Edit: more magisterium by aerial press conference.
(Rome) Besides the Brexit, a "new EU", the rejection of deaconesses, Pope Francis spoke on the return flight from Armenia on Martin Luther and the Protestant Revolt.
The Pope was asked in connection with his participation in a "Reformation commemoration" next 31st October in Sweden, if it would not be the "right moment, to commemorate the mutually inflicted wounds," but "only to recognize the 'gifts' of the Reformation and perhaps consider lifting the excommunication of Luther."
The Pope repeated in his reply, more or less, that which Cardinal Walter Kasper wrote what appeared in his last 14 March book "Martin Luther. An Ecumenical Perspective "(Patmos), whose scandalous key message is: "Luther was right." The reverse conclusion is: The Catholic Church was wrong. Francis indeed did not say this on the return journey, but the message has since been aired, continuing for months a significant drive towards a bow to Lutheranism. Here Pope Francis also includes Calvinism. Pope Francis has mentioned and commended the non-binding Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification of the Lutheran World Federation and the Catholic Church in 1999, while he did not mention one word on the binding Catholic Declaration Dominus Iesus, on the unicity and salvific universality of Jesus Christ and the Church from 2000.
Pope Francis said:
"I believe that the intentions of Luther were not wrong. He was a reformer. Perhaps some methods were not right, but at that time, when we read the story by [Ludwig von] Pastor - a German Lutherans who converted and became a Catholic - we see that the Church was not exactly a worthwhile model: it was corruption, worldliness, attachment to money and power. Therefore, he protested. He was intelligent and took a step forward and justified why he did it. Today we are unified as Protestants and Catholics on the doctrine of justification in agreement, and on this very important point, he was not wrong. He made a medicine for the Church, then he consolidated this medicine to a discipline, ito make it a way, a belief. And then Zwingli, Calvin had these principles behind them: ' cuius regio eius religio.' We must put ourselves in the history of that time. It is not easy to understand. Then things have gone further. This document on justification is one of the richest. There are divisions, even in the Lutheran Church there is a lack of unity. The diversity is what has perhaps been so bad for us, and now we are looking for the way to meet after 500 years. I believe that we need to pray together in the first place. Secondly, we need to work for the poor, the refugees, many people suffering, and finally that the theologians may study together ... That's a long way. I once jokingly said: I know, when the day of full unity will be: The day after the return of the Lord. We do not know when the Holy Spirit will effect this grace. Meanwhile, however, we must work together for peace. "
Text: Giuseppe Nardi
Image: MiL
Trans: Tancred vekron@hotmail.com
AMDG
I was expecting a post on Pope Francis roposing an apology to homosexuals, if that's what actually what happened.
ReplyDeleteAs for Luther, he was right in some ways, and the Church was wrong in some ways. But Luther went off the rails, as fringe elements often do. I don't see many 'gifts' of the Reformation--what on earth was he talking about there? As for lifting the excommunication of a dead person, that makes no sense whatsoever.
Luther was an apostate schismatic who started civil wars and may lives, not to mention souls, were lost. He HATED the Catholic Church and wrote that people should 'wash their hands in the blood of bishops'. He was not a good man at all. And Lutherans today are all over the place from approving sodomy and abortion to the more conservative synods.
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DeleteIt will soon be the case that nobody will care or be the least bit interested in whatever PF or his successors have to say.
ReplyDeleteG
How soon is that?
DeleteWell, 'soon' is somewhat elastic, but it is happening already. He was the media's darling, and is now passe. Similarly Catholics are becoming immune to his doctrinal innovations.
DeleteG.
The pope is always in fashion.
DeleteNobody will care what a Pope has to say? Hardly. There is tremendous interest daily in Pope Francis, in and outside the Church. Popes make headlines. The media thrive on headline news.
DeleteTed
I think 12:45 is suggesting schism will happen. Is he wrong?
DeleteHe's just Monday morning quarterbacking.
DeleteI'm no Sede, but I started tuning out in 1988, and began looking into Catholic Action (St. Pius X version, not Pius XI) and the social teachings of the Church. Now I'm running for Congress in Texas.
DeleteGood!
DeleteForget reading the story by Ludwig. Read Luther in his own sick words. Maybe Francis wouldn't be so effed up in the head if he read the TRUTH of things. Like this: http://www.traditioninaction.org/religious/e033rpLuther_Franca04.htm
ReplyDeleteLuther condemns himself. He was a most sinful man! His fruit was rotten and maggot-filled. He is roasting in Hell like a big, fat Protestant marshmallow. Maybe Francis wants to join him on the spit!
I defy you to your face, Francis.
"At times we need to drink more liberally, amuse and divert ourselves..."
DeleteIf you're trying to turn us into Lutherans, it's working...
Really--so Luther was a heterosexual? That's a far sight better than many other clerics.
