Posted on 10/03/2023 10:01:36 AM PDT by ebb tide
Pope Francis has effectively told clergy that they can decide for themselves whether to “bless” homosexual unions.
Responding to a dubia question submitted by five cardinals, as to whether or not the Church can ever accept as a “possible good” objectively sinful situations, such as same-sex unions, Pope Francis stated that “pastoral prudence must adequately discern whether there are forms of blessing, requested by one or more persons, that do not transmit a mistaken conception of marriage.”
On October 2 five cardinals made public a series of letters which they have sent to Pope Francis, expressing serious doubts and concerns about the Synod on Synodality and recent papal comments.
READ: BREAKING: Five cardinals write Dubia to Pope Francis on concerns about Synod, Catholic doctrine
The signatories of the dubia are: Cardinals Walter Brandmüller, former prefect of the Pontifical Committee for Historical Sciences; Raymond Leo Burke, former prefect of the Apostolic Signatura; Juan Sandoval Íñiguez, former Archbishop of Guadalajara; Robert Sarah, the former prefect of the Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments; and Joseph Zen, the former bishop of Hong Kong.
The five cardinals had written to the Pope on July 10, and received a reply from him on July 13, in a letter dated July 11.
It was in the July 11 letter that the Pope responded to the five concerns made by the cardinals: namely on possible attacks on the Church’s doctrines, the possibility of homosexual “blessings,” the weight of teaching afforded to the Synod, female ordination, and the necessity of repentance in sacramental Confession.
READ: Archbishop Fernández hints at openness to same-sex ‘blessings’ if they don’t ‘feed confusion’
So “vague” was the Pope’s letter, that the five cardinals wrote to him again on August 21, but this time received no reply.
Regarding same-sex “blessings,” the cardinals wrote in their July 10 letter:
According to Divine Revelation, confirmed in Sacred Scripture, which the Church “at the divine command with the help of the Holy Spirit,…listens to devotedly, guards it with dedication and expounds it faithfully” (Dei Verbum 10): “In the beginning” God created man in his own image, male and female he created them and blessed them, that they might be fruitful (cf. Gen. 1, 27-28), whereby the Apostle Paul teaches that to deny sexual difference is the consequence of the denial of the Creator (Rom 1, 24-32).
It is asked: Can the Church derogate from this “principle,” considering it, contrary to what Veritatis Splendor 103 taught, as a mere ideal, and accepting as a “possible good” objectively sinful situations, such as same-sex unions, without betraying revealed doctrine? [Emphasis original]
The letter they received from Francis was seven pages in total, with a page and a half given to responding to the issue of same-sex “blessings.”
Francis stated that “the Church has a very clear conception of marriage: an exclusive, stable and indissoluble union between a man and a woman, naturally open to the begetting of children.”
Due to only this union being “marriage,” wrote Francis, “the Church avoids any kind of rite or sacramental that could contradict this conviction and give the impression that something that is not marriage is recognized as marriage.”
However, he continued by expressing an openness to other forms of unions, including same-sex couples, being granted a “blessing.”
Nevertheless, in our dealings with people, we must not lose the pastoral charity that must permeate all our decisions and attitudes. The defense of objective truth is not the only expression of this charity, which is also made up of kindness, patience, understanding, tenderness and encouragement. Therefore, we cannot become judges who only deny, reject and exclude.
Pope Francis further stated:
For this reason, pastoral prudence must adequately discern whether there are forms of blessing, requested by one or more persons, that do not transmit a mistaken conception of marriage. Because when a blessing is requested, it is expressing a request for help from God, a plea to be able to live better, a trust in a Father who can help us to live better. [Emphasis not original]
On the other hand, although there are situations that from an objective point of view are not morally acceptable, pastoral charity itself demands that we do not simply treat others as “sinners” whose guilt or responsibility may be due to their own fault.
The Pope added that such decisions which “form part of pastoral prudence, should not necessarily become a norm.”
That is to say, that one country or diocese might deem it “pastorally prudent” to “bless” homosexual couples, while another might not.
“Canon Law should not and cannot cover everything, nor should the Episcopal Conferences claim to do so with their various documents and protocols, because the life of the Church runs through many channels in addition to the normative ones,” he added.
It was due to receipt of this letter from the Pope that the five dubia cardinals issued their August 21 correspondence, with the line: “With the same sincerity with which You have answered us, we must add that Your answers have not resolved the doubts we had raised, but have, if anything, deepened them.”
