Best canon law books according to redditors
We found 23 Reddit comments discussing the best canon law books. We ranked the 14 resulting products by number of redditors who mentioned them. Here are the top 20.
We found 23 Reddit comments discussing the best canon law books. We ranked the 14 resulting products by number of redditors who mentioned them. Here are the top 20.
> 3. If the Pope is Jesus's representation on this Earth, how do you justify some of the horrifying things Popes have done in the past?
King David was an adulterer and a murderer, but he was the anointed one of God.
In Matthew 23, Jesus makes a lengthy denunciation of the scribes and the Pharisees. And after you've read it, if you go back to the beginning, what Jesus tells the crowds is amazing: "do whatever they teach you and follow it." However scandalous a wicked priest may be, and however harshly he will be judged on the Day of the Lord, we look not on the man, but on the grace of his office. The value of the clerical orders derives from the grace of God, not from the personal holiness of their members.
> When should their authority be disregarded?
St Paul says to the Galatians: "even if we or an angel from heaven should proclaim to you a gospel contrary to what we proclaimed to you, let that one be accursed! As we have said before, so now I repeat, if anyone proclaims to you a gospel contrary to what you received, let that one be accursed!"
A cleric who departs from the unity of faith, or from the corporate unity of the Church, ceases to be a member of the Church and ceases to hold any office in the Church. This would apply even to the pope, if he became a heretic. As Lawrence Wrenn puts it in the Canon Law Society of America's New Commentary on the Code of Canon Law, "to fall from Peter's faith is to fall from his chair." However, that has never happened. (It is sometimes thought that the First Vatican Council defined that this never will happen, but Vinzenz Gasser, who drafted the definition, explicitly disavowed this interpretation in his explanation to the Council Fathers of what they were voting on.)
> Why is there a single Pope instead of a council like the Orthodox Church has and like the board of apostles we see in the NT?
The entire body of bishops corresponds to the board (we would rather say college) of apostles, and is considered a distinct subject of supreme authority in the Church when acting together with the Bishop of Rome as its head. Yet among the apostles, Peter's role is special. It was Peter to whom Jesus said, "Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah. For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my heavenly Father. And so I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven." And if you read the passage in Greek, the "you" is a singular "you," a "thou"; that is, Jesus does not say he will give the disciples the keys of the kingdom, but that he will give Peter in particular the keys of the kingdom. His words recall the prophecy of Isaiah:
> On that day I will summon my servant
> Eliakim, son of Hilkiah;
> I will clothe him with your robe,
> gird him with your sash,
> confer on him your authority.
> He shall be a father to the inhabitants of Jerusalem,
> and to the house of Judah.
> I will place the key of the House of David on his shoulder;
> what he opens, no one will shut,
> what he shuts, no one will open.
> I will fix him as a peg in a firm place,
> a seat of honor for his ancestral house;
> On him shall hang all the glory of his ancestral house:
> descendants and offspring,
> all the little dishes, from bowls to jugs. (Is 22:20-24)
In foretelling Peter's denial, Jesus also foretold his redemption, saying:
> "Simon, Simon, behold Satan has demanded to sift all of you like wheat, but I have prayed that your own faith may not fail; and once you have turned back, you must strengthen your brothers." (Lk 22:31)
After the Resurrection, just as Peter had denied Jesus three times, he was reconciled affirming that he loved Jesus three times, and Jesus gave him a special charge:
> When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, "Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?" He said to him, "Yes, Lord, you know that I love you." He said to him, "Feed my lambs." He then said to him a second time, "Simon, son of John, do you love me?" He said to him, "Yes, Lord, you know that I love you." He said to him, "Tend my sheep." He said to him the third time, "Simon, son of John, do you love me?" Peter was distressed that he had said to him a third time, "Do you love me?" and he said to him, "Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you." [Jesus] said to him, "Feed my sheep. Amen, amen, I say to you, when you were younger, you used to dress yourself and go where you wanted; but when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go." He said this signifying by what kind of death he would glorify God. And when he had said this, he said to him, "Follow me." (Jn 21:15-19)
What an exalted responsibility! Peter is to stand over the flock in the very place of the Good Shepherd (cf. John 10:11-18). He will bind and loose with divine ratification in heaven. Will he, as Eliakim did in the Davidic kingdom, have successors in his office as "a father to the inhabitants of Jerusalem"? It is hard to give a reason why there should not be more vicars when Christ has appointed one. It is even hard to understand why he would give such great means of grace to the Church, even the authority to forgive sins (Jn 20:21-23), and not perpetuate them beyond one generation.
Those vicars are the Roman Pontiffs. It used to be popular among Protestants to deny that Peter even went to Rome, but as Schatz says, that Peter went to Rome and was martyred there "is something that can be asserted with a degree of probability bordering on certainty." The tradition connecting Peter with Rome is very ancient and unrivalled, and supported by the New Testament itself if "Babylon" refers to Rome in 1 Peter 5:13, which is highly probable.
