Is the Catholic position a "take it or leave it" kind?

[John S]

I'm interested in your opinion about a Catholic position that filters out stuff the Church claims followers shall stand for. In Poland there is the church law that stretches over the regular Roman Catholic doctrine and I just want to bring forth an example.

It says: You can't live in the same house with a partner (both never married before), unless you are indeed married. Or, rather, it says you can't have sex, but they don't say sex out loud.

Let's say there is a member of that church that does not share this particular belief / consciously does not follow this rule. Is it more likely for this person to just not follow the rule, thinking he is still entitled to be a part of the community?

Or rather one should switch to a more generic Roman Catholic church? Or even to "bare" Christianity? For consequence sake?

And as a follow up - what is the reasoning behind ability to make an exception and not realizing that's a normative claim from outside of religion? Like, "if I know how to filter the Old Testament's bad ethical rules, I cannot be certain of the rest of them, and/or it is I who know something about Ethics, not the Old Testament". What stops people of faith from realizing this? How do they explain this to themselves?

The Pope is in charge of the Roman Catholic church. His rules are the law EVERYWHERE - the U.S., Poland, Spain, Central America - Everywhere.
Whether individual Catholics follow those laws or not, is up to them to decide.