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| Public latrines in Ancient Rome (Ostia) |
Naturally, it will be clothed as exceptional and extraordinary, but, since the only thing in the Church that remains extraordinary in both name and practice is the Traditional Mass, it will soon become the norm. Because, honestly, can't upstate New York or Utah, or Patagonia, or the Congo, all be considered "remote"? Stretch a little, and the spiritual deserts of secularized metropolises throughout the West can be as "remote", spiritually, as the vast expanses of the Amazon River basin.
And yet...in order to achieve that, Francis made up his Synod. Just as in the "Family Synods" they had one objective, and pursued it -- that is, communion for the "remarried divorcees" -- in this Synod the goal is the ordination of married men. However, just as in the "Family Synods" they took the time to include all kinds of unrelated scandalous matters (particularly related to homosexuality), in this one they plan to introduce paganism and pantheism as acceptable forms of Christianity.
Which leads us to the Instrumentum Laboris, the guiding document for discussions of the Synod, released Monday in Rome in Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese. We choose to call it the "Church Report on Amazon Problems", or CRAP. Still no English version available -- and we refuse to waste our resources to translate it. We know from other sources that this delay in the English translation is purposeful: they know where the greatest opposition would come from, so they wish to limit their criticism.
These are some of the theological pearls of the text:
These are some of the theological pearls of the text:
"Life in the Amazon communities not reached by Western Civilization is reflected in belief on work of spirits, of divinity - named in different ways - with territory, with and in relation to nature. This cosmoview is summarized in Francis' 'mantra': "All is interconnected." (n. 25)
"There is a need for a process of discernment in relation to the rituals, symbols and celebratory styles of indigenous cultures in contact with nature, which must be assumed in the liturgical and sacramental ritual. It is suggested that the liturgical celebrations be festive, with their own songs and dances, in tongues and with original costumes, in communion with nature and with the community.A liturgy that corresponds to their own culture, to be the source and summit of their Christian life (SC, 10), and linked to their struggles, sufferings and joys. The sacraments should be a source of life and medicine accessible to all (EG 47), especially to the poor (EG 200). ... In view of a salutary 'decentralization' of the Church (EG, 16), the communities ask Episcopal Conferences to adapt the Eucharistic rituals to their own cultures." (n. 126)
What we can say, after careful reading of the text, is that never in the history of Rome has such a pathetic document been published, and this since Romulus founded the City... It actually saddens us, in an environmentally-conscious sort of way, that this detritus in the shape of words will be printed, in many copies, for the members of the assembly: toilet paper is destined to a much higher and dignified use than the cellulose which will be wasted with this document.
For the moment, while the English version is not available, we post below an analysis by Chilean author José Antonio Ureta:
The Church at the Service of the Neo-Pagan AgendaThe Instrumentum laboris of the coming Extraordinary Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, made public this morning, represents a total opening of the gates of the Magisterium to Indian Theology and Ecotheology, two Latin American derivatives of Liberation Theology. After the collapse of the USSR and the failure of “real socialism”, the advocates of Liberation Theology (LT), on the Marxist style, attributed the historic role of revolutionary force to indigenous peoples and to nature.Like LT, the Instrumentum laboris does not take the Revelation of God contained in the Bible and in Tradition as the basis for its ruminations, but rather the supposed “oppression” to which the Amazon is said to be subject. Thus, from a simple geographical and cultural area, the Amazon becomes a “privileged interlocutor,” a “theological place,” “an epiphanic place,” and a “source of God’s revelation: (n° 2, 18 and 19).From a theological point of view, the Instrumentum laboris not only recommends the teaching of Indian Theology “in all educational institutions” for “a better and greater understanding of indigenous spirituality” and to “take into consideration myths, traditions, symbols, knowledge, rites and original celebrations” (n ° 98). It also repeats all its postulates throughout the document. That is to say, the “seeds of the Word” are present not only in the aboriginal people’s ancestral beliefs, but they have “grown and given fruit” (n° 120) so that the Church, instead of her traditional evangelization that seeks conversion, must limit herself to “dialoguing” with Indians as “the active subject of inculturation are the indigenous peoples themselves” (No. 122).In this intercultural dialogue, the Church must also enrich herself with clearly pagan and / or pantheistic elements of beliefs such as “faith in God the Father-Mother Creator,” “relations with ancestors,” “communion and harmony with the earth” (n ° 121) and connection with “the various spiritual forces” (n ° 13). Not even witchcraft is sidelined by this “enrichment”. According to the document, “The richness of the flora and fauna of the forest contains real ‘living pharmacopoeias’ and unexplored genetic principles” (No. 86). In this context, “Indigenous rituals and ceremonies are essential for integral health