Rome Newsroom, Aug 7, 2023 / 09:15 am (CNA).
Spiritual worldliness is one of the most dangerous temptations facing priests and the Church because it “reduces spirituality to appearance” while disconnecting it from the Gospel, Pope Francis warned in a recently released letter to the priests of Rome.
“[Spiritual worldliness] leads us to be ‘workers of the spirit,’ men clad of sacred forms that actually continue to think and act according to the fashions of the world,” the pope wrote.
The pope’s message was communicated in a lengthy letter released by the Vatican on Monday but which was dated Aug. 5, the memorial of the Dedication of the Basilica of St. Mary Major in Rome. The pope is the bishop of Rome and wrote the letter to provide what he described as the comfort of a “fraternal encounter.”
In his comments on spiritual worldliness, the pope drew heavily from the reflections of 20th-century theologian and cardinal Henri de Lubac, who wrote that the invasion of spiritual worldliness into the life of the Church would be “infinitely more disastrous than any simple moral worldliness” because spiritual worldliness “corrupts [the Church] by undermining her very principle.”
Pope Francis wrote that spiritual worldliness begins to take hold in the lives of priests not only through temptations to mediocrity, power and influence, and vainglory but also “from doctrinal intransigence and liturgical aestheticism,” which have the appearance of religiosity and even loving the Church but instead seek human glory and personal well-being.
“How can we fail to recognize in all of this the updated version of that hypocritical formalism which Jesus saw in certain religious authorities of the time and which in the course of public life made him suffer perhaps more than anything else?” the pope wrote.
The pope also took the occasion to address more deeply one of his perennial concerns, clericalism, which he described as a “specific form” of spiritual worldliness. Pope Francis wrote that clericalism falsely gives the impression that priests are “superior, privileged, placed ‘high’ and therefore separated from the rest of God’s holy people,” which the pope said denotes “an illness that makes us lose the memory of baptism we have received.”
Drawing from the prophet Ezekiel and St. Augustine, the pope also told the Roman clergy that they must not seek primarily the “milk” of material gain nor the “wool” of praise and worldly recognition, which undermines “the priestly spirit, the zeal for service, [and] the yearning for the care of the people.”
The pope also critiqued a “clerical spirit” among the laity, manifested by elitism, possessiveness of one’s ministry, and an inward focus, which he said leads to the loss of joy and gratuitousness and the rise of criticism and anger.
The antidote to spiritual worldliness and clericalism, the pope wrote, is “to look at Jesus crucified, to fix our eyes every day on him who emptied himself and humbled himself for us unto death.” Looking at the wounds of Jesus, Pope Francis said, helps the clergy learn “that we are called to offer ourselves, to make ourselves bread broken for the hungry, to share the journey of the weary and oppressed.”
“It is not a question of leading back to a good observance or reforming external ceremonies but of returning to the evangelical sources, of discovering fresh energies to overcome habits, of introducing a new spirit into the old ecclesial institutions,” Pope Francis wrote.
Finally, the pope encouraged the Roman priests to work together with the laity to initiate “synodal forms and paths” that would help to strip the clergy of worldly securities so that “the Lord’s consolation truly reaches everyone.”
“May the Church of Rome be an example of compassion and hope for all, with her pastors always, always ready and available to bestow God’s forgiveness as channels of mercy that quench the thirst of today’s man.”
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“Spiritual worldliness begins to take hold in the lives of priests not only through temptations to mediocrity, power and influence, and vainglory…which have the appearance of religiosity and even loving the Church but instead seek human glory and personal well-being. How can we fail to recognize in all of this the updated version of that hypocritical formalism which Jesus saw in certain religious authorities of the time and which in the course of public life made him suffer perhaps more than anything else?”
Yes, I can see it.
What I cannot see is the joy.
And spiritual worldliness must include clerics in civvies.
Looking forward to synodaling more very soon.
You can not force people in a parish to co-operate with abortionists and teachers of contraception, who are working it in as apostolate or otherwise.
You can not force the faithful to do it and you can not force the unfaithful to do it.
We read of “spiritual worldliness”: “…’doctrinal intransigence and liturgical aestheticism,’ which have the appearance of religiosity and even loving the Church but instead seek human glory and personal well-being.”
Yes and yet, the rest of the story: “Do not think that I have come to do away with or undo the Law or the Prophets; I have come not to do away with or undo but to complete and fulfill them” (Mt 5:17). The needed synthesis is better supplied, perhaps, by St. John Paul II:
“…the commandment of love of God and neighbor does not have in its dynamic any higher limit, but it does have a lower limit, beneath which the commandment is broken” (Veritatis Splendor, n. 52).
On the other hand, Catholic Reformer Martin Luther saw Jesus as too “clerical”, due to Jesus’ relentless demand to love God through obedience to God’s Ten Commandments with all your strength, in order to go to heaven through His blood.
