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Tough Day To Be In Law Enforcement

I know folks are going to move on to the next outrage if they haven't already - but the president of the United States had tear gas and rubber bullets shot at people who were protesting peacefully in from of The White House so he can do this - stand in front of a church he doesn't attend and hold up a bible from which he's already proven he can't recite one a single verse?

Let this sink in for the republicans who said Barack Obama was the worst president of all time. Or for that matter, the democrats who felt George W. Bush was the worst president of all time.


It isn't that Trump thinks God is his plaything, it is that he thinks he is God.
 
Early polls show that Americans aren't pleased so far with his handling of this crisis. The photo op yesterday isn't going to help things as those polls were taken prior to the church shenanigans.

It's all red meat for his supporters, but playing to his base isn't going to be enough in November. Not this year anyway.
 
Early polls show that Americans aren't pleased so far with his handling of this crisis. The photo op yesterday isn't going to help things as those polls were taken prior to the church shenanigans.

It's all red meat for his supporters, but playing to his base isn't going to be enough in November. Not this year anyway.

Sadly we have short term memory. This will fade, the coronavirus might a lot more (thanks somewhat in part due to manipulated data) too, and I’d guess Trump will go hardcore in September and October in finding (artificial) ways to prop up the stock market.
 
Early polls show that Americans aren't pleased so far with his handling of this crisis. The photo op yesterday isn't going to help things as those polls were taken prior to the church shenanigans.

It's all red meat for his supporters, but playing to his base isn't going to be enough in November. Not this year anyway.
That photo-op might go beyond red meat. It could be like eating bear liver: too rich; it’ll poison you.
 
went down a ways and didn’t see anything. What posts?

The guy tweets more than the president. My problem with his tweet is everything he says the church doesn't do or isn't about it does and is or no?

The bible is not a prop. -

The Church is not a photo op.

- dude has tons of pictures in his feed he's either posted or share of the church being a used for a photo op.

And my favorite - religion is not a political tool - uses twitter and religion as a political tool.


Maintaining that balance means that while the church does not act as a direct agent in the political, economic and social order—not in the same way, say, as our elected officials do—its mission is to illuminate these dimensions of human life in order “to establish and consolidate the human community according to the law of God” (No. 42). As such, when the church engages the state, it should not limit itself to explicitly “religious” issues. Nor should it engage the state exclusively on issues of self-interest—for example, the protection of religious institutions.

Rather, it must speak about all that pertains to the common good, which “would include the promotion and defense of...goods such as public order and peace, freedom and equality, respect for human life and for the environment, justice and solidarity” (From the doctrinal note published by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith on Nov. 21, 2002, “The Participation of Catholics in Political Life”). And the church’s proclamation of these values is not merely institutional but occurs primarily through the informed consciences of Catholics as citizens, who infuse Gospel values into the life of society and the state.

The church’s religious mission is best understood as one of service. The church offers its teachings with no pretense of having all the answers but recognizes that it will make mistakes and “will attain its full perfection only in the glory of heaven” (“Lumen Gentium,” No. 48). In fact, the church respects human knowledge and “desires to add the light of revealed truth to mankind’s store of experience” (“GS,” No. 33, and “Evangelii Gaudium,” No. 241). This conciliar teaching corrects a mistaken attitude toward the world found in some pre-conciliar societas perfecta ecclesiologies, which viewed the church as divided from and standing over the rest of humanity.


By virtue of the universality of the church’s mission, it is not bound to any particular form of human culture, nor to any political, economic or social system.
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By virtue of the universality of the church’s mission, it is not bound to any particular form of human culture, nor to any political, economic or social system. On the contrary, the church’s “universality can be a very close bond between diverse human communities and nations, provided these trust her and truly acknowledge her right to true freedom in fulfilling her mission” (“GS,” No. 42). It is in this spirit that the church “admonishes her own sons, but also humanity as a whole, to overcome all strife between nations and race in this family spirit of God’s children” (No. 42). By building relationships of trust in society, the church not only advances the cause of religious freedom but remains true to carrying out its universal mission.

As the church insists that its right of free exercise “must be recognized in the juridical order and sanctioned as a civil right,” it also recognizes that religious freedom “is not of itself an unlimited right. The just limits of the exercise of religious freedom must be determined in each social situation with political prudence, according to the requirements of the common good, and ratified by the civil authority through legal norms consistent with the objective moral order” (“Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church,” No. 422; see also “Dignitatis Humanae,” No. 2). Here again, we have an example of striking a proper balance between the church’s rightful autonomy and its commitment to work in solidarity with others, including civic officials, for the benefit of the human community.