They stated in the second letter that any “blessing” of same-sex couples “might create confusion in any case, not only in that it might make them seem analogous to marriage, but also in that homosexual acts would be presented practically as a good, or at least as the possible good that God asks of people in their journey toward Him.”
READ: Vatican and Cardinal Fernández fire back at cardinals’ new dubia about the Synod on Synodality
The five cardinals thus asked:
Is it possible that in some circumstances a pastor could bless unions between homosexual persons, thus suggesting that homosexual behavior as such would not be contrary to God’s law and the person’s journey toward God? Linked to this dubium is the need to raise another: does the teaching upheld by the universal ordinary magisterium, that every sexual act outside of marriage, and in particular homosexual acts, constitutes an objectively grave sin against God’s law, regardless of the circumstances in which it takes place and the intention with which it is carried out, continue to be valid?
Pope Francis has not responded to this question.
In his first letter to the Corinthians, St. Paul states that homosexual actions are sinful, explaining that “neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers” will “inherit the kingdom of God,” but rather, according to his letter to the Romans, those who practice homosexuality will receive “in their own persons the due penalty for their error.”
Under the leadership of Cardinal Ratzinger in 1986, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) issued a document instructing bishops on the pastoral care of homosexual persons. The CDF admonished bishops to ensure they, and any “pastoral programme” in the diocese are “clearly stating that homosexual activity is immoral.”
READ: Pope Francis leads ecumenical leaders at Vatican prayer vigil for the Synod on Synodality
Such an authentic pastoral approach would “assist homosexual persons at all levels of the spiritual life: through the sacraments, and in particular through the frequent and sincere use of the sacrament of Reconciliation, through prayer, witness, counsel and individual care,” stated the CDF.
The instruction adds:
But we wish to make it clear that departure from the Church’s teaching, or silence about it, in an effort to provide pastoral care is neither caring nor pastoral. Only what is true can ultimately be pastoral. The neglect of the Church’s position prevents homosexual men and women from receiving the care they need and deserve.
Therefore special concern and pastoral attention should be directed toward those who have this condition, lest they be led to believe that the living out of this orientation in homosexual activity is a morally acceptable option. It is not.
In 2021, the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith (DDF) – now led by Cardinal Fernández – stated clearly that the Church does not “power to give the blessing to unions of persons of the same sex.”
The DDF stated that it is “not licit to impart a blessing on relationships, or partnerships, even stable, that involve sexual activity outside of marriage (i.e., outside the indissoluble union of a man and a woman open in itself to the transmission of life), as is the case of the unions between persons of the same sex.”
But as part of the response to the five dubia cardinals’ question about Pope John Paul II’s Apostolic Letter Ordinatio Sacerdotalis definitive statement that it is impossible to ordain women, the Pope’s July 11 letter stated:
let us acknowledge that a clear and authoritative doctrine has not yet been exhaustively developed about the exact nature of a “definitive statement.”
It is not a dogmatic definition, and yet it is to be observed by all. No one can publicly contradict it and yet it can be the subject of study, as is the case with the validity of ordinations in the Anglican Communion.
It seems that both in practice and in writing, Pope Francis and his new vice-roy Cardinal Fernández have not come to terms with the concept of a “definitive statement,” and the impossibility of blessing what Scripture denotes as sinful.
My wife and I are trying to keep her mother from seeing this. She is a life long Catholic, with dementia, and not doing well. This may push her over the edge.
So in Frankenchurch, it's up to the individual priest to decide whether or not to bless active, unrepentant sodomites, but heaven help him, if he attempts to offer a TLM unless he has specific, personal permission from the dictator pope.
Is it possible for a heretic to be Pope?
He does not have the mental bearing to be considered a serious leader.
:Leadership” Whats that?
Please. please Ebby, get your Lexapro, nitroglycerin, medical marijuana, tequila and all the other support you can get as the anticipation and anxiety of seems immanent is about to kill you. “Here I come, Elizabeth, it’s the big one.”
So the idea of ignoring Catholic doctrine has been revised to... If you want to ignore Catholic doctrine, go for it???
It will take time to clean up this Pope’s mess of the Catholic church.
And Ebby, in the meantime, before the intoxicants can kick-in, try finding and reading more rational discussions (we all know the term “homosexual” is frenzy inducing for you):
https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/4186651/posts
All the above will work.
