Concrete suggestions for the Synod of Bishops

Posted on 7 October 2014 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

The issue of Communion for those in irregular marriages, and for other sinners as well, is not to be quickly solved.  Rushing to amend the annulment process seems to me a bad idea.

However, there are a couple things that Bishops, with the Pope, could do to make it easier for people who should not be going to Communion, not to go.

First, in the places where the practice is used, could we get rid of row by row Communion?

Some people will feel psychological pressure to go with everyone else.  They watch the rows getting closer and closer, all the while debating, “Should I sit here or stay in the aisle and wonder about what people are wondering about me?  Why I am not going forward?”

Second, lengthen the Eucharistic fast before Communion to 3 hours instead of the ridiculous 1 hour.

Were we to have a longer Eucharistic fast, people could assume that you, mortal sinner that you probably are, may have had a stack of flapjacks before coming to church, rather than all those other things that people might wonder about.

Let’s make it easier for people not to commit sacrilege.

No more row by row!

Three hours!

Posted in "How To..." - Practical Notes, Hard-Identity Catholicism, Liturgy Science Theatre 3000, New Evangelization | Tagged ,
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As The Synod Turns

Posted on 7 October 2014 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

As The Synod TurnsAny one who looks at Catholic stuff on these interwebs today (and for the near future) is going to be inundated with Synod stuff.

We have to be wary.

Do you remember that, just before Benedict XVI abdicated, during an audience he talked about the Council of the Fathers v. the Council of the Media?

This is what we are seeing develop around this Synod.

There is a Synod and there is a Synod of the Media.

A great example of this is found today at CRUX.

My first observation is that, when you look at CRUX’s main page the great burning question that all Catholics are focused on is “gay” marriage.  There is a disproportionate focus on this issue, just as there is a disproportionate representation of “gays” in TV sitcoms, etc.  Surely this comes from a desire not just to report news but to advance an agenda.  I circled stories on the main page that have to do with “gay” matters.  Given the percentage of Catholics who actually want there to be same-sex unions, for any reason, … well… you decide what’s going on here.

You can conduct the same exercise over at Fishwrap (aka The National Schismatic Reporter).  It’ll probably be a higher percentage yet, given that outlet’s leanings.

To their credit, CRUX has an op-ed piece by Mark Brumley of Ignatius Press which is worth a moment or two.  He explodes the canard that conservatives are against change and he clearly states that we have to embrace also the hard sayings of the Lord, the difficult teachings.  “Pastoral” doesn’t mean selling out.

On the other hand, at CRUX we see a “Synod of the Media” piece by John Allen (who now works for the Boston Globe for CRUX). Allen enthusiastically relates that married couples are stealing the show at the Synod (which is all of 36 hours old).  Highlighted are the comments of a couple who assert that the Church should be open to same-sex couples.  There are no other explanations of what that is supposed to look like other than the analogy offered: just as a parents of a son in some kind of same-sex relationship should welcome that “couple” into their home at Christmas time, so too the Church should welcome same-sex couples.  There is a lot of ambiguity here.  Say parents do allow their son and his … whatever he is called… to their home for, say, Christmas dinner.  Do they then give that “couple” a bedroom in their home for the night or longer?  Similarly, Holy Church already welcomes every sort of couple of Catholics.  As a matter of fact Holy Church obliges every sort of Catholic to come to Church and participate in Sunday Mass.  Remember the obligation thing?  What Holy Church does not do is say to people in mortal sin that they can receive Communion.  The language of “welcome” in these scenarios, namely, the Church should “be welcoming” is a red herring.  OF COURSE the Church is welcoming to sinners.  THAT’S WHAT SHE’S FOR, for the love of all that’s holy.

Moreover, Allen also expostulates about how the way annulments are handled in these USA could be a model for the rest of the world.  What he is referring to is the high percentage of cases that receive decrees of nullity, without consideration of whether those tribunals were exercising due diligence or not.  This was considered a serious problem during the pontificates of St. John Paul II and Benedict XVI.  Is it suddenly not a problem anymore just because there is, right now, an almost lemmings-to-the-cliff rush in favor of some “streamlined” annulment process?

The Synod of the Media, folks.

But wait!  There’s more.

Mr. Allen also reports that Card. Kasper has received an “endorsement” from fellow German Card. Marx of Munich, who is also a member of the fabled “Gang of Eight”.  Well, that’s a huge surprise, isn’t it!  Germans bishops support Kasperite thesis!  Sun to rise at dawn!

First of all, the fact that the German bishops, with Marx, might back Kasper’s notions during the Synod means very little, in terms of the Synod.  The Germans have their representation.  I think its at about the same level as that of the Church in, say, Croatia.

Also, could there be behind this German push for Communion for the civilly remarried a desire to defend Germany’s Church Tax?

In the UK’s best Catholic week, The Catholic Herald, there is in the print edition (you can subscribe HERE) a letter to the editor by Fr. Francis Coveney, which raises a good point:

As The Synod Turns

Over at Lifesite News, there is an entry which touches on the fact that the German Church is losing members like fleeing rodents from a less than stable barque.

The issue [Communion for those in irregular situations] has been a high priority for the German Catholic bishops for whom much of the Church’s funding comes from the Church Tax, in which citizens identify themselves as affiliated with a particular church and the government pays a portion of their income tax to support it. The Catholic Church’s refusal to budge on Communion for divorced and remarried Catholics has cut into Catholic revenues as thousands of Catholics in “irregular” situations have switched their affiliation on tax forms.

