A corporal work of mercy.

A corporal work of mercy.
Click on photo for this corporal work of mercy!
Showing posts with label Richard Gaillardetz. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Richard Gaillardetz. Show all posts

Sunday 29 May 2016

Cardinal Caffarra says that the "Pope cannot change doctrine in a footnote," but we know that "that isn't how doctrine changes"

caffarra1

Cardinal Caffarra is a good man. He is one of the five Cardinals who authored the book which another Cardinal, Baldisseri, prevented Cardinals and Bishops from receiving at the Synod by interfering with the Postal service - a crime, no? 

He has recently said that the Pope cannot change doctrine in a footnote.

But that isn't how doctrine changes, is it?


"Will this Pope re-write controversial Church doctrines? No. But that isn't how doctrine changes. Doctrine changes when pastoral contexts shift and new insights emerge such that particularly doctrinal formulations no longer mediate the saving message of God's transforming love. Doctrine changes when the Church has leaders and teachers who are not afraid to take note of new contexts and emerging insights. It changes when the Church has pastors who do what Francis has been insisting: leave the securities of your chanceries, of your rectories, of your safe places, of your episcopal residences go set aside the small minded rules that often keep you locked up and shielded from the world."

This often stated quote, which is in print and video by Father Thomas J. Rosica, CSB, originated from Richard Gaillardetz in the National Catholic Reporter.

You see, a footnote can indeed, change doctrine.

Thursday 6 August 2015

Vatican's "Spin-Doctors" have left something out! - Father Lombardi, answer the question!

The world's media has been reporting on the Pope's comment from his Wednesday, August 5, 2014 Audience, wherein he spoke of divorced Catholics. The media has been pronouncing on the Pope's words and adding their spin to make the Church and its doctrine appear mean, nasty and uncharitable. The Pope was not wrong in what he said, however given the tension between last year's Synod and the upcoming one, stress is being created on both sides of the issue.   

In the original Italian comments, however; the Pope refers at the Audience, to Paragraph 84 of Familiaris Consortio. The statement by the Pope is included in the full Italian text as follows:
La Chiesa sa bene che una tale situazione contraddice il Sacramento cristiano. Tuttavia il suo sguardo di maestra attinge sempre da un cuore di madre; un cuore che, animato dallo Spirito Santo, cerca sempre il bene e la salvezza delle persone. Ecco perché sente il dovere, «per amore della verità», di «ben discernere le situazioni». Così si esprimeva san Giovanni Paolo II, nell’Esortazione apostolica Familiaris consortio (n. 84), portando ad esempio la differenza tra chi ha subito la separazione rispetto a chi l’ha provocata. Si deve fare questo discernimento.

The Church knows well that such a situation contradicts the Christian sacrament. However, his gaze teacher always draws from a mother's heart; a heart, animated by the Holy Spirit, always looks for the good and the salvation of people. That's why she feels the duty, "for the love of the truth", to "discern situations." He expressed himself as St. John Paul II, Apostolic Exhortation Familiaris Consortio (no. 84), for example, bringing the difference between those who have suffered the separation compared to those who caused it. You must do this discernment.
The fact is, the Pope has said nothing new. the media and the Vatican spin doctors want you and the world to think he has. St. John Paul II said himself in that document that the Church must "help the divorced" so that they "do not consider themselves separated" from the Church.

Mercy was not suddenly sent down to earth in March 2013 any more than papal humility or kindness to babies and the sick or taking the bus. 

What game is being played here by the Vatican and its communications experts? Firstly, no other language has this paragraph. Secondly, the referral is only relevant in its doctrinal soundness if one goes to Familiars Consortio and reads it. This is a profound paragraph and it has not been reported on. The Pope referred to it, did he mean just that sentence about the situational "discernment" or did he intend to endorse the whole paragraph? -- a paragraph which upholds the doctrine as given to the world be Our Lord Jesus Christ!

The mainstream media outside of Italy would not be expected to research what he actually said in Italian. For this, they cannot be blamed - the lingua franca of the world is English in which it does not appear. One can forgive the Pope for not speaking English, one cannot forgive the Vatican communication experts for not properly translating and reporting on what the Pope actually said.

There is a game being played here. The Pope made a statement on a matter which is being hotly debated and the world's media has lapped it up. Yet, he included reference to doctrinal orthodoxy that has been ignored because it has not been translated. 

Is the Pope himself playing this game with full knowledge that as long as he says it in Italian, he can't be accused of being unorthodox? Or is he an innocent bystander to a corrupt and agenda driven Communications Office which is out of control and bent on changing doctrine through pastoral initiatives?

