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| We We're Warned!! St. Francis of Assisi ora pro
nobis! |
The Enemy Within...
Bergoglio “The Pope Who Wants to Put Himself in
God's Place!”
A Prominent
German Theologian Warns of the Danger of Schism!
By: Dr. Robert Moynihan
"That
it is a rupture is something that is seems obvious to any person capable of
thinking who reads the texts in question." —Prof. Robert Spaemann, 89, a
leading German Catholic philosopher, in an interview yesterday on the Pope's
document Amoris Laetitia ("On the Joy of sex")
It is "hard-wired" into the
"genetic code" of the Christian faith -- and into the historical memory
of the Christian faithful - that there will always be temptations to leave the
"straight and narrow" path,
temptations to change doctrine, temptations to introduce "heresies,"
temptations to betray the faith handed down from Christ and the Apostles, what
we call "the deposit of the faith" (depositum fidei).
This is the "capital" which the Church is entrusted with, the
"treasure" she must guard with fidelity, even unto death -- and this
is the reason why cardinals where red, symbolizing that blood which they must
be willing to shed rather than see any harm come to the deposit of the faith.
The protection of this "deposit" is the task of all of the
leaders of the Church, all of the bishops, and pre-eminently of the Bishop of
Rome.
It is also the task of all the faithful: to "keep the faith,"
to "hold fast to the faith," to preserve "the faith once handed
down," no matter what temptations to change it or set it aside may arise.
At the same time, there is a second dynamic also always present, a
dynamic of study and interpretation.
It is the dynamic of theological study and argument -- and there is
nothing to be afraid of when this dynamic seeks to interpret the faith, to come
to a deeper understanding of the faith, to clarify the deeper meaning of the
faith.
This interpretation and clarification is the precise work of theology,
of theologians, of those who seek to peer into the meaning and purpose of
"God's ways" -- even if his thoughts are not our thoughts, nor His
ways, our ways...
In this process, as Blessed John Henry Newman taught,
there can be a "development" of the faith. A growth, an enrichment, a
deepening, a more profound understanding.
But this "development" must always be "in
continuity" with the faith once handed down.
It must never break with that faith. Never betray that faith.
This is the fundamental reason why we can never have a "new"
Church, because that would suggest that there was an "old" Church now
superseded. This would make two Churches, "ours" and
"theirs," the "modern" Church and the Church of "those
people back then."
But the Church is one. One, holy, Catholic, and apostolic.
This Church is, by analogy with human marriage, the... "Bride of
Christ."
One bride, one Lord -- such is our faith. The unity of the Church, and
the uniqueness, the singularity, of the Lord Jesus (Dominus Iesus).
This "singularity," this uniqueness and irrepeatability of the
two partners in this "marital" union, is one reason why our theology
of marriage holds that there cannot be a second husband, or a second wife, and
more than there could be a "second Church" or -- and I hesitate even
to write these words -- a "second Lord."
So the Church is one, undivided, and we cannot have two or more
Churches.
And this means a unity over space, and over time -- the "mystical
communion of the saints" throughout the world, from East to West, and from
the beginning until the end of time.
We cannot have an "old" and a "new" Church, Catholic
Church version 1.0 and Catholic Church version 2.0.
No.
We can only have one, united, historically continuous Church that
deepens its understanding of her beliefs, but does not alter them, or abandon
them.
And one of the great "temptations" of our time, the
post-Conciliar period, has been to embrace the false belief that we have became
a new Church, a "Conciliar Church," different in profound ways from
the "pre-Conciliar Church," through the dramatic processes of the
Second Vatican Council from 1962 to 1965.
It would be heretical to believe this. It would be a denial of the faith
to say we had one Church "back then, before the Council," and another
Church "today."
Holding all of these elements together -- the duty to preserve the
faith, the need to update our understanding of the faith, to "do
theology" -- is not easy.
Again, it is part of the "genetic code" of the Church that
precious truths -- priceless truths -- must be handed down unaltered, and all
preserved in a harmonious whole, the "deposit of the faith," as they
were handed down to us, but that new ways of expressing those truths
must be developed in every generation to enable those
unchanging truths to be understood by new generations in new contexts.
And this brings us to our current predicament.
Because one of the good friends of Emeritus Pope Benedict XVI, the
respected Catholic German philosopher Robert Spaemann, 89, has just
come out in an interview with a warning about the recent document of Pope
Francis.
