Heresy Unveiled: Amoris Laetitia
I. Heresy Unveiled
Since the public presentation of Pope Francis’ Apostolic Exhortation Amoris Laetitia on
Saturday, February 8, the traditional media has been flooded with
negative evaluations. I made a list of some of the pejoratives:
ambiguous; undermining; fundamental option; turning point in Catholic
doctrine; uncertainty; coup; revolutionary; relativistic; plot to turn
the Church upside down; demolish the foundations of two thousand years
of Catholicism; constant teaching of the Church destroyed; strange;
surreal; disquieting; dreadful; devastating for the Church; a praise to
heretic joy; catastrophic. It has even been simply called the
“Bergoglian heresy”.
In these evaluations, a number of passages
have been quoted from the Exhortation, virtually all of the relevant
ones to be found in Chapter 8, which is titled “Accompanying, discerning and integrating weakness”.
Unquestionably, these passages and their respective evaluations offer
evidence for the strong condemnations of these commentators. Possibly
most succinct, and most often employed, is a passage from paragraph
305, and its footnote. The passage reads:
Because of forms of conditioning and
mitigating factors, it is possible that in an objective situation of
sin — which may not be subjectively culpable, or fully such — a person
can be living in God’s grace, can love and can also grow in the life of
grace and charity, while receiving the Church’s help to this end.
The relevant footnote (#351) reads:
In certain cases, this can include
the help of the sacraments. Hence, “I want to remind priests that the
confessional must not be a torture chamber, but rather an encounter
with the Lord’s mercy” (Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii Gaudium [24
November 2013], 44: AAS 105 [2013], 1038). I would also point out that
the Eucharist “is not a prize for the perfect, but a powerful medicine
and nourishment for the weak” (ibid., 47: 1039)
Implicit heresy
All this is indeed an indication of an
underlying heresy, but it does not, so to speak, “put the nail to the
coffin”. As one commentator put it, it is “careful language”. Or, as
Cardinal Schönborn stated in his Intervention at the Presentation of Amoris Laetitia, it is a “linguistic event”.
Possibly the most succinct, devastating, and poignant summary of this position — that Amoris Laetitia represents
not explicit, but implicit, heresy — has come, not from a traditional
Catholic, but from a man who describes himself as having been a
secular Jew who converted to Catholicism, and now has rejected the
Faith entirely. Damon Linker, in The Week magazine, writes
the following:
the following:
If there were any doubts that Pope Francis is a stealth reformer of the Roman Catholic Church, the apostolic exhortation he released last week (Amoris Laetitia, or the "Joy of Love") should settle the matter.
A straightforward reformer of the church seeks to change its doctrines. A stealth reformer like
Francis, on the other hand, keeps the doctrines intact but invokes
such concepts as mercy, conscience, and pastoral discernment to show
priests that it's perfectly acceptable to circumvent and disregard
those doctrines in specific cases. A doctrine officially unenforced
will soon lose its authority as a doctrine. Where once it was a
commandment sanctioned by God, now it becomes an "ideal" from
which we're expected to fall short. Before long it may be treated as a
suggestion. Eventually, repealing it is no longer controversial — or
perhaps even necessary.
Stealth reform ultimately achieves
the same reformist goal, but without inspiring the intense opposition
that would follow from attempting to change the doctrine outright.
Explicit heresy
However, Cardinal Schönborn, Damon Linker,
and others who promote such views concerning the Pope’s Exhortation
are wrong. It is not just a “linguistic event” or “stealth reform” or
revolution, which is able to fly under the radar of a specific charge
of heresy. There is a very explicit heresy, it is the foundation of all
the other legitimate condemnations of Amoris Laetitia, and it
clearly reveals the agenda which germinates and nourishes all the rest
of its errors. It is found in paragraphs 296 and 297:
The way of the Church is not to
condemn anyone forever; it is to pour out the balm of God’s mercy on
all those who ask for it with a sincere heart… For true charity is always un-merited, unconditional and gratuitous. (296).
