Posted on 03/17/2017 7:12:45 PM PDT by ebb tide
A well-known Vaticanista is calling on Catholics to turn to the unchanging Magisterium for guidance, and is especially highlighting the pastoral leadership of the dubia cardinals.
Italian journalist Antonio Socci published a blog post Thursday titled "Fraternal Advice" encouraging readers to "decisively take as the only points of pastoral reference the cardinals who've shown with facts to have in their hearts the good of Christian people, the good of their souls."
The situation of the Catholic Church has become explosive.Tweet
He was referring specifically to Cdls. Raymond Burke, Carlo Caffarra, Joachim Meisner and Walter Brandmüller, who submitted a set of dubia, or questions, to Pope Francis last year seeking clarity on Amoris Laetitia, the pope's apostolic exhortation on marriage and the family.
"Follow them," Socci insisted. "FOLLOW THEM."
The dubia came in light of confusion from Chapter 8 of the papal exhortation, particularly paragraphs 300–305, used by liberal bishops to promote opening up the sacraments to the divorced and civilly remarried, among other things, contrary to longstanding Church teaching and practice.
Titled "Seeking Clarity: A Plea to Untie the Knots in Amoris Laetitia," the cardinals' letter notes "a grave disorientation and great confusion" among the faithful over "contrasting interpretations" of the exhortation.
Socci caused a stir in early March when he claimed a number of liberal bishops who elected Pope Francis are now experiencing "buyer's remorse."
"A large part of the cardinals who voted for him is very worried, and the curia ... that organized his election and has accompanied him thus far, without ever disassociating itself from him, is cultivating the idea of a moral suasion to convince him to retire," he claimed in the Italian paper Libero.
"Four years after Benedict XVI's renunciation and Bergoglio's arrival on the scene, the situation of the Catholic Church has become explosive, perhaps really on the edge of a schism, which could be even more disastrous than Luther's," Socci observed.
"The cardinals are worried that the Church could be shattered as an institution," he added.
Socci acknowledged the climate of confusion in his Thursday blog post.
"To the many Catholics who — feeling lost — have asked me over the years how to navigate through the darkness of our times (accentuated by the Vatican's darkness)," he wrote, "I've always replied that I was taught, in other words, that the guiding lights are: Sacred Scripture, the unchanging Magisterium of the Church, the Catechism of the Catholic Church, the sacraments and prayer."
In addition to looking to the faithful guidance of Cdl. Burke and his brother cardinals, he warned Catholics against following sharp critics of the Holy Father, "especially those who are screaming invectives against Pope Bergoglio," critics he accused of "shouting more loudly in order to show off and make converts."
"It's a time when you need to utilize real discernment," he noted. "I repeat: We follow the shepherds. No one else."
No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. Tweet He closed his blog noting the "dramatic situation" in which we find ourselves, and recalling the words of St. Paul:
Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written,
"For thy sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered."
No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8:35–39)
"VATICANISTA URGES CONFUSED CATHOLICS TO LOOK TO UNCHANGING MAGISTERIUM FOR GUIDANCE"
What does he mean by Magesterium? I know the definition in general, but I don’t know the specific RCC term.
The “Magisterium” means the teachings of the Church over the ages. The Pope is only supposed to express or elucidate them, not come up with his own. Francis believes he’s more important than Scripture or the Maigsterium and that he is creating a whole new church.
This is certainly what he’s trying to do, so this means he’s gone from heresy to outright apostasy.
Ah. So like confessions of doctrine or the like, as well as the teaching thereof. Or at least similar to that.
Thanks.
“What does he mean by Magesterium? I know the definition in general, but I don’t know the specific RCC term.”
Per the Catechism of the Catholic Church, “....the bishops in communion with the successor of Peter, the Bishop of Rome.”
But it also says, “...this Magisterium is not superior to the Word of God but is its servant.”
The main problem is that the current Magisterium (including the Pope) is teaching new doctrines that are in clear contradiction to 2000 years of prior Magisterial teaching. It would be different if they were merely formal changes to worship, but they are substantive changes to doctrine (and in some cases dogma). The changes I’m referring to regard teachings on marriage, divorce, adultery, and Holy Communion.
Follow them, AND pray for them. Every day, I pray a rosary for just Cardinal Burke. Another is for a group of mostly bishops: Bishop Athanasius Schneider, Cardinal Robert Sarah, Archbishop Charles Chaput, Father Z(uhlsdorf), and the three other Dubia Cardinals: Brandmüller, Meisner, and Caffarra. A third rosary is for Cardinal Gerhard Müller of the CDF. They need as many prayers as they can get.
For me, who grew up in a Baptist family, the Magesterium was a major reason I became Catholic. Every preacher in my history had a different interpretation of almost every passage in the Bible. It was an enlightenment to realize that there is an official statement of doctrine, rather than the literal confusion I had grown up with, where if the minister had a different idea, you just changed churches and denominations till you found one you agreed with. You can find the answers to questions in the Catholic Church very easily.
I get what you mean.
Personally, I’m Missouri Synod Lutheran. (And in my defense, I made my first post before the title was amended to Catholic caucus. So I’m only violating the rules with THIS reply, yuk yuk yuk.) And one joke that is often said about LCMS Lutherans is that we’re more Catholic than Catholics are.
Now, dispute if you want, but what you call the Magesterium, we call the Confessions, and pastoral candidates are rigorously expected to teach, preach, and uphold the doctrine that is taught therein. And of all the LCMS churches I’ve attended over my travels over the US, they all have. From Brooklyn to rural Missouri to suburban Ohio.
Before I was LCMS Lutheran, I was ELCA Lutheran and flirted with Calvinism, and I really get what you’re saying about being able to choose your own theology. It really aggravated me that I couldn’t seem to get at capital-T Truth in any of these churches, and it all just came down to the opinion of the person in the pulpit.
Then you get a church that actually preaches and teaches sound doctrine, and it’s like night and day, my friend. Night and day.
Yes it is night and day. I will say that if all the non-Catholics had your outlook on the posts, we wouldn’t need to mark them ‘Catholic Caucus”. I have to admit I am not familiar with Lutheran doctrine, but I am with S Baptist, etc.
Discussion of religion is one thing, being attacked is not. Are you in Missouri? I am a rural Missourian.
I had veered away from organized religion in general for many years, although my wife is from a good Catholic family, spent about five years learning about it before taking the classes, etc and joining my wife in the Church.
You are very wise.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.