Spaemann warns that passages of the document represent, not a
development of doctrine, but "a break (or rupture) with the
doctrinal traditions of the Church." (link)
And he warns that this "rupture" brings with it a risk of
schism: "The Pope should have known that with such a step he splits
the Church and leads her toward a schism. This schism would not reside at
the periphery, but in the very heart of the Church. God forbid."
The Spaemann Interview
The Catholic News Agency (CNA) news service (which is
connected with the late Mother Angelica's EWTN Catholic television network),
has bureaus in a number of countries, and a journalist in the bureau in
Germany, Anian Christoph Wimmer, has just published an interview
with Spaemann. It appeared in German first and is now out in Italian thanks to
the Vatican journalist Sandro Magister. (link)
Spaemann is a professor emeritus of philosophy at the Ludwig-Maximilians
University of Monaco of Bavaria. He is one of the leading Catholic philosophers
and theologians in Germany. He lives in Stuttgart. His latest book published in
Italy was God and the World. An Autobiography in the Form of Dialogue,
published by Cantagalli in 2014.
Here is my own English translation based on the Italian.
It is worth noting that Spaemann is the same age as Emeritus Pope
Benedict, who turned 89 in April.
Spaemann: "It's
chaos made into a principle with the stroke of the pen"
This following is a translation of
the interview on Amoris laetitia that Spaemann gave exclusively to Anian Christoph Wimmer for the German edition of
the Catholic News Agency on April 28.
****
Professor Spaemann, as a philosopher, you followed closely the pontificates
of John Paul II and Benedict XVI. Many believers today are asking whether the
post-Synodal Exhortation Amoris laetitia of Pope Francis may
be read in continuity with the teaching of the Church and of these Popes.
Prof. Robert Spaemann: For most of the text that is possible, even
though his line leaves room for conclusions that can not be made compatible
with the teaching of the Church. In any case, Article 305, together with
footnote 351, which states that the faithful "in an objective situation of
sin" may be admitted to the sacraments "because of mitigating
factors," directly contradicts Paragraph 84 of Familiaris
Consortio by John Paul II.
What was John Paul II's central concern?
Spaemann: John Paul II
declares human sexuality "real symbol of the giving of the whole
person" and, more precisely, "a union that is not temporary or ad
experimentum ("for an experiment"). In Paragraph 84 he affirms, then,
with total clarity that the divorced and remarried, if they wish to receive
communion, must give up the sexual acts. A change in the practice of the
administration of the sacraments would therefore not be a
"development" of Familiaris Consortio, as Cardinal Kasper holds, but
a break with its essential teaching, on the anthropological and theological
level, regarding marriage and human sexuality.
The Church does not have the power, without there being a prior
conversion, to give a positive value to sexual relationships, through the
administration of the sacraments, dispensing "in advance" the mercy
of God. And this remains true no matter what the judgment may be of these
situations whether on the moral level or on the human level. In this case, as
in the case of women priests, the door here is closed.
Could
one not argue that the anthropological and theological considerations you
mentioned could perhaps be true, but that the mercy of God is not bound to
these limits, but connects to the concrete situation of each person?
Spaemann: The mercy of God is at the heart of the Christian faith
in the Incarnation and Redemption. Certainly the gaze of God falls upon every
single person in that person's concrete situation. God knows every single
person better than that person knows himself or herself. The Christian life,
however, is not an educational exhibition in which one moves toward marriage as
toward an ideal, as it seems it is presented in many passages ofAmoris laetitia.
The entire scope of relations, especially those of a sexual nature, has to do
with the dignity of the human person, with the person's personality and
freedom. It has to do with the body as the "temple of God" (1 Cor 6:19).
Any violation in this area, no matter how frequent it may have become, is
therefore a violation of the relationship with God, to which Christians are
called; it is a sin against His holiness, and always and continuously is in
need of purification and conversion.
The mercy of God consists precisely in the fact that this conversion is made
continuously and ever again possible. This mercy, certainly, is not bound
within certain limits, but the Church, for her part, is obliged to preach
conversion and does not have the power to go beyond the existing limits by the
administration of the sacraments, causing, in this way, some violence against
God's mercy. This would be proud arrogance.
For this reason, the clerics who stick to the existing order do not condemn
anyone, but take into account and announce this limit with regard to the
holiness of God.
It is a healthy proclamation.
To accuse them unjustly, for doing this, of "hiding themselves
behind the teachings of the Church" and of "sitting on the chair of
Moses... to throw stones at people's lives" (Paragraph 305), is something
that I do not even want to comment on. I note, just in passing, that this text
is exploited, playing on a deliberate misreading of that Gospel passage. Jesus
says, in fact, yes, that the Pharisees and scribes sit on the chair of Moses,
but he stresses that the disciples have to practice and observe all they say,
but do not live like them (Mt 23:2).
