https://rorate-caeli.blogspot.com/2022/12/pope-franciss-heresy-concerning.html Pope Francis’s heresy concerning reception of the Eucharist? — Response by John Lamont to Harrison and Fastiggi On November 17 and 24, 2022, the American Catholic newspaper The Wanderer published articles by Fr. Brian Harrison about the statement ‘The Teaching of the Catholic Faith on the Reception of the Holy Eucharist,’ concerning Pope Francis’s Apostolic Letter Desiderio Desideravi (DD). The statement in question was signed by 56 Catholic clerics and scholars, and was issued on September 16, 2022. It accused Pope Francis of teaching heresy in the Apostolic Letter, as follows: Defending the Faith Against Present Heresies); other evidence can be found in the book Dictator Pope and other sources. Given this evidence, there is nothing improbable a priori about Pope Francis’s having taught the heresy attributed to him in the statement. His doing so is perfectly consonant with what we know about him, and is indeed something that one would expect of him. Fr. Harrison is completely silent about these facts. Fr. Harrison’s defence of Pope Francis on this topic does not however rest solely on these methodological considerations. He makes a positive argument for the Pope’s assertions having an orthodox meaning. This argument is the core of his case, and if it is correct then his defence of Pope Francis should be accepted. Fr. Harrison adopts the defence of Pope Francis made by Prof. Robert Fastiggi,[4] who asserts that the faith referred to by Pope Francis in DD is a faith that includes the theological virtues of hope and love, and that thus requires repentance, sacramental confession of sin, and sacramental absolution in the case of Catholics who are guilty of having committed mortal sin. Prof. Fastiggi correctly says that if ‘faith’ is so understood, Pope Francis’s description of faith as the sole condition for worthy reception of the Eucharist is not heretical. Fr. Harrison rejects my own response to Fastiggi, which stated: The standard meaning of “faith” in Catholic theology is the faith involved in the theological virtue of faith, not the faith informed by charity that is necessary for salvation and the worthy reception of the Holy Eucharist. This faith is thus described in Dei filius: “Faith, which is the beginning of human salvation, is a supernatural virtue by which we, with the aid and inspiration of the grace of God, believe that the things revealed by Him are true, not because the intrinsic truth of the revealed things has been perceived by the natural light of reason, but because of the authority of God Himself who reveals them, who can neither deceive nor be deceived.” If “faith” were to be standardly read as “formed faith,” then Catholic theology would have no term available for faith as described by Dei filius. This standard theological meaning of the term “faith” is the one that should be ascribed to the term when it is encountered in a papal document. Fr. Harrison raises two objections to this assertion about the meaning of the term ‘faith’ in DD. The first objection is that Dei Filius did not in fact define faith as intellectual assent. The second objection is that this understanding of faith as the supernatural virtue by which one believes Christian teaching on the grounds of its being divinely revealed is not the principal understanding of faith that is found in the New Testament; instead, the New Testament almost always understands faith as justifying, and thus as including the theological virtues of hope and charity. But Pope Francis should be understood as having used the term ‘faith’ in the sense given it by the New Testament, not in the theological sense I provide. His statements in DD are therefore not heretical, for the reasons given by Prof. Fastiggi. Long. Read the rest at the link.
Thank you, Brian. It is a long read, but thorough in its points. I have to be careful myself in my response to Pope Francis since he has disappointed me in the past and at times grieved my sensibilities. The temptation now on my part is to approach what Pope Francis teaches through the lens of those previous disappointments. And someone will add, "Yes, look at the preponderance of evidence!" It is times like these that I wish I lived 200 years ago. I would have never heard 95% of what popes uttered! Anyway, I need to make sure I'm on the narrow path and influence those around me more by example than words. After all, there are some who probably think I'm too stuffy and judgmental! Lord have Mercy!
What do people make of this, is this stuff that's written here, true? Does PF say these things? https://Citizens.news/683233.html
That’s one of those made up out of whole cloth antiCatholic rants. PF knows not to say anything so blatantly heretical. He values the power of the papacy too much to provide such obvious grounds for his downfall.
Quite clearly he did not say those things - He said it was dangerous for people to say I have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ but I don't need the Church - The Pope insists we must be in the ark of the church as believers. I think this may be an anti-Catholic website
To understand the depth of the changes "suggested" in Desiderio desideravi, read the following analysis by a huge fan of "Pope Francis": https://www.commonwealmagazine.org/earnest-desire In the analysis, the author pulls out two very important themes: 1. Bergoglio says, in Desiderio desideravi, the following: “This is the purpose for which the Spirit is given, whose action is always and only to confect the Body of Christ. It is that way with the Eucharistic bread, and with every one of the baptized” (41). In other words, in the liturgical action, there is a double "confection" of the Body of Christ. There is the confection of "the Eucharistic bread" (the Blessed Sacrament) and the confection of "every one of the baptized." Sorry, that is not Catholic. The baptized are not "confected" into "the Body of Christ." 2. Note this how the author contrasts John Paul II's understanding of the Eucharist with Bergoglio's: When I first saw that Francis was using the language of “amazement” in his letter I wondered if he was borrowing this idea from Pope Saint John Paul II’s 2003 encyclical letter, Ecclesia de Eucharistia (“On the Eucharist and Its Relationship to the Church”). John Paul’s stated aim in writing this encyclical was to “rekindle…amazement” at the mystery of the Eucharist. Upon careful reading, however, it becomes clear that what Francis has done is really something quite different. John Paul was intensely focused on the role of the priest in the Eucharist. In fact, so much of the “amazing” role of Christ is absorbed by the action of the priest in the Mass, in his telling, that little is left for the people, aside from the reception of Communion. He acknowledges the Church as the Body of Christ, but assigns them no particular agency in the liturgy. What he does instead is devote thirteen paragraphs at the end of the encyclical to the “Marian” role of the people, complementing the Christic role of the priest. Francis’s invocation of Eucharistic amazement could not be more different. He finds amazement in the paschal mystery itself. Christ’s Passover is amazing. The fact that his Pasch is made sacramentally present and accessible to us in the today of the liturgy is amazing. The role of the priest is of irreducible importance to Francis, but he is after something wider and more all-embracing when he talks about being amazed at the liturgy. “Wonder is an essential part of the liturgical act,” Francis explains. “It is the marvelling of those who experience the power of symbol, which does not consist in referring to some abstract concept but rather in containing and expressing in its very concreteness what it signifies” (26). Guided by the writings of the German liturgical theologian Romano Guardini (1885–1968), Pope Francis discusses in some detail the challenge modern (and postmodern) people face in learning to speak the language of symbol. This challenge is essential to meet, however, because liturgy speaks in the language of symbol, and so we must continue to listen and learn. Now, the quotes the author provides in the second paragraph from Bergoglio are very important. She shows that Bergoglio is replacing the standard Catholic unchanging understanding of the Eucharist (JPII's understanding) with something that "could not be more different." The Bergoglian understanding of the Eucharist is something that we "marvel" and "wonder" at, not something we understand at all. Because of this lack of final understanding, "we must continue to listen and learn." The Eucharistic definition is then subjected to the process of "synodality." Through this process, the concept noted in section 1 above will become for clear, as the Spirit reveals itself.