Remember this quote
"Will this Pope re-write controversial Church doctrines? No. But that isn't how doctrine changes. Doctrine changes when pastoral contexts shift and new insights emerge such that particularly doctrinal formulations no longer mediate the saving message of God's transforming love. Doctrine changes when the Church has leaders and teachers who are not afraid to take note of new contexts and emerging insights. It changes when the Church has pastors who do what Francis has been insisting: leave the securities of your chanceries, of your rectories, of your safe places, of your episcopal residences go set aside the small minded rules that often keep you locked up and shielded from the world."
It originated as best as we can tell by Richard Gaillardetz in the National Catholic Reporter and used repeatedly in talks without attribution by Father Thomas J. Rosica, CSB, Executive Producer of Salt + Light Television and a high-profile Vatican official and English-language spokesman for the Holy See and he is a well-known member of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications. The man in charge of all of this is Jesuit Father, Federico Lombardi as Director of the Vatican Press Office.

Who can answer the question and explain why the English speaking world is not getting the full story? Imagine, the Church of Christ on Earth engaged in media spin and obfuscation. Expect it to increase before October.

Familiars Consortio 84.

e) Divorced Persons Who Have Remarried

84. Daily experience unfortunately shows that people who have obtained a divorce usually intend to enter into a new union, obviously not with a Catholic religious ceremony. Since this is an evil that, like the others, is affecting more and more Catholics as well, the problem must be faced with resolution and without delay. The Synod Fathers studied it expressly. The Church, which was set up to lead to salvation all people and especially the baptized, cannot abandon to their own devices those who have been previously bound by sacramental marriage and who have attempted a second marriage. The Church will therefore make untiring efforts to put at their disposal her means of salvation.

Pastors must know that, for the sake of truth, they are obliged to exercise careful discernment of situations. There is in fact a difference between those who have sincerely tried to save their first marriage and have been unjustly abandoned, and those who through their own grave fault have destroyed a canonically valid marriage. Finally, there are those who have entered into a second union for the sake of the children's upbringing, and who are sometimes subjectively certain in conscience that their previous and irreparably destroyed marriage had never been valid.

Together with the Synod, I earnestly call upon pastors and the whole community of the faithful to help the divorced, and with solicitous care to make sure that they do not consider themselves as separated from the Church, for as baptized persons they can, and indeed must, share in her life. They should be encouraged to listen to the word of God, to attend the Sacrifice of the Mass, to persevere in prayer, to contribute to works of charity and to community efforts in favor of justice, to bring up their children in the Christian faith, to cultivate the spirit and practice of penance and thus implore, day by day, God's grace. Let the Church pray for them, encourage them and show herself a merciful mother, and thus sustain them in faith and hope.

However, the Church reaffirms her practice, which is based upon Sacred Scripture, of not admitting to Eucharistic Communion divorced persons who have remarried. They are unable to be admitted thereto from the fact that their state and condition of life objectively contradict that union of love between Christ and the Church which is signified and effected by the Eucharist. Besides this, there is another special pastoral reason: if these people were admitted to the Eucharist, the faithful would be led into error and confusion regarding the Church's teaching about the indissolubility of marriage.

Reconciliation in the sacrament of Penance which would open the way to the Eucharist, can only be granted to those who, repenting of having broken the sign of the Covenant and of fidelity to Christ, are sincerely ready to undertake a way of life that is no longer in contradiction to the indissolubility of marriage. This means, in practice, that when, for serious reasons, such as for example the children's upbringing, a man and a woman cannot satisfy the obligation to separate, they "take on themselves the duty to live in complete continence, that is, by abstinence from the acts proper to married couples."[180]

Similarly, the respect due to the sacrament of Matrimony, to the couples themselves and their families, and also to the community of the faithful, forbids any pastor, for whatever reason or pretext even of a pastoral nature, to perform ceremonies of any kind for divorced people who remarry. Such ceremonies would give the impression of the celebration of a new sacramentally valid marriage, and would thus lead people into error concerning the indissolubility of a validly contracted marriage.

By acting in this way, the Church professes her own fidelity to Christ and to His truth. At the same time she shows motherly concern for these children of hers, especially those who, through no fault of their own, have been abandoned by their legitimate partner.

With firm confidence she believes that those who have rejected the Lord's command and are still living in this state will be able to obtain from God the grace of conversion and salvation, provided that they have persevered in prayer, penance and charity.

