A well informed and valued contributor to this website wrote the following comment regarding the retirement of Pope Benedict XVI.
“His break with tradition by creating a Pope Emeritus position will, I am afraid, reflect poorly on him and perhaps eclipse that which he should be remembered for. We are in uncharted territory here and it has thrown the Church into pandemonium after the Galen mafia got their man elected and Benedict XVI’s silence is deafening during these difficult and confusing times.
I write as an Anglican, but I can fully appreciate and go along with what is obviously a deeply held conviction. Despite being a pastor of the Anglican Communion I was profoundly moved and impressed by Pope Benedict’s visit to the UK. He brought with him a refreshing Spirit of holiness and love to these islands. I watched each day on BBC TV his visits and celebrations of the Mass
His holiness visited England and Scotland on a four-day Papal visit from 16-19 September 2010. The Holy Father flew initially to Scotland where he was received by Her Majesty The Queen. Later he celebrated a public Mass at Bellahouston Park in Glasgow. In England, amongst other things, His Holiness made a speech to British civil society at Westminster Hall, met with the leaders of other Christian traditions, took part in a service of Evening Prayer with the Archbishop of Canterbury, led a prayer vigil, met with leaders and people of other faiths and beatified the nineteenth century theologian and educationalist Blessed John Henry Newman.
He represented for me all that his Divine Office implied. I was therefore disappointed and not a little shocked when he announced that he was retiring. It didn’t seem right. I couldn’t have imagined St Peter retiring as Chief Pastor of the Apostolic Church. Surely the keys were given to Pope Benedict for his life time as the successor of St Peter? Should he have passed them on to someone else?
Has the Papacy been devalued? Belonging to the Anglo Catholic wing of the Church of England I have to some extent looked to the Papacy as the upholder of the faith “once delivered to the saints.” How will history judge him?
Pope Benedict giving Benediction.
All Along the Watchtower 
I hope I’m not crossing the line when I say this, but I have my suspicions that much of the anger directed at Benedict XVI has less to do with breaking tradition and more do with strong dislike of Pope Francis being projected onto him. I seem to recall that during Benedict XVI’s papacy, there were a fair number of self-styled traditionalists on the internet bewailing him as just another modernist copy of St. John Paul II. I will put my biases on the table and say that I like Pope Francis, though I also liked Benedict XVI for his theological acumen (I don’t think we need to accept the false dichotomy of Benedict vs. Francis that we often find in internet comment sections). All speculation aside, despite my liking for the current pope, I do question the wisdom of stepping down from the papacy for who knows what reason; it lends itself to too much unhealthy speculation and increases the bitterness of division if the next pope is not well-received by many within the Church.
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Steven, I always enjoy agreeing with a fellow poster and I do with you. Stepping down, even for all the right reasons, leaves a sense of incomplete work.
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The mystery of all of this is quite simply the legitimacy of this situation, Steven.
‘Back on April 29, 2009, Pope Benedict XVI did something rather striking, but which went largely unnoticed.
‘He stopped off in Aquila, Italy, and visited the tomb of an obscure medieval Pope named St. Celestine V (1215-1296). After a brief prayer, he left his pallium, the symbol of his own episcopal authority as Bishop of Rome, on top of Celestine’s tomb!’__ Scott Hahn
Now Pope St. Celestine V passed a law that allowed for his abdication and thereafter abdicated. Pope Benedict has carved out a unique halfway measure that the Church has never seen before: a Pope Emeritus where, as he stated he will be the contempletive side of the Papacy . . . a type of diarchy. It is not normal no matter how hard everyone wants to see this just another passing thing.
He chose the title Benedict XVI because of a personal compassionate view of Benedict XV [the Pope of Fatima]. Benedict the 15 was chosen for his young age at the time and only lasted about 7 years. He was Pope during WWI and was hated by both the Germans and the French for declaring the Church’s neutrality during the war. But he tried and largey succeeded in bringing peace back to the Church whilst it seems that the war Benedict XVI fought was more internal it appears that he never fully brought about peace between the warring factions of the traditionalists and the liberal or modernist wings of the Church. Now Francis has thrown in his lot with the latter and Benedict can only look on and remain silent as he watches his work and that of his predecessor undermined and unraveled bit by bit.
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This puzzles me Scoop:
‘Pope Benedict has carved out a unique halfway measure that the Church has never seen before: a Pope Emeritus where, as he stated he will be the contempletive side of the Papacy . . . a type of diarchy. It is not normal no matter how hard everyone wants to see this just another passing thing.’
Do you have a source for BXVI saying he will be the contemplative part of the Papacy and that he sees it as a dyarchy? I can’t find one, and nothing he has done gives credence to the idea that that is how he sees things?
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It wasn’t Benedict who ever said this; if my memory is correct it was a comment by his personal secretary Bishop Georg Ganswein (who was then heavily criticised for making the comment, with good reason, as you infer above.)
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That was my recollection, Francis, but I couldn’t quite focus on who said it; it certainly was not BXVI; thanks for clarifying this for us.
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Yes and they are the words of Abp. Georg Ganswain. This one account is from 1P5 but there are others who dealt with it in more detail.