In 2012, the German bishops’ conference issued a statement that Catholics who did not pay the Church Tax would be refused the sacraments. German citizens are required to give an affiliation on their tax forms, and the bishops declared that changing the affiliation to one of the Protestant Churches is tantamount to a declaration of apostasy. In 2011, the Catholic Church in Germany received 5 billion euros (approximately $6.84 billion U.S.) from the government.

The bishops have repeatedly complained of the loss of membership and blame the Church’s refusal to change teachings such as that on divorce, the reservation of priestly ordination to men and clerical celibacy. [… “but for Wales?”] The German media, however, has pointed to the clerical sex abuse scandals as a major motivator for the refusal of Catholics to continue paying the tax levy. In 2011, 126,488 Catholics asked to be removed from registers.

Kasper, long a theological opponent of the former Cardinal Ratzinger, has espoused a change in the practice for years. In 2005, Cardinal Kasper refused to accept the decision of a synod of bishops on the question, [Wait just a doggone minute here!  I thought “synodality” was the bestest and most wonderfulest way ehvurrrr to work out problems in the Church.] saying “It is a question that exists, and we have to reflect on it in order to be able to respond…Every bishop in every Western country recognizes that this is a grave problem.” Of the Synod’s conclusion that the practice of withholding Communion could not be changed, Kasper said it “is not the final result.”  [I guess there are Synods and then there are Synods.]

In 1993, as Bishop of Rottenburg-Stuttgart, Kasper released a pastoral letter along with Karl Lehman, then-Bishop of Mainz that allowed divorced and remarried Catholics to receive Communion after “serious examination” of their conscience. [And the CDF shot that down right away.]

There’s a lot more to say, but that’s enough for now.

Bottom line: Keep your eyes open and your ears tuned to the problem of the Synod of the Synod v. the Synod of the Media.

Posted in CRUX WATCH | Tagged , , , ,
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2015 Guide to Catholic colleges and universities

Posted on 7 October 2014 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

2015 Guide to Catholic colleges and universitiesThe world keeps on turning, even though an Extraordinary Synod is going on, and some of you readers out there are dealing with things that actually matter to you here and now.

Some of you are trying to figure out which college to choose, where to send your children for their university education.

Will you, can you in good conscience, pick a Catholic school?  Will it really be Catholic?  Will it wind up being a catholic school, more in keeping with Fishwrap than The Wanderer?

The Cardinal Newman Society (see their spiffy feed on my side bar) has released their 2015 Newman Guide to Choosing a Catholic College. HERE

An innovative new “Recruit Me” program gives high school students the opportunity to get recruited by the 27 faithful Catholic colleges, universities and higher education programs recommended in the 2015 edition of The Newman Guide to Choosing a Catholic College, which was released today by The Cardinal Newman Society.
Families can view The Newman Guide and its companion magazine, My Future, My Faith, online for free or purchase print copies at TheNewmanGuide.com.

[…]

Read the rest there.

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Couple tells Pope about welcoming homosexual “couples” in parishes. Fr. Z muses.

Posted on 7 October 2014 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

You can expect that those who support Communion for the divorced and civilly remarried will find eager allies in those who support the homosexualist agenda.  The former are willing (or want) to detach the sexual act from marriage.  The latter want to detach the sexual act from procreation.

Thus, Fishwrap (aka National Schismatic Reporter) is all over a story from CNS reporting that:

A married couple told Pope Francis and the Synod of Bishops on the family that Catholic parishes should welcome same-sex couples, following the example of parents who invite their son and his male partner to their home for Christmas.

I don’t want to shift any blame onto the couple who spoke at the Synod, of course. It is the sensationalizing of the reportage that is troublesome.

That said, I wonder just how it is that parishes should welcome homosexual “couples”?  What would that look like?  What do we mean by “couples”?  Civilly married “couples”?

Here’s the deal.

Part of the problem of homosexual “couples” (and perhaps also civilly remarried couples) involves the corruption of friendship.

Say a man and woman are in an irregular situation.  One, a Catholic, is divorced from the previous spouse.  No decree of nullity.  Civil marriage follows to another Catholic.  They cannot receive Communion as is.  However, it could be possible for them to receive Communion (provided that they avoid scandal) were they willing to live in a “Josephite” marriage or a “brother and sister” situation.   As you can imagine, it could happen that once in a while they might slip, as it were.  In that case, they go to confession and start again, resolved to do better.

Say a man and a man, who are great friends, determine to live together, share expenses, take care of each other when ill, etc.  They are heterosexual and they don’t have any attraction to each other.  They are simply great friends, like Capt. Aubrey and Dr. Maturin, Capt. Kirk and Mr. Spock, Mr. Holmes and Dr. Watson, Porthos, Athos and Aramis… okay, that’s three.   Jesus and the Apostles.   No problems here.

Say a man and a man, who are great friends, determine to live together, share expenses, take care of each other when ill, etc.  They, however, are homosexuals and they do have an attraction to each other.  However, they have determined to live chastely, because they know that homosexual acts are sinful.  As you can imagine, it might happen that they slip once in a while.  They go to confession – like any other sinners do – and they renew their resolve to live chastely.   That is not very different from the situation in which the divorced and remarried couple find themselves in.

