Tuesday, March 29, 2016

Cardinal Müller: Catholics Have No Obligation to Celebrate Protestant Revolt

Edit: thanks to Infocatolica and Chiesa, we located this excellent piece by Cardinal Müller who is reading Catholicism through Francis.  Of course, Cardinal Müller would probably never use such polemical language as "Protestant Revolt", but this is a start.  In addition to taking on those who would use a statement by Francis out of context to justify a massive relativization of Catholic moral teaching, he has this to say about the Protestantization of the Church:


PROTESTANTIZATION OF THE CHURCH


Strictly speaking, we Catholics have no reason to celebrate October 31, 1517, the date that is considered the beginning of the Reformation that would lead to the rupture of Western Christianity.

If we are convinced that divine revelation is preserved whole and unchanged through Scripture and Tradition, in the doctrine of the faith, in the sacraments, in the hierarchical constitution of the Church by divine right, founded on the sacrament of holy orders, we cannot accept that there exist sufficient reasons to separate from the Church.

The members of the Protestant ecclesial communities look at this event from a different perspective, because they think that it is the opportune moment to celebrate the rediscovery of the “pure Word of God," which they presume to have been disfigured throughout history by merely human traditions. The Protestant reformers arrived at the conclusion, five hundred years ago, that some Church hierarchs were not only morally corrupt, but had also distorted the Gospel and, as a result, had blocked the path of salvation for believers toward Jesus Christ. To justify the separation they accused the pope, the presumed head of this system, of being the Antichrist.

How can the ecumenical dialogue with the evangelical communities be carried forward today in a realistic way? The theologian Karl-Heinz Menke is speaking the truth when he asserts that the relativization of the truth and the acritical adoption of modern ideologies are the principal obstacle toward union in the truth.

In this sense, a Protestantization of the Catholic Church on the basis of a secular vision without reference to transcendence not only cannot reconcile us with the Protestants, but also cannot allow an encounter with the mystery of Christ, because in Him we are repositories of a supernatural revelation to which all of us owe total obedience of intellect and will (cf. “Dei Verbum,” 5).

I think that the Catholic principles of ecumenism, as they were proposed and developed by the decree of Vatican Council II, are still entirely valid (cf. “Unitatis Redintegratio,” 2-4). On the other hand, I am convinced that the document of the congregation for the doctrine of the faith “Dominus Iesus,” of the holy year of 2000, not understood by many and unjustly rejected by others, is without a doubt the magna carta against the Christological and ecclesiological relativism of this time of such confusion.

.http://chiesa.espresso.repubblica.it/articolo/1351260?eng=y

21 comments:

Anonymous said...

The first three paragraphs of the Cardinal's statement are excellent. The rest is incomprehensible.

The principles of true ecumenism were laid out by Pope Pius XI in Mortalium Animos.

Credo in Unum, Sanctam, Catholics et Apostolical Ecclesiam (Credo)

Francis go home! said...

Sorry, Muller but anything short of a condemnation of the REVOLT and an exhortation to reists and reject ALL evil and nonsense coming from Francis just...ain't...good enough.

Anonymous said...

Mea culpa. It should be:

Credo in unam, Sanctam, Catholicam et Apostolicam Ecclesiam. (From the Credo)

GMUA said...

I agree with -Francis Go Home!-.
Not only are catholics "not obligated" as Muller mentions. Catholics should be "Against" the protestant revolt.

"Where there Is No Hatred of Heresy, There Is No Holiness"- Fr. Frederik Faber

Anonymous said...

You title this piece: "Catholics Have No Obligation [on pain of mortal sin] to Celebrate Protestant Revolt "

Then the article states: "Strictly speaking, we Catholics have no reason to celebrate October 31, 1517"

Does that mean "loosely" speaking or generally we do have reason to celebrate Halloween? Your headline is even worse: many things that aren't "obligatory" such as attending services on Good Friday are seriously recommended.

I sincerely recommend you stop trying to fit square pegs into round holes. You are going nowhere except to hell w/Cardinall Muller (for that piece of wisdom you will probably delete this comment. But go ahead--it only shows what kind of peg you yourself are and that you serve VC2 heretics, i.e. those who celebrate and worship Satan on Halloween). GMUA is correct: the position of CATHOLICS should be to OPPOSE the Protestant Revolt.

Anonymous said...

It's all in the toilet with Vatican II and Pope Francis.

Anonymous said...

Resist this BULLsh*t to Francis' face. Yes, Francis needs to GO HOME.

philipjohnson said...

Cardinal Muller.May God Bless you!

Anonymous said...

If you like this, then share it with others:

http://remnantnewspaper.com/web/index.php/articles/item/2198-the-year-of-mercy-begins

It's an Urgent Appeal to Pope Francis (extensively footnoted and linked - anything in blue is linked).



Anonymous said...

I posted this above, but thought you might like it too;

http://remnantnewspaper.com/web/index.php/articles/item/2198-the-year-of-mercy-begins

It's the Urgent Appeal to Pope Francis (which is extensively footnoted and linked - blue type is a link).

If you like it, then share it with others. It's also been translated into a dozen languages besides English.


Ivan said...

The skeptic in me wonders if Cardinal Muller's responses are designed to give the appearance that the Vatican is still concerned with orthodoxy.

M. Prodigal said...

What is there to celebrate? The loss of millions of souls to the One True Church? The fomenting of a civil war that cost hundreds of thousands of people their lives? You have to either be stupid or a heretic to want to 'celebrate' a revolt or the revolting heretic that started the protesting movement.

Anonymous said...

I would not 100% trust Cardinal Muller, but he's been a surprise in the pontificate of Francis....standing up for the doctrine of the Catholic Faith and our belief is the last thing I thought he would do considering his past track record.
Damian Malliapalli

Trust no Modernist said...

I would have LOVED to hear what Mother Angelica would have had to say on this evil business. Eeeeyowww!

Anonymous said...

What would Martin Luther know about the pure Word of God,a man who claimed Christ was a womaniser ,and God a scoundrel.the question is not why Catholics should celebrate a heretic ,but why the Vatican is celebrating him.

Anonymous said...

Oh God save us from Pope Francis!

Nicolas Bellord said...

Living in a historically Protestant country (England) I often notice how people from historically Catholic countries have very little understanding of Protestantism and how it differs from Catholicism. Generally they display an enormous naivety suggesting that the only difference is a residual and unjustified prejudice against Protestants on the part of the Catholic minority. Only last week a Mexican asked me what the difference was with Anglicanism and I tried to explain that it was difficult to find two Anglicans with the same beliefs so any answer to their question would be complex! The recent visit of Cantalamessa and his sermon at Westminster Abbey was a typical and insulting example of this ignorance of southern European Catholics about the situation here.

JTLiuzza said...

"Southern European Catholics" can spend their entire lives studying the true faith in all it's richness and never cover it all. It is boundless. Why should they spend so much as one instant learning about protestant heretics? For that matter should they try to understand buddhism, too? Islam?

Deacon Augustine said...

It is important to learn how to crush Protestant heresies because Satan wants your souls too and he will use your ignorance to ensnare you just as he has ensnared Bergoglio

Deacon Augustine said...

It is important to learn how to crush Protestant heresies because Satan wants your souls too and he will use your ignorance to ensnare you just as he has ensnared Bergoglio

Anonymous said...

To Nicolas, firstly your country was historically Catholic, secondly read up a little on Irish history and your countries Protestant relationship with it.