THE NEW INQUISITORS AGAINST RATZINGER
The Self- Demolition of the Church recommences
Antonio Socci
January 26, 2014
There have been some great popes whose pontificates have been practically discarded by the errors of the clerics in their entourage. This risk is also present for the pontificate of Pope Francis.
In fact, there have been episodes, decisions and “bizarre outbursts” by some prelates that have been quite disturbing. I am thinking of Cardinal Maradiaga and Cardinal Braz de Aviz, who feel they are so powerful in the Vatican that they can ‘use the club’ on both the Prefect of the former Holy Office, Müller, as well as on the ‘Franciscans of the Immaculate.’
AGAINST BENEDICT
The targets of their “club-beatings” (given obviously in the name of mercy) are those who, for different reasons, have been targeted as paladins of Catholic orthodoxy and have had dealings with Pope Benedict XVI.
The real target in fact, appears actually to be him: “guilty” of so many things: from his historical condemnation of Liberation Theology and the defense of correct doctrine, to the Motu Proprio on the liturgy.
Cardinal Oscar Maradiaga is Archbishop of Tegucigalpa, in Honduras - a decadent diocese. But the prelate, who is running around the stages of the world’s mass-media, recently caused an uproar because of the interview he gave to a German newspaper, where – along with new-age rubbish and third-world banalities – he publically attacked the Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Archbishop Müller, to whom the Pope has just given the cardinal’s hat. This is also scandalous seeing that Maradiaga is the head of the commission which should reform the Curia.
What had happened? Müller, who was called to that office by Benedict XVI and confirmed by Francis, had reaffirmed in recent months that – even though new pastoral ways may be sought (already indicated by Benedict XVI) – the upcoming Synod on the Family, cannot subvert the law of God with “a false call to mercy” with regard to the man-woman family, which was established by Jesus in the Gospel and which has always been taught by the Church.
THE MARADIAGA SHOW
Müller, who had already been personally attacked by Hans Küng, has [now] been liquidated by Maradiaga with these words: “he is German and also a German professor of theology. There is only true and false in his mentality. That’s all. But I say: my brother, the world is not like this, you should be a little more flexible.” Words that have scandalized many of the faithful. Above all, because the allusion to “the German professor of theology” inevitably brings to mind that perhaps the target is Benedict XVI, who called Müller to that office. Also because a public attack between cardinals is completely out of order, as if Muller was there to sustain his own personal theology and not the constant teaching of the Church and all of the popes.
In the end, according to Maradiaga, it would be wrong to examine reality in terms of true and false – he forgets that Jesus Christ in the Gospel gave this precise commandment: “But let your speech be yea, yea: no, no: and that which is over and above these, is from evil.” (Mt. 5,37).
Does Maradiaga prefer “that which is over and above these” to the proclamation of the Truth? On the themes regarding the family, where [now] we have an ideological attack similar to the Marxist one of the Seventies, various ecclesiastics are ready – as they were then – to cave in shamefully.
And they do it with Maradiaga’s sophisms, which state that, yes, Jesus’ words on marriage are binding, “but they can be interpreted” as today there are many new situations of cohabitation and “answers which can no longer be based on authoritarianism and moralism” are needed.
This sentence alone liquidates the entire Magisterium of the Church: evidently according to Maradiaga even Jesus was authoritarian and moralistic since He expressed Himself with great clarity.
But what does “more pastoral care than doctrine” mean? Every great pastor, from St. Ambrose to St. Charles [Borromeo], from Don Bosco to Padre Pio, have been paladins of doctrine.
Maradiaga says that what is needed for the family are “answers suitable for the world of today.” These are empty, ellusive words which foster confusion and doubt. And this is the typical way which is spreading in the Church today, to raise questions without providing answers.
Concerning such things, St. Thomas Aquinas had this to say: “Well, these ones are false prophets, or false doctors, inasmuch as, raising a doubt without resolving it is the same as conceding to it.” (Sermon “Attendite a falsis prophetis”).
Today there are those in the Church who prefer the famous questionnaire associated with the Synod (which was sent to all the dioceses of the world and is presented by some as a survey) to the words of Jesus reported in the Gospel – as if revealed Truth should be substituted by the most diverse opinions.
SELF-DEMOLITION
Also this takes us back to the Seventies, when Paul VI alarmed, denounced:
"So Christian truth is undergoing fearful shocks and crises. They will not accept the teaching of the magisterium […] There are some who try to make the faith easy by emptying it - the whole, the true faith - of those truths which appear to be unacceptable to the modern mind. They follow their own tastes, to choose a truth which is considered to be acceptable... Others are looking for a new faith especially a new belief about the Church. They are trying to bring her into line with the ideas of modern sociology and secular history."
It is like instantly wiping away the pontificates of Paul VI, John Paul II and Benedict XVI to return to the dark years of the Seventies, to the self-demolition of the Church (as Paul VI defined it).
This is not renewal, but a return to the most disastrous past.
THE SHAME
Another episode of the Church’s self-demolition is the persecution of the “Franciscans of the Immaculate”, one of the most orthodox, the most vibrant (full of vocations), the most ascetic and missionary of religious families. But their zealous faithfulness to Benedict XVI (which I have already written about in these columns) starting with his Motu Proprio on the liturgy, has not been forgiven.
The reversal of roles is shocking. In fact we have obedient Catholics in the dock while in the role of inquisitor we have Brazilian Cardinal João Braz de Aviz, who in a long interview, had nostalgic words of praise for the disastrous Liberation Theology, not caring at all about the condemnations of it by Popes Benedict and John Paul II.
Braz de Aviz peacefully confessed that, at the time, he had been ready to leave the seminary for those social ideas. However, he has made a career for himself. Today he is Head of the Congregation for Religious and he is not even a religious.
The prelate, who proclaims that he is a great friend of the Community of Sant’Egidio, has a strange idea about dialogue. For him, it is important for everyone, except for Catholics most faithful to the Magisterium.
When he was Archbishop of Brasilia, he peacefully took part and was a speaker at a conference of the “Fórum Espiritual Mundial” with the former friar Leonardo Boff, leader of Liberation Theology, Nestor Masotti, President of the Brazilian Spiritist Federation, Ricardo Lindemann, President of the Theosophical Society in Brazil, and Hélio Pereira, Grand Master of the [local] Grand Lodge.
As soon as he arrived at the helm of the Congregation for Religious, he immediately began dialogue with the “lively” Congregations of religious sisters in the United States [the LCWR], who had given Pope Benedict a very hard time. Braz made a sort of criticism of the Holy See: “we have begun again to listen…With no preventative condemnations.”
On the other hand, regarding the Franciscans of the Immaculate, who have never given any problems - he never called them nor listened to them. They have been subjected to preventative condemnation - and a very heavy one at that.
Quite odd, is it not? Some days ago “Vatican Insider” headlined: “There are fewer and fewer friars and nuns in Italy.” Do you believe that Braz de Aviz is worried about this? Not at all. He is interested in punishing one of the few orders where vocations are in the increase.
In the first number of “Jesus” [the monthly of the Society of St. Paul and one of the most important Catholic periodicals in Italy] in 2014, a monument is built to Vito Mancuso [Professor, famous for his "progressive" views on bioethics], famed for denying “a dozen dogmas” (as “La Civiltà Cattolica” reported). But be assured nobody will make any objections to the Daughters of St. Paul about it.
Instead, the “Franciscans of the Immaculate” are being repressed for having defended the dogmas of the Church.
The self-demolition has recommenced in earnest.
[Source: “Libero”, January 26, 2014. Translated by Contributor Francesca Romana.]