Possessing Faith in Jesus great enough to Move Mountains, Yet Jesus burns them in hell as ‘Evildoers’, V.S., Martin Luther’s, “Faith Alone”, “Sin Boldly, ‘No sin can separate us from Him, even if we were to kill or commit adultery thousands of times each day’”
Matthew 7:21 The True Disciple.
Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord’, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven. When that day comes, many will plead with me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ have we not prophesied in your name? have we not exorcized demons by its power? Did we not do many miracles in your name as well? Then I will declare to them solemnly, I never knew you. Out of my sight, you evildoers!
John 14:15
If you love me, you will keep my commandments.
Catechism 2052 “Teacher, what good deed must I do, to have eternal life?” To the young man who asked this question, Jesus answers first by invoking the necessity to recognize God as the “One there is who is good,” as the supreme Good and the source of all good. Then Jesus tells him: “If you would enter life, keep the commandments.” And he cites for his questioner the precepts that concern love of neighbor: “You shall not kill, You shall not commit adultery, You shall not steal, You shall not bear false witness, Honor your father and mother.” Finally Jesus sums up these commandments positively: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”
John 5:27
“The Father has given over to him power to pass judgment because he is Son of Man; no need for you to be surprised at this, for an hour is coming in which all those in their tombs shall hear his voice and come forth. Those who have done right shall rise to live; the evildoers shall rise to be damned.”
John 15:22
If I had not come and spoken to them, they would have no sin; but as it is they have no excuse for their sin. Whoever hates me also hates my Father. If I had not done works among them that no one else ever did, they would not have sin; but as it is, they have seen and hated both me and my Father. But in order that the word written in their law might be fulfilled, ‘They hated me without cause.’
Catechism of the Catholic Church; Ten Commandments
Catechism 2055 When someone asks him, “Which commandment in the Law is the greatest?” Jesus replies: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments hang all the Law and the prophets.” The Decalogue must be interpreted in light of this twofold yet single commandment of love, the fullness of the Law: The commandments: “You shall not commit adultery, You shall not kill, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,” and any other commandment, are summed up in this sentence: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.
Catechism 2068 The Council of Trent teaches that the Ten Commandments are obligatory for Christians and that the justified man is still bound to keep them; The Second Vatican Council confirms: “The bishops, successors of the apostles, receive from the Lord . . . the mission of teaching all peoples, and of preaching the Gospel to every creature, so that all men may attain salvation through faith, Baptism and the observance of the Commandments.”
Catechism 2083 Jesus summed up man’s duties toward God in this saying: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.” This immediately echoes the solemn call: “Hear, O Israel: the LORD our God is one LORD.” God has loved us first. the love of the One God is recalled in the first of the “ten words.” the commandments then make explicit the response of love that man is called to give to his God.
https://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P78.HTM?
1 John 5:3
For the love of God is this, that we keep his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome
If you suspect you have such faults and failings, Dom Chautard’s book The Soul of the Apostolate, is chock full of remedies and consolations. It is not as if the problems were only just unearthed by de Lubac. The Church has known of then through the ages and she has made provisions for them transcending both the 20th Century and 21st.
You can not take 30 years to solve an issue the Council of Jerusalem, the first council, said to abstain from; and withholding the remedies.
The word used is a spiritual word. ABSTAIN. Also it is foundational. Ignoring what is commanded here amounts to an all out attack on the Church and desecration.
If you try to justify delay on account of isolating people with “internal narrative” you are in reality assisting the evils all the same and still compromising yourself too at the same time; empowering the aggressors who have adapted the “internal narrative” formulas to their own purposes not even Christian anyway.
Isolating people open to conversion is not the meaning of the Council of Jerusalem.
Besides “spiritual worldliness” among the clergy, a great (if not the greatest) evil in the Church, is the deeply embedded homosexual subculture among many – not all – of the clergy which spectacularly exploded in the ongoing homosexual predation scandal showcased by the unveiled and disgraced homosexual Cardinals: McCarrick (USA); O’Brien (Scotland); Groer (Austria); and Coccopalmerio (Vatican/Italy). Besides them are the thousands of active homosexual bishops and priests worldwide (often called the “gay mafia”) in chanceries, seminaries, and rectories who cover and hide their shenanigans and promote among themselves to higher positions making the hierarchy look like a gay club.
You’re absolutely right.
Instead of attacking the homosexualists in the Church who are tearing things down, the pope advances their careers. In order to distract, the pope focuses on clerics with an aesthetic bent who favor reverent liturgies. We’re no longer hoodwinked by the agenda of this Vatican.
The sight of the Lord hanging on the Cross is enough for everyone to liberate oneself from every form of clericalism.