You might bring up the point that they have placed themselves in an occasion of sin, because the proximity of the other person is too tempting.  This would apply to the man and woman living like “brother and sister” and to the homosexuals.

I respond in two ways.  First, human beings are not brute animals which have no control over their appetites.  Second, say they have separate dwellings.  There is nothing to stop them from getting into the car at any time of the day or night.  Separation in separate dwellings isn’t a guarantee of anything, in this highly mobile world we live in.

Yes, there are some less thoughtful reactionaries who will jump all over this like a trampoline, because they hold that, if you are attracted to another person, you should avoid even seeing that person.  Sure, that is one approach.  I don’t recall that it’s in the Bible. It isn’t de fide.  It is one way to counsel a person, depending on the circumstances.

That said, those who want divorced and civilly remarried couples to receive Communion without any commitment to living chastely, while continuing to have marital relations whenever, are, in effect, separating the sexual act from its proper locus, valid marriage.  Homosexualists, homosexual activists, will find this goal parallel to their own.  If they can disconnect the sexual act from its primary end, procreation, they score a victory.

 

Posted in Hard-Identity Catholicism, One Man & One Woman, Our Catholic Identity, Sin That Cries To Heaven, Wherein Fr. Z Rants | Tagged , , ,
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INTERVIEW: Card. Burke our challenges and “authentic pastoral care”

Posted on 6 October 2014 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

INTERVIEW: Card. Burke our challenges and "authentic pastoral care"His Eminence Raymond Card. Burke was interviewed by Vatican Radio about the “Five Cardinals Book” and about the Synod.

Compare and contrast with Card. Kasper’s recent interviews?  Night and day!  This is on an entirely different level.

Cardinal Burke: Christ’s truth is at the heart of marriage

(Vatican Radio) “Remaining in the truth of Christ” [both the theme and the book title] is at the heart of the Extraordinary Synod on the Family, said Cardinal Raymond Burke, Prefect of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura. With the Synod beginning this week, Cardinal Burke sat down with Vatican Radio to talk about his perspectives on the Synod, on issues ranging from outreach to those marginalized in difficult marriage situations, as well as the necessity to proclaim the beautiful truth of marriage instituted by God the Father at creation, taught by Christ, and upheld by the Church.

Cardinal Burke was also one of several contributors to a book, entitledRemaining in the Truth of Christ, intended to help the Synod and the Pope as they work to renew the Church’s commitment to the pastoral care of families.

Listen to the interview:

Read the full transcription of Cardinal Burke’s interview below: [With my patented treatment.]

INTERVIEW: Card. Burke our challenges and "authentic pastoral care"

Click to PRE-ORDER

Q: Your Eminence, you recently authored a chapter in a book about the indissolubility of marriage, entitled Remaining in the Truth of Christ.  What motivated the book and what is its underlying premise?BURKE: At the extraordinary consistory of Cardinals, which was held on Feb 20 and 21 of this year, Cardinal Walter Kasper gave a lengthy discourse on marriage and the family in which he invited a dialogue about what he had stated in his discourse. A group of us decided to ponder more deeply a number of questions which he raised in his presentation and to respond to them in a systematic way. And thank God, with the help of the general editor, Father Robert Dodaro of the Augustinianum, we were able to put this together as a service to the Synod and above all to the Holy Father in his desire to present once again the beauty of the Church’s teaching on marriage and the family.  [The Book is a service, not an attack.  Card. Kasper suggested that this was a “conspiracy” and an attack on the Pope.]

Q: Going into the Extraordinary Synod on the Family, what would you identify as three of the biggest challenges to the Catholic family today?

[His Eminence begins to lay out a series of challenges.] One of the biggest challenges is the defective catechesis in the Roman Catholic Church—I can speak from my experience in the United States—for the past 40 to 50 years. [Do I hear an “Amen!”?] Children and young people are not well catechized with regard to marriage. Coupled with that is the recent entrance of a so-called “gender theory” that alienates human sexuality from its essentially conjugal meaning. [This is well-done.  As a matter of fact, I think that the homosexual lobby within the Church are among the most vociferous in clamoring for Communion for the civilly remarried precisely because they want to detach sexual acts from procreation.  Thus, anything that weakens that original and putatively valid marriage bond is heading in their direction.] This is now being brought into schools along with the advancement of the homosexual agenda. This is a big challenge for families. It is only in the family that the true sense of who we are as man and woman is taught effectively both by the example of the father and mother, but also in catechesis to amplify that and assist the parents in the fuller teaching of the faith. So this is one major difficulty.

Obviously too, we are dealing with a culture, at least in the West, which is totally secularized and therefore denatured. When God is no longer taken into account, and His plan for creation is no longer considered… Instead, we have the pretense to decide for ourselves the meaning of our own lives and the meaning and destiny of our world, the family suffers first and foremost. The family today has to be especially alert to the subtle influences of the secularized culture, what St. John Paul II once called the Godless culture, especially its insinuation into the lives of the members of the family and the family itself, through the mass media and above all through the Internet and the horrible reality of pornography on the Internet, which is causing so much damage to families. The second big challenge to families is secular society itself and the challenge to Christian families today to be countercultural.

