which is invisible by experiencing that which is visible". For example, even if I tell someone I love them repeatedly , they won't believe me unless I show visible signs of that love, such as kindness, affection, or hugs. I can toss around the phrase "I love you" however many times I like, but human nature only allows us to understand the invisible (like the emotion of love) from the visible (signs that demonstrate love). It is the same with God and the Sacraments. The Sacraments correspond to human nature as they allow us to understand deeper realities, such as God, through their efficacious and visible nature. So the sacraments both allow us to receive grace from Christ and serve as instruments to help us understand the Trinity.

Indulgences

The Protestant Reformation came about through Martin Luther's dispute over indulgences. Indulgences are extra- sacramental remissions of temporal punishment for our forgiven sins. During Martin Luther's life, indulgences were sold for money by corrupt priests and bishops. Martin Luther did have a point to refute the sale of indulgences. Indulgences are not meant to raise funds for the Church. Where Martin Luther did go wrong is by criticizing indulgences itself. Indulgences are a part of the Church's infallibly defined teaching. They can be still given out today, but they usually are for certain, deserving cases.

Being "Pro-Life" Towards Quality of Life

Being "pro-life" in the Catholic understanding does not stop after birth. Of course, allowing innocent children to be born is most definitely classified under the pro-life banner, but respecting the sanctity of life continues until natural death. Unfortunately, in today's society, quality of life, or ensuring that a child's life is respected after birth, is considered less important than the quantity of life, or the number of children that are born at all. The Church recognizes that protecting peoples' quality of life is just as integral to giving God glory as protecting their right to life. For this reason, the Church endorses welfare for the poor. This teaching is inscribed in Pope Leo XIII's Rerum Novarum, where he states that:

“[W]hen there is question of defending the rights of individuals, the poor and badly off have a claim to especial consideration. The richer class have many ways of shielding themselves, and stand less in need of help from the State; whereas the mass of the poor have no resources of their own to fall back upon, and must chiefly depend upon the assistance of the State. And it is for this reason that wage-earners, since they mostly belong in the mass of the needy, should be specially cared for and protected by the government."

In addition to endorsing welfare for the less fortunate, the Catholic church also expresses support for workers' rights. The US Conference of Catholic Bishops website affirms that:

"The economy must serve the people, not the other way around. Work is more than a way to make a living; it is a form of the continuing participation in God's creation. If the dignity of work is to be protected, then the basic rights of workers must be respected-- the right to productive work, to decent and fair wages, to the organization and joining of unions, to private property, and to economic initiative."

Above all, in the realm of governmental participation and human dignity, the Church recognizes that humans are communal beings; we constantly influence and rely upon each other for assistance. The common good is the most important goal towards which one can strive. 

What Catholicism Means to Me pt. 3

The Church is very much a member based establishment. Without any people in the Church, the Church would cease to be the Church. In our country, religion is being struck down in schools and other activities. Many people do not go to Church on a regular basis, this absence of religion reflects how our society is changing for the worse. Laziness is becoming increasingly pervasive in our society. This might not be related to the suppression of religion in our country. There are lots of benefits of churches for a community, even our government.