On Father Mike Schmid's upcoming Catechism In a Year Series- Dogma, Doctrine, and Discipline.

I started writing this as a post for Fr. Mike Schmidt's Catechism in a Year group on facebook, then I realized it had drifted very off topic, so I'm putting it here.

I hope that we start with an understanding of what the catechism is. There is much confusion these days between dogma, doctrine, and discipline; and the Catechism is doctrine.

Dogma is the foundation- it's the deposit of faith the Apostles received from Christ, and has not changed in 2000 years. It's supposed to not change; it's the bedrock of the faith of Peter. If dogma changes, we're in very deep and have essentially started teaching against the gospels. Even many of our separated brethren, be they ethnic orthodox or Protestant, hold to dogma; they'll usually pick some inflection point where Catholicism appeared to separate from dogma as the sticking point causing the branch. To avoid schism, we must avoid such sticking points! Changing the definition of a sacrament, for instance, as the German Bishops are proposing (to change marriage and ordination from the family unit that brings forth children to serve God in the Church, to something else I truly don't understand that can encompass birth control, abortion, women priests, and same sex marriage) runs the risk of schism from the teachings of Christ and from those of us who consider the Sacraments to be dogmatic. Doctrine is our very human, but led by the magisterium, understanding of dogma- it's the Kerygma, the preaching of the Gospel, and how the gospel applies to our lives today. As such, it changes very slowly and carefully- and it's the idealized form of our religion. Nobody can possibly live up to it all, that's why we have the Sacrament of Reconciliation, that's why we have Purgatory! Not living up to it doesn't mean you're automatically going to hell, and it doesn't mean that you have lost friendship with Christ. It does mean you could, but that depends on a very individual set of circumstances as to how and why you've strayed. Discipline changes both temporally and geographically- and as such can be very different from diocese to diocese and decade to decade. Your local Bishop's job is to set discipline for your diocese. Discipline is boots on the ground, how to apply the teachings of Doctrine. One good example is the "Ordinary Form" General Instruction of the Roman Missal- it's translated into local languages, and implemented by the Bishops, there's a lot less wiggle room for priests than most people think. But it is only discipline- and your experience at Mass will change from diocese to diocese, often subtly. I think it is essential to point this out at the beginning, to avoid scrupulosity and the problems of literalism that can arise from such a study.