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We have heard something similar recently from Archbishop Georg Gänswein, personal secretary to Pope Benedict and Prefect of the Papal Household of Pope Francis, about an “expanded Petrine ministry” with an “active and a contemplative member.” Said Gänswein in a recent speech:
“From the election of his successor, Pope Francis—on 13 March 2013—there are not then two Popes, but de facto an enlarged ministry with an active and a contemplative member. For this reason, Benedict has not renounced either his name or his white cassock. For this reason, the correct title with which we must refer to him is still “Holiness.” Furthermore, he has not retired to an isolated monastery, but [has retired] within the Vatican, as if he had simply stepped aside to make space for his Successor, and for a new stage in the history of the Papacy, which he, with that step, has enriched with the centrality of [prayer] and of compassion placed in the Vatican Gardens.”
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With a sad heart and a goodly dose of anxiety, my hope is that he is remembered, at the very least, with great compassion.
“My dear friends – at this moment I can only say: pray for me, that I may learn to love the Lord more and more. Pray for me, that I may learn to love his flock more and more – in other words, you, the holy Church, each one of you and all of you together. Pray for me, that I may not flee for fear of the wolves.” ___ Homily of Benedict XVI, MASS, IMPOSITION OF THE PALLIUM AND CONFERRAL OF THE FISHERMAN’S RING FOR THE BEGINNING OF THE PETRINE MINISTRY OF THE BISHOP OF ROME, St. Peter’s Square,Sunday, 24 April 2005
https://w2.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/homilies/2005/documents/hf_ben-xvi_hom_20050424_inizio-pontificato.html
It would appear that our prayers were not enough to sustain and to protect this instrument of God from fleeing for the fear of the wolves.
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. “Grant that we may be one flock and one shepherd! Do not allow your net to be torn, help us to be servants of unity!”
Scoop, In Benedict’s sermon, which you posted, that sentence especially caught my eye. The responsibility of the Papal vocation must be enormous. So much is expected and the burden intolerable. We’re living at a time when our civilization as we have known it is collapsing. The Papacy is possibly the only unchanging reality in a changing world. There’s all the more reason for the trumpet call both to be constant and to be heard.
Their sound hath gone forth into all the earth: and their words unto the ends of the world. (Psalm 19 : 4)
It was one of the Psalms set to-day for the Anglican Morning Office.
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Interesting Malcolm.
In 2008 Cardinal Caffara granted an interview that was translated into English:
Q. There is a prophecy by Sister Lucia dos Santos, of Fatima, which concerns “the final battle between the Lord and the kingdom of Satan”. The battlefield is the family. Life and the family. We know that you were given charge by John Paul II to plan and establish the Pontifical Institute for the Studies on Marriage and the Family.
Yes, I was. At the start of this work entrusted to me by the Servant of God John Paul II, I wrote to Sister Lucia of Fatima through her Bishop as I couldn’t do so directly. Unexplainably however, since I didn’t expect an answer, seeing that I had only asked for prayers, I received a very long letter with her signature – now in the Institute’s archives. In it we find written: the final battle between the Lord and the reign of Satan will be about marriage and the family. Don’t be afraid, she added, because anyone who works for the sanctity of marriage and the family will always be fought and opposed in every way, because this is the decisive issue. And then she concluded: however, Our Lady has already crushed its head.
Talking also to John Paul II, you felt too that this was the crux, as it touches the very pillar of creation, the truth of the relationship between man and woman among the generations. If the founding pillar is touched the entire building collapses and we see this now, because we are at this point and we know it. And I’m moved when I read the best biographies of Padre Pio , on how this man was so attentive to the sanctity of marriage and the sanctity of the spouses, even with justifiable rigor on occasion.
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If this doesn’t seem like the midst of that battle with satan I cannot for the life of me know what that batte will look like. Though satans head is crushed by the defined teachings of Holy Church, it seems that the German Bishops and Francis have created a confusion regarding the teaching. The same can be said in regards to contraception and abortion; both family issues.
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Scoop, That was an extremely relevant interview and a prophetic voice that needs to be heard in these perilous times.
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I also feel very sad that he chose to retire. But he was between a rock and a hard place; if he had stayed, in growing weakness, he would have lost his grip on the Curia (and he had watched this happen under John Paul II); by resigning he created a bad precedent and it has led to much turmoil in the Church (though I have to say the Church has survived worse turmoils in her 2000 year history).
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He never had a grip on the Curia that developed during the latter years of JPII. They had a grip on him . . . perhaps around his neck? 🙂
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Like, I think, everyone who has commented and most of our readers, I, too, regret Benedict’s abdication, but Francis Phillips is on the mark in what she says. Benedict trusted to the Holy Spirit to give the Church what it needed. We got Francis. That gives rise to two thoughts on my part: that we are meant to have him; and that from the having of him, something needful to the Church will come. God trains his children, like any good father. We may not like the process, but the results will be worth it – or so says (in paraphrase) the author of Hebrews.
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I remain of the opinion that despite Francis’ imperfections and perhaps less-than-stellar ways he’s gone about some things, I think the Holy Spirit has called him into office to guide the Church somewhere new. Yes there are problems that need fixing (God help our liturgy and religious orders!), but the institutional Church in her humanness is all too comfortable with reveling in the status quo. Maybe I’m wrong here, but I really believe what we’re witnessing is God moving the Church out of her comfortable institutional status quo and into more of a “in the trenches” mode with both the faithful and those who struggle to be faithful. With this I believe a certain amount of “house cleaning” shall also be accomplished by God, as the scriptures tell us that judgement begins in the house of God.