Luther was not only a sinful man, but obsessed with his own sinfulness, to the point he could only come up with 'sola fide' to explain justification. Over-scrupulous.
And the Catholic church needed reforming. Otherwise, why was there a 'counter-reformation'?
"Reformation" is only a historiographical prejudice. The so-called Reformation was a revolt.
DeleteThe main problem with Pope Francis is that he is anti-Jesus. He gives the impression that Jesus was wrong as Francis continuously contradicts Him. Why doesn't Francis just convert to the Lutheran church or the Muslim religion, he does favor them more than he does Catholics.
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DeleteAnother day, another heretical and scandalous action or statement from Pope Francis. May God end his life soon and bring him to heaven.
ReplyDeleteOn Vatican Radio Francis said this, "...it isn’t that we say our sin and God forgives us. No, not that! We look for Jesus Christ and say: ‘This is your sin, and I will sin again’. And Jesus likes that, because it was his mission: to become the sinner for us, to liberate us...".
ReplyDeletewww.news.va/en/news/pope-the-christian-life-proclaims-the-road-to-reco
omg. hearing what he says is dangerous to our souls. I just went to that link, his words, they feel evil. I want to cry. I simply cant read what this man says anymore, it is sick and twisted. Where is the Gospel? Where is, "go, and sin no more", where is "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do"?
DeleteThis man is weird and cruel to us who believe in the real Jesus !
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DeleteThis was said by Pope Francis in June 2013 i.e. three years ago and it is surprising that it has only come to my notice now. It seems to be a strange theory about the nature of redemption where Jesus is supposed to have become a sinner and we can carry on sinning because they are Jesus's sins. I am not a theologian but this seems worse than heresy and indeed utterly barmy. I am afraid I am giving up on this Pope and am not going to take any notice of whatever he says. Or perhaps some theologian can explain to me how such nonsense is orthodox?
DeleteHe actually made these comments in the context of his Armenian flight when asked about the upcoming celebrations of the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Revolt. Considering the state of the Lutheran Church and Protestant mainline denominations with their collapsing membership levels and growing impotence, I'm not sure there's something to celebrate...
DeleteThe main scandal is not this heretical pope. It is the silence of the cardinals, bishops, and priests who will not speak out against him.
ReplyDeleteYou are so right. How many cardinals, bishops, and priests know the Bible Aquinas, and Augustine, much less any of the classics?
DeleteKudos, Tancred: I think the opening editorial comment is the most apt and succinct I have ever read. I'll let everyone's favourite yet dreaded martinet drone one that the 'm' wasn't capitalized.
ReplyDeleteIt's all Nardi, basically, but thanks. Part of why I do this is because I've l have been amazed that a lot of his insights on world events in the Church don't make it to the fore. Glad to see others, more able than me, like Mrs. Doctor Hickson, a fellow Slave of the Immaculate Heart, make even greater contributions to this battle than I could.
DeleteKasper and Francis should not be so ready to say Luther was right about anything. The Catholic Church was right how they handled Luther back then. But I will grant that if the Curia, the Papal court and some parts of the Church hadn't been as corrupt as the typical Renaissance royal or imperial court of it's day, but rather had been more disciplined , Luther probably would never have been heard from. His own Augustinian monastery he came from represented an attempt to bring back monastic discipline and tradition to the entire Augustinian Order, which at that timewas a huge community of over 20,000 friars across Europe.
ReplyDeleteKasper and Francis should not be so quick to praise, or glorify Luther, or say he was right. Some os Luther's writings are those of a madman, and his rants about the Jews (that they should be rounded up and put into work camps and do all the menial tasks so the German people would not have to), was adopted by the Nazis and taken much, much further. But the original anti-Jewishness of the general German people was influenced by Luther. Also 1930's Lutheran pastors and "bishops" actually supported Nazi pogroms and persecutions of Jews, while the Catholic hierarchy of Germany spoke against it.
I read a book once which stated that Martin Luther was mentally ill, and had been from the time he entered the monastery. And it gave some bizarre examples. Like him going to confession 15X a day, etc.
And this is the man Kasper and Francis praise so highly.
Damian Malliapalli
I can accept the defects of the Clergy as long as they leave Church doctrine intact. That's why Francis is so much darker than the kettle he is calling black.
ReplyDeleteAll we have to do is keep the precepts of the Church and pray the rosary. Hopefully our sacrifices will be meritorious.
DeleteIsn't the central distinctive tenet of Catholicism supposed to be the doctrine of Papal Infallibility? Even when they contradict the words of previous popes? Maybe those of you who reject the words of your pope would be happier as Protestants? Fewer doctrinal contradictions.
ReplyDeleteI guess, if your understanding of Papal Infallibility were commensurate with what that dogma actually is.
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