Manila, Philippines, Apr 7, 2018 / 09:41 pm (CNA).- A relic of St. Pope John Paul II was recently gifted to the Archdiocese of Manila by Cardinal Stanislaw Dziwisw, the former secretary of the belated pope.
The relic – a vial of the saint’… […]
Rome, Italy, Apr 7, 2018 / 03:46 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Speaking Saturday in Rome, Cardinal Raymond Leo Burke said that the pope is the highest authority in the Church, but because his power is derived from the divine law, the faithful are obligated to reject his teaching if it falls outside that divine law.
“According to the Holy Scriptures and the Sacred Tradition, the Successor of St. Peter enjoys a power that is universal, ordinary and immediate on all the faithful,” Burke said at a conference on confusion within the Church, held in Rome April 7.
“Since this power comes from God himself, it is limited by natural law and by divine law,” he continued, “which are the expressions of the eternal and immutable truth and goodness that come from God, are fully revealed in Christ and have been transmitted in the Church uninterruptedly.”
“Therefore, any expression of doctrine or practice that is not in conformity with the Divine Revelation, contained in the Holy Scriptures and in the Tradition of the Church, cannot constitute an authentic exercise of the Apostolic or Petrine ministry and must be rejected by the faithful.”
Burke spoke alongside Cardinal Walter Brandmueller, Bishop Athanasius Schneider, philosopher Marcello Pera, professors Renzo Puccetti and Valerio Gigliotti, and journalist Francesca Romana Poleggi.
The conference, which was put on partly to honor the last wishes of the late Cardinal Carlo Caffarra, archbishop emeritus of Bolona, was titled: “Church, where are you going?”
The subtitle, “Only the blind would deny there is confusion in the Church,” was taken from one of Caffara’s last interviews before his death on Sept. 6, 2017.
Topics at the conference included questions about the Church’s doctrine on matters of sexual morality; the issue of conscience and the concept of “discernment;” and the limits of papal authority and infallibility, which the Church teaches is applicable only in cases of certain public statements on faith and morals.
Cardinal Burke presented a lengthy speech outlining both what papal power is and what its limits are. He also discussed what he believes to be the role of the bishops and the faithful when the pope is thought to have stepped outside these bounds.
Burke explained that while it is both the pope and the bishops who share in the care of the universal Church, it is only the pope who “exercises the fullness of power, so that the unity of the universal Church may be effectively safeguarded and promoted.”
“It is clear that the fullness of power has been given by Christ himself and not by any human authority or popular constitution, and that, therefore, it can only be exercised in obedience to Christ,” he continued.
He argued that from the beginning of the Church, this idea of the “fullness of power” has been well-defined and that it was well understood that it did not allow certain actions to be performed by the Roman Pontiff.
“For example,” Burke stated, “[the pope] could not act against the Apostolic Faith. Moreover, for the good of the good order of the Church, it was a power to be used sparingly and with the greatest prudence.”
Asking how we should correct the pope if he does overstep the limits of his power, Burke pointed to two steps, which he called “a brief and preliminary answer, based on natural law, on the Gospels and on the canonical tradition.”
First, he said, “the correction of the presumed error or abandonment of his duty should be addressed directly to the Roman Pontiff; and then, if he continued to err or not answer, a public declaration should be made.”
“The Roman Pontiff is – like all the faithful – subject to the Word of God, to the Catholic faith and is the guarantor of the obedience of the Church and, in this sense, servus servorum [servant of the servants].”
He noted that he believes devout Catholics must always teach and defend the fullness of power that Christ gave to “His Vicar on earth.” But at the same time, they must teach and defend the power “within the teaching of the Church and the defense of the Church as the Mystical Body of Christ.”
Cardinal Joseph Zen, a bishop emeritus of Hong Kong, was not present, but sent a brief video message recorded in February 2018, stating that though he was not able to travel to the conference, he was there with his prayers and with his heart.
Zen, who has spoken out strongly against a possible forthcoming agreement between the Holy See and the Chinese government, said that the Church is a great family, and that at the center of the family is the Holy See, which is very important.
He noted how Pope Francis likes to emphasize the importance of the peripheries, but said that “in this moment, our periphery, China… is in much difficulty, great difficulty,” and that “many voices from this periphery do not arrive at the center [of the Church.]”