It is a matter of reaching out to
everyone, of needing to help each person find his or her proper way of
participating in the ecclesial community and thus to experience being
touched by an 'unmerited, unconditional and gratuitous' mercy. No one can be condemned for ever, because that is not the logic of the Gospel! (297)
Clearly, the Pope is here speaking of the
individual human person, and the state of his soul which determines
whether he is justified or condemned. As a Catholic, whatever he says
therefore must be judged in the light of the Council of Trent’s
infallible teaching concerning justification. Chapter VII of the
Council’s Decree on Justification is titled: What the Justification of the Impious Is, and What Are the Causes Thereof. It contains this crucial passage:
For, although no one can be just but
he to whom the merits of the Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ are
communicated, yet is this done in the said justification the impious,
when by the merit of that same most holy Passion, the charity of God is poured forth by the Holy Spirit in the hearts of those that are justified and is inherent therein:
whence, man, through Jesus Christ, in Whom he is ingrafted, receives,
in the said justification, together with the remission of sins, all
these (gifts) infused at once, faith, hope, and charity.
For a person to possess justifying
charity, therefore, means that he is in an ontological state of being in
friendship with God, and ingrafted into Christ. In defining the
justifying theological virtue of charity, St. Thomas teaches: “It is
written: I will not now call you servants…but My friends. Now
this was said by reason of nothing else than charity. Therefore charity
is friendship.” (ST, II-II, Q.1, A.1). This is why we rightly speak of
the possession of sanctifying grace as “being in the friendship of God”.
To assert, as does Pope Francis, that such charity is unmerited, unconditional, and gratuitous is
simply a form of the Lutheran heresy, which views justification, and
the perseverance in God’s friendship as totally unmerited by man, and
as not requiring the cooperation of man in virtue and the performance of good works.
Condemned by Trent
In my article The Dream of Nabuchodonosor, to appear in a forthcoming edition of Christian Order,
I quote 21 Canons of the Council of Trent’s Decree on Justification
which condemn Luther’s position, and detail at every stage of man’s
justification — from preparation for conversion up to the grace of
final perseverance — the absolute necessity of the cooperation of man’s
free will and the performance of good works in the attainment of, and
perseverance in, God’s friendship, and the possession of that
supernatural charity which we call sanctifying grace.
I will not repeat all of these Canons here, but only offer a section from Chapter XI of the Council’s Decree, and also the paragraph which constitutes the entirety of Chapter XV:
But no one, how much soever
justified ought to think himself exempt from the observance of the
commandments, no one ought to make use of that rash saying, one
prohibited by the Fathers under an anathema, that the observance of the
commandments of God is impossible for one that is justified. For God
commands not impossibilities, but, by commanding, both admonishes thee
to do what thou art able, and to pray for what thou art not able (to
do), and aids thee that thou mayest be able; whose commandments are not
heavy, whose yoke is sweet, and whose burden light. For whoso are the
sons of God love Christ; but they who love Him keep His commandments,
as Himself testifies; which, assuredly, with the divine help, they can
do.
In opposition also to the subtle wits
of certain men who, by pleasing speeches and good works, seduce the
hearts of the innocent, it is to be maintained that the received grace
of justification is lost not only by infidelity [loss of faith],
whereby even faith itself is lost, but also by any other mortal sin
whatever, though faith be not lost; thus defending the doctrine of the
divine law, which excludes from the kingdom of God not only the
unbelieving, but the faithful also (who are) fornicators, adulterers,
effeminate, liars with mankind, thieves, covetous, drunkards, railers,
extortioners, and all others who commit deadly sins; from which, with
the help of divine grace, they can refrain, and on account of which they
are separated from the grace of Christ.
Against this orthodox benchmark, consider
the statement of Pope Francis (including his twisting of the statements
of PaulVI) in paragraph #305:
Because of forms of conditioning and
mitigating factors, it is possible that in an objective situation of
sin — which may not be subjectively culpable, or fully such — a person can be living in God’s grace, can love and can also grow in the life of grace and charity, while receiving the Church’s help to this end.