"[Catholic Caucus] Pope Francis to clergy: Decide for yourselves whether to ‘bless’ homosexual unions"
FR: Never Accept the Premise of Your Opponent’s Argument
Based on Proverbs 14:12, there is a way that seems right to a man but leads to death.
In fact, 1 Corinthians 6:9-10 warns "Do not be deceived" about sexual immorality including same-sex sexual relationships because you will not inherit the kingdom of heaven.
Not a matter for the Church, the Pope, nor any person to decide -
God decided this already. Scripture is clear.
All opposition is Satanic in nature and must be resisted by all means.
heaven -> G-d
So...can clergy decide for themselves that they will no longer be PC in sermons without being censured or even defrocked? That would probably get me back to Mass.
It means he is not pope
"Gallup: Voters Overwhelmingly Want GOP in Charge of 'Most Important Problems,' Reject Democrat Policies"
FR: Never Accept the Premise of Your Opponent’s Argument
The Gallop poll completely sidesteps the idea of a constitutionally limited power federal government imo.
In fact, one of the main reasons that citizens would need get in contact with their peacetime federal representatives is to complain about the price of postage stamps, delivering the mail being one of the very few powers that the states have expressly constitutionally given to the feds to dictate domestic policy.
"Article I, Section 8, Clause 7: To establish Post Offices and post Roads;"
"From the accepted doctrine that the United States is a government of delegated powers, it follows that those not expressly granted, or reasonably to be implied from such as are conferred, are reserved to the states, or to the people. To forestall any suggestion to the contrary, the Tenth Amendment was adopted. The same proposition, otherwise stated, is that powers not granted are prohibited [emphasis added]." —United States v. Butler, 1936.
In other words, most federal policy is now wrongly based on state powers, and uniquely associated state revenues, that the corrupt, constitutionally undefined political parties that have pirated control of state and federal government have stolen from the states, state revenues and citizens' wallets stolen by means of unconstitutional federal taxes.
"Congress is not empowered to tax for those purposes which are within the exclusive province of the States." —Justice John Marshall, Gibbons v. Ogden, 1824.
“If the tax be not proposed for the common defence, or general welfare, but for other objects, wholly extraneous, (as for instance, for propagating Mahometanism among the Turks, or giving aids and subsidies to a foreign nation, to build palaces for its kings, or erect monuments to its heroes,) it would be wholly indefensible upon constitutional principles [emphases added].” — Justice Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution 2 (1833).
From the congressional record:
”Simply this, that the care of the property, the liberty, and the life of the citizen, under the solemn sanction of an oath imposed by your Constitution, is in the States and not in the federal government [emphases added]. I have sought to effect no change in that respect in the Constitution of the country.” —John Bingham, Congressional. Globe. 1866, page 1292 (see top half of third column)
Pelosi: "We have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it." (non-FR; 6 sec.)
“Cherish, therefore, the spirit of our people, and keep alive their attention. If once they become inattentive to the public affairs, you and I, and Congress and Assemblies, judges and governors, shall all become wolves [emphasis added]. It seems to be the law of our general nature.” - Thomas Jefferson (Letter to Edward Carrington January 16, 1787)
Democrats Are Terrified Of An Educated And Informed Public (3.12.23)
The next major political event in the US is not Democratic and Republican Trump supporters reelecting hopeful Trump for the second time, but patriots primarying ALL incumbent state and federal lawmakers and executives in 2024, except for MTG, Gaetz (others?), replacing them with Trump-supporting patriots.
After all, lawmakers and executives continue to show that they do not have the patriotism and leadership skills necessary to find legislative support for effective remedies for unconstitutional government policies.
Trump can endorse true patriots from lists that patriots who are up to speed on the federal government's constitutionally limited powers give him.
Pope Francis is a deeply confused man.
The question that nags me is, What was the Holy Spirit trying to tell us by allowing such a Pope in this time?
Neither side is keeping this very simple. Here’s how this should play out ...
“Pope ... can we bless gay marriages?”
“No.”
Simple question, simple answer. It shouldn’t take pages upon pages and repeated questions to resolve this.
The cardinals' second dubia was rephrased to pose simple questions that required only "Yes" or "No" responses. Bergoglio and Fernadez never responded to the second dubia.
And the cardinals are fishing for the answer they want to hear. They’ll keep asking until they get it.
They’re not fishing. They are asking legitimate questions pertaining to faith and morals.
It’s Bergoglio and Tucho who are crawfishing around with their nebulous responses.
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