“We have a great desire to have more communication between the center and the periphery,” he continued, “because if one wants to help the Church in China, one should know [the country]” and not only statistics or what can be read in books.
“At the moment, we are afraid that at the center they do not bring a decision that will truly help to grow the Church. This is the worry of many,” he stated.
Muenster, Germany, Apr 7, 2018 / 11:59 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Bishop Felix Genn of Muenster, Germany called for prayers Saturday, after a man drove a delivery vehicle into a crowd of pedestrians, killing three and injuring dozens more.
“What has h… […]
Vatican City, Apr 7, 2018 / 08:58 am (CNA/EWTN News).- On Saturday Vatican police arrested former Vatican diplomat Fr. Carlo Alberto Capella, who has been under investigation for the violation of laws concerning the possession of child pornography and … […]
Washington D.C., Apr 7, 2018 / 06:02 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Bishops in both the US and Mexico have criticized the Trump administration’s plan to send National Guard troops to the southern border of the United States.
“The new measures on the border US-MX. Once again a senseless action and a disgrace on the administration,” tweeted Archbishop Gustavo García-Siller of San Antonio April 5.
“These measures manifest represion, [sic] fear, a perception that everyone is an enemy, and a very clear message: we don’t care about anybody else. This is not the American Spirit.”
U.S. President Donald Trump signed an order Wednesday to deploy the National Guard.
“A key and undeniable attribute of a sovereign nation is the ability to control who and what enters its territory,” said Trump in the April 4 memo. “The situation at the border has now reached a point of crisis. The lawlessness that continues at our southern border is fundamentally incompatible with the safety, security, and sovereignty of the American people. My administration has no choice but to act.”
The Pentagon stated Thursday that a “security support cell” was being developed to aid coordination between the Homeland Security and the Defense departments. The expected financial costs, number of troops, and time frame have not been announced, but the Pentagon said the cell will support U.S. Customs and Border Patrol.
Both the Obama and Bush administrations had ordered the National Guard to attend to the border, but critics of the deployment have questioned the reasons behind this recent move when illegal border crossing is, broadly speaking, at historically low levels.
Fiscal Year 2017 saw nearly 304,000 people caught trying illegally to cross the border, the lowest number of since 1971. The number of apprehenions in March (37,393) is more than double from a year ago, but is less than in 2013 and 2014.
The Mexican bishops’ conference tweeted against the militarization of the border, expressing concern that the move may put more Latin Americans at risk.
“It is extremely risky for our Mexican and Latin American people, to have a semi-militarized border. #JesusChrist #migrant, could be executed again for trying to cross #frontier.”
Bishop Mark Seitz of El Paso wrote April 5 that it is his understanding that “the National Guard is a military force intended for the protection of our nation. They assist in times of natural disasters or respond to an armed threat from a foreign military force.”
“I am left with many questions to which there appear to be no reasonable answer,” he continued. “To what threat are the citizen soldiers of our powerful nation responding? Why are we placing a military force on the border when the vast majority of those in our country without documents are here because they have overstayed their visa? Why are we further militarizing a border that we share with a peaceful neighbor at a time when undocumented immigration across our border is at a low ebb? Is our nation reacting to a ragtag group of Hondurans who are fleeing for their lives seeking refuge? They are fleeing from a nation controlled by narco-trafficking gangs flush with cash provided by our nation’s insatiable appetite for illegal drugs.”
The bishop noted that many of those entering the country are seeking asylum, “following international asylum laws which our country had a major role in writing, to assure that people fleeing persecution and organized violence would be able to find safe refuge.”
“Have we become so fearful and hypocritical that we would expect a country like Lebanon to accept a number 30% the size of their population from Syria, but we ourselves cannot accept a fraction of one percent of those fleeing from the countries with the highest homicide rates in the world?” he asked. “If you were a Honduran whose children were being raped and told that they would have to do the gang’s bidding or die, what would you do?”
Bishop Seitz urged that Trump “stop playing on people’s unfounded fears.”
“I live on the border and my city is year after year one of the safest in the country. These troops are being asked to leave their families and their employment to come to our border where they can do battle against the wind. They will find no enemy combatants here, just poor people seeking to live in peace and security. They will find no opposition forces, just people seeking to live in love and harmony with their family members and neighbors and business partners and fellow Christians on both sides of the border.”
“I pray that our President will reconsider this rash and ill-informed action,” he concluded.