Clearly, this does indeed constitute heresy. Just as his statement in footnote 351 explicitly invites Eucharistic sacrilege:
In certain cases, this can include
the help of the sacraments. Hence, 'I want to remind priests that the
confessional must not be a torture chamber, but rather an encounter
with the Lord’s mercy' (Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii Gaudium [24
November 2013], 44: AAS 105 [2013], 1038). I would also point out that
the Eucharist 'is not a prize for the perfect, but a powerful medicine
and nourishment for the weak' (ibid., 47: 1039).
Heretical essence
Herein resides the essence of this heresy.
It lies specifically in teaching that there is a “gradualness”
applicable to the possession of charity and sanctifying grace. It is
Catholic dogma that possession of supernatural charity is an ontological
state created by sanctifying grace added to the soul, that one cannot possess this charity unless living in this substantial state, and that it is this state of being which
is absolutely necessary for receiving the Eucharist and other
sacraments. It cannot be possessed by a person living in objective
mortal sin, or by any person who is in some process of pastoral effort
working towards the attainment of some “ideal”.
In addition, all of Francis’ various
statements which promote the idea that an individual’s correspondence
with immutable Catholic moral doctrine is only an ideal, which may be
now unattainable, and which must be subject to this new principle of
“gradualism”, constitutes a blasphemy against God’s goodness and grace,
“Who aids thee that thou may be able”, as clearly laid out in Chapters
XI and XV of Trent’s Decree on Justification as quoted above.
It must also be noted, that it is
also an egregious error to claim, as does paragraph 297, that
It is a matter of reaching out to everyone, of needing to
help each person find his or her proper way of participating in the
ecclesial community and thus to experience being touched by an 'unmerited,
unconditional and gratuitous' mercy. No one can be condemned forever,
because that is not the logic of the Gospel! (297).
It is not “the logic of the Gospel” that
“no one can be condemned forever”. Our Lord emphatically stated, “For
many are called, but few are chosen”. Again, as taught by the Council
of Trent’s Decree, the “call” (which is termed “prevenient grace”) is
indeed unmerited and gratuitous, coming as it does before any decision
by the individual, but the being “chosen” (justified, and living in the
state of charity), demands our cooperation and works. This is the
“call” which Nineveh heard and complied with in the Old Testament. It
is the “call”, which the world heard at Fatima, and with which few have
cooperated. Thus our present chastisement.
Mercy is often not unmerited,
unconditional, and gratuitous, and this is especially true of its
application to the salvation of the individual soul. To conclude
otherwise amounts to the promotion of a “cheap” and false mercy.
Crushing impact
Amoris Laetitia has the potential
to place every priest in the world on the ropes. This is especially
true because the way in which it will be implemented has been
decentralised and, as it were, democratised. Every priest (and of course
every bishop) will be forced to make the decision as to whether he
chooses to obey Christ and His Gospel, or whether to embrace this
heresy and its consequences (especially sacrilegious Communion and
Confession). If he chooses the first alternative, he will almost
certainly suffer profoundly, even to the point of losing his faculties.
If he chooses the latter, he will be complicit in both heresy and
sacrilege. There will be an immense pressure placed upon priests’
ministry in the confessional, not only by what will probably be the
majority of bishops, but even more overwhelmingly by the “faithful”.
Cardinal Burke
Finally, I think it necessary to mention Cardinal Burke’s rather lengthy response to Amoris Laetitia.
This would seem necessary because of the respect he has earned among
traditional Catholics in his defense of the moral law in general, and
the indissolubility of marriage in particular.
Cardinal Burke is quite critical of those
who have offered critical evaluations of the Pope’s Exhortation, and
who see it as a “revolution in the Church”, and as “a radical departure
from the teaching and practice of the Church, up to now, regarding
marriage and the family”. He sees such criticisms as a “wonder and
confusion to the faithful”, and as “potentially a source of scandal….”