Wednesday 15 April 2015

Good Cardinals, Bad Cardinals

The Radical Catholic has a good commentary today worth reading with regards to recent comments by Cardinals Müller, Sarah and Brandmüller who have all called Cardinal Walter Kasper's Synodal machinations, "heretical." Let us remember what Cardinal Müller said:
"Any separation of the theory and the practice of the faith would, in its formulation, represent a subtle christological heresy." 
Radical Catholic applies that statement to comments by Washington Cardinal Donald Wuerl:
"I think one of the reasons we're having this Synod, one of the reasons the Holy Father has asked for two Synods, is to reflect on the situation today. When we talk about doctrinal 'givens,' things that are 'fixed,' we're talking about something such as, in what marriage consists. The reception of Communion is not a doctrinal position; it's a pastoral application of the doctrine of the Church. And that involves a number of things: it involves the mercy of God, the Sacrament of Reconciliation, the conscience of the individual person, the state of the soul of that individual person - all of those things are quite distinct from a statement in the doctrine of the Church concerning the nature of marriage. And I think we have to sort those things out. And that's probably what's going to go on in these two Synods. We're not in a position to say, "This is how this must be understood today," if all we intend to say is, "It must be repeated," i.e. what we said in the past. We have to repeat the doctrine, but the pastoral practice is what we're talking about. That's why we're having the Synod, and just to repeat the practice of the past, without any effort to see, "Is there some awareness, openness, influence of the Spirit, that might be helping us - in total continuity with our past practice - to find a new direction today?"
This same statement by the Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith can be applied to this statement frequently uttered on video by Father Thomas J. Rosica, CSB at conferences apparently originated by Richard Gaillardetz Joseph Professor of Catholic Systematic Theology at Boston College as written in the September 25 2013 issue of the National Catholic Reporter:
Will this pope rewrite controversial church doctrines? No, but that isn't how doctrine changes. Doctrine changes when pastoral contexts shift and new insights emerge such that particular doctrinal formulations no longer mediate the saving message of God's transforming love. Doctrine changes when the church has leaders and teachers who are not afraid to take note of new contexts and emerging insights. It changes when the church has pastors who do what Francis has been insisting on for the last six months: Leave the security of your chanceries, rectories, parish offices and episcopal residences. Set aside the "small-minded rules" that keep you locked up and shielded from the world. Go meet the people where they are.
We have just six months until round two of the "battle" that Cardinal Kasper whined about recently. Yes indeed, it is a battle and we will not lay down and allow Cardinals and others with heretical ideas as confirmed by these three Cardinals run over the Church and the Catholic faithful.

Many have and will suffer for it as we have seen and I include myself in that with the imprudent and unjust actions against me by Father Thomas Rosica of the Congregation of St. Basil with his failed attempt to bankruptcy into silence. There can be no silence in the face of this potential heresy that some would perpetrate. We see the evil and confusion that is proffered by some Cardinals such as Kasper and Danneels, Marx and Wuerl and bishops with a homosexualist and homoheresy agenda such as Bonny, Currie and Lynch. Thank God that it is being balanced by voices of truth and clarity and filled with Christ such as Cardinal Burke and these three. 



How many Cardinals does it take to condemn a heresy?

If I had been gifted with more wit by Almighty God, I'd be able to turn that into one heck of a joke. I'm sure there's at least a mediocre one in there somewhere.

As many of you know by now, Cardinal Walter Brandmüller, President Emeritus of the Pontifical Commission for Historical Sciences, has gone on record in condemnation of any proposal to change Catholic teaching on marriage as heresy. As reported on LifeSiteNews yesterday, when asked whether the Church can change its teaching on marriage without falling into grave error, the good Cardinal replied:

Tuesday 24 March 2015

Out of the rot and confusion of Germany's bishops comes a voice of Truth

There can be no denying the literal evil coming out of the hierarchy and the Church in Germany. The power that these men wield because of their wealth and the influence which this gives them upon many around the world and in Rome is disturbing.

In a report on March 23 in the Catholic Herald, Cardinal Walter Kasper urged that "We should all pray" for the Holy Spirit's guidance over the Synod "because a battle is going on." Kasper made his remarks in English presenting his new book to be published by the Paulist Press, Pope Francis's Revolution of Tenderness and Love. I can't wait to stand in line to get this bestseller. The Cardinal went on to say that “Hopefully, the synod will be able to find a common answer, with a large majority." On the matter of doctrine, Kasper said that he hopes there "will not be a rupture with tradition, but a doctrine that is a development of tradition." 

Does this man seriously think that God is going to answer prayers that will undermine doctrine or that doctrine is determined by a majority vote? 