Cleveland, Ohio, Apr 6, 2018 / 05:24 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- After an in vitro fertilization clinic in Ohio lost more than 4,000 eggs and embryos, one of the couples is suing the clinic, asking a court to recognize an embryo as a person.
Wendy Penniman was one of many people to file a lawsuit against University Hospitals Fertility Center after a malfunctioning cryogenic tank increased temperatures the weekend of March 3.
“We are asking the court to declare that an embryo is a person and that life begins at conception,” said the Penniman’s lawyer, Bruce Taubman, according to News 5 Cleveland.
Having first filed a lawsuit March 12, Taubman filed an additional complaint March 30, asking for a declaratory judgment on the legal status of an embryo. If embryos are recognized as persons, wrongful death suits could be brought against the fertility center.
Taubman has referred to a 1985 Ohio Supreme Court case, Werling v. Sandy, in which the court held that a viable fetus is a person.
“In Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court held that an embryo is not a person, but that was solely for the purposes of obtaining an abortion,” said Taubman, according to News 5 Cleveland.
“I see this case ending up in front of the Ohio Supreme Court, and I would like to think that they are going to follow my line of reasoning and declare an embryo a person.”
But Harvard Law Professor Glenn Cohen told News 5 Cleveland, “Ohio has already had a case where they basically said you can’t use this statute unless you’re talking about a viable fetus, and this is so much earlier than that.”
The Pennimans chose to use IVF after suffering 11 miscarriages. Through the clinic, the couple had two children and was hoping to have a third with another one of the frozen embryos.
Having a degree in biochemical engineering herself, Penniman felt betrayed to hear how the lab handled liquid nitrogen and the malfunction.
Reportedly, an employee had turned off the alarm system so none of the staff offsite had been notified, and an issue occurred with the tank’s autofill valve, which replenishes the freezers with liquid nitrogen to keep the embryos cool.
“You think to yourself, ‘How can this be going on behind the scenes?’” said Penniman, noting that the clinic should treat embryos and eggs with the same care as other patients.
“They trusted them with the most important thing they have: the future of their families. With the flip of a switch, they’ve lost the future,” Taubman added.
Washington D.C., Apr 6, 2018 / 05:14 pm (CNA).- “The Church, from the very beginning, has always recognized the special and unique role of Peter,” said Cardinal Donald Wuerl at the closing Mass of a Catholic University of America symposium on the 50th anniversary of papal encyclical Humanae Vitae.
The role of Peter – as an authoritative teacher of faith and morals – was reaffirmed, Wuerl believes, by the US bishops’ response to initial controversy over Humanae Vitae.
During the Mass, celebrated in the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, Wuerl spoke of his personal experience as a young priest at the time of Humanae Vitae’s promulgation. He noted that he was taken aback by negative attitudes towards the encyclical.
“As a newly-ordained priest, I came very quickly in ministry to recognize that not every encyclical or apostolic exhortation meets with immediate acceptance,” he said, to laughter among the congregation.
Having begun his first priestly assignment just the year before, Cardinal Wuerl said that he was “surprised” by the “vehement rejection” of the encyclical, particularly in the archdiocese he now leads.
The Archdiocese of Washington, he said, was “one of the largest flashpoints of opposition.”
“I remember attending a lecture on this very campus [The Catholic University of America] in which it was explained to us that the teaching of Paul VI was his own personal views, and that it was not truly a part of the papal magisterium,” said Wuerl.
However, the dissent was far from universal, he said. Priests who agreed with the document and supported the pope as the “universal shepherd” were assisted by the United States Catholic Conference (a precursor to the USCCB) in writing a pastoral letter to help better explain and support the teachings outlined in Humanae Vitae. This letter, titled “Human Life In Our Day,” was published about four months after the encyclical was released.
Wuerl said this experience helped to confirm his beliefs in the importance of the teaching ministry of the pope, in addition to the overall teachings of the document.
“I was impressed then with the alacrity of the response in defense of the teaching office of Saint Peter and therefore the validation of the teaching of Humanae Vitae,” explained Wuerl.
“But there was another lesson that I saw confirmed in those days of dissent from Humanae Vitae – the importance of the teaching role of Peter. The issue was not just what was said, but also who said it.” The pope, regardless of which pope, is “Peter” and has the role of Christ’s vicar, Wuerl said.