Practical consequences
The Vatican II vision of church, state and politics provides a secure pathway as we face the issues of pandemic and partisanship that are becoming destructive of our national unity. The intense debates in recent days about religious freedom versus the right of the state to protect public health provide a key example. For the church, the right to public worship lies at the core of its mission and identity. Similarly, for the state, the protection of its citizens is at the heart of its raison d’être. Too often, the public debate has focused on these sets of rights as if they were absolute.

One way to break this seeming impasse may be found in thefocus in “Gaudium et Spes” on the common good, which recognizes the transcendent goal of each of these claims: public worship and the defense of human life. But it places those claims within the larger context of the whole of human flourishing. Neither public health and the defense of human life nor the right to public worship can be ignored. Both must be integrated into the larger constellation of issues surrounding our response to the pandemic, such as the economic suffering that our country is enduring, the vulnerability of older people and the ways in which people of color are disproportionately suffering during this crisis.


Vatican II invites us to a broad, integrating perspective, rather than one that arises from absolutist interpretations of partial dimensions of the common good.
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The conciliar teachings point to the reality that religious freedom can sometimes be limited by the state in accord with laws that promote the common good but that such limitations must be carefully circumscribed and monitored. Vatican II invites us to a broad, integrating perspective, rather than one that arises from absolutist interpretations of partial dimensions of the common good. And the council urges us to pursue wide, cordial public discussions of these questions rather than tactics that lead to confrontation.



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This means that the central issue for the church during this election campaign season is to find a way of witnessing to Catholic teaching in the public square without allowing it to become distorted by partisan divisions. One of the council’s most illuminating passages on the role of the church in the modern world provides the inspiration that must inform the church’s contribution to today’s public debate:

The Church, by reason of her role and competence, is not identified in any way with the political community nor bound to any political system. She is at once a sign and a safeguard of the transcendent character of the human person. The Church and the political community in their own fields are autonomous and independent from each other (“GS,” No. 76).
Navigating the issues
How can the church be a sign and safeguard of the transcendent character of the human person during the 2020 election cycle?

First, by witnessing to the whole of the church’s social teaching through its participation in public debate and by forming, not replacing, the consciences of believers. Catholic leaders must reject any effort to truncate church teaching and the imperatives of the Gospel in a way that reinforces partisan divisions.

Second, by transcending such divisions in every political relationship and policy discussion. There should be cordiality with all candidates and public officials but not alignment with any candidate or party.

Third, by always recognizing the sacred dignity of conscience among all people, not seeking to short-circuit the responsibility that citizens have to bring the light of their conscience to bear upon their own political choices.

The church is in the world. It is called to be both immanent and transcendent. As Vatican II made clear, that means it must speak prophetically and not be compromised. It must engage the state and public leaders in cordiality but not in partisanship. It must witness to the Gospel in its entirety.

The church’s proclamation of the dignity of the human person and the pursuit of the common good in all of its dimensions provides an essential framework for navigating the issues that divide the nation today. This is why the church enters the public square with both confidence and humility amid the perils that surround us. And it is in the sacred consciences of lay women and men that the church finds its greatest resource for transforming the world.



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US CHURCH / CORONAVIRUS / RELIGIOUS FREEDOM / US POLITICS
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Blase J. Cupich
Cardinal Blase J. Cupich is the archbishop of Chicago.



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That photo-op might go beyond red meat. It could be like eating bear liver: too rich; it’ll poison you.
Someone needs to tell trump that polar bear liver will cure COVID-19.
 
"The church is not a photo op."

Unless he likes it and posts it, then it's ok. Dude has so many pics of churchs being used for photo ops. Lol


 
Yet another example of White supremacists deception. Pretty obvious that these very fine people believe trump is their ticket to overthrowing our democracy.

 
The guy tweets more than the president. My problem with his tweet is everything he says the church doesn't do or isn't about it does and is or no?

The bible is not a prop. -

The Church is not a photo op.

- dude has tons of pictures in his feed he's either posted or share of the church being a used for a photo op.

And my favorite - religion is not a political tool - uses twitter and religion as a political tool.



Lol. I just posted the tweet because it was a good picture of our dip **** president.

I never heard of the dude before this morning and haven't read any of his other tweets.
 
The violence and looting reached Providence last night. Police and civilian injuries, but this woman escaped harm. Crazy...

 
"The church is not a photo op."

Unless he likes it and posts it, then it's ok. Dude has so many pics of churchs being used for photo ops. Lol




A true believer (presumably this priest) doing things in line with their faith doesn't make it a prop or photo-op. An outsider (Trump) doing so is using it as a prop. Very different scenarios imo.

I say this as a fairly aggressive agnostic.
 
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