because they integrate the different cycles of human life and nature. They create harmony and balance between human beings and the cosmos. They protect life from the evils that can be caused by both humans and other living beings. They help to cure diseases that damage the environment, human life and other living beings” (No. 87).On the ecclesiological level, the Instrumentum laboris is a real earthquake that undermines the hierarchical structure that the Church has by Divine mandate. In the name of “incarnation” in the Amazon culture, the document invites us to reconsider “the idea that the exercise of jurisdiction (power of government) must be connected in all areas (sacramental, judicial, administrative) and permanently to the Sacrament of Order” (No. 127). It is inconceivable for the Synod’s working document to call into question a doctrine of Faith as is the distinction, in the structure of the Church, between clergy and laity, which has been affirmed since the First Council of Nicaea and is based on the essential difference between the common priesthood of the faithful and the ministerial priesthood of clerics. The latter is rooted in the apostolic succession and endowed with a sacred power.Along with this dilution of the Catholic priesthood, which becomes somewhat similar to that of a Protestant pastor, comes a call to reconsider the obligatory nature of celibacy and, even worse, to identify what kind of “official ministry” can be conferred on women (§ 3 ). Cardinal Joseph-Albert Malula, from Zaire, and Most Rev. Samuel Ruiz, of the Diocese of Chiapas, will have turned in their graves upon seeing that the projects they tried to achieve (which the Vatican quickly rejected) are now proposed by a Synod, which according to its organizers, has a certain universal dimension.From an ecological point of view, the Instrumentum laboris represents the Church’s acceptance of the deification of nature promoted by the UN conferences on the environment.In fact, official UN documents, already in 1972, claimed that man has mismanaged natural resources mainly due to “a certain philosophical conception of the world.” While “pantheistic theories … attributed part of the divinity to living beings … scientific discoveries led to … a kind of desacralization of natural beings,” the best justification of which is reaffirmed “in the Judeo-Christian conceptions according to which God created man in his image and gave him the earth to subdue.” Conversely, the UN said, practicing the cult of ancestors “constituted a bulwark for the environment, since trees or water courses were protected and revered as a reincarnation of ancestors” (Aspects éducatifs, sociaux et culturels des problèmes de l’environnement et questions de l’information, UN General Assembly, Stockholm, June 5-6 1972, A/CONF.48.9, p. 8 & 9).In the closing speech of Rio 92 in Rio de Janeiro, the then-UN Secretary General, Boutros Boutros-Ghali declared that “for the ancients, the Nile was a god that was worshiped, as was the Rhine, an infinite source of European myths, or the Amazon rainforest, mother of all forests. Everywhere, nature was the home of gods. They gave the forest, the desert, the mountain, a personality that imposed adoration and respect. The Earth had a soul. Finding it, resurrecting it: this is the essence [of the Intergovernmental Conference] in Rio.” (A / CONF.151 / 26, vol. IV, p. 76).And this neo-pagan UN agenda is now proposed by a Synodal Assembly of the Catholic Church!Citing a document from Bolivia, the Instrumentum laboris states that, “the forest is not a resource to be exploited, it is a being or more beings with which to relate” (n ° 23); it continues by stating that “The life of the Amazon communities still unaffected by the influence of Western civilization [sic], is reflected in the beliefs and rituals regarding the action of spirits, of the divinity – called in so many names – with and in the territory, with and in relation to nature. This cosmovision is summarized in the “mantra” of Francis: ‘everything is connected’” (n ° 25).From the socio-economic point of view, the Instrumentum laboris is an apology of communism, disguised as “communitarianism”. Moreover, it is the worst form of communism: the collectivism of small communities. In fact, according to the document the aborigines’ project of “good living” (sumak kawsay) assumes that “there is an intercommunication between the whole cosmos, in which no one excludes or is excluded.” The explanatory note on the indigenous word refers to a declaration by various indigenous entities, titled “The Cry of the Sumak Kawsay in Amazonia,” which states that the word “is an oldest and newest Word” (with a capital W in the text; that is, a Divine Revelation) which proposes “a communitarian lifestyle with one and the same FEELING, THINKING AND ACTING” (capital letters also from the original).This phrase reminds us of Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira’s denunciation, in 1976, that indigenous tribalism was a new and even more radical stage of the Anarchist Revolution: “Structuralists see tribal life as an illusory synthesis between the apex of individual freedom and consensual collectivism, in which the latter ends up devouring freedom. According to structuralism, in this collectivism the various ‘I’s and individual persons, with their thought, will, sensibility and ways of being, characteristic and discrepant, are merged and dissolved in the collective personality of the tribe, which generates an intensely common thinking, will, and way of being.”The Instrumentum laboris is nothing short of an invitation for humanity to take a fatal step towards the final abyss of the anti-Christian Revolution. [Source: Edward Pentin]
Translated from the Spanish by James Bascom