Wuerl conceded that there is still much to be done in terms of implementing the teachings of Humanae Vitae for the good of the faithful.
“One half century later, we continue to set forth the teaching of Blessed Pope Paul VI concerning the proper regulation of the propagation of offspring, and over these five decades we have learned that it is not sufficient simply to announce the teaching and repeat the words of the encyclical.”
To assist with this endeavor, the cardinal suggested that this 50th anniversary be viewed as “a call to [….] whom we go out, announce, engage, and walk with as we try to help them grasp and appropriate the teaching of this encyclical.”
“Today then, dear brothers and sisters in Christ, as we commemorate the encyclical letter, Humanae Vitae, we renew our own fidelity to the Vicar of Christ. It is his voice that gives us assurance of the truth of what we profess.”
London, England, Apr 6, 2018 / 04:07 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- As the parents of a sick toddler fight for continued treatment, saying that he is showing signs of improvement, the hospital where he is staying is requesting court permission to end his life su… […]
Vatican City, Apr 6, 2018 / 02:07 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Hundreds of Pope Francis’ missionaries of mercy are gathering at the Vatican in coming days for formation and fellowship, for the first time since their mandate was extended at the end of the Jubilee of Mercy.
It has been two years since the missionaries were first commissioned on Ash Wednesday 2016 during the jubilee, and it has been nearly 18 months since the pope extended their mandate at the close of the holy year, allowing them to continue hearing confessions freely in every diocese throughout the world and lifting censures – ecclesiastical penalties – that normally require the permission of the pope.
The missionaries, who number over 1,000 and come from all over the world, have spent much of the past two years working to spread the message of God’s mercy and forgiveness through their daily activities and ministries, including talks, retreats, and social communications. An emphasis on confession is central to their work, which many of the missionaries say is greatly needed.
“I’m very grateful the Holy Father has continued our mandate, because not only is it needed, but also, it’s a joy to do this work as a priest,” Fr. John Mary Devaney told CNA April 6.
He said the missionaries originally got a letter informing them that their mandate would end with the close of the Jubilee of Mercy, and were surprised and delighted when Pope Francis published a letter the day after the end of the holy year saying their ministry would be extended.
Devaney said the majority of American Catholics he meets do not go to confession regularly. But when he has heard the confession of someone who has been away for decades, the experience was largely life-changing for the penitent.
The encounter with God’s mercy in a new or forgotten way is so powerful, he said, that “I have no doubt that they will continue to go to confession again.”
Devaney, who comes from the Archdiocese of New York, hosts the weekly program Word to Life on SiriusXM radio, and is just one of some 600 Missionaries of Mercy expected to come to Rome for an April 8-11 meeting focused on spiritual formation and building fellowship.
During the meeting, missionaries will have the opportunity to go to confession themselves and listen to talks dedicated to themes relevant to their ministry, such as confession as a sacrament of mercy, and sin and mercy in the life of the priest.
The event will open April 8 with Mass for Divine Mercy Sunday, which the missionaries will concelebrate alongside Pope Francis.
They will hear talks from Cardinal Robert Sarah, prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments; Archbishop Rino Fisichella, prefect of the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of the New Evangelization; and Archbishop Jose Octavio Ruiz Arenas, secretary for the Pontifical Council for the New Evangelization.
The missionaries’ work was placed under the jurisdiction of the Pontifical Council for the New Evangelization, from which they receive instruction and ongoing communication throughout the year.
According to Msgr. Graham Bell, an official working with the council, the main idea for the event is that it offer “ongoing formation” to the missionaries.
“It’s about the exercise of your ministry as Missionaries of Mercy. So it’s understanding how mercy works, how it functions in the life of persons, and in the life of priests,” he told CNA April 5, adding that the scope is simply “to make them better at what they do.”
What the council wants from the missionaries, he said, is to place a strong emphasis on the sacrament of confession, and to promote their ministry through specific activities, particularly during major liturgical seasons such as Lent and Advent.
And with no clear end in sight to the missionary mandate, Bell said the idea is to continue having meetings on a regular basis to offer formation and time to share stories. So far, from the feedback they council has received, the missionaries “have a very, very strong impact,” he said.
For Fr. Roger Landry, a missionary of mercy who works for the Holy See’s Permanent Observer Mission to the United Nations in New York, the ministry of mercy is always needed in the Church, but is especially crucial in the modern global context.