A third challenge is the whole question of marriage itself and the effective presentation of the Church’s teaching about marriage, which in fact is also known by reason. Marriage is part of our human nature and therefore it is taught by natural law. Faith illumines reason and helps to see the truth in all its richness. So, we need to help especially young people when they are at the age where one is preparing for marriage to see marriage itself as a beautiful call, a way to eternal salvation—not only to their happiness now on earth—and to assist them in every way we can. I think if we have a good catechesis for children and for young people it will be easier to reach them with the message of the Church, the message of reason and faith with regard to marriage as they come into their young adult years.

Q: How can we renew our pastoral care for people who are divorced and those who are divorced and remarried?

What we must do for those who are in irregular unions is to show the care to each and every one of them the same care we are called to share with every member of the Church, especially those who are in the most need. There is no question that those who are living in irregular unions have a very particular need of the Church’s care. I think the important thing for us is to show them how, even in their particular situation, they can convert themselves more and more to Christ and conform themselves more to Him. It is not easy; it is one of the more particularly challenging situations in which a Christian can find him or herself, but nevertheless there is grace to respond in a way that is true to the teaching of Christ and therefore liberating.

[NB] It would be a big mistake to approach the situation simply from the point of view of trying to figure out how to admit persons in irregular unions to the sacraments. This is a contradiction in itself and would truly miss the point of the authentic pastoral care that these couples need. The Church has a long history of trying to help couples who, for one reason or another, are not able to leave an irregular union to live chastely and to live justly as they can in that situation.

Q: The Synod has attracted a great deal of media attention. How do you think the media reporting has impacted the Synod and people’s perception of it?

Certainly one good thing is that people are very much aware that there will be a Synod on the family! That message has gotten out. The sad part is that the message has been colored by the media with expectations which are unrealistic and actually not true to the nature of the Synod and, even in a more serious way, not true to the doctrine of the faith.  [The false expectations are what scare me, not what the Synod will actually propose to the Holy Father.]

I have experienced myself in talking with the faithful and with bishops and priests that there has been built up this expectation that the Church is now going to change Her teaching with regard to the indissolubility of marriage and permit now second and third marriages and that for those in irregular unions there will be access to the sacraments. These kinds of expectations are unreal. They are not true to the work of the Synod in the first place and, in a more profound sense, not true to what Christ himself has taught us, the truth that human nature itself teaches us. Therefore, that part is very sad. It has been going on now for several months, which is not a good situation. The Church’s teaching needs to be made clear now and her fidelity to Christ needs to be very clear in the Synod. Just like the title of the book to which I contributed, Remaining in the Truth of Christ, which is taken from St. John Paul II’s post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation, Familiaris consortio. That is what the Synod is all about: remaining in the truth of Christ.  [I believe it was Card. Baldisseri, head of the Synod of Bishop who, in an interview of his own suggested that Familiaris consortio was already outdated.]

Q: What would you like to see come out of the Extraordinary Synod?

I’m hoping that it will take up again the great papal Magisterium, which is a gift to us, beginning with Casti connubi of Pope Pius XI, the teaching of Pope Pius XII, then in more recent times, the prophetic and heroic teaching of Humanae vitae of Pope Paul VI, soon to be beatified at the end of this Synod, as well as the teaching of Familiaris consortio of St John Paul II. Fundamentally, what I hope will emerge from the Synod is this beautiful truth about the human person, who has written into his nature the call to union and communion between man and one woman, which is faithful, which is indissoluble, and which by its very nature is procreative; it participates in the creation of new human life in the image and likeness of God, what the Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World  referred to as the “crown” of marital love, the gift of offspring.

Whatever the Synod’s particular emphases are—marriage preparation, teaching on natural family planning, all the particular questions—(I hope what) would emerge over all is the splendor of the truth about marriage as God created us from the beginning.

Report and Interview by Andrew Summerson

Food for thought for every parish priest in here.

Posted in One Man & One Woman, Our Catholic Identity, PODCAzT, The Drill, The future and our choices | Tagged , , ,
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“Five Cardinals Book” in defense of marriage, tradition – Remaining in the Truth of Christ

Posted on 6 October 2014 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf
"Five Cardinals Book" in defense of marriage, tradition - Remaining in the Truth of Christ

Click to PRE-ORDER

UPDATE 10 Oct: Amazon seems to be selling out as fast as they are stocking. 

HOWEVER, the good news is that the book is available for KINDLE (USA) for $12.86, which is much less than the paperback. HERE  It was $9.99.   The price is fluctuating!

Don’t have a Kindle yet.  What on earth are you waiting for?  USA HERE (for one type, a Paperwhite, you can surf to others) and UK HERE

Also available now in the UK! HERE – UK KINDLE HERE

_____

The new book, Remaining in the Truth of Christ: Marriage and Communion in the Catholic Church contains five essays of cardinals, of the archbishop secretary of the Vatican congregation for the Oriental Churches, and of three scholars on the ideas supported by Walter Card. Kasper in the opening discourse of the consistory in February 2014.

