Looking for sources of liberal Roman Catholicism

[austinbrown2]

By "liberal Roman Catholicism" I mean teachers and scholars that teach in the name of Roman Catholicism but express a kind of theology that looks a lot like our Protestant modernists and liberals.

I am aware that higher criticism and a general wishy washy liberal-esk theology dominates a good portion of Roman Catholic scholarship. Do you guys have names, websites or specific schools you could offer?


Thank you,
Austin

 

[yeutter]

Rubenm Alves of Brazil was an early writer promoting liberation theology. Gustavo Gutierrez of Peru is another early advocate of that particular brand of liberalism in the Roman Communion.

A vile Jesuit, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, effectively denied origianl sin, promoted evolution, and introduced existentialist thinking into Catholic discourse.

These are the Romish liberals that most readily come to mind.

 

[VirginiaHuguenot]

Hans Küng

Andrew Greeley

Liberation Theology

Association for the Rights of Catholics in the Church

Call to Action USA

Catholics for a Changing Church

Future Church

Roman Catholic Women Priests

Take Back Our Church

My old church: Newman Center, Chapel Hill, NC (we used to sing songs from "Godspell" )

 

[austinbrown2]

Thank you guys.

That is a very helpful portion of resources. Again, thank you.

Blessings,
Austin

 

[austinbrown2]

To VirginiaHuguenot and yeutter-

Would you say that Roman Catholicism is currently confused about its official teachings? In this respect, do some of the official teaching positions have liberal-esk leaders or professors in those spots? Can you help me understand the current landscape within their borders?

Those are pretty open-ended questions, so feel free to add anything that might be pertinent (or suggestions for reading).

Thanks again,
Austin

 

[Scott]

This one is right on the money for you: Goodbye, Good Men: How Liberals Brought Corruption Into the Catholic Church

Marcel Lefebvre's Open Letter to Confused Catholics is important reading. Lefebvre was an archbishop who eventually formed a splinter conservative group.

This book is good: The Smoke of Satan: Conservative and Traditionalist Dissent in Contemporary American Catholicism

 

[Scott]

Would you say that Roman Catholicism is currently confused about its official teachings? In this respect, do some of the official teaching positions have liberal-esk leaders or professors in those spots? Can you help me understand the current landscape within their borders?

With respect to American and European Catholic churches, by and large you can think of it a mainline liberal church indistinghuishable from other mainline liberal churches (PCUSA). Some congregations may be conservative, but by and large liberalism, higher criticism, relativism, and the like dominate. This is not true for RC churches in South America, Asia, and Africa, which tend to be conservative on those issues.

The American church has its conservative wing, but it is estimated to be less than 10 percent of the whole (which is still big, considering that there are over 60 million catholics in America). It is represented by EWTN. A good way you can get a view on whether a Catholic is conservative or not is to ask what he thinks of EWTN.

 

[austinbrown2]

Scott

Thank you! That is very helpful. I have a lot of information to examine. That's what I was looking for.

Blessings,
Austin

 

[austinbrown2]

What about Raymond E Brown?

I have heard that this man is actually a first rate scholar. Two questions:

Do you think Reformed folks should consider his works?

Do his teachings undermine traditional Roman Catholic teachings?

Austin