My post and comments about what Card. Burke said in a French TV interview received some vigorous responses, some which I declined to post. His Eminence responded to a hypothetical question … always a little dangerous … about what he might do were Pope Francis to continue on course X. Get that?
In any event, His Eminence’s answer stirred the pot. He said that were Pope Francis to do X (persist – quite an assumption – in driving forward Communion for the divorced and remarried) then he would have to resist such an effort:
“Resisterò. Non posso fare altro…. I shall resist. I can do no other.”
Card. Burke has now offered a bit more on that response. Mind you, there was nothing wrong with his response, other than the fact that he responded to a hypothetical, which, as I mentioned before, is a dicey move.
At CNA we find this:
What Cardinal Burke really said about ‘resisting’ Pope Francis
Cardinal Raymond Burke said he was “responding to a hypothetical situation” when he stated that he would resist any possible move by Pope Francis away from Catholic doctrine.
“I simply affirmed that it is always my sacred duty to defend the truth of the Church’s teaching and discipline regarding marriage,” Cardinal Burke told CNA Feb. 9.
“No authority can absolve me from that responsibility, and, therefore, if any authority, even the highest authority, were to deny that truth or act contrary to it, I would be obliged to resist, in fidelity to my responsibility before God.”
[…]
That’s it. He has made clearer – for the less agile of mind and for the muckrackers – what he said.
I, however, am still waiting for those professional and perennial Pope resistors at Fishwrap to embrace Card. Burke as their new model.
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Good for his Eminence. My money was on him to enter the room of tears, but alas…
My cousin sent me yesterday a petition to send to the Holy Father about standing up for the Sacrament of Marriage. It’s gotten to the point – or has for some time, I guess – that we are expected to duck when people take offense at what we as Catholics believe. When I was in seminary, an upperclassman (now a fine priest, and his mother died last week, Jesu, mercy, Mary, pray) told my classmate that he would be persecuted for his faith, and that it would happen within the seminary as much as without. Men were, at another seminary near me, expelled right and left for standing up for our Catholic Faith.
Last week, I visited my alma mater, and witnessed the third year theologians make their Profession of Faith and Oath of Fidelity. These men are soldiers, in every sense of the word. Seeing this was a tremendous grace. We should thank our soldiers – not only those in the military, but also, and especially those, ordained to work in the fields of the Lord.
Ah, but… to Fishwrap, Cardinal Burke is a dissenter on-the-other-side. That is his sin: the only sin there is. They don’t like it when a *real* prophetic voice comes out of the wilderness. God bless Cardinal Burke.
Why doesn’t the Holy Father offer such clarification to his off the cuff statements that often lead to confusion. It wasn’t hard for Cardinal Burke so why is it so hard for our Holy Father?
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St. Paul seems to go a bit further than the cardinal did:
“But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach a gospel to you besides that which we have preached to you, let him be anathema.” Galatians 1:8
Cardinal Burke has said that it is his sacred duty to defend the truth of the Church’s teaching and discipline regarding marriage.
True. As a bishop and Cardinal he has a particularly enhanced duty do so.
But it is also the duty of all Catholics who have a knowledge of the Faith, each in his own way, and according to his own capacities.
But of course it was a hypothetical question, so let’s wait and see. The second session on the Family, note the Family, will clarify this – or is “clarify” expecting too much?
If any cleric of Holy Mother Church tries to change doctrine…..faithful Catholics will resist. God Bless Cardinal Burke.
With all due respect to His Eminence, I greatly appreciate His resistance at this stage of
the game (I believe even the Holy Father appreciates it). But, what will His Eminence(and all of us)
do IF the Holy Father definitively decides to allow the divorced and civilly remarried to receive Holy Communion? Hopefully we will give our “Roma locuta; causa finita est.”
The other day you wrote about how the Holy Father doesn’t wear certain vestments. I’d rather him wear a burlap sack if that’s what it took to send the likes of Marx and Kasper packing. That way we could actually see what was in the depositum fidei, away from the “fog of controversy.”
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I hope that, if not right after the Lord calls him, within a century, Cardinal Burke will be revered in the same breath as Pope St. Pius X, St. Robert Bellamire, {sp?} and so on.
brhenry says:
10 February 2015 at 7:08 pm
With all due respect to His Eminence, I greatly appreciate His resistance at this stage of the game (I believe even the Holy Father appreciates it). But what will His Eminence(and all of us) do IF the Holy Father definitively decides to allow the divorced and civilly remarried to receive Holy Communion? Hopefully we will give our “Roma locuta; causa finita est.”
Without attempting to demean, it is posts like the above that demonstrate the depth of the problems in the Church.
The response is, NO, true Catholics will NOT give their “Roma locuta, causa finita est” to such a proposal, even if it comes from the pope, because there is a PRIOR “locuta” that even the pope must obey: GOD HIMSELF has spoken on this issue, and the matter is settled. The Church, and by extension the pope, has no authority to change this discipline without contradicting the very words of Jesus Christ our Savior.
That’s the whole point of the discussion.
If the pope were to announce a change in the discipline, he must be resisted mightily and publicly.
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DJAR wrote …true Catholics will NOT give their “Roma locuta, causa finita est” to such a proposal, even if it comes from the pope, because there is a PRIOR “locuta” that even the pope must obey: GOD HIMSELF has spoken on this issue, and the matter is settled. The Church, and by extension the pope, has no authority to change this discipline without contradicting the very words of Jesus Christ our Savior
The words of Jesus say that a divorced person who remarries commits adultery. I haven’t heard anyone propose to change that doctrine.
Paul created some exceptions for converts and the Church created some exceptions in cases in which the spouses were never “really” married to begin with.
Paul taught that we should not “unworthily” receive the Eucharist.
It seems to me that the current discussion is about what Paul’s “unworthily” means, not about Jesus’s words.
“Pope-resisters”, or perhaps “Faith-resisters”?