On the matter of doctrine that it be a "development of tradition" according to Kasper, where have we heard this kind of talk before?


“Will this Pope re-write controversial Church doctrines? No. But that isn't how doctrine changes. Doctrine changes when pastoral contexts shift and new insights emerge such that particularly doctrinal formulations no longer mediate the saving message of God's transforming love, Doctrine changes when the Church has leaders and teachers who are not afraid to take note of new contexts and emerging insights. It changes when the Church has pastors who do what Francis has been insisting: leave the securities of your chanceries, of your rectories, of your safe places, of your episcopal residences go set aside the small-minded rules that often keep you locked up and shielded from the world.”

I'd like to be able to attribute that quote properly; the problem is, I really don't know who said it first. As far as can tell, it first appeared in the September 25, 2013 edition of the National Catholic Reporter and was written by Richard Gaillardetz. On the other hand, it has been used a number of times in lectures given by Father Thomas J. Rosica CSB as can be found in this report at LifeSiteNews and the accompanying video without attribution to Gaillardetz.

There is no doubt that the thinking of Kasper is in line with the quote above by whomever said it first. Doctrine changes when that doctrine that is a "development of tradition" and it "changes when pastoral contexts shift and new insights emerge."

Kasper is a Protestant. His thinking is heretical. There can be no doubt about it any longer and those that give credence to this man in Rome, no matter who they are, are like unto him. When you lie down with pigs you end up covered in mud is an apt expression.

Germany's Religious viewpoint

Meanwhile, Niedziela in Poland is carrying a report from Radio Watykańskie that German men and women religious are demanding changes to the Church's teaching on sex, marriage and homosexuality. The statement of the twenty-two thousand nuns and religious calls for the church to change its approach to sexuality and in this matter expressed more confidence in the faithful than the Church. The Church must be open as is the Orthodox Church and should bless divorcees, allowing them to receive communion. The Church should also bless same-sex couples and communion should not be denied them. German monks are inclined to the opinion that many of these would aspire to the Christian way of life and a faithful partnership for life, but cannot accept the fact that the Church requires them to maintain sexual abstinence. "How homosexuals would be considered as beloved children of God, if the Catholic Church does not bless them in their quest for a fulfilling partnership," the authors ask rhetorically. They blame the Magisterium of the Church for widening the gap between the doctrine and the everyday life of the laity.

Cardinal Marx's schismatic comments

Not long ago, we had Cardinal Marx stating; "We are no subsidiaries of Rome, Each conference of  bishops is responsible for pastoral care in its culture, and must, as its most proper task, preach the Gospel on our own. We cannot wait for a synod to tell us how we have to shape pastoral care for marriage and family here." 

Cardinal Marx is simply a new Luther! Combined with Cardinal Kasper's comments that Africans "should not tell us too much what we have to do," it becomes quite clear to all that these Germans are planning a schism one way or another as I wrote about previously.

Well, not all Germans it seems, thanks to the LORD. 

Cardinal Cordes reprimands Marx

Rorate Caeli blog is now joined by other news services reporting on a March 7, 2015 letter to Tagespost from Paul Josef Cardinal Cordes an 80 year-old Cardinal and former Curia official. Cardinal Cordes commented on Marx's "theological blurriness" and that, "as a social ethicist Cardinal Marx may know much about the dependency of branches of large corporation but in an ecclesiastical context, such statements should rather be rather left to the village pub." 

The Cardinal went on to say that the Church in Germany is "unfit to work against growing secularism." Cardinal Cordes lamented that in Cardinal Marx's comments, the idea of communion – among bishops, and with the Bishop of Rome – was sorely lacking, “even though the bishops expressly promised 'unity with the College of Bishops under the Successor of Peter' during their episcopal consecration. The sentence: 'We cannot wait for a synod to tell us how we have to shape pastoral care for marriage and family here' is not imbued with a spirit of 'Communio'.”

As reported in the NCRegister, the Cardinal “Particularly deplorable are the statements during the press conference that the 'new solutions' – everyone knows what is meant – can be theologically justified,” Cardinal Cordes wrote. “Does he want to say that the dogma of the inseparability of marriage becomes intolerable because of the life situations of remarried people? 

These "new solutions" proposed by Kasper and Marx align directly with the statement above on changing doctrine due to new "development" or "new insights."

Catholics, wake up!

We cannot sit by and allow these men to undermine the beauty of the Truth of Christ as expressed in the Magisterial teaching of the Church in some false form of mercy which we hear about daily.

There is indeed a "battle going on" and Kasper will not win it.