The Pope would like us not to focus on the
individual phrases of his exhortation, but on the work as a whole...
Spaemann: From my point of view, focusing on the passages cited
above is entirely justified. Before a text of the papal Magisterium, one
cannot wait for people to rejoice because it is a nice text and pretend not to
notice decisive sentences, that change substantially the teaching of the
Church. In this case there is only one clear decision between yes and no. Give
or withhold Communion: there is no middle way.
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HERESY!! NO ONE CAN BE
CONDEMNED FOREVER - Newpope Bergoglio
|
Pope Francis in
his text repeats that no one can be condemned forever...
Spaemann: I find it hard to
understand what he means. That it is not licit for the Church to personally
condemn anyone, let alone eternally -- which, thank God, she cannot even do --
is something quite clear. But, when it comes to sexual relationships that
objectively contradict the ordering of Christian life, then I really would like to know from the Pope after
how long and under what circumstances an objectively sinful conduct turns into
a conduct pleasing to God.
Here, then, is there really a rupture with the
traditional teaching of the Church?
Spaemann: That it is a rupture is something that is seems obvious
to any person capable of thinking who reads the texts in question.
How was it possible to come to this rupture?
Spaemann: That Francis
positions himself at a critical distance from his predecessor, John Paul II,
was already seen when he canonized John Paul together with John XXIII, when he
deemed unnecessary for the latter the second miracle that, instead, is
canonically required. Many have rightly perceived that choice as manipulative.
It seemed that Pope Francis wanted to relativize the importance of John Paul
II.
The real problem, though, is an influential current of moral theology, already
present among the Jesuits in the 17th century, which supports a mere situational
ethics. The quotes of Thomas Aquinas used by the Pope in Amoris laetitia seem
to support this line of thought. Here, however, the fact that Thomas Aquinas
knows objectively sinful acts, for which admits of no exception linked to
situations, is obscured. These acts include disordered sexual behaviors. As he
had done already in the 1950s regarding the Jesuit Karl Rahner, in an essay
that contains all the essential arguments, still valid today, John Paul II has
rejected situation ethics and he condemned it in his encyclical Veritatis
Splendor.
Amoris Laetitia also breaks with this magisterial document. In this
regard, moreover, do not forget that it was John Paul II who made the theme of
his pontificate divine mercy, dedicating to divine mercy his second encyclical,
discovering in Krakow the diary of Sister Faustina and, later, canonizing her.
He is her authentic interpreter.
What implications do you see for the Church?
Spaemann: The consequences can be seen already. Growing
uncertainty, insecurity and confusion: from the episcopal conferences to the
last parish priest in the jungle. Just a few days ago, a priest from the Congo
expressed to me all his despair in front of this text, and the lack of clear
guidance. According to the relevant passages of Amoris laetitia, in
the presence of not-better-defined "extenuating circumstances," not
only the divorced and remarried may be admitted to absolution for sins and
communion, but everyone living in any "irregular situation," without
requiring them commit themselves to abandon their sexual conduct and,
therefore, without full confession and without conversion.
Every priest who holds to the sacramental order hitherto in force may undergo
forms of bullying from their faithful and be put under pressure by their bishop.
Rome can now impose the directive that from now on only "merciful"
bishops will be appointed, bishops who are willing to soften the existing
order.
Chaos has been erected as a principle with the stroke of a pen.
The Pope should have known that with such a step he splits the Church
and leads her toward a schism.
This schism would not reside at the periphery, but in the very heart of
the Church. God forbid.
One thing, however, seems certain: what seemed to be the aspiration of this
pontificate -- that the Church would transcend her
"self-referentialness" in order to go out to meet persons with an
open heart -- with this papal document has been destroyed for an unforeseeable
length of time.
One must now expect a secularizing boost and a further decline in the
number of priests in large parts of the world. One can easily verify that, for
some time, that the bishops and dioceses with an clear attitude in matters of
faith and morals have the highest number of priestly vocations. It must be
borne in mind here what St. Paul writes in his letter to the Corinthians:
"If the trumpet gives an uncertain sound, who shall prepare himself to the
battle?" (1 Cor 14: 8).
What will happen now?
Spaemann: Every cardinal, but also every bishop and priest, is
called to defend in their own field of expertise the Catholic sacramental
system and to profess it publicly. If the Pope is not willing to introduce
corrections, it will be up to the next pontificate to put things back in place officially.
