Heretic ... no wait, Heathen!

Tom has blogged on this earlier, but I am having my own little run-in with Mrs. Lovric of The Winnepeg Sun over at Angelqueen.

Lydia: Our baby is full of original sin. That's right. Not yet eight months old, our daughter has yet to be baptized and will therefore never grace the gates of heaven. Some will no doubt rebuke our decision to turn away from the Catholic church. That's fine. But reading the latest edict issued by the Vatican, my husband and I feel further justified in our resolve to raise a heretic.

JtH: Lydia, just for the record, you're an idiot. Five minutes of research would have shown you that you are raising a heathen, not a heretic. YOU, dear lady, are the heretic (and an apostate, for that matter). Having been baptized, you are dissenting from the Church
on a matter of faith and morals. Your statement is a textbook example of heresy.

Lydia: Sorry to disappoint you J, but I did not use the term "heretic" incorrectly.
The Oxford English Dictionary describes heresy as the following:

• noun (pl. heresies) 1 belief or opinion contrary to orthodox religious (especially Christian) doctrine. 2 opinion profoundly at odds with what is generally accepted.

So, we are indeed raising or planning to raise a heretic.

JtH: Silly me! Understanding heresy in a Catholic sense! According to the Catholic Encyclopedia (and St. Thomas Aquinas), heresy is

"a species of infidelity in men who, having professed the faith of Christ, corrupt its dogmas"

The Encyclopedia goes on to explain:

"There are, therefore, two ways of deviating from Christianity: the one by refusing to believe in Christ Himself, which is the way of infidelity, common to Pagans and Jews; the other by restricting belief to certain points of Christ's doctrine selected and fashioned at pleasure, which is the way of heretics. The subject-matter of both faith and heresy is, therefore, the deposit of the faith, that is, the sum total of truths revealed in Scripture and Tradition as proposed to our belief by the Church. The believer accepts the whole deposit as proposed by the Church; the heretic accepts only such parts of it as commend themselves to his own approval. The heretical tenets may be ignorance of the true creed, erroneous judgment, imperfect apprehension and comprehension of dogmas ..."

So your daughter cannot be a heretic, since she has not professed faith in Christ. I know the headline sounds so much cooler with the term "Heretic", but until she is baptized, she is a heathen.

Heathens don't sell copy, though.