“Luxembourg’s RTL media group quoted the cardinal as saying on July 25 that Catholics who expected the Church’s structure to be “completely changed” would be disappointed.”
So, make the Church a democracy and change its teachings on sexual morality. What was sacred for 1,500+ years (the traditional Latin Mass) is now odious, and what was odious and sinful for 2,000+ years is now sacred!
It would seem to me that if homosexuality is not a sin, and if remarriage after divorce is not adultery, then the Church is not what she claims to be. If you believe these things, why would you be a member of the Church? And, supposing the Church would change its teaching, why should anyone join an institution that says X is true one day and false the next? The Church would have no doctrinal integrity, which is, at root, something required for any religion to be true.
That has been the general drift of the Church ever since Vatican II - the protestantisation of the Catholic Church.
Most strikingly, this has occurred liturgically - with the Catholic Latin Mass of Ages being replaced by vernacular Protestant style worship. The new order Mass was created with the help of representatives of 6 major protestant denominations. The idea was to find a form of service which would be acceptable to all - this is why the new Mass is only vaguely Catholic compared to the traditional Mass.
The major architecht of the new Mass, Annibale Bugnnni, famously stated that we must remove from our prayers anything with is stumbling block to unity with protestants. The stumbling block for protestants is, of course, the Catholic faith - so its hardly a surprise that the new Mass is what it is.
There is a famous lie that the new Mass is what Vatican II asked for - but it isn't. (Francis and his sycophant, Austen Ivereigh, have been banging this drum again recently.) It's been a classic bait and switch - some limited scope for reform was used to throw the baby out with the bath water.
The new Mass doesn't resemble Vatican II's vision at all - Latin and Gregorian Chant have almost been fully expunged from the Church, for example, and the new Mass is different in ever Parish, Diocese and Nation. Where is the Catholicity in this situation?
The neo-reformers think the liturgy battle is won - especially with Francis now trying to roll back Benedict's progressive concessions to authentic Catholic worship - and so we now see the attacks on orthodox doctrine accelerate, as they turn their guns there.
(also, that most Catholics since Vatican II have had a very poor catechesis means that reformers now feel bold enough to attack openly, think few people will recognise what is going on).
I’m interested in what the response was to the small but probably vocal group at the Synod in Luxembourg calling for general availability of the TLM.
“ Cardinal Hollerich said earlier this year that he believed that the “sociological-scientific foundation” of the Church’s teaching on homosexuality was “no longer correct.” Seems like a pretty good summary to me. Bible? Tradition? Where’s the “sociological-scientific” in any of that old stuff? We want new stuff. Bring on the late 20th century scientism.
I didn't know the Church's foundation was "sociological -scientific". I thought it was Divine Revelation articulated as far as human reason can approach it via some form of metaphysical realism and all that implies about "human nature".
> integrate women by giving them responsibilities, abolish mandatory celibacy
It's becoming increasingly odd to me that the idea "women are important" and the idea "men have needs [and those needs are: women]" are more-or-less always found together when I read articles about people's visions for the future, but I suppose that no one intends it to look odd, they just haven't thought it through.
The Synodal report also said a respondents firmly believed that "Cardinal Hollerich is the most handsome Cardinal in the Catholic Church." Remarkable. That wasn't even one of the discussion topics.
At what point does this become the Synod on Confirmation Bias?
I would like to see some reporting on what the heck is supposed to happen at the Synod on Synodality. In the west, most countries are returning results that request radical changes to Church teaching. The effort appears to be coordinated.
Cd. Hollerich is running the Synod, and we know where his sympathies lie. Also, it’s hard not to believe that this isn’t all happening with Francis’ tacit, at least, approval.
What can the faithful expect when this thing kicks off? What are people in Rome saying?
The reasonable voices, so to speak, all seem to be suggesting that we shouldn’t worry about it because Church teaching can’t change, but that doesn’t seem like a safe bet. What happens if the “God of Surprises” appears at the Synod? (And we’ve been primed for his—her?—appearance now for some time.) What would that mean for Church unity?