So I've been thinking about these questions too, and I've noticed that there's been a lot of material from theologians who are trying to defend/reconsider/retrieve the Reformation solas for today. For that reason, these resources interest me greatly and I hope that they help you too:
edit: you can read the introduction of Biblical Authority After Babel here: http://cdn.bakerpublishinggroup.com/processed/book-resources/files/Excerpt_9781587433931.pdf?1471965248
I can recommend Dominion and Dynasty: A Theology of the Old Testament by Stephen Dempster for a good overview of the Old Testament. I think I had a few nuances with it while I was reading it, but it was a pretty good overview nevertheless.
So, let me get this straight. You have been Orthodox all your life, and that, while you were in the military, you entered into a civil marriage. Your first wife divorced you, and then you got married a second time in the Church. And now you are asking us whether or not your civil marriage is an impediment to the priesthood, or rather, whether this presents a scandal to the laity.
I'm not going to give my opinion on the matter, but just a book recommendation: A Noble Task: Entry into the Clergy in the First Five Centuries by Lewis J. Patsavos.
Not a direct comparison, but some interesting primary sources could be found here and here
>Debatable. If it was invalid, it could be argued it was not confession. Part of the premise of the movie Calvary.
No it is no debatable. Movies are not Catholic teaching. Not all confessions are completed with absolution. Even a priest who hears a confession, if they refuse absolution or if the confession is interrupted for some reason, must not break the seal.
[edit} At the bottem of page 1163 of this book (http://www.amazon.com/New-Commentary-Code-Canon-Law/dp/0809105020)
>Canon 983 is concerned with any kind of betrayal of a penitent, whose confession is said to be under or protected by the inviolable or sacramental seal, and is even if he or she has not been absolved. It is a betrayal of a person who has simply confessed in the context of the sacrament.
Here's the CLSA Commentary (https://www.amazon.com/New-Commentary-Code-Canon-Law/dp/0809105020) for canon 988:
https://i.imgur.com/Dc778qt.png
Here's the 1917 Code: https://i.imgur.com/cqoMMKs.jpg
I'll find other commentaries on Monday if I remember.
It’s supposedly a change in the 1983 Code from the old norms. Came from this commentary:
New Commentary on the Code of Canon Law
https://www.amazon.com/dp/0809105020/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_00Z9AbMCFE3D3
I wasn’t trying to offer any personal interpretation except to say that maybe the priest felt there was just cause here.
I agree, having a nice paper edition is so much more satisfying than the alternatives! As for why I think the Clay MBh is worth investing in: principally because the number of times in my life when I've read the Mbh from first cover to last cover is tiny compared to the number of times I've returned to specific sections. But that's personal taste. Plus, I just think the CSL books are much higher quality (in terms of binding, paper quality, etc.) than many of the books printed in India, unfortunately. Still, if you're hesitant about buying incomplete sets, I completely understand.
Those other sets are excellent. They don't have that incompleteness problem, thankfully. The plays set is also good, since some of the most canonical literature is in that form (Kalidasa's Shakuntala, e.g.).
While I don't agree with them these are thoughts by /u/Ibrey. I'm hesitant to link to them since they are potentially much more than just dubious.
>The basic doctrinal truth underlying this is that the members of the Church are those who:
>1. have been baptised;
>2. profess the true faith; and
>3. maintain corporate unity by submitting to the jurisdiction of the Roman Pontiff and the bishops in communion with him.
>This is expressed in the Code of Canon Law in [Can 205], using language from Lumen Gentium 14. Baptism unites us to the body of the Church, and manifest heresy, apostasy, and schism cut us off from it. The Church is a visible institution, and so what counts for membership in it are visible facts; we are not cut off by merely internal, mental infidelity, or infidelity which is only written about in a diary or disclosed to a few discreet individuals, but by heresy and apostasy which is manifest or notorious, that is, openly divulged.
>There is a radical incompatibility between being a non-member of the Church and holding any office in it. Thus, a cleric who notoriously defects from the Church is automatically removed from any office he holds. [Can 194]
>Many Catholic theologians have defended as a pious and probable opinion that God would never allow the Roman Pontiff to personally fall away from the faith (and it is heresy to allow that God might permit him to define an error to be held by the universal Church). However, if God should allow such a great evil to occur, what applies to lower offices would logically apply to the supreme office. If you are not a member of the Church, you cannot be the head of the Church. As Lawrence Wrenn puts it in the Canon Law Society of America's New Commentary on the Code of Canon Law, "to fall from Peter's faith is to fall from his chair." The pope would not have to commit heresy in any special or official way; if he makes his heresy manifest, he departs from the Church as easily as you or I.
>Of course, the idea of evicting an ipso facto ex-pope from the Apostolic Palace (or even the Casa Santa Marta) presents great difficulties in practice. Many authors think that a general council would be competent to declare the fact of the pope's heresy. Others would accept a judgement of the College of Cardinals. In any case, the rest of the Church should all stick together while we work through this and not leave parishes in communion with Rome for sedevacantist chapels. Roberto de Mattei has recently argued that even though Francis has professed heresies in public, they are not notorious. After all, "notorious" means they are known to everybody, and there are still many members of the faithful interpret all Francis' statements in an orthodox light.