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I am hoping this is what is happening!
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I’m optimistic about the Church’s future; if I’m going to lose faith in the papacy over a pope that I may at times have concerns over, then why bother being Catholic? The Orthodox have better liturgy, strong theology, and don’t have to worry about one man at their head messing everything up. They of course have their own problems and ongoing crises, but I guess that’s my point.
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Indeed hope is a good thing Francis. As long, of course, that it doesn’t make room for a thing to be true and untrue at the same time.
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No indeed! I am thinking of the word ‘hope’ as one of the 3 theological virtues.
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I thought so my dear friend . . . just my sense of humor that many seem to miss. 🙂
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I would be open to this view, Steven. Although it is tiring at times, he has a point about ‘rigorists’ and it is the same point Our Lord made. I am sure that the Pharisees thought they were right and quoted the letter of the Law and precedent; I am equally clear Our Lord did not think that a sufficient response. In so far as Francis reminds us of this, he does something needful.
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I’m increasingly of the opinion that much of this online controversy is little more than idle talk. With the exception of today’s involvement in this discussion, I have recently been pulling back away from social media and all the controversies about this stuff, and focusing more on my local parish and spiritual development under the guidance of my confessor. I quite agree that Francis’ strong suit is his insistence on the pastoral aspect of the Church’s ministry and of how to discern the balance between rule of law and mercy for the bruised reeds. I strongly suspect that’s a big reason God lead him into his ministry is Vicar of Christ. Otherwise, if he’s just an anti-pope or a heretic who’s about to destroy the Church, then why even remain Catholic if the Church can be so easily destroyed after winning tougher battles in the past?
Peace and blessings to all, regardless of whether we may see eye to eye on this stuff.
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This is well said. I have a friend who seems obsessed by this present papacy (and not in a positive way.) He is annoyed with me for not joining in the anti-Francis debate. I tell him I have better things to do (like loving my neighbour – or trying to…)
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. . . or has he used the ‘rigorist and pharisaical argument’ as a club against the divine commandments themselves and the direct words of Our Lord? There is an immense difference.
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Is that not precisely what those who were quoting the Ten Commandments and the Torah, the revealed word of God to the Jews, said to the Lord? From their point of view, Jesus was saying things which clearly transgressed the divine revelation as they understood it.
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Not at all. They were making exceptions for the law and Jesus scolded them for it.
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Do you think that in upbraiding Our Lord for working on the Sabbath they were making exceptions? Surely they were saying ‘the law says this and you are not doing that’ – in their eyes he was the one making exceptions, surely?
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And so you would conflate an intrinic evil with the misconception that one did not have to abandon all earthly obligations simply because it was the Sabbath. Your intent still has to be to keep the Sabbath Holy. The rest was a poor reading of that instruction. In both adultery and the Sabbath he brought them back to the letter of the law.
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But surely one response to that, it that is what all liberal catholics do, try to read the divine instructions in a way which allows them to do what they think ought to be allowed? After all, who gave Moses the Law? Do you really feel that when the Pharisees are unbraiding Our Lord that on the whole they think him a rigorist? I can’t think of an issue other than divorce where they are not hard on him because they think he’s playing fast and loose with the divine law.
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First of all, Francis is not Christ Who alone had the ability to change that which was already codified into the faith. If you are willing to let 2000 years of Church teaching be upturned like a cart of money changers on the whim of Francis then there is nothing left to defend. It is the same type of governance that the Muslims have. Each new leader can change the teaching to exactly the opposite of the preceding one and it is the new will of Allah.
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But then to the Pharisees, Jesus was not God, he was a man challenging what God had told Moses and their ancestors. So, in rebuking the rigorists, the successor of St Peter is warning them, as the successor of St Peter, that the yoke they are putting on the faithful is too heavy. Who, other than the successor of St Peter has that right, and, if that is how he sees it, that duty? This isn’t, in his eyes, about changing teaching, it is about lightening the yoke. I don’t agree with him, but then no one abdicated and made me Pope.
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He is not warning them . . . he is encouraging them to ignore the commandments as it is a sin against memory.
You are perhaps as much the Pope as the one we are speaking of C. Don’t be such a rigorist. 🙂
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If the successor of St Peter cannot speak his mind as he sees it, what use would he be? If it is simply a matter of keeping the Commandments then there is no need for anyone to interpret anything and no development, surely?
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Yes after all he sees copraphagia everywhere he goes. He seems to have a rather perverted mind.
So the constants of Church teaching stands in need for interpretation due to our not understanding plain and simple doctrines and they stand in need of being developed in a way that negates the original and traditional values and understanding. I think such interpretations are far from the mind of your beloved Blessed Cardinal Newman.
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He has said it a couple of times, I think. Odd, but then I am not an Argentinian and don’t know if it is one commonly used in Argentinian slang.
It is precisely the difficult of establishing what is and is not a genuine development which necessitated the Magisterium. One may say one does not agree with it, and one may have one’s reasons, but one is pitting that against the Magisterium. As I understand it, Francis has not said any of this using Magisterial authority. He is doing what has happened before in our history, which is provoking a debate. Those who don’t want one because they think all is settled can sit it out, or they can holler #notmypope, but rather like the anti-Trumpers, they won’t stop the debate.
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If it is common in Argentina then Argentinian’s are a very flawed culture of human beings.