Cardinal Burke’s solution is a receiving of Amoris Laetitia by
interpreting it with “the key of the magisterium”, and that “the task
of pastors and other teachers of the faith is to present it within the
context of the Church’s teaching and discipline”. It should be added
that, to his credit, Cardinal Burke devotes quite a bit of space in an
attempt to do precisely that. Despite his efforts, however, it is quite
evident that a good number of traditional Catholic websites, which
usually pay attention to his every word, have conspicuously ignored his
response. One has even called it “weak”.
In consideration of Cardinal Burke’s position, I would offer two points.
First, his position that we can interpret Amoris Laetitia in
light of the perennial teaching of the Church, and the implicit
conclusion that what is mostly at fault are pastoral policies which
might contradict this teaching, is dependent upon there being no real
contradiction in Amoris Laetitia with the Church’s doctrine — no heresy. As should be obvious from the above analysis, I believe such a conclusion to be false.
Secondly, Cardinal Schönborn’s unusual, but very perceptive, observation that Amoris Laetitia is a “linguistic event”
should cause us to shudder in regard to consideration of any sort of
“presentation” of this document, not only to the faithful, but also to
priests and bishops. The term “linguistic event” indicates a power
within much of its language and passages — variously described as
“beautiful”, “inspiring”, “poetic”, and “mystical” — which is bound to
exercise a profound effect upon even the most wary. This language will
act as an apparently beautiful and seductive vortex drawing the
faithful down into the embrace of that central heresy which is the
foundation of all of the rest of this document’s errors and destructive
pastoral approaches.
It would seem necessary to conclude, therefore, that Amoris Laetitia should not be received by the Church: it should be flatly rejected.
As Cardinal Burke has himself made clear in his response, Amoris Laetitia is
not a binding magisterial document, nor are there any binding
juridical norms. Despite this, any faithful Catholic should experience
“fear and trembling” in proposing the sort of criticisms and
conclusions which I have offered above. It is as it must be.
* * *
II. Modernism Invades the Catholic Heart
“The final battle between the Lord and the reign of Satan
will be about marriage and the family.”
will be about marriage and the family.”
(from Sister Lucia of Fatima’s letter to Cardinal Carlo Caffarra)
In Part I, we noted that the Holy Father's Apostolic Exhortation Amoris Laetitia directly
contradicts the Council of Trent. Contrary to the teaching of Francis,
Trent teaches that there can be no possession of charity, and no
“living in God’s grace” for one living in objective mortal sin. With
one mortal sin, charity and justification are lost. Nor can such a
person “grow in the life of grace and charity.” As Trent also makes
clear, sanctifying grace and charity may indeed grow and increase, but
only where justification and charity are already present.
Let us now turn to Sister Lucia’s
statement quoted above, that the final battle between Christ and Satan
will be “about marriage and the family.” This might at first sight seem
quite surprising. We might protest that there are deeper theological
issues and doctrines which would surely have to hold a higher priority
for Satan’s malice and plan of attack — such things as the divinity of
Christ, or the truths concerning the Incarnation. We might further
claim that even greater damage has been done by such things as false
ecumenism, religious indifferentism, the banalities of the New Mass,
or the prostitution of the priesthood and the religious life to the world. I think, however, that we need to look deeper in order to perceive the depth of the threatened devastation which is now upon us.
or the prostitution of the priesthood and the religious life to the world. I think, however, that we need to look deeper in order to perceive the depth of the threatened devastation which is now upon us.
Catholic resilience
In the spiritual warfare between Modernism
and the traditional Catholic Faith, the Modernists’ goal of final
victory has always been most severely hampered by one factor: the basic
instinct (this word here used loosely) which is called the sensus fidelium (sense of the faithful).
