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    Richard Dawkins

    Here is the book's synopsis from the Wikipedia article: The book contains ten chapters. The first few build a case that there is almost certainly no God, while the rest discuss religion and morality. It is dedicated to the memory of Dawkins' late friend Douglas Adams, accompanied by the quote...
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    Question about annullment - Priest Input Welcomed

    Just FYI, the question on who can petition the Catholic Church for an annulment of their marriage, as well as many other procedural questions, is answered in the instruction Dignitas Connubii: Art. 3 §2. However, an ecclesiastical judge hears only those causes of the nullity of marriage of...
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    Infallible Statements of the Church

    This is the link that I always use, since I don't understand Latin. This is an online version of an English translation of an older version of Denzinger's that uses the older "D" numbering and not the newer "DS" numbering. Here is a link to an online version of a slightly newer...
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    When do we consider an embryo/fetus a "person"?

    Pope John Paul II's encyclical Evangelium Vitae contains an explanation of this distinction: 60. Some people try to justify abortion by claiming that the result of conception, at least up to a certain number of days, cannot yet be considered a personal human life. But in fact, "from the time...
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    When does an embryo have a soul?

    Another medical example to consider is the case where the pregnancy starts off with two fertilized eggs, but as the embryos develop, they merge to form a single person with extra body parts. I believe there was a case a while back where the newborn baby had (only) the foot of his twin growing...
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    When does an embryo have a soul?

    I not only provided a link to Evangelium Vitae in my post, but I quoted the relevant section, where Pope John Paul II not only acknowledges that "the Magisterium has not expressly committed itself", but also makes the powerful argument that the mere possibility that the embryo has a soul is more...
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    When does an embryo have a soul?

    The article Delayed Animation: An Ambiguity and Its Abuses, by John J. Conley, S.J. provides a detailed, scholarly explication of the Church's teaching on the point of ensoulment. But for those who don't want to wade through it all, the answer is the Magisterium of the Catholic Church has yet...
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    A question about the Diaconate

    This website places the number at "over seventy".
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    A question about the Diaconate

    From the Directory for the Ministry and Life of Permanent Deacons: 5. The specific vocation to the permanent Diaconate presupposes the stability of this Order. Hence ordination to the Priesthood of non-married or widowed deacons must always be a very rare exception, and only for...
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    A question about the Diaconate

    Yes, married men can be ordained as deacons in the Latin Rite.
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    Church Government, Succession (from OBOB)

    Does this mean you were going to be a Jesuit priest? I will respond to your posts in more detail this weekend, but right now I'm behind on a paper I'm writing for work that is due tomorrow.
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    Church Government, Succession (from OBOB)

    Not very well. Theology mostly goes over my head, but that doesn't stop me from trying to read it. In an over-simplified nutshell (the only kind I can understand), I think Fr. Sullivan's argument is that God didn't just simply drop a fully bound Bible on the early Church and then abandon Her...
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    Church Government, Succession (from OBOB)

    If you are interested in modern Catholic scholarship on this issue, you should definitely read From Apostles to Bishops: The Development of the Episcopacy in the Early Church by Fr. Francis A. Sullivan. He starts from accepted historical evidence and makes a strong theological argument for the...
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    Priest/Catholic U President: "Abortion is Not an Infallible Teaching"

    I guess it depends which teaching on abortion he is talking about. The teaching that abortion is intrinsically evil is infallible. The teaching that abortion must be prohibited by civil law (i.e., made illegal) is prudential in nature, and is therefore not capable of being infallibly proclaimed.
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    sorry, 1 more marriage question

    There is an article on the impediment of Disparity of Worship (Christian marrying a non-Christian) in the old online Catholic Encyclopedia. This encyclopedia is hopelessly out-of-date for understanding the Catholic Church today, but as an historical source it shouldn't be too bad. According to...
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    In communion with/ good standing question

    It looks like the OCA is just as strict as GOARCH.
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    Question regarding Catholic communion

    The Catholic Church is very rule-oriented, and the rules on marriage are very complicated, and depend at great deal on the facts of a particular situation. If this is a real-life situation, there is no substitute for talking with a real-life priest. Having said that, it is certainly possible...
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    Questions on Marriage

    I didn't write the Code of Canon Law - the Pope did. I'm just trying to explain how it works. Excommunications can be formal, or they can be automatic. Either way, they prohibit the person from receiving any of the sacraments, not just the Holy Eucharist. That is why the excommunication must...
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    Questions on Marriage

    From Excommunication and the Catholic Church, by Edward Peters, J.D., J.C.D.: 14. I had heard that Catholics who divorce and then remarry outside the Church are excommunicated. Is this true? In the United States, this was true for nearly a hundred years, but it is not true today. In 1884...
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    Questions on Marriage

    You seem to be confusing "excommunication" (canon 1331 of the 1983 Code) with "being excluded from communion" (canons 915 and 916 of the 1983 Code). You did not have a valid marriage, and you were excluded from communion, but you were not excommunicated. The same principle holds for other...