Yes, the Magisterium was needed and it is precisely formed according to the Church by those who are union with their Pope and the teachings of the Church. Insofar as we may have to negate all previous Popes and Magisteriums in order to give validity to the present one, is it not right and just to examine everyone by their orthodoxy? That is not being one’s own Magisterium it is a matter of survival when many are apostatizing themselves from the Church. Are we to stand about and yawn or are we to cry out like the ladies at Christ’s tomb: Where have they taken my Church?
I’m sure She will arise from the tomb as did Christ but woe to those who have tried to kill Her and hide Her from our sight or attribute lies to Her.
The final battle for the family is in full swing and I need take a firm stance. In order to that I have to try to make sense out of that which is seemingly insensical.
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There is a danger in this. Who is the ‘we’ who might have to decide who is and is not apostatising? Surely this is the job of the Magisterium?
As I understand it, and I may be wrong, the Pope is not giving some of the comments you mention Magisterial status, and therefore we are all at liberty to say that these are things with which we disagree. But there’s a huge difference between that and using words such as ipso facto excommunication, as though anyone of us has that authority.
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The ‘we’ is every individual who in the end will have to deterimine as best they can what is good and proper for their soul and what is not. It is always this way. But it is not always so obvious that we have a divided magisterium and a breach in our understanding of what the Catholic Church teaches. Each must ferret out their own answers I’m afraid as there is nobody out there who is glowing with a radiant light and no voices saying: listen to him for he is my only begotten son. When bishops and cardinals are so diametrically opposed one should be concerned that both cannot be right.
Ipso facto excommunication is Latae sententiae excommunication and it is a well accepted rule of the Church as you know. Bishop Bruskewitz declared that anyone who was involved in ACTA were ipso facto excommunicated due to their heretical beliefs. Was he wrong to do so?
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Latae Sententiae applies in a set number of canon law situations and it is not clear to me that membership of Acta is covered by these – but if a Bishop says they are, I’m not arguing with him. What I am arguing with is the idea that an individual Catholic can use it as a sort of ‘gotcha’. That’s a bit like the habit of the left of shouting ‘waacist’ and thinking they’ve won an argument. Left and Right argue in quite similar ways – seeking to signal their own virtue whilst impugning that of others. This seems to me neither particularly Christian, nor especially helpful as a means of discussing serious issues on which Christians can sincerely hold opposing views.
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It was sent to JPII and contested. The Church agreed with him and yet no other bishops did the same . . . that tells you something right there. Many bishops are afraid to act on anything that might be unpopular.
Discerning what people are saying and doing is not a sort of ‘gotcha’ it is an objective ‘gotcha’. If they preach another gospel we are warned quite clearly to reject it. It is our duty to do so.
The serious issue at hand is how can 2+2=4 be of equal value to 2+2=5.
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Again, the view that ‘this is another Gospel’ is, in your hands or mine, an opinion, therefore it is a form of ‘gotcha’, which is why it doesn’t work. Signalling one’s own virtue whilst casting doubt on that of others is not a form of debating which is likely to convince others – that’s clear to you and I with the anti-Trumpers, but it is clear only to me with regard to Traditionalists, it would seem?
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There is no signalling of one’s own virtue . . . those are weasel words that mean nothing. It is objective evaluation by use of reason to either make sense of someone’s words in respect to my vow to abide by the teachings of the Church or not. Now I must rely on my own logic to assume I understood the teaching and I have to do the same to those who seem to speak in opposition to that understanding. So why won’t the Pope answer the dubia? Are the bishops of Malta and Argentina right? Are the communions of adulterers recently in Germany sound? How about the admittance of Lutherans to Catholic communion?
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But that is precisely what a social justice warrior would say to our charge that they were virtue signalling. They think they are conducting an objective evaluation by reason, that reason being the standards of a liberal social order. By that, you and I look like bigots for not approving gay ‘marriage’ and the woman’s ‘right’ to have an abortion on demand. Of course, the virtue signaller never admits to doing that, because in his or her own mind that is not what they are doing. But to those on the other end, that looks precisely like what is being done.
In terms of your questions, these are precisely the issues under discussion. Naturally one would like a cut and dried answer, but if the Pope and many Bishops think a discussion is needed, then they would, I suspect, be behaving as they are.
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Since when did a liberal ever objectively argue an issue C. You must be overworked. God bless you man!
Well if we don’t approve for religious reasons we will no longer need bother with that . . . if things keep degenerating on schedule.
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Which is, of course, precisely what a liberal would say about a traditionalist. An eye for an eye makes the whole world world blind.
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Then they will answer the very simple questions presented by the dubia which was made quite respectfully and which has reaped a whirlwind of confusion around the world.
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Your view, and mine, but alas, no one has made us either a Pope or a Bishop.
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Nope and thus we are orphaned by our leadership.
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Better that than, after Nicaea, that most Bishops side with error. One of the many virtues of history is it allows one to be thankful for small mercies 🙂
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Not sure about that yet either, C. The majority have remained silent through all of this.
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And if they were convinced of Apostasy would more than a few of them not have said so? If not, then one can say they are cowards – or one could say they are less convinced than you are that what the journalists are saying is the unbiased truth. I am very wary of judging anyone’s immortal soul on the basis of the media.
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So am I. And I am equally wary of saying that we have a majority of orthodox bishops to ensure our safety. I don’t think anyone outside of God knows the balance. The prophecies attest to this battle and I suspect that there are those on both sides. But I cannot say that this side has the majority or the other side has the majority. Maybe you can?