Gotcha!
Two helpful books for me on this score were:
Both belong to the Baylor University Evangelical Ressourcement series, published by Baker Academic -- very good resources.
Sure thing buddy:
On the side of Calvinism, Grace and Assurance by Martyn McGeown:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Grace-Assurance-Message-Canons-Dordt-ebook/dp/B07P75Y4S9/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=Grace+and+Assurance&qid=1566903176&s=gateway&sr=8-1
This is a commentary on the Canons of Dordt and a defense of five-point Calvinism (if I remember rightly it defends double-predestination as well). Very well written and sourced, but a hard read in places. This is a comprehensive account of conservative Reformed doctrine. After reading this I looked into the other side of the debate as I wanted to see if non-Calvinists really were Semi-Pelagian.
I imagine you've heard of Desiring God ministries? John Piper has some good resources from the reformed point of view:
https://www.desiringgod.org/
Calvin's Institutes is 99p on the Kindle store:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Institutes-Christian-Religion-John-Calvin-ebook/dp/B00394F31U/ref=sr_1_1?crid=237SQ2P8CDI1V&keywords=institutes+of+the+christian+religion&qid=1566903405&s=gateway&sprefix=Institutes+of+the+c%2Caps%2C305&sr=8-1
I like Spurgeon's commentary--this is also very cheap on the Kindle store:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Spurgeons-Commentary-Bible-Commentaries-ebook/dp/B01CZ4LMP0/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=spurgeon%27s+commentary+on+the+bible&qid=1566903614&s=gateway&sr=8-1
On the other side of the debate, I found Salvation and Sovereignty to be interesting (it's a defense of a sort of middle-way between Calvinism and Arminianism):
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Salvation-Sovereignty-Kenneth-Keathley-ebook/dp/B00RYGEPPY/ref=sr_1_2?keywords=salvation+and+sovereignty&qid=1566903451&s=gateway&sr=8-2
Finally, a stronger defence of free-will based soteriology comes from Leighton Flowers. His book (The Potter's Promise) is free on Kindle Unlimited and lays out the counter arguments to Calvinist readings of Romans 9 and the doctrines of Judicial Hardening:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Potters-Promise-Biblical-Traditional-Soteriology-ebook/dp/B01N13T1V2/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=potter%27s+promise&qid=1566903505&s=gateway&sr=8-1
Leighton's YouTube ministry (Soteriology101) is really good as well.
Thank you for the warm welcome, God bless!
Kingship and Law in the Middle Ages by Fritz Kern
From Amazon
> Originally published: New York: Frederick A. Praeger Publishers, 1956. xxxi, 214 pp. First published in 1914, this is one of the most important studies of early constitutional law. Kern [1884-1950] observes that discussions of the state in the ninth, eleventh and thirteenth centuries invariably asked whose rights were paramount Were they those of the ruler or the people? Kern locates the origins of this debate, which has continued to the twentieth century, in church doctrine and the history of the early German states. He demonstrates that the interaction of these two sets of influences in conflict and alliance prepared the ground for a new outlook in the relations between the ruler and the ruled, and laid the foundations both of absolutist and of constitutional theory (4).
PDF
I got you, fam.
Thank you, I look forward to reading it.
Also, not necessarily toward you but to anyone reading this thread at a later date I think that this work might address my question too, so I wanted to add that somewhere in the thread as well.
Thanks for your thoughtful and respectful response. As I indicated in the blog article, the issue of Saul/Paul was something I wrestled with for many years. I am now 100% confident that he is a false prophet, after dozens/hundreds of hours of study and consideration.
I don't want to provide a lengthy reply to your points on the scriptures provided. But I will just say (as I said initially), that Paul says many things that are doctrinally true. But Paul engages in double speak, or speaking out of both sides of his mouth. There are places where he says to follow the law, and then places where he says/indicates to NOT follow the law.
In this world of mass deception, in order to advance in our knowledge of the truth, we all have to be open minded enough to question even our most deeply held beliefs. That takes humility. I can see that you have this.
In your continued study on the subject of Saul/Paul, I would recommend to you the best book I have read on this subject, "Jesus' Words Only" by Douglas Del Tondo: https://www.amazon.com/Jesus-Words-Apostle-Condemns-Revelation/dp/0741429659
And here is his website with many articles: http://www.jesuswordsonly.com/
I think he was teasing. There is something called modernism that is a form of style that is not the same thing as theological modernism. So it seems to be a play on words. Though there is some definite overlap in those who are theological modernists and those who enjoy art deco in churches.
If you want to learn more about modernism, you might check out this book, Liberalism is a Sin published in 1886. Please note that modernism, liberalism, and modernistic liberalism are all the same thing -- and that, when used in a theological sense, are not necessarily the same as political liberalism are artistic liberalism, though there are sometimes some relationship between the three.
I wasn't aware they'd made their own BoM When I went to their temple a few years ago it was obvious that they have lost all of the key tenents of the gospel. The way they present themselves there is basically Unitarian and they had very few mentions of the BoM anywhere in the temple (which is just a weird auditorium with a museum of sorts attached).