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Author Topic: Exposed: Dimonds' "monastic" life  (Read 4790 times)

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Offline sedevacantist

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Re: Exposed: Dimonds' "monastic" life
« Reply #45 on: February 21, 2018, 06:35:04 PM »
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  • And just for the record, I do not equate the Rhythm Method with NFP. I stated this clearly in my lengthy post on the subject. 

    Offline Motorede

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    Re: Exposed: Dimonds' "monastic" life
    « Reply #46 on: February 21, 2018, 06:35:58 PM »
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  • No, he's not talking about the notion of a "virtuous continence" for about one week every month specifically to avoid offspring.  He's talking about how not every marriage has to have the intention fo having children ... when VIRTUOUS continence is practiced.  Nor is he talking about practicing continence for no other purpose than to avoid children.  He's talking about a couple who wish to avoid relations for spiritual reasons (aka virtuous ones) ... such as to seek a higher perfection or to do penance.

    What part of VIRTUOUS in the phrase virtuous continence didn't register to your mind?
    I believe this has been referred to as a Josephite marriage? Not positive. There is also the case when two elderly (like in 70's or 80"s) want to be married for simple companionship, knowing there can't be children.


    Offline Ladislaus

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    Re: Exposed: Dimonds' "monastic" life
    « Reply #47 on: February 22, 2018, 08:07:20 AM »
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  • I know exactly what you meant.
    In this post, explaining yourself, you use the phrases "preventing conception" and "hopes that conception won't occur". You use both of these phrases while describing the actions and intentions of a couple while engaging in the marital act. They are the same thing. Both are against nature and both are mortal sins. Preventing conception involves hoping conception won't occur and using the rhythm method is a means for preventing conception. What am I missing?

    Attempting to prevent conception and hoping that it doesn't occur are in fact two separate things.  I could have intercourse during a fertile period while hoping that conception doesn't occur at this time (maybe because of financial hardship or some other reason).  That is not even sinful ... so long as one is prepared to accept God's will in the end.

    Offline Ladislaus

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    Re: Exposed: Dimonds' "monastic" life
    « Reply #48 on: February 22, 2018, 08:08:23 AM »
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  • And just for the record, I do not equate the Rhythm Method with NFP. I stated this clearly in my lengthy post on the subject.

    Same difference ... from the moral standpoint.  You're trying to use semantics as justification.

    Offline Ladislaus

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    Re: Exposed: Dimonds' "monastic" life
    « Reply #49 on: February 22, 2018, 08:13:08 AM »
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  • The response of the Sacred Penitentiary (during the reign of Pope Leo XIII), dated June 16, 1880, was:
    “Married couples who use their marriage right in the aforesaid manner are not to be disturbed, and the confessor may suggest the opinion in question, cautiously, however, to those married people whom he has tried in vain by other means to dissuade from the detestable crime of onanism.”

    This right here is the context of these questions ... which you ignore.  This is talking about "cautiously" leaving people's consciences undisturbed as a toleration of lesser evil when their alternative behavior would involve onanism (or other means of birth control).  This is not a general endorsement of the practice as licit by any stretch.

    In addition, you ignore the state of the science at this time.  This notion of there being "safe" periods in which conception could not occur was just an opinion ... until it was established as scientific fact in the 1920s.  No one considered it a solid guarantee that there would not be conception.  Consequently, it was viewed objectively as a period of time during which conception "less likely" vs. "more likely".


    Offline forlorn

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    Re: Exposed: Dimonds' "monastic" life
    « Reply #50 on: February 22, 2018, 01:34:26 PM »
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  • I know exactly what you meant.
    In this post, explaining yourself, you use the phrases "preventing conception" and "hopes that conception won't occur". You use both of these phrases while describing the actions and intentions of a couple while engaging in the marital act. They are the same thing. Both are against nature and both are mortal sins. Preventing conception involves hoping conception won't occur and using the rhythm method is a means for preventing conception. What am I missing?
    No, hoping that conception does not occur does not mean preventing conception. I can hope all I like that my bills won't come but I'm not preventing them from arriving in the mail. 