The Modernist works his wiles through the
complexities of deceitful words and ideas. We think of men like Rahner,
Kung, de Lubac, von Balthasar, Teilhard de Chardin. The average
Catholic knows virtually nothing about these men or their writings. It
is equally unlikely that they have read Pope Pius X’s analysis and
refutation of Modernism in his great encyclical Pascendi. The
faithful tend rather to believe the truths that they have received and
which give meaning and purpose to the immediate realities experienced
in their lives — family, marriage, the rearing of children, and their
work. Their faith is in many ways protected by the births, loves, joys,
sufferings, and deaths which form the rhythms of a human heart in
touch with reality, and the life of God which is the light of their own
existence: “In him was life, and the life was the light of men.”
This is not to say that the Modernists
have not enjoyed great success. Their perverse ideas have penetrated
into catechisms and the education of youth, confused the faithful
through such events as Assisi and all of the other scandalous ecumenical
activities and pastoral practices, adversely affected their
spirituality through the banalities of the New Mass, severely stained
priesthood and hierarchy with virtually every sin conceivable, and
penetrated with their poisonous atmosphere into every corner of
Catholic belief and life. This has produced a massive loss in
vocations, destruction of Catholic education, soaring divorce rates,
widespread ignorance of, and dissent from, certain articles of the
Catholic faith, and “filth” and corruption seemingly everywhere.
And yet, despite all sorts of ominous
predictions, this Catholic “Thing” refuses to die, and in fact has
shown surprising life in the very midst of all this chaos and filth.
Many thousands of fathers and mothers have turned to homeschooling
their children. Vocations to the priesthood have taken a dramatic turn
upward, with many young men showing a deep interest in Catholic
tradition, and even the traditional Mass. Something similar may be said
in regard to the founding of new religious congregations, especially
among young women. A profound poverty of orthodox literature and media
sources during the 1970’s has been completely overturned. The
establishment of Perpetual Adoration in local parishes continues to
grow. And the offering of the Traditional Latin Mass continues to
spread in dioceses throughout the world. The Catholic heart, though in
many ways confused, fearful, and often seduced into excesses and error,
is still very much alive.
The Catholic heart
And what is this Catholic heart? What is its deepest root and foundation?
St. Thomas teaches that three things must be held explicitly by
all who would be considered to possess the Catholic faith (whether
other articles must be held explicitly, or only implicitly, can depend
upon various factors). Two of these are constituted by theological
doctrines of the faith, namely: all the truths concerning the
Incarnation; and belief in the Trinity. But the other thing — which
Thomas actually mentions first because it holds a certain priority in
terms of the basic structure of the human heart in its deepest
relationship to God — is to be found in the teaching of St. Paul:
But without faith, it is impossible to please God. For he that cometh to God, must believe that he is, and is a rewarder to them that seek him. (Heb. 11:6).
And lest we think that such “seeking” is
some sort of non-substantive quest with no specific demands or
commandments, we need only refer to the words of Our Lord in the very
last chapter of the Book of the Apocalypse:
Behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me, to render to every man according to his works.
I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the
end. Blessed are they that wash their robes in the blood of the Lamb: that they may have a right to
the tree of life, and may enter in by the gates into the city. Without
are dogs, and sorcerers, and unchaste, and murderers, and servers of
idols, and every one that loveth and maketh a lie.
In other words, the one thing most
necessary for integrity within the human heart is the foundational
principle of justification — that God is the source of all goodness
and grace, and that our cooperation with Him is the necessary condition
for all the “rewards” promised by Him. This is the root principle of
all else — of Who God is, of human dignity and freedom, and of that
charity upon which all else depends. It determines the basic
orientation of the human heart upon which all intellectual and moral
sanity pivots.
Amoris: Lutheran nightmare revisited
It is not a matter of mere historical
accident that this was the “first truth” denied by Luther, and the
corner stone upon which all the rest of his perversions were erected.
His own moral, intellectual, and physical degradation was the direct
natural fruit of this denial, as was the profound decay in Christian
civilisation, and all its institutions, which it effected.
And now, we stand at the edge of an
intellectual and moral precipice over which the Catholic Church is
being pushed into this same nightmare of the human heart. And it is the
Pope’s Apostolic Exhortation which is poised to be the engine of this
destruction.
