And if the development of doctrine is right, then who gets to decide what does and doesn't fall under the umbrella of acceptable Christian belief and practice? Catholics of course would say the Pope and the Magisterium. But I just don't see how a bunch of celibate men can make proclamations that affect the rest of humanity. Based on what lived experience? And don't tell me it's the Holy Spirit speaking through them, because the Holy Spirit never required an intermediary in the Bible, why start now?
I'm at an infinite impasse, it seems. I rejected the Protestant churches I looked at previously because they didn't have the reverence, piety, holiness that I expected from a church. I found it in Orthodoxy, but then realized for all their holiness, it never seemed to transfer into a lived faith beyond the boundaries of their own denomination. I boomeranged back to Catholicism yet again, but it was short lived.
The piety and reverence and holiness present in the Catholic church... I am wondering if it is actually of God, of it is a recipe for self-righteousness. "Look at all the outward signs of holiness we're doing, see? We're right with God. Therefore, you should do what we say." I am scared to think of the alternative, but I think I must.
The religious establishment of Jesus's day was likewise all about piety, reverence, and outward appearances of holiness. To the point of excluding those who didn't measure up. Same story today, just with different outcasts. And Jesus spoke out against it. He didn't say, "don't be holy". In fact, He said quite the opposite: "be perfect like your Father in heaven is perfect" (Matthew 5:48) and "be holy for I am holy" (1 Peter 1:16).
But of course none of us ever fully lives up to this ideal: "for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God" (Romans 3:23). The idea to on the one hand have expectations of outward piety and reverence and on the other hand an expectation to regularly confess how we fail for any of that to actually lead to a changed life is disturbing.
I hesitate to state this next wondering. One of the virtues that repeatedly seems to draw me back to the Catholic church is chastity. Very few Christian churches actually uphold chastity according to the definition I grew up with and believe: all sex is for marriage only. What flows from this then is no adultery, obviously (though how do you explain adultery to the Old Testament patriarchs who are considered founders of our faith yet had multiple wives and concubines?), but also no premarital sex, no pornography, no prostitution, and no allowing lustful desires of any kind to overcome our emotions. The Catholic church also includes under chastity no same-sex marriage, no birth control, no artificial reproductive technologies, and if I'm not mistaken, even within the bonds of marriage - certain sexual positions and acts.
I hate to say it, but it almost seems like the whole system is set up so that the faithful inevitably fail and then have to bring these "sins" to the confessional. Now that I think about it, it's rather creepy. And considering the recent church scandals, it does not bode well for the church. It appears that some clergy may be living vicariously through the sins of the people. I mean, if we're not supposed to entertain lustful thoughts, why intentionally bring them up to a priest, thereby exposing him to what otherwise may not have entered his psyche?
But the alternative, the rhetoric that claims that the purity culture of traditional Christianity has done a lot of damage to people, doesn't yet sit well with me. They don't just do away with the Catholic teachings that I disagree with (because, you know, I'm the litmus test of what should and shouldn't be church dogma ;)), but likewise premarital sex. I suppose I agree that all other restrictions can be done away with, other than fidelity within marriage. But for some reason, the idea of allowing non-marital sex doesn't sound like holiness to me. Then again, the point is not to judge those who don't live up to the ideal, but to at least have that ideal in theory something to aspire towards. Protestant churches that have redefined chastity have lowered the bar to where it doesn't actually take any effort at all to "be chaste".
One definition I've read of the new chastity is "good stewardship of one's body, and the bodies of those we come in contact with". This is taken straight from the secular culture at large, not from any body of religious writing. The thinking seems to go, since most people are ignoring the old definition of chastity, we may as well redefine it to help people not feel shamed and judged.
Except that what happens when you start to lower the bar is that it continues to go down. I've hear that in some Protestant denominations there's even a push for non-violent pornography to be acceptable within the scope of chastity. I'm sorry, but what the what?!?!
Are we then doomed to have a moving target for our moral standards? If the bar is set too low, it keeps slipping into seriously questionable territory. If on the other hand the bar is set too high, there develops a group of self-righteous who lord it over those who don't equally live up to their definition of chastity, resulting in the shaming and judging that of course Jesus warned against. ("You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye" (Matthew 7:5).)
It almost seems that what is needed is what is preached by the fundamentalists - a focus on the Bible as the sole source of authority. But of course, this doesn't make sense either, since the early church had only oral tradition to base their faith on, then both oral tradition and scripture. What is needed is a system of checks and balances. There is always going to be an interpretation of Scripture. Always. Anyone who claims they "let the Bible speak for Itself" is fooling themselves. The Bible cannot be "taken literally" any more than it can be taken as purely anecdotal. It is nuanced and a respectful approach to the Bible necessitates correct interpretation. Someone or some group of people will interpret it, as they must. The question is - who and how?
I may really need to revisit the Episcopalian church...
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