    Offline forlorn

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    Re: Exposed: Dimonds' "monastic" life
    « Reply #51 on: February 22, 2018, 01:41:14 PM »
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  • Yes, and unless I misunderstood, he's talking about hoping that it doesn't occur while using the Rhythm method. The Rhythm method is a means to prevent conception while engaging in the marital act. I know that the Rhythm method can be used to conceive as well, but then why would somebody who wants to conceive, hope that conception doesn't occur.
    I would never say it's even a sin to not want a baby as long as there is no intent to frustrate the primary ends during intercourse. What he's talking about, from my viewpoint, is frustrating via Rhythm, as merely a venial sin.
    The Rhythm Method cannot prevent conception during sɛҳuąƖ intercourse. Conception may still occur and is not unnaturally impeded at all. The married couple are merely avoiding more fertile periods and hoping that no conception occurs during the less fertile ones. It is a form of conception as it allows sɛҳuąƖ intercourse to take place with a reduced chance of conception, HOWEVER during the act of intercourse itself there are no unnatural impediments to it. Conception may still take place, and there is only a reduced chance of it because they are having intercourse when the wife is NATURALLY less fertile. They are doing nothing to make conception impossible or less likely during intercourse. Therefore it is not a mortal sin. But as the couple are still engaging in intercourse without the intent of procreation, and in fact the opposite intent, they are committing a venial sin. 

    Offline Croix de Fer

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    Re: Exposed: Dimonds' "monastic" life
    « Reply #52 on: February 22, 2018, 01:46:12 PM »
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  • Sounds like the OP (sedevacantist) got his feelings hurt by the Dimond brothers. Sounds like he needs to man up and move on...


    Offline Croix de Fer

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    Re: Exposed: Dimonds' "monastic" life
    « Reply #53 on: February 22, 2018, 01:49:42 PM »
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  • I can appreciate how the Dimond brothers bend protties and novus ordoites into human pretzels by exposing their heresies. 8)

    Offline forlorn

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    Re: Exposed: Dimonds' "monastic" life
    « Reply #54 on: February 22, 2018, 02:06:59 PM »
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  • I agree with this. So I have this straight, you are saying that by hoping you don't conceive, while engaging in the act, without Rhythm or NFP etc..., it is still a venial sin. In normal circuмstances it's a venial sin just to hope you don't conceive even without subordinated the primary ends.

    IOW, using your analogy above, it would be a venial sin to hope your "bills don't come"?
    Sex is for the purpose of procreation. Having sex for any other reason is a venial sin. 

    Offline sedevacantist

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    Re: Exposed: Dimonds' "monastic" life
    « Reply #55 on: February 23, 2018, 01:49:24 PM »
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  • Sounds like the OP (sedevacantist) got his feelings hurt by the Dimond brothers. Sounds like he needs to man up and move on...

    No one would write a 20-page exposition simply because his feelings were hurt. That would be psychotic. On the other hand, if one were prompted by what he believed was a moral obligation, then we might have a sufficient reason. I have been putting up with numerous insults in this thread, as well as the others I've posted recently, and yet there has never been any indication in my posts of being hurt or offended. I've been called a fool, a moron, a child, and even a borderline demoniac - and yet there is no sign of my getting agitated or angry. I've answered the questions just as I always have; with an effort to explain things as clearly as I can. Nor have I lashed out at anyone who's attacked me with verbal abuse. All this to say, to imagine that I turned around and penned a 20-page exposition simply because my "feelings were hurt", doesn't follow the evidence. As Christ instructed, make proper judgments - lest you be judged the same.


    Offline sedevacantist

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    Re: Exposed: Dimonds' "monastic" life
    « Reply #56 on: February 23, 2018, 05:05:34 PM »
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  • This is the last post I'm going to make in regard to the issue of the "Rhythm Method". This discussion is absolutely ridiculous. Forlorn and Ladislaus, these men quoted below have forgotten TEN TIMES the moral theology you will ever know. To imagine that you are more knowledgeable than they are is either the height of pride, or the depths of stupidity. Take your pick. Either way, you are espousing a position that falls under anathema by the Council of Trent - and I don't care what your personal interpretation is. Catholic moral theologians have already interpreted the Church's teaching on the Rhythm Method. Ergo, I have absolute confidence in the position I espouse here. 

    In his "Handbook of Moral Theology" (1921), Fr. Prummer states:
    “To make use of the so-called safe period (i.e., to refrain from the conjugal act during the period when the woman is fertile) has been declared lawful by the Sacred Penitentiary, but it is not a certain means of preventing conception, since there is no infallible way of determining the safe period.”

    Notice Fr. Prummer's reference to the judgement of the Sacred Penitentiary as the basis for his position. Likewise, Fr. Tanquerey references the judgement of the Penitentiary:
    "Totally different from onanism is the practice of having conjugal relations only at those times when conception rarely occurs... Such a practice is not sinful, according to the Sacred Penitentiary (June 16, 1880)." ("Brevior Synopsis Theologiae Moralis et Pastoralis", 1933).