Landry told CNA that both St. John Paul II and Pope Francis have emphasized that “we are living in a ‘kairos of mercy,’ a time in which God’s loving forgiveness is especially crucial.”
This, he said, is because “we’re living at a time in which unexpiated guilt is wreaking so much havoc.”
“After two World Wars and the Cold War, the Holocaust, the genocides in Armenia, Ukraine, Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia and Darfur, after so many atrocities from tyrannical governments, after the waterfalls of blood flowing from more than two billion abortions worldwide, after the sins that have destroyed so many families, after so much physical and sexual abuse, after lengthy crime logs in newspapers every day, after the scourge of terrorism, after so much hurt and pain, the terrible weight of collective guilt crushes not only individuals but burdens structures and whole societies.”
The modern world, he said, is like “one big Lady Macbeth, compulsively washing our hands to remove the blood from them, [but] there is no earthly detergent powerful enough to take the blemishes away.”
People can speak to psychiatrists and psychologists, but their words and advise can only help deal with guilt, “not eliminate it,” Landry said.
“We can confess ourselves to bartenders, but they can only dispense Absolut vodka, not absolution, and inebriation never brings expiation.”
There is also the attempt by many to try to escape reality through “distractions and addictions” such as sports, drugs, entertainment, food, power, materialism, lust and many other things, Landry said, but stressed that none of this “can adequately anesthetize the pain in our soul from the suffering we’ve caused or witnessed.”
“We’re yearning for a second, third or seventy-times-seventh chance. We’re pining for forgiveness, reconciliation, and a restoration of goodness. We’re hankering for a giant reset button for ourselves and for the world.”
Landry said his mandate has also impacted his work at the Holy See’s Permanent Observer Mission to the U.N., much of which is already dedicated to the works of mercy, such as caring for the poor, defending the vulnerable, feeding the hungry and seeking to provide education and care for those suffering due to war.
In addition to his work at the U.N., Landry said bishops have also sought him out and asked him to come to their dioceses to speak and hear confessions, and “thanks be to God, there has been a lot of fruit.”
Similarly, Fr. John Paul Zeller, a friar with the Franciscan Missionaries of the Eternal Word and a missionary of mercy from Birmingham, Ala., said he has had the opportunity to travel around the United States and offer talks and retreats centered on mercy, and has seen enormous fruits.
One of the things he has emphasized the most is reaching out to people who have been far from the Church or who have had a bad experience in confession, and have either left the Church or refused to go back to the sacrament as a result.
In comments to CNA, Zeller noted that when they were first commissioned in 2016, Pope Francis told them that people had been “lambasted” at times by priests in the confessional, and that this experience did a lot of damage.
“I really took that to heart,” Zeller said, explaining that there have been multiple times he has stood in front of a group and apologized for these bad experiences, saying “if anybody here has had a bad experience in the confessional, from childhood until now, I beg you in the name of Jesus Christ, I beg you in Jesus’ name and as a representative of our Holy Father, I beg your forgiveness.”
The results have been profound, not only in people returning to the sacrament, but in those seeking him out for spiritual advice or guidance.
“So many people are starving for a shepherd, starving for someone to show them love, show them that they care and to listen to them,” he said, adding that “it’s been such a privilege” to be put into situations where he is able to offer help to a person in real need.
However, Zeller stressed that mercy doesn’t mean a lack of justice. These two virtues, he said, are not opposed, but rather, according to the logic of God, they are “the same thing.”
“Sometimes we come across as thinking mercy is just being all sappy and not firm with people and not clear with people…. [But] when we’re exercising mercy, we need to exercise the virtue of justice too.”
In addition to talks and retreats, Fr. Devaney has turned to media to get the message of mercy out.
Though his primary ministry is carried out at a hospital, Devaney said that he and another missionary of mercy – Nigerian Fr. Augustine Dada, who is currently one of the missionaries serving in New York – decided to offer a special program dedicated to mercy on his SiriusXM radio show for Lent.
Looking forward, the missionaries voiced hope that a full list of all the Missionaries of Mercy would be made public so that people would know where to find one if needed.
They also expressed a desire for additional instruction on the technicalities of how to lift censures – penalties for certain delicts, or canonical “crimes” – which they have been given the faculty to remit. Some of the missionaries said they are uncertain about the process for remitting those penalties.