It just seems like the Catholic world is sleepwalking into this thing. Shouldn’t we flesh out the consequences of this before the thing gets started? This is radical stuff, and it’s not coming from the peripheries.
The reason I don't worry is because the job of an individual layperson is to become a saint and this is possible to do (though only by agreeing with God to let Him do it, which by the standards of the world might as well be signing one's own death warrant) even if the Church is a dumpster fire floating down a flooded street, which we know empirically because it has been several times during the lives of saints to which one has a particular devotion and happens to know the general historical settings of. It would, naturally, be better if the Church were not a dumpster fire but since it is a mystical body I will freely assume that any serious flaws in the hierarchy are partly the consequences of my own past sins and, conversely, that any random layperson becoming more holy and closer to God cannot fail to have some effect (as though it were, what is it that German physicists would say, "spooky action at a distance") on the entire rest of the Church. Therefore we should prepare for the synod by doing the same thing we do every night, try to take over the world.
The mental picture of the Barque of Peter as a dumpster fire floating down the Tiber is hilarious! You are spot on with our need as individual Christians to take up our cross every day and serve the Lord as best we can. There have been many times in the history of Holy Mother Church where sin and error brought great crises and yet Christ will not abandon His bride. Saint Catherine of Siena pray for us!
I love your answer. If we just keep doing what we are supposed to be doing in following Our Lord to the Cross and allowing Him to work through us, then we can love even those who seem to be throwing more fuel into the fire.
Francis fatigue and the long process of being worn down within the episcopacy has set us up for this moment. If you remember, there was a coordinated effort by many bishops to counter the radicals at the first synod on the family. By the time you get to the Amazon synod there's still efforts being made, but the intensity was much less. I think people are just tired. And I think the Francis Vatican has become better at sidelining those who would oppose radical changes.
I agree with Bridget at the end of the day with regard laypeople. We can't fight the fight. We have to trust in the Spirit. All we can do is raise our concerns (and let's face it....that doesn't do much of anything) and then move on. That doesn't mean I'm not worried at what I'm looking at.
I disagree, lay people can do a lot. In terms of which Clergy & Masses we support, not only with our attendance but also with our time, efforts and - crucially - donations.
I am extremely discerning about all of these things - in my opinion it is a major way in which lay people can influence and shape the Church.
Certainly it is a major way in which lay people *try* to. I don't think it is healthy for a person's soul, to think "I have donated a lot of money, and contributed many hours, and this makes my opinion more important" when they are talking to the music director about whether there has been far too much Latin lately (or whatever their important opinion is.) There's probably a healthy way to do it though and I'm sure you have found that one instead.
Hi Bridget, sorry I may have given you the wrong impression.
I didn't mean we should do things to increase our own apparent importance, (of course not!), I mean we should target our contributions (of whatever type) to mostly support "the best" clergy. If they are well resourced and supported, then we should see knock on positive effects for the health of the Church.
In my opinion, "the best" clergy are those who are unwaveringly orthodox (the modern Church is well known for being vague and equivocal) and who recognise, and are at ease with, the 2000 year history of the Church. And so those are the clergy whom I target with support.
Right, so the sociological-scientific understanding of homosexuality has changed in the last 100 years, but sociological and scientific reasons AREN’T the reason the Church holds homosexual acts as sinful so that’s kind of irrelevant to the discussion. Have these learned church men NEVER read theology of the body???
I get it, a lot of people with same sex attractions have suffered a lot of cruelty, violence and dehumanising treatment for something that they didn’t choose to have and can’t always help having either. We shouldn’t deny them the goodness of Gospel and the fact that their body and sexual desires (misguided in raw form, just like the rest of us) reveal something divine.
Luxembourg's synodal experience reinforces the usual western trends:
(i) most 'Catholics' are so only on paper, with most being completely alienated from the Church or only having the most superficial connection.
(ii) those few Catholics who are actively involved with the (mainstream) Church have fundamentally secular values and opinions.
The luxembourg ouput is pathetic, 1% is hardly representative of general opinion and clearly the process has been stage managed by a select few.