These are the nine chapters of the book:

  • The Argument in Brief- Robert Dodaro, O.S.A.
  • Dominical Teaching on Divorce and Remarriage: The Biblical Data – Paul Mankowski, S.J.
  • Divorce and Remarriage in the Early Church: Some Historical and Cultural Reflections – John M. Rist
  • Separation, Divorce, Dissolution of the Bond, and Remarriage: Theological and Practical Approaches of the Orthodox Churches – Archbishop Cyril Vasil’, S.J.
  • Unity and Indissolubility of Marriage: From the Middle Ages to the Council of Trent – Walter Cardinal Brandmüller
  • Testimony to the Power of Grace: On the Indissolubility of Marriage and the Debate concerning the Civilly Remarried and the Sacraments – Gerhard Ludwig Cardinal Müller
  • Sacramental Ontology and the Indissolubility of Marriage – Carlo Cardinal Caffarra
  • The Divorced and Civilly Remarried and the Sacraments of the Eucharist and Penance  – Velasio Cardinal De Paolis, C.S.
  • The Canonical Nullity of the Marriage Process as the Search for the Truth – Raymond Leo Cardinal Burke

The Augustinian Robert Dodaro, the editor of the book, is head of the patristic institute “Augustinianum” in Roma. The Jesuit Paul Mankowski is a professor at the Lumen Christi Institute in Chicago. Professor John M. Rist teaches ancient history and philosophy at the University of Toronto and at the Catholic University of America in Washington.

______ORIGINAL POST Jul 29, 2014

There is a book of great importance about to emerge.  It is available for PRE-ORDER at a substantial discount.  It will come out in October 2014, timed for the upcoming Synod of Bishops, which will tackle – inter alia – Communion for the divorced and civilly remarried.

CLICK HERE

(Don’t hesitate, just click.  The UK link is HERE. Kindle is coming, I hope.)

I know quite a bit about this book, as it turns out.  The “five Cardinals” mentioned in the blurb, below, are going to please you when their names are revealed.  The other scholars involved are also top-notch.

The book will eventually be out in several languages.  It won’t be an easy read for some people, since a couple of the essays really drill into primary sources.  Do NOT let that discourage.  Punch above your weight, as they say.  You can do it.

YOUR TASK, however, is to pre-order this book NOW.  Make sure that Ignatius has a good response so they can have a big printing and wide distribution.

Here is the blurb:

In this volume five Cardinals of the Church, and four other scholars, respond to the call issued by Cardinal Walter Kasper for the Church to harmonize “fidelity and mercy in its pastoral practice with civilly remarried, divorced people”.

Beginning with a concise introduction, the first part of the book is dedicated to the primary biblical texts pertaining to divorce and remarriage, and the second part is an examination of the teaching and practice prevalent in the early Church. In neither of these cases, biblical or patristic, do these scholars find support for the kind of “toleration” of civil marriages following divorce advocated by Cardinal Kasper. This book also examines the Eastern Orthodox practice of oikonomia (understood as “mercy” implying “toleration”) in cases of remarriage after divorce and in the context of the vexed question of Eucharistic communion. It traces the centuries long history of Catholic resistance to this convention, revealing serious theological and canonical difficulties inherent in past and current Orthodox Church practice.

Thus, in the second part of the book, the authors argue in favor of retaining the theological and canonical rationale for the intrinsic connection between traditional Catholic doctrine and sacramental discipline concerning marriage and communion.

The various studies in this book lead to the conclusion that the Church’s longstanding fidelity to the truth of marriage constitutes the irrevocable foundation of its merciful and loving response to the individual who is civilly divorced and remarried. The book therefore challenges the premise that traditional Catholic doctrine and contemporary pastoral practice are in contradiction.  [Remember: Liberals will say to us who defend tradition that we are conducting a war on mercy.]

“Because it is the task of the apostolic ministry to ensure that the Church remains in the truth of Christ and to lead her ever more deeply into that truth, pastors must promote the sense of faith in all the faithful, examine and authoritatively judge the genuineness of its expressions and educate the faithful in an ever more mature evangelical discernment.”
– St. John Paul II, Familiaris Consortio

Start ordering.  Order and then order some more.  When this book comes out, we want a torrent of copies absolutely everywhere.  You can bet that those who want to overturn our teaching and practice will be as active as little termites, chewing away at our foundations.  Don’t let them.  Get good information into as many hands as possible.

Trust me.

Buy in USA HERE
Buy in UK HERE

UPDATE 29 Sept:

I saw a pretty good blurb about the book HERE

Posted in ¡Hagan lío!, "How To..." - Practical Notes, ACTION ITEM!, Be The Maquis, Hard-Identity Catholicism, New Evangelization, One Man & One Woman, Our Catholic Identity, Semper Paratus, The Drill | Tagged , ,
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The Synod and transparency

Posted on 5 October 2014 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

The Synod and transparencyDuring Synods past, the interventions (speeches, addresses) of participants were made public, either in the Vatican daily L’Osservatore Romano or also online.  Yes, weighing through then was pretty boring, but we knew what was being said and who said it.

For this Synod the interventions will not be made public.

I saw this from Lifesite about the reason of the Cardinal who runs the Synod of Bishops, His Eminence Lorenzo Balidsseri, when a journalist pressed him a little.

The first press conference of the Extraordinary Synod on the Family took place this morning with Cardinal Lorenzo Baldisseri, secretary general of the Synod of Bishops, running through the agenda of the Extraordinary Synod.

The Cardinal noted there would be 191 speakers with only four minutes each to make their remarks.  The list of speakers includes 61 cardinals, one cardinal patriarch, 7 patriarchs, one major archbishop, 67 metropolitan archbishops, 47 bishops, one auxiliary bishop, 1 priest and 6 religious.

