Posted on 02/21/2020 6:09:16 PM PST by ebb tide
VATICAN CITY (ChurchMilitant.com) - A clerical staff member of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue is using his position to recruit Freemasons in the Roman Curia, well-placed sources have revealed.
Outraged Catholics called for Fr. Michael Weninger to be excommunicated, after Church Militant reported that the Vatican cleric, a Freemason, published a 500-page book defiantly claiming that Catholics could join a masonic lodge and "certainly not" be excommunicated.
The Austrian priest, who was outed as a Freemason chaplain to three lodges, launched his 500-page doctoral dissertation in popular format Loge und Altar: Über die Aussöhnung von Katholischer Kirche und regulärer Freimaurerei (Lodge and Altar: On the Reconciliation of the Catholic Church and Regular Freemasonry) last Wednesday in Vienna, accompanied by Austrian Lodge Grand Master Georg Semler on the dais.
Weninger disingenuously asserted that the confusion over whether Catholic Freemasons are excommunicated stems from a contradiction between the 1983 Code of Canon Law — which, he contends, removed the condemnation of Freemasonry contained in the 1917 code — and a damning 1983 declaration from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF).
However, an expert in Canon Law demolished Weninger's claim as "nonsense." Speaking to Church Militant on condition of anonymity, the canonist insisted that "the Code of Canon Law of the Roman Catholic Church still provides that a censure of Excommunication for Freemasons is incurred automatically ('latae sententiae') pursuant to canon 1364, par. 1 CIC 1983, because Freemasons constitute an heretical sect and Freemasonry universally is a heretical belief system."
Canon 1364 §1 reads: "An apostate from the faith, a heretic or a schismatic incurs a latae sententiae excommunication, without prejudice to the provision of Can. 194 §1, n. 2; a cleric, moreover, may be punished with the penalties mentioned in Can. 1336 §1, nn. 1, 2 and 3."
"This clearly results from the Pontifical Code Commission's Relatio published in 1981," he explained.
Freemasonry lives within the Church like a parasite on its host organism.Tweet
"It is nonsense to reference the abrogation of can. 2335 CIC 1917 [on 'Affiliation With Masonic or Similar Societies'] as somehow rehabilitating Freemasonry because can. 1374 still punishes any Catholic who is registered as a Freemason with a ferendae sententiae penalty." A ferendae sententiae excommunication comes after a formal canonical trial, and is often a matter of public record.
The canonist told Church Militant that the punishment was actually double what it was under the 1917 Code of Canon Law.
"The 1983 Code therefore provides two penalties, not just the one censure that the 1917 Code previously provided," he categorically stated.
Sources also cautioned against bombastic claims being made for Fr. Weninger's position in the Vatican, which would be touted to justify his recent claims for the compatibility between Catholicism and Freemasonry.
"Weninger is listed on page 1214 of the 2019 edition of the Annuario Pontificio as an 'Addetto di Segreteria' (secretary). He is not a member, not a superior, and not even an official of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue. He is an entry-level staffer," a source said.
The expert in canon law also questioned Weninger's qualifications on the subject of Canon Law — a highly complex and specialized discipline.
"Weninger's doctorate is in spirituality, he has no expertise in Canon Law. His claims that the beliefs of the 'masonic sect' are reconcilable with Catholicism, that Freemasons can receive Holy Communion in violation of can. 915 CIC 1983, and most of all that Masons are not automatically excommunicated is dangerous apart from untenable," he said.
Catholic apologist and Episcopal convert to Catholicism Dr. Taylor Marshall told Church Militant that Weninger's openness about his own Freemasonry and his book commending the Masonic religion to Catholics was a vindication of his book on the masonic infiltration of the Church.
"When Infiltration: The Plot to Destroy the Church from Within was first published in 2019, some pundits on the Left were quick to dismiss the book as 'conspiracy theory,'" Marshall observed.
"Within less than a year we have seen new rotten fruits exposed in the public square from McCarrick details to Pachamama worship. And now we have explicit confirmation of what St. Pius X warned us about: Freemasonry lives within the Church like a parasite on its host organism," he confirmed.
The 1983 Code therefore provides two penalties, not just the one censure that the 1917 Code previously provided.Tweet
Marshall recounted how "Pope Pius IX, Pope Leo XIII, and Pope St. Pius X, these three popes, spoke openly and in magisterial documents against 'Freemasonry' and secret societies' waging war against the Catholic Church and her doctrines."
Eight popes in the course of 200 years have issued 20 legal interdicts condemning Freemasonry and never have any of the pronouncements been revoked.