We often hear of "liturgy wars", with currently the traditional Latin Mass (and attendant restrictions) being discussed a lot. We should not forget that the neo-reformers also sought to destroy Catechesis in the wake of Vatican II, not just the liturgy.
My own childhood catechesis (80s and early 90s) was so poor as to be laughable. After 13 years of Catholic school, I could not even have made a guess at answering why the Church exists and I knew more about Jewish liturgical items and rites of passage than I did about our own.
It is clear to me looking back that this poor catechesis has been quite intentional, because if Catholics do not know their faith, then they cannot easily identify or object to enforced changes regarding it.
These synodal outputs are a good example. How can the Church possibly 'change' its teaching on homosexuality? The teaching is a clear sighted, accurate and honest analysis of homosexuality through the prism of human biology. For the teaching to change, human biology must first change.
Those calling for changes are either activists or - if Catholic at all - are completely ignorant about the teaching and its foundation, as a result of poor catechesis.
To say nothing of the knock-on effects of a 'change' on the rest of our doctrines, or indeed of the effect on the Church's remaining credibility if She 'changes' a teaching in order to agree with secular society. That this is even suggested is lunacy - we are not protestants!
The presence of men like Cardinal Hollerich in the hierarchy is a big problem for the Church. Like so many of his brother Bishops and Cardinals, he has repudiated his oath to defend and broadcast Catholic doctrine, instead only ever attacking and undermining it.
People need to recognise the Hollerichs of this world and give them a wide berth. Rank, past record or canonical status is of no use to determine Catholicity in this modern age. Look only at clergymen who broadcast Catholicism - whole and entire - and use that as your only reliable guide of which Clergy and Churches to interact with.
Note that those who say the Church has got the teaching 'wrong' never articulate why it is wrong, or what should replace it. Such people are led by secular mores, not the Holy Ghost.
“Luxembourg’s RTL media group quoted the cardinal as saying on July 25 that Catholics who expected the Church’s structure to be “completely changed” would be disappointed.”
I sure hope so.
So, make the Church a democracy and change its teachings on sexual morality. What was sacred for 1,500+ years (the traditional Latin Mass) is now odious, and what was odious and sinful for 2,000+ years is now sacred!
It would seem to me that if homosexuality is not a sin, and if remarriage after divorce is not adultery, then the Church is not what she claims to be. If you believe these things, why would you be a member of the Church? And, supposing the Church would change its teaching, why should anyone join an institution that says X is true one day and false the next? The Church would have no doctrinal integrity, which is, at root, something required for any religion to be true.
“In order to be credible the Church needs to admit it has been wrong for 2000 years” won’t have the effect these Luxemburgers think it will have.
I believe you're assuming most people think rationally.
Why do so many Catholic clergy want us to become Protestant? I truly don’t get it.
That has been the general drift of the Church ever since Vatican II - the protestantisation of the Catholic Church.
Most strikingly, this has occurred liturgically - with the Catholic Latin Mass of Ages being replaced by vernacular Protestant style worship. The new order Mass was created with the help of representatives of 6 major protestant denominations. The idea was to find a form of service which would be acceptable to all - this is why the new Mass is only vaguely Catholic compared to the traditional Mass.
The major architecht of the new Mass, Annibale Bugnnni, famously stated that we must remove from our prayers anything with is stumbling block to unity with protestants. The stumbling block for protestants is, of course, the Catholic faith - so its hardly a surprise that the new Mass is what it is.
There is a famous lie that the new Mass is what Vatican II asked for - but it isn't. (Francis and his sycophant, Austen Ivereigh, have been banging this drum again recently.) It's been a classic bait and switch - some limited scope for reform was used to throw the baby out with the bath water.
The new Mass doesn't resemble Vatican II's vision at all - Latin and Gregorian Chant have almost been fully expunged from the Church, for example, and the new Mass is different in ever Parish, Diocese and Nation. Where is the Catholicity in this situation?