Speakers were asked to submit their remarks prior to the Synod. However, none of the texts are to be made public.  When the press conferences take place, while some of what was said will be transmitted, the public will not learn who said what.

There were several complaints from journalists about the new rule, which many said demonstrates a lack of transparency.  Frustrated by repeated pointed questions about the matter, Cardinal Baldisseri replied to another reporter who pushed on the matter, “You should come up here if you know everything, maybe you should be a Synod Father.”

[…]

?

Really?

 

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Over the top interview with Card. Kasper on the eve of the Synod

Posted on 5 October 2014 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Yet another interview with Card. Kasper is available for your … what… edification?

His Eminence gave an interview to Il Quotidiano.  My translation:

“We will reach a wide consensus. I am not Nostradamus, but I believe, I hope that the line of mercy about access to the sacraments for the divorced remarried can be approved next year by a majority of bishops in the assembly”.  [Sounds like a candidate for office on the eve of the election, no?  And note the point of “mercy”, which by now is a manipulation word. Who’s against mercy, right?] On the eve of the Synod on the Family, a preparatory meeting in view of the ordinary, deliberative meeting of 2015, the tensions between progressivists and conservatovies are more and more inflamed. Especially under attack is Cardinal Walter KAsper, who carries the liberal flag. Favorable toward admitting the remarried to Communion after a period of penance, [… blah blah removed…]

Q: Cardinal, they say that you are attacking the indissolubility of marriage.

KASPER: This is a complete falsehood, doctrine isn’t being touched.  [“la dottrina non si tocca”] In play here is ecclesiastical discipline, or the application of principles. It is on this point that there is need for a reform in order to meet those to have wounded hearts.  [When you change discipline, there are unintended (or intended?) consequences.  Isn’t the Catholic practice of, say Friday abstinence, these days bring many spiritual fruits to the Church and isn’t it enriching our Catholic identity before the watching world?  … No?]

Q: How is this even of the Synod going for you, which finds you between protagonists after the direct nomination of the Pope?

KASPER: I am quite calm, dialectic has never been lacking even in Vatican II. At the end of this synodal road I foresee, and with some compromise, as often happened in the Council, that the thesis of mercy will pass. [The “thesis of mercy” v. … what?  The “thesis of cruelty, legalism, ideology”.]

Q: Until now, however, the voices raised have been nearly completely raises against Communion for the divorced remarried.

KASPER: Muller, De Paolis and Burke have the right to express themselves, Francis wants there to be a serious debate. That said, they are not alone.  [“They are not alone….” Ooooo!]

Q: Is Muller’s strong opposition an attack on the Pope?

KASPER: I don’t know if it is a conspiracy (congiura). Even at Vatican II the Prefect of the Holy Office, Ottaviani, was not in agreement with the Pontiff, John XXIII. So, let us avoid exaggeration and focus only on the divorced remarried. [Apples and oranges.  Ottaviani wrote to the Holy Father about his concerns.  Also, there is a qualitative difference between a mere Synod, and an extraordinary one at that, and the work of an Ecumenical Council.]

Q: Moving to couples living together. Are these a sign of the times or not?

KASPER: They are, [and why is that?  Is it, in part at least, because the Church’s teaching and practice have become muddled?] and for that reason the Church must announced the beauty of the Gospel also to those who are not married.

Q: Does that include homosexual unions?

KASPER: They are not families, [Activists and Fishwrap are going to love that one!] but, if lived with seriousness and fidelity, they have their own value. [What does that mean?]

Okay…. let’s play this out, off the interview page for a moment.

Q: Multiple wives?

A: We need to learn from our Muslim brothers. The more the merrier. God permitted the Hebrew Bible patriarchs to have many wives at the same time. Why not now?

Q: What about removing the Church Tax so that everyone in Germany can approach the Church without paying for sacraments?

A: Non si tocca!

My concern, partly validated here, is that, after this extraordinary Synod does little or nothing, we are going to have a whole year of liberal grinding in the press and pulpits, thus raising expectations of huge changes.  And then, when Francis doesn’t do what they want, the revolt really breaks out into the open.

You will say that liberals are already in revolt against the Church’s teachings and disciplines.  Sure.  However, when their hopes are dashed they will break whatever tethers still remain.

And let us not forget that the Synod can do nothing but talk.   They can vote on anything, say, that French croissants are better than Roman cornetti.   In the end, they can recommend things to the Pope.  The Pope decides.

 

Posted in One Man & One Woman, Our Catholic Identity, The Drill | Tagged , ,
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Lack of transparency during the Synod. A problem?

Posted on 5 October 2014 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

I am soooo glad that I’ll arrive in Rome with my pilgrimage group after the Synod is over.  I really wouldn’t like to be covering at all from a “press” point of view.

For instance, I noticed at Fishwrap this info tid bit in a piece about the Synod and the spiffy way it is being run by Card. Baldisseri.

Vatican: Synod will be ‘original and innovative,’ but with limited public information

Okay that’s just the headline. But are you already thinking, “Original and innovative? What could go wrong?”

Let’s move on.

Baldisseri, the secretary general of the Vatican’s office for the synod, spoke Wednesday at an event at LUMSA University, a private university in Rome located just east of the Vatican.

The event, one of many hosted in early October by diverse interest groups hoping to have impact on the synod discussions, focused on presenting viewpoints of accomplished women of faith from around the globe regarding struggles stemming from changes in family life.

