The Russian Orthodox Church has broken off ecumenical contact with the Church of Scotland and the United Protestant Church of France. The latter has allowed its pastors to officiate at sodomarriages and the Church of Scotland has announced it will ‘ordain’ clergy who are in same-sex civil unions. Moscow says these are now no longer Christian communities, ecumenical dialogue with them is pointless, they are harbinger of the antichrist and are destined for hellfire. Refreshing. WWJD? This.
We have to face up to the fact that vast numbers of bishops and priests and laity who exercise functions in the church and identify themselves as Catholics and Christians are not. We cannot conduct ordinary church functions (e.g. synods) in such a context. How can one enter into discussions or indeed remain in communion with individuals who professedly repudiate divine revelation? In this sense the forthcoming synod is a trap. Catholic bishops cannot debate with nonbelievers concerning discipline and doctrine. Those members of the synod who profess the Catholic faith must insist that all members of the synod make clear profession of the Church’s teaching on sodomy and adultery and the eucharist before they agree to sit with them in synod. To do otherwise is already to have conceded that such matters are open to doubt or denial.
The irony is that it is Moscow’s own errors on divorce which may well be the concession sought by the Modernist bishops at the synod. Which only goes to show the un-sustainability of any compromise. Jerusalem aedificata est ut civitas, in se compacta tota.
The problem in the Modernist crisis has been that the proton-pseudos – the basic error – has not been clearly identified. This caused serious difficulties in the Arian crisis as well. It took a long while for the homoousion to be clearly seen as the point which distinguished the faithful from the Arians. Many conservative prelates blanched before the stark clarity of this term and sought to find a more nuanced approach. Only when such conservatives had submitted to the Nicene term, come out as Arians or bowed out altogether was it possible to get down to (and so win) a straight fight.
Most of the particular controversies that have devastated the vineyard over the last hundred years are corollaries of the basic dispute, proxy wars for the real conflict. The basic question is this: is faith “a blind sentiment of religion welling up from the depths of the subconscious under the impulse of the heart and the motion of a will trained to morality” or is faith “a genuine assent of the intellect to truth received by hearing from an external source”? Or, to put it more bluntly still “can someone be justified after the age of reason without explicit faith in the Trinity and the Incarnation?” If you answer ‘yes’ to that question you are ultimately forced into accepting Modernism, if ‘no’ into rejecting it. This is the homoousion of the Modernist Crisis.
Laodicea 
June 6, 2015 at 4:43 pm
I agree with your premise with this distinction — accepting same sex marriage as societal/religious policy is not the same as accepting people who engage in same sex activity. The very next verse in John’s Gospel from perhaps the most quoted in Christian circles (John 3:16) says “God did not send his Son to condemn the world, but that the world through his Son might be saved.” (v.17) God does not judge individual acts (yet) — but he does will the consequences of our acts. We are fed spirituality by “hearing and doing the will of the Father.” When we do otherwise we starve spiritually and must either change or fill ourselves with worldly pleasures to self-medicate the pain. But when a Country or other social entity that rules over God’s people (whoever that may be) removes an “ancient landmark” and “sow’s to the wind” they will surely “reap the whirlwind.” There’s nothing any of us who see what it is that is actually happening can do — “Therefore, the wise person will keep silent at such a time, for the days are evil.” Amos 5:13
Some of us are fortunate enough to be in positions where our livelihoods are not threatened by what we say on social media — but many if not most must avoid speaking their real concerns and misgivings on these things publicly . And if what is happening truly is “the abomination of desolation standing in the holy place” (Mat.25:15) then we must be ready to head for the hills and hold on tight — the excrement has hit the fan.
June 7, 2015 at 1:18 am
Those who are refusing to cooperate with evil, to deny God and His Holy Law, are few. And they are being persecuted in every aspect of life.
June 7, 2015 at 1:16 am
The truth does not change. The truth is not debateable. What has always been evil cannot become good; and vice versa.
June 7, 2015 at 1:49 pm
Here’s the latest internet thing to support the the homoousion of the Modernist Crisis: https://thejosiasdotcom.files.wordpress.com/2015/06/take-the-oath-with-insignia.gif
June 12, 2015 at 8:54 pm
[…] The case of Schockenhoff shows that present crisis is only superficially about sexual morality. The real issue is the nature of revelation and of faith. The fundamental problem with theologians such as Schockenhoff is a neo-modernist understanding of revelation. We are thus in full agreement with the insightful analysis recently offered at the traditionalist blog Laodicea: […]
June 13, 2015 at 10:56 am
[…] The case of Schockenhoff shows that present crisis is only superficially about sexual morality. The real issue is the nature of revelation and of faith. The fundamental problem with theologians such as Schockenhoff is a neo-modernist understanding of revelation. We are thus in full agreement with the insightful analysis recently offered at the traditionalist blog Laodicea: […]