    And again, as I mentioned in the lengthy post on this topic, Fr. Tanquerey's books were the most widely used seminary textbooks of the era. As to the morality of the Rhythm Method, Fr. Gerard Kelly, S.J., explains in his book, "Medico-moral Problems":
    “The Church teaches that contraception is a sin because it means doing what is evil. It is not the same with rhythm. Those who practice the rhythm do nothing evil. They simply omit doing something good — that is, they abstain from intercourse at the time when it might be fertile. Therefore, the morality of using rhythm must be judged in the same way as other omissions: if the abstinence from intercourse is a neglect of duty, it is sinful; if it does not imply a neglect of duty, it is not sinful.”


    In The Administration of the Sacraments by Fr. Nicholas Halligan, O.P., there is yet another reference to the morality of rhythm:
    “As regards the conjugal act spouses are free to choose whatever time they wish to use their marital rights or also to abstain by mutual consent. Thus they are not obliged to perform this act only during the fertile period, neither are they obliged to refrain during the sterile period.
    “God has endowed the nature of woman with both periods. Deliberately to limit the use of marital relations exclusively to the sterile periods in order to avoid conception (i.e., to practice periodic continence or rhythm) is, according to the common teaching of theologians, morally lawful in actual practice if there is mutual consent, sufficient reason, and due safeguards against attendant dangers. 
    “It is also common teaching that this practice of family limitation without good and sufficient reason involves a degree of moral fault. This fault certainly could be mortal if serious injustice is done or there exists grave danger of incontinence, divorce, serious family discord, etc.”


    It is also incorrect to say that Pope Pius XI had not referred to rhythm in his encyclical when he taught:
    “Nor are those married couples to be considered as acting against the order of nature who make use of their right in the proper, natural way, even though through natural causes either of time or of certain defects, new life cannot thence result.”

    In Moral Theology by Fr. John C. Ford, S.J., and Fr. Gerard Kelly, S.J., we find an interesting answer to those who would doubt whether this quote of Pope Pius XI was referring to rhythm:
    “The fact that the licit use of the sterile period was already at that time a commonplace among theologians, the fact that the phrase ‘through natural reasons... of time’ was used, rather than ‘reasons of age’ or some similar expression, and the fact that the immediate context of the encyclical itself was concern for the difficulties of married people tempted to onanism — all these considerations convinced the great majority of theologians that Pius XI was here referring to the permissible use of the sterile periods as a means of avoiding conception. Pius XII, we may mention here, explicitly confirmed this view in 1958 (Address to Hematologists, 12 Sept. 1958, A.A.S., 50 [1958] 736), thus dispelling what little doubt had existed on this point.”

    Nor is it correct to say that conception cannot occur while using the Rhythm Method. It certainly can. And has. As quoted above, Fr. Prummer says the Rhythm Method is in no way a sure means of preventing pregnancy since there is no guaranteed way of determining the safe period. On the same note, in Marriage Guidance by Fr. Edwin F. Healy, S.J., S.T.D., we find:
    “Rhythm cannot be looked upon as a certain method of avoiding offspring... The reasons for lack of certainty are: (1) It is difficult to be sure of the strict regularity of a particular woman’s ovulation periods. (2) Fertilization at times occurs during the periods which this theory regards as absolutely sterile.”

    I would add here that most everyone who practices rhythm knows full well it is not a sure means of preventing pregnancy. Ergo, to argue that the fact a couple uses the Rhythm Method absolutely means they are not open to conception at other times, is fallacious reasoning. Conception can occur whether one wants it or not. A monkey knows this. 

    Nor is it required under the moral law for a couple to explicitly desire babies every time they have relations. The simple fact that they refuse to use anything that might frustrate the marriage act is itself proof of openness to conception. No couple has an explicit desire for children every time they have relations. Nor do couples that use Rhythm have an explicit desire not to conceive every time they engage in relations.

    Finally, I would add that neither of you have one single quote to support your objection to this teaching. Not one. All you can produce are quotes which speak of the immorality of anything that frustrates the marriage act. That's all you have. And no one is arguing against those teachings. But you will not find one single statement anywhere condemning the Rhythm Method in any book of Catholic moral theology. Instead, the universality of Catholic moral theologians, along with Pius XI, have decided on the morality of the Rhythm Method. 

    All you have is your opinion. And that, according to Catholic theologians, is wrong.

    Offline sedevacantist3

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    Re: Exposed: Dimonds' "monastic" life
    « Reply #57 on: February 24, 2018, 07:58:03 AM »
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  • Agreed, horrible post and can be argued to be sinful according to St Alphonsus 

    2. Defamationconsistsintellingasecretsinofanother to those who are ignorant of it; this, too, when griev ous, is a mortal sin, because the person defamed, as long as his sin is occult, retains his good name; you rob him of it by revealing his sin, and when he has lost his repu tation, he can no longer show himself in the world.