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All discussion is about establishing orthodoxy – the Spirit guides the Church and despite man’s best efforts, she ends up in the right place 🙂
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It will do so, my friend, though it does not mean that there won’t be moments where she is being guided toward the wrong place. It is a truth concerning Her final outcome though not of its present state. We do get winnowed now and then and we do have to endure internal sufferings from time to time but I do trust She will end aright. 🙂
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She will, we have His promise. But it can be bewildering for us mere mortals 🙂
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It can be indeed. I appreciate your arguments and only wish that they were convincing enough to clear the air. But alas, I see a parallel to the demonic entaglement of many of our bishops all the way up to a Cardinal that makes it hard for me to think that such disorder does not extend beyond the borders of the US. Afraid that my own experiences and information in these cases leaves open possibilities that I truly wish were not on the table. But life being as it is . . . we all have life experiences that teach and inform in ways that nothing else can. So I have a bias that it undeniable as I detest being manipulated by those who would use false narratives to perpetrate the illusions that want us to buy into.
But your opinion is based on your own set of experiences and knowledge and I cannot doubt that you advise and offer answers that would be very helpful if I hadn’t been down this road of discovering deep corruption in the past within this country. These are sad times and I am quite frankly tired and not energetic enough to be a true warrior . . . simply a critic that is skeptical about much . . . just looking to be on the right side of the war for the soul of the Church.
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It has been a useful discussion my friend, and I am far from denying that Satan is not prowling about seeking whom he might devour. One of the few things being an historian gives me is a longer perspective. Satan has often found allies, some of them unwitting ones, in the Church, but in the longer term he is defeated. Often, in eras where there was no media, most of the faithful had no idea there were discussions and disputes. Now we can know there are at the drop of a hat, and the media being what it is, the reports will always tend to emphasise the lurid and controversial elements.
I sympathise, and empathise with your experiences, having had similar ones, but in the end I believe in Christ’s promise about the Church enduring.
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If we are talking about the individuals that make up the magisterium and not specifically the pope are we not at least suspicious of the state of some who would openly defend gay sex, same sex marriage, contraception, adultery, sex outside of marriage, abortion and other grave moral sins. Now if promoting such behavior is not gravely sinful in itself; then unrepentent of such teachings [contrary to the teachings of the Church] would in my mind negate their authority to teach; for they have broken their vow of obedience to the Church as well as leading souls to perdition willfully. Or is their no limit on their authority . . . an anything goes policy since they have absolute authority even over Christ and the Church?
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Again, are ‘we’ sure that what these bishops are arguing for is a blanket approval in all the cases you mention, or are they arguing something else which is more nuanced? One of the other things Left and Right do alike is to guy their opponents’ arguments by painting them with a broad brush.
Yes, if a bishop is saying adultery is fine and abortion is fine, that would certainly be a cause for concern. But is that the chosen headline or is it the substance of what is being said?
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Well if all news is fake then language and particularly all communication is to be discounted and rendered unfit for the job. How then do you move forward in life and know that you have given a good account of yourself? It seems to me that you take them at their word or at their stance on an issue at face value. If that can no longer be done and nobody from the hierarchy corrects them . . . then what is one to think? We may as well all just forget religion and become nones and hope in universal salvation.
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I am not saying all news is fake news, but I am saying that just as the Left tend to paint with a broad brush when describing the policies of Republican administrations, so do those of a conservative liturgical bent when expostulating on the views of liberal Catholics. As an academic, I am used to asking what lies beneath the headlines and examining the evidence rather than assuming the headline is the whole of the truth. That’s not relativism, it is common-sense – and, when dealing with one’s fellow Catholics, common courtesy. I think the Pope is a scold and could do with having better manners, but responding to him in like manner is not helpful. For all the talk of fighting fire with fire, you don’t often find fire brigades squirting liquid fire on burning buildings.
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The broad brush was wielded by past popes. All we need do is hang on to the faith that they handed down over the ages.
At what point does a man stand up agains the invectives that hurled at them? Even a pope is bound to be treated to such language in return for having initiated fights with just about everyone save the UN, petty dictators and his rather unusual cadre of professional yes men.
That is not fire on fire that is an attempt to blow away the smoke that has been issuing forth from the Vatican since his arrival.
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Except that no Pope thought he had decided all possible issues for all time. Yes, it would be jolly nice if things did not change and societies remained the same and nothing ever happened to provoke thought – or would it? The faith handed to us is the product of fierce debate in the past, and we should not be such snowflakes about the fact that our own time is another such period of debate.
I think Our Lord had a word or two on the subject of how a Christian should respond to being slapped in the face.
The current language used both by the Pope and his critics is creating a whole pile of smoke, a lot of heat and very little light.
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Once you have several hundred coats of paint of the same color on a canvass I think I can safely say the canvass is of a certain color and can also discern if a wildly different color is now being used.
You seem to not understand that smoke and confusion play a great part in war. One first has to aknowledge that this is a war being waged by our Lord and satan. If not, then it is simply men arguing for the sake of arguing . . . and there is no virtue in it for either side.