The neo-reformers think the liturgy battle is won - especially with Francis now trying to roll back Benedict's progressive concessions to authentic Catholic worship - and so we now see the attacks on orthodox doctrine accelerate, as they turn their guns there.
(also, that most Catholics since Vatican II have had a very poor catechesis means that reformers now feel bold enough to attack openly, think few people will recognise what is going on).
I’m interested in what the response was to the small but probably vocal group at the Synod in Luxembourg calling for general availability of the TLM.
“ Cardinal Hollerich said earlier this year that he believed that the “sociological-scientific foundation” of the Church’s teaching on homosexuality was “no longer correct.” Seems like a pretty good summary to me. Bible? Tradition? Where’s the “sociological-scientific” in any of that old stuff? We want new stuff. Bring on the late 20th century scientism.
I didn't know the Church's foundation was "sociological -scientific". I thought it was Divine Revelation articulated as far as human reason can approach it via some form of metaphysical realism and all that implies about "human nature".
> integrate women by giving them responsibilities, abolish mandatory celibacy
It's becoming increasingly odd to me that the idea "women are important" and the idea "men have needs [and those needs are: women]" are more-or-less always found together when I read articles about people's visions for the future, but I suppose that no one intends it to look odd, they just haven't thought it through.
The Synodal report also said a respondents firmly believed that "Cardinal Hollerich is the most handsome Cardinal in the Catholic Church." Remarkable. That wasn't even one of the discussion topics.
At what point does this become the Synod on Confirmation Bias?
I would like to see some reporting on what the heck is supposed to happen at the Synod on Synodality. In the west, most countries are returning results that request radical changes to Church teaching. The effort appears to be coordinated.
Cd. Hollerich is running the Synod, and we know where his sympathies lie. Also, it’s hard not to believe that this isn’t all happening with Francis’ tacit, at least, approval.
What can the faithful expect when this thing kicks off? What are people in Rome saying?
The reasonable voices, so to speak, all seem to be suggesting that we shouldn’t worry about it because Church teaching can’t change, but that doesn’t seem like a safe bet. What happens if the “God of Surprises” appears at the Synod? (And we’ve been primed for his—her?—appearance now for some time.) What would that mean for Church unity?
It just seems like the Catholic world is sleepwalking into this thing. Shouldn’t we flesh out the consequences of this before the thing gets started? This is radical stuff, and it’s not coming from the peripheries.
The reason I don't worry is because the job of an individual layperson is to become a saint and this is possible to do (though only by agreeing with God to let Him do it, which by the standards of the world might as well be signing one's own death warrant) even if the Church is a dumpster fire floating down a flooded street, which we know empirically because it has been several times during the lives of saints to which one has a particular devotion and happens to know the general historical settings of. It would, naturally, be better if the Church were not a dumpster fire but since it is a mystical body I will freely assume that any serious flaws in the hierarchy are partly the consequences of my own past sins and, conversely, that any random layperson becoming more holy and closer to God cannot fail to have some effect (as though it were, what is it that German physicists would say, "spooky action at a distance") on the entire rest of the Church. Therefore we should prepare for the synod by doing the same thing we do every night, try to take over the world.
The mental picture of the Barque of Peter as a dumpster fire floating down the Tiber is hilarious! You are spot on with our need as individual Christians to take up our cross every day and serve the Lord as best we can. There have been many times in the history of Holy Mother Church where sin and error brought great crises and yet Christ will not abandon His bride. Saint Catherine of Siena pray for us!
I love your answer. If we just keep doing what we are supposed to be doing in following Our Lord to the Cross and allowing Him to work through us, then we can love even those who seem to be throwing more fuel into the fire.
Francis fatigue and the long process of being worn down within the episcopacy has set us up for this moment. If you remember, there was a coordinated effort by many bishops to counter the radicals at the first synod on the family. By the time you get to the Amazon synod there's still efforts being made, but the intensity was much less. I think people are just tired. And I think the Francis Vatican has become better at sidelining those who would oppose radical changes.
I agree with Bridget at the end of the day with regard laypeople. We can't fight the fight. We have to trust in the Spirit. All we can do is raise our concerns (and let's face it....that doesn't do much of anything) and then move on. That doesn't mean I'm not worried at what I'm looking at.