The missionaries were initially given the faculty to remit penalties for four of these types of delicts: profaning the Eucharistic species by taking them away or keeping them for a sacrilegious purpose; the use of physical force against the Roman Pontiff; the absolution of an accomplice in a sin against the Sixth Commandment, (“thou shalt not commit adultery”) and, in limited circumstances, a direct violation against the sacramental seal by a confessor.
In an April 2017 letter confirming their mandate, the pope added an additional delict to the list, allowing the missionaries to remit the penalty associated with recording what a priest or penitent says in confession, and the diffusion of that the recording online.
Fr. Zeller told CNA that while he was in Rome for the commissioning of the missionaries during the jubilee, he was able to visit the Apostolic Penitentiary, the Vatican court dealing with some cases of excommunication and with matters addressed in confession, where he got an explainer from an official on how remitting censures works.
For more than an hour, “I asked questions upon questions, and we went over the different censures,” Zeller said, adding that “to see how the Church deals with them and how much the Church deals with the salvation of souls was astounding to me.”
“I came away from there with a renewed sense of how much the Church cares about the soul,” he said, explaining that when the Penitentiary gets an inquiry from a priest involving a delict that incurred automatic excommunication, a response, remission, and penance are sent back within 24 hours.
“Nothing happens that quickly in the Church, nothing,” he continued. “Everything, on every level of the Church, everything takes so long…but when it comes to sin, when it comes to that restoring people to grace…I am just so grateful for…how much the Church cares about the salvation of souls.”
A response is “sent out in less than 24 hours. That’s saying a lot,” Zeller emphasized. He said he has had the opportunity to explain the process to other priests, and hopes that in the future, better formation will be offered in seminaries for how to handle these delicts if they are confessed.
However, while remitting censures is a part of their mandate, the missionaries agreed that it is not the most important part.
Fr. Devaney told CNA that the circumstances that incur censures are rare, and that while they have been given the faculty to remit them, “the core and heart of what [Pope Francis] wants is for us to just go and renew Catholics, in particular, with God’s mercy.”
Vatican City, Apr 6, 2018 / 11:05 am (CNA).- Before he died, the late Cardinal Carlo Caffarra, emeritus Archbishop of Bologna, told friends that he wished for a conference that would gather bishops and other Catholics to reflect on the state of the Church.
The conference “Church, where do you go?,” scheduled for April 7 in Rome, can be considered the fulfillment of Cardinal Caffarra’s wish.
Not by chance, the conference is dedicated to his memory. Not by chance, the subtitle of the conference is “only the blind would deny there is confusion in the Church,” a passage of one of his latest interviews.
A number of significant topics that have arisen during Pope Francis’ pontificate will be discussed: the 50th anniversary of the Humanae Vitae; questions about the Church’s doctrine on matters of sexual morality; the issue of conscience, which was crucial during the 2015 synod on family, and the concept of “discernment,” which is sometimes used in arguments justifying more open access to communion for divorced and remarried Catholics.
The topics of discussion will also include the limits of the papal authority and infallibility.
There are all the ingredients of a rich food for thought.
Relators of the conference are Cardinals Raymond Leo Burke, Walter Brandmueller and Joseph Zen Zekiun; Bishop Athanasius Schneider; philosopher Marcello Pera; professors Renzo Puccetti and Valerio Gigliotti; and journalist Francesca Romana Poleggi.
The titles of the lectures touch critical issues, and also explore the possibility of correcting the pope, if his statements seem to contradict Catholic doctrine. This demonstrates the increasing preoccupation in some circles with the protection of the deposit of faith.
Though some presentation titles might seem harsh, the topics are real, and they are intended to be part of an attempt to respond to open issues, such as those put forth by the 2016 dubia of four cardinals, that asked the pope certain questions about the doctrine of the Church, in light of the different ways Amoris Laetitia was being interpreted.
The late Cardinal Caffarra was one of the signatories of those dubia, and his approach to the issue provides a good way to glimpse into the conference, beyond any possible vis polemica.
Cardinal Caffarra always underscored he was not against the Pope, but he was merely seeking clarity on issues of faith. His signature at the end of the dubia, and the following letter he sent to the Pope to solicit a response, was intended as a search for the guidance of Peter on questions on faith and doctrine.