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Not sure the analogy works. One of Arius’ complaints was that never, in 300 years, had anyone used the word ‘Trinity’ and neither was the word ‘homoousios’ ever used in Scripture. Not did not stop the Church deciding they were the best descriptions for something which fierce debate had raised as an issue. The conservatives in Alexandria declined to accept the language of Chalcedon because there was no precedent for it, it was, they argued, novel and unsciptural. Yet history has judged they were wrong – although their descendants, the Copts, are with us still, and still, in many cases, arguing that Rome was wrong to add to the Creed the words ‘and of the Son’, which were not in Nicaea.
It is simply more complex than I think you seem willing to allow.
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I think satan takes the calculus that was done in the early years of the church and turned it on its head. Because after the calculus was done we could teach with confidence that 2+2=4 and we need not make it any more complex than that. If you want to have redo on everything and hope to get a new result then this Pontificate is for you.
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It would be good if theology was as simple as 2+2+4, but it has never been that simple – even the Apostles complained about unorthodoxy – and even among the ‘saved’. One reason I find our friend Bosco’s line ultimately unconvincing is that as any reading of Paul or John’s letters shows, the ‘saved’ did not just think 2+2=4. One could, of course, say in that case they were not really ‘saved’, but we’re into the ‘no true Scotsman’ fallacy there.
I wish it were easier, but many of our problems come from the fact that from about 150 years from 1848 through to the 1960s, the Church tried to pretend nothing had changed and that telling the world to stop because it wanted to get off was a a viable policy. It never was, and instead of having, as Newman wanted, continual discussion before issues became toxic, successive Pope tried to keep the lid on the pressure cooker – we have seen the effects of this since V2.
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Didn’t I just say as much about the calculus done in the early Church. They did the heavy lifting so that we would be left with the simple arithmetic.
I’m not sure of the validity of your assessment and I’m not sure anyone can explain it any better than to know that satan has pulled out the stops since V2 and a war has begun.
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I am afraid that the heavy lifting is constant. Some important Christological heavy lifting was done back then, but the idea we can relax and say ‘all is done’ is so clearly not the case, and wishing it were, whilst natural, won’t make it so 🙂
I do not think that Satan convened an ecumenical Council. The Holy Spirit guided St John XXIII because there were issues which needed to be thrashed out. We are in the middle of that process. It is uncomfortable, but we must bear it. No one ever said that every issue that could be considered by the human condition was a settled point of dogma; would it could be so, but were that the case, there would have been no Fall.
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Satan attacks human souls of course. But these same human souls are not exempt from his attacks simply because they are a bishop. Far from it. Satan desires to sift them like wheat all the more. His severest attacks are on such as these.
So you do not think that what our parents in the faith believed was sufficient to living a good life and coming to their reward? Thank goodness we were born when we were. Of course 100 years from now we find out that this was bunk and something new is needed.
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To each generation come the challenges which God thinks fit – this is our challenge, all we have to do is prove capable of meeting it. We shuold not have been sent it were that not the case 🙂
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Quite. I have little to contribute to this discussion, and so won’t. But C. is entirely correct, quite a few of us outside the Catholic church, also regretted Benedict’s retirement. Most of the hypotheses put forward here likely have merit. Francis also has strong points, particularly in pastoral care. But he does seem to have a fair number of weaknesses, as well.
I suspect that we will have to leave it that God has his purpose, and we can’t know it, but we know he works through imperfect instruments. That leaves me as unsatisfied as it does everybody, but it is likely to be so.
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Pope Benedict made a very profound contribution to Christianity generally. Nor only was he a brilliant theologian but he was also a good communicator of the Gospel He also had the gift of being a very adept celebrant of the Eucharist. There was a quiet and solemn beauty about his liturgical performances. The priest at the altar must not draw attention to himself, but in his own way enhance the Lord’s glory. After all the Lord Jesus Christ is the true celebrant of the Mass.
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And Francis sees such things as mere flippery and seems to have disdain for the transcendent in liturgy.
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I remember the days when a solemn High Mass in Westminster Cathedral was an offering of extraordinary power and beauty. The Tridentine Mass was a liturgical jewel.
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Indeed it was Heaven on Earth. We seem to have no desire for such anymore.
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I agree – but would have used the word ‘reverent’ rather than ‘adept’, and ‘celebrations’ rather than ‘performances’. Otherwise it seems as if we might be ‘rating’ the Mass like a concert performance.
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In the end it is still a question of legitimacy. Pope Francis must stand squarely upon the legitimacy of a possible ’emeritus’ Pope. We must decide if there was and is a provision for this new status.
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Sorry, I don’t see where there is ‘a question of legitimacy’? BXVI abdicated, Francis was chosen in the usual manner. The title ‘Pope emeritus’ is a courtesy one. BXVI asked to be called ‘Fr Benedict’. There is no ‘new status’. BXVI is not any kind of Pope save a retired one.
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Not according to Ganswein, surely.
Not according to the measures that JPII put on a valid consistory without campaigning behind the scenes. The St. Gallen Mafia admission was enough in my mind to fit the criteria of campaigning for a future Pope.
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There is either a Magisterium which says the Pope is the Pope, or there are random individuals who claim that for whatever reason they know better.
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It is always your fall-back position C. But is it not true that ipso facto excommunication is quite likely the situation in many of those magisterial slots. And if, as I suspect, there is coercion taking place throughout the upper echelons of the Church . . . would it not be a confused state that we are in? Where the magisterium is difficult to assess and the will of the Holy Spirit is being thwarted? It becomes increasingly difficult to decipher unless we judge them by their fruits . . . individually. And it is apparent to many that we have a host of cardinals and bishops who hold to a new Gospel and relish the upturning of the old outdated Church that Christ founded.