But it will likely be largely unknown what impact, if any, those groups — or even the petitions of Catholics around the world — will have on the bishops gathered in synod. [Up until this point we’ve been reading blah blah. Now watch!] The Vatican press office announced Monday that no texts from the synod discussions would be released. And unlike in previous synods, no printed summaries of the daily discussions are to be issued, either. [Hmmmm.]

Instead, the press office will host daily briefings with Vatican spokesman Jesuit Fr. Federico Lombardi, who will be present during the synod meetings and is expected to brief reporters in Italian on general themes discussed each day. [On “general themes”?  Oooo!  That’s be helpful!   “Today the Synod on the Family discussed matters relating to and of interest for the family, from the point of view of the Church in modern times.”] He is to be assisted in those briefings by three priests and one woman who will summarize the events from inside the synod room* in English, Spanish, French and German.

[…]

Fishwrappers are probably worked up that they won’t know anything about the impact made by the suggestions of the liberals and dissidents in these lobby groups which are probably hounding the synod participants.

On the other hand, why would they adopt this new method for the Synod?  We are all suppose to accompany the Synod in prayer.  Is this a matter of “Shut up and pray!”?
“Never mind what the Synod participants are saying (about you) behind closed doors!”

Someone who is suspicious might ask (as some are asking in email): Are the interventions (speeches) to be made by the Synod participants secret?  Is there any accountability issue involved here?  Is there any worry that somehow, if the texts of the participants interventions are not made public, they might somehow be “disappeared” or edited one way or another for “correctness”?

 

Posted in One Man & One Woman, Our Catholic Identity, Si vis pacem para bellum!, The Drill, What are they REALLY saying? |
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Card. Kasper: Christ’s adultery language is offensive! Fr. Dodaro: No, it’s Christ’s tough love. POLL

Posted on 5 October 2014 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Meanwhile, as the Synod is about to rev up.   This from CNA:

Cardinal Kasper: Adultery language is offensive, insulting

Rome, Italy, Oct 3, 2014 / 08:02 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- In recent interviews, German Cardinal Walter Kasper suggested that while Church doctrine cannot change, it can be adapted and interpreted in different ways, and language can be softened when it is deemed offensive. [?  Is this part of the whole “we must never call X for what it is!” campaign?]

[…]

He urged against using the language of adultery, generally drawn from the words of Jesus that one who divorces his wife and marriages another commits adultery. [You mean as in Luke 16:18?  Mark 10:11?  Matthew 5:52?  Matthew 19:9?   There is a good, but hard, section on this point in the “Five Cardinals Book” I keep harping on.  HERE]

Cardinal Kasper said that “to tell them that’s adultery, permanent adultery, I think they would feel insulted and offended.”  [Oh!  Okay.  Let’s call it anything but what the Lord called it.  How about a dynamic equivalent version such as … “croquet”?]

“Such a sexual relationship within a couple has also its positive values, it’s not only its negative values,” he said, rejecting the idea “that every sexual act is sinful” in such situations. [I guess it all depends on your level of conscience formation.  Right?  If people who have had nothing but what they see in TV sitcoms about relationships, and therefore have zero concept of sin, and they cannot therefore intend the sin, who knows what they are doing subjectively.  But that is a pretty low bar.  It would be hard to believe, however, that a Cardinal of Holy Church is suggesting otherwise.]

The most important thing, the cardinal said, is to accompany individuals where they are at, realizing that we are fallen beings and none of us loves God and neighbor fully as we are called to.

“I can encourage them to do according to their conscience when it is a very mature conscience,” he added.  [But wouldn’t that rule out the scenario I described?]

[…]

Curiouser and curiouser.

Meanwhile,  also at CNA:

Card. Kasper: Christ's adultery language is offensive! Fr. Dodaro: No, it's Christ's tough love. POLL

Click to PRE-ORDER

Taking Gospel seriously on marriage is not ‘rigid’ – it’s love  [Bingo!]

Rome, Italy, Oct 4, 2014 / 05:58 am (CNA/EWTN News).- The editor of a high-profile book on marriage [The “Five Cardinals Book” I keep harping about.] said that adhering to Christ’s Gospel teachings on divorce is not harsh and mean-spirited, but rather a form of tough love aimed at the salvation of souls.  [You mean to say that the Lord is not being mean and offensive after all?]

“Mercy and truth and justice have to accord with one another,” said Fr. Robert Dodaro OSA, president of Rome’s Patristic Institute, the “Augustinianum,” as well as a specialist in patristics and a consultor to the Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith.

[…]

“We would like to see the Church more active in welcoming, embracing, involving divorced and civilly remarried Catholics into the full life of the Church,” he explained. [Everyone! PAY ATTENTION!] “Where we disagree with Cardinal Kasper is on one point, but it is an important one. The question of admission to the sacraments of penance and Holy Communion.”  [One point.  This is KEY!]

As a solution to the problematic situation, Cardinal Kasper has proposed “oikonomia” – a notion prevalent in Eastern Orthodox Churches. The cardinal has suggested that the Catholic Church follow the Orthodox example of “tolerating, but not accepting second marriages,” Fr. Dodaro explained. “We oppose that suggestion.”

As the book points out, the Orthodox Church does not have a unified view on the subject.