Amoris and annulments: corroding the Catholic heart
We now should be able to understand why
the final battle between Christ and Antichrist may well be conducted
over the issues of marriage and the family. The Sacrament of Matrimony,
which is the absolute foundation of the family, is constituted as the
primordial image of Christ’s faithful and indissoluble love for His
Church: “This is a great sacrament; but I speak in Christ and in the
church” (Eph. 5: 32). As Pope John Paul II wrote in Familiaris Consortio,
Their bond of love becomes the image
and the symbol of the covenant which unites God and His people. And
the same sin which can harm the conjugal covenant becomes an image of
the infidelity of the people to their God…. Infidelity is adultery, disobedience to the law is abandonment of the spousal love of the Lord.”(12).
Thus, the heresy in Amoris Laetitia over
which the Church now hovers penetrates into the human heart as the
most profound betrayal and denial of Christ’s love for His Church and,
in turn, the Church’s fidelity to Christ.
A true sacramental marriage is the
communion of love and fidelity within which God wills the formation of
all children in justification and charity. It begins in the simplest of
ways. A father and mother tell their young child that he can only have
the biscuit he desires if he first says he is sorry for some bad
behaviour. Thus the child learns that reward and repentance are
intimately connected, and constitute the deepest “rule of faith” in
regard to human life, love, and justice.
All of this is shattered in a child who
then witnesses his parents, while living in adultery, presuming to
receive God Himself in Holy Communion. If we think that children do not
“pick up” on such hypocrisy at a very early age, at least intuitively,
we are very gravely mistaken. It is indeed a matter of pathos that Pope
Francis offers “for the good of the children” as probably the primary
“mitigating factor” which might allow those living in an adulterous
union to receive the Eucharist.
It needs pointing out that the
“liberalisation” of the annulment process proposed by Francis is the
other “end” of this hypocrisy. Satan now surrounds the Sacrament of
Matrimony as a vulture awaiting the death of the Catholic heart.
It is also no accident of history that
Luther’s denial of the Catholic doctrine of Justification culminated in
his blessing of the adulterous second marriage of his protector,
Landgrave Philip of Hesse, who became the leader of the Schmalkaldic
League in its war against the Catholic Church. Luther denied the heart
of justification and charity, and his blessing of adultery followed as a
logical fruit. Luther bent his knee to Phillip of Hesse, the political
power of his time; the Church now genuflects before the forces from
which Antichrist will arise. One of the first things always instituted
by Godless secular power is civil divorce and remarriage. They know where the Catholic heart resides.
From Amoris to Lund
Coming hard on the heels of the publication of Amoris Laetitia will
be the journey of Pope Francis to Lund, Sweden, on 31 October 2016,
in order to initiate the year-long celebration of the Protestant
“Reformation”, and the 500th anniversary of Luther’s issuance of his 95
Theses. This event will be the fruit of the Catholic-Lutheran Joint Declaration on Justification (1999) and the Vatican document From Confrontation to Communion issued
in 2013. As stated in Part I, my analysis of the significance of this
event, especially as it relates to the topic which I have discussed in
this present article, will appear in a forthcoming edition.
Beyond 'interpretation'
I wish to emphasise again that Amoris Laetitia must
be rejected by the entire Church. It is absurd to believe that it can
somehow be interpreted in the light of tradition. It is equally foolish
and futile to petition the Pope for “clarification”. From a human
perspective, the only thing that can alter this Pope’s trajectory is a
wall of the sensus fidelium which loudly cries NO!
It is presumptuous to claim that we must wait for God’s grace and
intervention, while we remain silent in false meekness. Very possibly,
the grace that awaits us is that we be given the heart to speak. We
need to do this most of all for our children:
Behold I will send you Elias the
prophet, before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord.
And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the
heart of the children to their fathers: lest I come, and strike the
earth with anathema. (Malachias 4: 5-6).
It is time to cast off cowardice.
For further insightful analysis of Amoris Laetitia, visit the author's site: www.waragainstbeing.com/