Suspended "mason priest" Pascal Vesin
In 2013, Bishop Yves Boivineau of Annecy in southeastern France suspended Fr. Pascal Vesin, 43, for his membership in a masonic lodge of the Grand Orient of France. The priest was relieved of his ministerial duties only after he repeatedly refused to renounce Freemasonry.
Vesin was outed as a Freemason following an anonymous letter sent to the apostolic nunciature in Paris, and suspended on the order of the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. He joined the lodge in 2001, five years after his 1996 ordination.
In a brazen show of impudence, Vesin made a 40-day walking "pilgrimage" to Rome to plead his case with the Holy Father.
Pope Francis refused to meet him and, through certain contacts in the Curia, Vesin was only able to secure a meeting with the undersecretary of the CDF.
"He considered me a negligible quantity," and only "reminded me of the law" and the famous text of 1983, lamented the Mason, who is still hoping for a rapprochement between Catholicism and Freemasonry.
A 2013 book by Italian investigative journalists Giacomo Galeazzi and Ferruccio Pinotti described the extent of Masonic infiltration in the Vatican.
In Vaticano Massone: Un patto segreto e una finta inimicizia (Vatican Freemason: A secret pact and a fake enmity) the authors explicitly asked Catanian Grand Master Vincenzo Di Benedetto, head of the Most Serene Grand Lodge of Piazza del Gesù:
"'Various sources indicate the existence of masonic lodges also in the Vatican; do you consider it possible?' He replied without hesitation: 'Yes, absolutely, regardless of whether you use the name [Freemason] or not.'"
Ping
Interesting. Self-ping for my Friday night reading. (while not Catholic, I find this intriguing).
Thanks.
Masons simply require members believe in a supreme being.
They couldn't care less what religion one has.
I would be interested in knowing the Catholic opposition to Free Masons as well.
My uncle was a Mason.
One of the best guys you could have met.
As an Eastern traveler I can attest you are absolutely correct. But most mainstream churches have banned membership in Mason Lodges.
Reads in part:
"...WE strongly exhort them to beware of the perfidious discourses of sectarians who, under a disguise of honesty, are inflamed by an ardent hatred of the Religion of Christ and of all legitimate authority: they have but one thought with the sole aim of exterminating, all Divine and human rights."
Freemasonry tends to piss off the people that I despise. Some great men have been Masons as well.
Church leaders don’t like competition for the time or MONEY of their flock.
Reads in part:
The aim of Freemasonry: the destruction of holy Church
At this period, however, the partisans of evil seems to be combining together, and to be struggling with united vehemence, led on or assisted by that strongly organized and widespread association called the Freemasons. No longer making any secret of their purposes, they are now boldly rising up against God Himself. They are planning the destruction of holy Church publicly and openly, and this with the set purpose of utterly despoiling the nations of Christendom, if it were possible, of the blessings obtained for us through Jesus Christ our Saviour.
Satan doesn’t like competition for souls.
Now, the fundamental doctrine of the naturalists, which they sufficiently make known by their very name, is that human nature and human reason ought in all things to be mistress and guide. Laying this down, they care little for duties to God, or pervert them by erroneous and vague opinions. For they deny that anything has been taught by God; they allow no dogma of religion or truth which cannot be understood by the human intelligence, nor any teacher who ought to be believed by reason of his authority. And since it is the special and exclusive duty of the Catholic Church fully to set forth in words truths divinely received, to teach, besides other divine helps to salvation, the authority of its office, and to defend the same with perfect purity, it is against the Church that the rage and attack of the enemies are principally directed.
By a long and persevering labor, they endeavor to bring about this result — namely, that the teaching office and authority of the Church may become of no account in the civil State; and for this same reason they declare to the people and contend that Church and State ought to be altogether disunited. By this means they reject from the laws and from the commonwealth the wholesome influence of the Catholic religion; and they consequently imagine that States ought to be constituted without any regard for the laws and precepts of the Church.
Not a smart thing to do. He will have to answer for his misdeeds at the moment of his death.
The main purpose of the Masons is to destroy the Catholic Church.
George Washington, and most of the other founding fathers of the USA were Masons.
Actually the main purpose of Freemasonry is to retain, display, and teach occult knowledge through fellowship, symbolism, and allegory.
Which would destroy the Catholic as well as the Christian Churches.
People need to look deeper into the higher ranks of this organization to find what we are talking about.
It is time to organize a conclave of the remaining actually Catholic cardinals to elect a new Pope or to simply return to loyalty to the existing Pope Benedict.
There was a well-liked advertising executive in Des Moines who was Grand Master of his lodge and a 3rd degree Knight...
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.