“There is no single Orthodox position on divorce, on second marriages, on admission to the sacraments; there is no one position that characterizes the views of all of the various Orthodox Churches,” Fr. Dodaro explained.

“I have not heard any senior Orthodox prelates applauding the Catholic Church for wanting to adopt or even to look more closely at their practice, so I do not know how much our doing so would contribute to ecumenical dialogue,” he added. [As you can see, the debate about this issue reaches to more than just the relationship of a couple to the Communion rail!]

Ultimately, the priest discarded “oikonomia” as a valid solution: “We believe that it violates the principle of indissolubility of marriage, because the individuals in question are already married, or at least one of them is. [PAY ATTENTION!  This is a key phrase.  Remember this one:]Not just in the eyes of the Church, but in the eyes of Christ. We cannot understand how Cardinal Kasper does not see that.”

Fr. Dodaro suggested that the teaching of the indissolubility of marriage would be in danger, especially in marriage preparation, should Cardinal Kasper’s proposal be accepted.

“So the priest says to a young couple in marriage preparation that the marriage is ‘until death does us part.’ They would reply: ‘Yes, Father, yes, Father, we get that.’ Then after the class, when they leave the rectory, they will say: ‘Ok, mom and dad are divorced and remarried and they go to Communion every Sunday, so what’s the big deal?’”

A change in the discipline of the Church would introduce confusion about the nature of sin and repentance, he said.

“Let’s be clear, we are all sinners, we are not singling out the civilly remarried because they sin. We all sin. Catholics who sin can go to confession and be absolved because they repent of their sin and resolve not to sin again. However, Cardinal Kasper’s proposal would allow civilly remarried Catholics to receive sacramental absolution without resolving to cease having sexual relations, while in the eyes of Christ, [NOT just in the eyes of the Church but in the eyes of Christ!] they are still married to their original spouses. That is what makes the sacrament of penance impossible for them,” explains Fr. Dodaro.

Cardinal Kasper recently warned against a “rigid” view and stated in an interview that the Gospel is not a “code of penal law,” a phrasing that caught Fr. Dodaro’s attention.  [That’s the tactic.  Hear it?  Brand those who defend the Church’s teaching as being “legalistic”, “ideological”, “rigid”, “against mercy”.]

“I agree with the Cardinal that the Gospel is not a code of penal law. But it is a code of divine law and we have to make a distinction between human laws, the laws that the Church makes up, and laws that are divine.”

“When Jesus unveiled his teaching on marriage in the Gospels, he triggered incredulity on the part of his disciples. He told them that Moses had permitted divorce because of the hardness of their hearts, adding, ‘but I say to you, in the beginning it was not so.’ This is found in Matthew 19. And then Jesus refers the disciples to Genesis 2:24, where the original divine teaching concerning marriage is found. So if Jesus quotes the Scriptures in order to correct a faulty, permissive divorce practice, then is He a fundamentalist? Is Jesus rigid?”  [This is the theologian equivalent of tearing the ball out of the other guy’s arms and then running over him on the way down the field in the other direction.]

“How seriously do we take the Gospels? What is left of the Gospel when we start striking out things that Jesus said because we do not want to give them a ‘fundamentalist’ interpretation, we do not want to be rigid?”  [And then getting back the onside kick.]

Mercy is another key word in the debate. Fr. Dodaro cautioned that “we have to be careful not to confuse mercy with sentimentalism or romanticism. Love is tough love sometimes.”

“So we find mercy by submitting ourselves to the will of Christ, each one of us starting with himself as a sinner, each one of us is called to conversion, each one of us has stuff to figure out in his life.”

[I interrupt this article to ask… so far, considering everything that you have read about the thoughts of Card. Kasper, and I assume that you have been doing your homework… which position to you passes your Catholic sense, your Catholic “smell test” as it were.  Card. Kasper’s?  Fr. Dodaro’s?]

Commenting on the book that is being released to explain and defend Church teaching on marriage, Fr. Dodaro rejected claims that it was intended as a personal attack.

“I am a university professor, I write articles, I publish books and sometimes other people write articles and books saying: Dodaro is wrong about something. This is a normal part of academic life,” he said.

“I do not see the book as polemical in the sense of being angry or of trying to ‘gang up’ on the Cardinal, as some journalists have suggested.”  [I’ve read it.  It isn’t in the least mean-spirited.]

Rather, he said, the book tries to argue objectively and with well-founded arguments, and the dialogue that has arisen is fruitful.

“As a famous university professor, Cardinal Kasper should be used to an academic debate: does his solution fit in terms of the Catholic Tradition and teaching? Is it doctrinally acceptable? Or would it imply a radical change in teaching? That is the nature of the debate.”

Fr. Dodaro holds out hope for the upcoming gathering of bishops in Rome: “The themes of marriage and family concern all Catholics, and I think part of what Pope Francis wants to do is to emphasize the positive role of joy in Christian life.”

Food for thought there, folks.

I would read Fr. Dodaro’s remark again, but over at CNA where you don’t have my notes.

Meanwhile…

Anyone can vote, but you have to be registered and approved to comment.

Pick your answer and give your reasons.

Given what you have read about the "Communion for divorced, civilly remarried" debate, whose arguments seem to be right? Whose arguments pass your Catholic "smell test"?

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Posted in One Man & One Woman, Our Catholic Identity, POLLS, SESSIUNCULA | Tagged , , , ,
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