The Apr. 7 conference will be concluded by a short video interview Cardinal Caffarra granted on the issue of Humanae Vitae, one of the increasingly controversial topics of the moment.
Presenting a book on the contribution of Cardinal Karol Wojtytla (then Pope John Paul II) to the preparatory commission of Humanae Vitae, Cardinal Gerhard Ludwig Mueller, emeritus prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, stressed that overturning the teaching of the Bl. Paul VI encyclical would be “a crime against the Church,” and denounced the work of a “secret commission” to re-write Humanae Vitae.
The commission is a study group led by professor Gilfredo Marengo, that is said to be looking back to the genesis of the encyclical.
The genesis of Humanae Vitae is one of main topics of discussion, and Renzo Puccetti, one of the lecturers, described it very well in the book “I veleni della contraccezione” (“The poisons of contraception”) that explains how the contraceptive pill was invented, developed and spread, describes the work of the lobbies of demographic control and how Catholics responded with natural family planning, and describes the struggle between bishops, theologians, doctors, and association of lay people over contraception.
This struggle poisoned the years before and after the Second Vatican Council, but Paul VI resolved to staying faithful to the doctrine.
The rebellion that followed provides a lot of clues about what is going on now. The encyclical was strongly resisted by a group of theologians that grabbed the headlines, and the pope was subjected to strong pressures.
The first step was to question the authoritativeness of the encyclical, saying that norms of contraception were not mandatory, as the document did not present a solemn declaration of infallibility.
This is the reason why Cardinal Wojtyla, who took part the in the preparatory committee, recommended that Paul VI clearly express the infallibility, not of the encyclical, but of the teaching expressed in the encyclical, a part of deposit of faith that needed to be preserved to stay faithful to the Gospel.
If the story behind Humanae Vitae says a lot about how campaigns against Catholic teaching is carried on even nowadays, the issue of pope’s infallibility is another interesting topic.
Is Amoris Laetitia or any other Papal document beyond the possibility of any mistake? To this extent, it is worthy to note that Cardinal Walter Brandmueller, another of the speakers, wrote in 1992 a book titled “The Church and the right to be wrong” about the Galileo case.
Cardinal Brandmueller took the example of Galileo to stress that the Church does not claim any infallibility except in some, well defined cases. Things can be discussed, in the end. Noting this is also an indirect response to those who blame any critic of Amoris Laetitia as a critic of papal authority itself.
Cardinal Burke is a very well known personality, and on numerous occasions he has addressed the problems of confusion over Catholic teaching. and the need to tackle that issue for the sake of the faithful.
Cardinal Zen has become the loudest voice in the defense of the Church’s freedom in China. While a discussion on the China-Vatican deal on the appointment of bishops is underway, Cardinal Zen has expressed the concern of many Catholics of China, and decried a return to Ostpolitik, the label given to Holy See’s policy with Eastern bloc countries on the other side of the Iron Curtain.
Ostpolitik was a diplomacy of dialogue and concessions, developed in the 60s by Msgr. Agostino Casaroli, later St. John Paul II’s Secretary of State.
Ostpolitik was also strongly criticized from the Cardinals of the Church of Silence, i.e., Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski, Primate of Poland, and above all Cardinal Jozef Mindszenty, Archbishop of Budapest-Esztergom, that both considered the Holy See’s approach as amounting to too much dialoguing with the countries of the Soviet bloc.
Bishop Schneider of Astana, Kazakhstan, has been one of the strongest defenders of Catholic teaching and a promoter of the Kazakhstani profession of truths on marriage.
Is the current approach on issues of doctrine and morality a replica of the Ostpolitik approach? Is the Church dialoguing too much with the world, giving up the primary task of evangelization?
Those are issues that will be explored during the April 7 discussion.
The conference will end with a declaration, which will likely restate the truth of faith regarding doctrine on marriage and sexuality.
According to the veteran Vatican watcher Sandro Magister, “this ‘declaratio’ will be the polar opposite of that ‘Kölner Erklärung’ – the declaration signed in Cologne in 1989 by German theologians now in the good graces of Francis – which concerned the principles later reaffirmed by John Paul II in the 1993 encyclical “Veritatis Splendor.”
It remains to be seen how much the conference will garner attention and make an impact. It is likely it will be labeled as an “anti-Francis” conference, but it is also likely that there will be a poor response to the hard-hitting questions raised during the lectures.
© Catholic World Report