By the fruits and the fruitcakes we shall know them. 🙂
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We come back, as ever, to authority. Neither you nor I have any authority to decide who is and is not excommunicated. We can have an opinion, and most of us have those, but they count for nothing in matters such as excommunication. What is clear is that there is a Magisterium, it is acting, and some people don’t like it. There are, I am told, those who don’t like the result of the last US presidential election and who are suggesting that Trump is, ipso facto, not a real president. Is there is a difference between #notmypresident and #notmypope – asking, as they say, for a friend 🙂
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By their fruits . . .
Do you not even question those whom the Pope has elevated and those he has bludgeoned with his sharp tongue? Do you not find his ‘poopgate’ comments rather disturbing . . . usually a fettish that is only spoken of between sodomites? . . . or perhaps it was a mere tip of the hat to his favorite theologian, Martin Luther, to his snow covered dung routine. 🙂
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I am a fairly robust character, so little disturbs me. As I say, I don’t care for his use of language, but then I don’t speak Argentinian Spanish or know what sort of phrases might be taken for normal there; not knowing any sodomite fetishists, I had best not comment on what they do or don’t discuss. As for sharp tongues, well, it seems to me he and those who oppose him are both equipped with those, and I’m not sure that the sparks from the conflict are not generating more heat than the light one would hope for. As for Luther, I think it odd to celebrate him, but as long as he is not using his Magisterial authority to insist we all join in, that’s fine. As someone who has occasionally dipped into Luther’s collected works, I find him an interesting mind – a curious mixture of diamonds and the stuff Francis talks about. . 🙂
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Something is rotten in the state of Denmark. That is perhaps all any of us will ever know. But it is not light which are trying to generate on our own. We only want to blow away the fog that is enshrouding the Light that Christ already manifested in the Church.
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What some call ‘fog’ others call debate. I am struck by the similarities between #notmypresident and #notmypope
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Yes, so am I. Isn’t that a sign that something has gone off the tracks here?
Those bishops that held to JPII and Benedict XVI were during their pontificates the ones you would have defended. Now since we have the opposite views being extolled from on high, those whom were ‘in communion’ with the Church are suddenly no longer ‘in communion’ with the Church. Those who once were blatant dissenters are now the ones we are supposed to place our trust in. It was not meant to be like politics. It was supposed to have continuity; remember the old hermeneutic that we all tried feverishly to apply to everything? An hermeneutic of change is rather hard to swallow since we prided ourselves in the consistent teaching of the Church over the past 2000 years.
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I think we have to be careful here. The ‘consistent teaching of the Church’ has often been subject to severe debates. When Arius put forward his views, he defended them with Scriptural authority and many bishops agreed with him. Nicaea established he was wrong, or so it seemed, but within a few years most bishops were taking a position which was semi-Arian. It took 150 years for the position seemingly accepted at Nicaea to become ‘the consistent teaching of the Church’. I’d rather be part of a living Church that had these arguments than part of a museum which didn’t. Does it make it hard at times? Well, if you want a quiet life, don’t become a Catholic 🙂
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Yes, past tense. I am happy for the early arguments that gave us a clear theology and teaching. So why would welcome a newer theology that reintroduces confusion and doubt?
Nothing quiet about Catholics. The battles between our Lord and satan are rife within the Church. It is that which lets me know that I am in the Church that our Lord founded, indeed. 🙂
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Arguments come when they come. There is never going to be a period before the Second Coming when all is ‘settled’ and buttoned up. The idea that confusion and doubt is simply the result of some external assault may be true, but it may equally be the case that as societies change, so those changes need to be reacted to by the Church. There will always be those who just want to be like secular society, and there will always be those who want to have nothing to do with it: neither are ways signalled by the earthly ministry of Our Lord or his Apostles.
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Look if that is what the people in today’s church want to spend their time doing then they can rehash every doctrine we have. After all most Catholics couldn’t tell you what they believe even if they tried. So it is all new doctrine to them and they welcome it. For others of us who actually thought we understood what the Church taught and were bolstered by the consistency of the Popes to underscore those teachings then this is a scandal for the times.
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So it is for all who have the misfortune to live in turbulent times. On avergae it has taken 150 years after an ecumenical council for things to settle down. We are only fifty five years after the last one, I fear. This current debate is one that was ducked because the last two Popes were pretty conservative (not enough for some, of course). It had to come, it is upon us, and we must hold our nerve and make the best arguments we can. Saying those on the other side are de facto excommunicated, or that they are heartless rigorists is, bit doubt, good fun in terms of debating tactics – its usefulness in terms of resolving issues is to be doubted.
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They used to say 50. Time does seem to pass by much quicker these days . . . or is that simply showing my age?
I am not making a case that all are excommunicated . . . I am only making the point that if you have power and you corrupt an election for pope by use of that power you have become an enemy of the Church not one in authority. Unrepentent child abusers or enablers are certainly not fit to sit in a synod much less than a consistory.
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If the sin of the minister is no bar to the efficacy of the Sacraments, then I doubt it is a bar to their vote in a Synod. Again, the cry that the last papal election was rigged reminds me of the cries of the Sedes that that of John XXIII was rigged – it is what some people say at such times; it is usually to enable them to deny that they are being disloyal to the Pope #notmypope ?