" We can't fight the fight."
I disagree, lay people can do a lot. In terms of which Clergy & Masses we support, not only with our attendance but also with our time, efforts and - crucially - donations.
I am extremely discerning about all of these things - in my opinion it is a major way in which lay people can influence and shape the Church.
Certainly it is a major way in which lay people *try* to. I don't think it is healthy for a person's soul, to think "I have donated a lot of money, and contributed many hours, and this makes my opinion more important" when they are talking to the music director about whether there has been far too much Latin lately (or whatever their important opinion is.) There's probably a healthy way to do it though and I'm sure you have found that one instead.
Hi Bridget, sorry I may have given you the wrong impression.
I didn't mean we should do things to increase our own apparent importance, (of course not!), I mean we should target our contributions (of whatever type) to mostly support "the best" clergy. If they are well resourced and supported, then we should see knock on positive effects for the health of the Church.
In my opinion, "the best" clergy are those who are unwaveringly orthodox (the modern Church is well known for being vague and equivocal) and who recognise, and are at ease with, the 2000 year history of the Church. And so those are the clergy whom I target with support.
That makes sense, thanks for clarifying!
Right, so the sociological-scientific understanding of homosexuality has changed in the last 100 years, but sociological and scientific reasons AREN’T the reason the Church holds homosexual acts as sinful so that’s kind of irrelevant to the discussion. Have these learned church men NEVER read theology of the body???
I get it, a lot of people with same sex attractions have suffered a lot of cruelty, violence and dehumanising treatment for something that they didn’t choose to have and can’t always help having either. We shouldn’t deny them the goodness of Gospel and the fact that their body and sexual desires (misguided in raw form, just like the rest of us) reveal something divine.
Luxembourg's synodal experience reinforces the usual western trends:
(i) most 'Catholics' are so only on paper, with most being completely alienated from the Church or only having the most superficial connection.
(ii) those few Catholics who are actively involved with the (mainstream) Church have fundamentally secular values and opinions.
The luxembourg ouput is pathetic, 1% is hardly representative of general opinion and clearly the process has been stage managed by a select few.
We often hear of "liturgy wars", with currently the traditional Latin Mass (and attendant restrictions) being discussed a lot. We should not forget that the neo-reformers also sought to destroy Catechesis in the wake of Vatican II, not just the liturgy.
My own childhood catechesis (80s and early 90s) was so poor as to be laughable. After 13 years of Catholic school, I could not even have made a guess at answering why the Church exists and I knew more about Jewish liturgical items and rites of passage than I did about our own.
It is clear to me looking back that this poor catechesis has been quite intentional, because if Catholics do not know their faith, then they cannot easily identify or object to enforced changes regarding it.
These synodal outputs are a good example. How can the Church possibly 'change' its teaching on homosexuality? The teaching is a clear sighted, accurate and honest analysis of homosexuality through the prism of human biology. For the teaching to change, human biology must first change.
Those calling for changes are either activists or - if Catholic at all - are completely ignorant about the teaching and its foundation, as a result of poor catechesis.
To say nothing of the knock-on effects of a 'change' on the rest of our doctrines, or indeed of the effect on the Church's remaining credibility if She 'changes' a teaching in order to agree with secular society. That this is even suggested is lunacy - we are not protestants!
The presence of men like Cardinal Hollerich in the hierarchy is a big problem for the Church. Like so many of his brother Bishops and Cardinals, he has repudiated his oath to defend and broadcast Catholic doctrine, instead only ever attacking and undermining it.
People need to recognise the Hollerichs of this world and give them a wide berth. Rank, past record or canonical status is of no use to determine Catholicity in this modern age. Look only at clergymen who broadcast Catholicism - whole and entire - and use that as your only reliable guide of which Clergy and Churches to interact with.
Note that those who say the Church has got the teaching 'wrong' never articulate why it is wrong, or what should replace it. Such people are led by secular mores, not the Holy Ghost.