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Well of course not. But that assumes that the person is sorry for his sins and will seek forgiveness when it is in the realm of unbelief of the teachings of the faith. Indeed his belief in doing what the Church intends is necessary or you do not have a valid sacrament. The Church can make up for sin but it cannot supply the necessary intent of the priest.
I only take the words of a member of the St. Gallen Mafia at his own words. You can dismiss them at will but I think that it is pertinent to this subject.
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No, I don’t think it says anywhere that the Sacraments are only valid if, retrospectively, the Minister is repentant. All this was sorted out during the Donatist debate.
Again, the so-called St Galen Mafia is, like the reported words of its members, verified only by the report of its opponents. It may or may not have existed. I know only one person who is supposedly associated with it, a UK Cardinal, and he is contemptuous of the idea. So, one takes the view that either ‘he would say that’, and, despite his track record, he is lying, or that newspaper reporters whose veracity one has not way of knowing, are right. I’ll go with the man I know.
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I am simply saying that to deny the teachings of the Church in matters of belief is not to be Catholic. It is illicit for an apostate to find ministry or any authority in the Church as an apostate.
Of course, why would those who are on board with the shenanigans care or repeat such things. As I recall it was a direct quote from a Cardinal but some time has passed and million other shoes have been dropped since his statement. I suppose a search in Google might yield some results.
So your UK Cardinal who is a member of St. Gallen’s Mafia is saying what exactly? That he is not a part of the group or that he is but they didn’t use their influence on anyone. I’m unclear by your words.
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But again, you paint with a very broad brush. You are judging, on the basis of media reports that Bishop X is an apostate. Oddly enough, not a single one of his fellow bishops nor the Pope, those legally qualified to pronounce such a sentence, agree with you. Such language certainly creates heat, but casts no light.
My Cardinal is saying that the so-called group is a media invention and that what is written about the Pope’s election is a lie. I know him well enough to make a judgment on his words; the journalists upon whose interpretations you rely may have give 60 years of service to the Catholic Church and have no other motive than the truth; I am unsure of their record, of his I am sure.
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I paint with a broad brush because I am not going to scandalize a person . . . it is the positions and the actions that are under scrutiny here. We have no direct line to the relationship of another’s soul. But if I cannot know what is true and what is false by yesterday’s standards in the Church then we have built our Church on sand which would be a foolish notion.
Thanks for the explanation it was unclear to me.
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I just wonder whether he might not be still the legitimate successor of St Peter despite having abdicated. I’m not saying that his abdication wasn’t sincere, but was it legitimate in the eyes of the Holy Spirit.
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There have been other abdications, and the new Pope was selected in the usual manner. Once one begins down the round of wondering ‘is it legitimate’ there is, perhaps, no ending. who decides? In the RCC it is the Magisterium. The Pope abdicated, that was accepted and new one chose in the usual manner.
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Understandable Malcolm. If you see a unicorn for the first time ever you doubt its legitimacy and it should be worthy of discussion and discernment. To dismiss it as business as usual is to me an attack on sanity itself. Everything else is almost peripheral to this basic abnormality.
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It occurs to me that without the continued presence of the Pope Emeritus the activities of clerical liberals would be more uninhibited than they are. So long as the possibility exists that Fr Benedict may speak out publicly against this or that action then these actions will not be undertaken. It may be that providence wills the Church to be tried but through him provides the safety net which she needs.
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I too pray that at some point Pope Benedict XVI will speak up but then as I look back at the pictures taken during his ‘active’ pontificate, he looked more and more like a victim of elder abuse like that we see so often these days in old age homes.
It is simply a mystery of how he regained his strength and robust health once he stepped aside. A mystery as to what role an ’emeritus’ pope has. A mystery that the homosexual element in the Vatican has not been dislodged. A mystery that the St. Gallen mafia wanted Bergoglio at the time of Ratzinger’s election. A mystery why Bergoglio was chosen once Benedict XVI stepped to the side. A mystery how almost everything that Benedict XVI and JPII taught are now being sytematically destroyed. A mystery that the battleground is proving to be precisely as the seer of Fatima proclaimed it to be.
I don’t think Bergoglio is inhibited at all by his presence. Almost as though he knew that there was no risk of being corrected by the former Pope even if he is diametricaly opposing much of what the former Pope taught.
There is nothing normal about these times. So let us pray that Pope Benedict is free to speak his mind and heart since he looks these days to be of similar mental distress as a victim of Stockholm Syndrome.
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In one sense its hilarious and in another its too sad to even think about. Religions. Their members trust in it and wake up in hell.
The two pictures above, one with Ratzinge holding up the bible, and the other, I guess hes holding god up, gingerly, in that golden cage. Don’t drop god, you know how sensitive he is. aaahhHa.AAAAAHHHHhaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAA. The fearless leader is holding up a book that he doesn’t believe one gat danged word of. Its just for show. He showing the world that he is a child of those that killed the Lord.
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Oh, I almost forgot what I was going to contribute…not wanting to go off the subject of the thread. heaven forbid. Ratzinger stepped down because of the Gay Cabal that runs the CC and resides in the Vatican. You know damn well hes always known the CC is a homers hangout. But he wasn’t going to go down in history as presiding over a gay bathouse. AAAAHHHHahahahahahahahahaha (;-D
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