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Saturday, November 19, 2016

OH TO BE A FLY ON THE WALL: PAPAL PSYCHOLOGY, VATICAN INTRIGUE AND MAGISTERIAL CRISIS AT CONSISTORY OF NEW CARDINALS!

TU ES PETRUS!!!!!!!!!!



This is the morning Liturgy for the Consistory elevating men of the Church to be her princes. Please note too that the very rarely used "Tu Es Petrus" is the opening chant for the papal procession, a chant that is not often used anymore at Pope Francis' liturgies. I think there is a certain psychology in this as all the cardinals are gathered with the Vicar of Christ, Successor of St. Peter for this event under a cloud of a papal mess created by Christ's visible representative and head of the Church!

And of course yesterday, we read in yet another papal interview that Pope Francis had dismissed those who are raising concerns about the confusion His Holiness' Magisterium is sowing among the clergy and laity as being rigid and basically psychologically compromised. The pope's dismissive on these ground is a bit breath taking given the fact that at least three of the four cardinals cannot be described as canonists and thus rigid legalists with psychological issues. Pope Francis basically said the same thing about young and older Catholics who prefer the ancient form of the Liturgy and the discipline of the Catholic Church as exercised prior to the Council. This dismissive attitude doesn't build bridges (pontiffs) but rather sends them to the margins or periphery of the Church, thus marginalized by the very pontiff who has a supposed love for the peripheries of the Church!

Thus in the homily of the Holy Father at this morning's consistory, His Holiness seems to backtrack  on his interview and dismissive attitude to four high ranking cardinals when he says:

  (Considering what Pope Francis said about the four cardinals seeking a righteous clarification of Pope Francis' moral teachings which seem to conflict with what the Church has consistently taught in the past, and his dismissive, mean-spirited calling of them to be in a rigid state of psychological imbalance, what Pope Francis preached this morning seems to be a kind of personal repentance, no?)

This is what the Holy Father preached:

(Jesus) tells us: love your enemies; do good to those who hate you; bless those who curse you; pray for those who mistreat you (cf. vv. 27-28).

These are not things we spontaneously do in dealing with people we consider our opponents or enemies. Our first instinctive reaction in such cases is to dismiss, discredit or curse them. Often we try to “demonize” them, so as to have a “sacred” justification for dismissing them. Jesus tells us to do exactly the opposite with our enemies, those who hate us, those who curse us or slander us. We are to love them, to do good to them, to bless them and to pray for them. He tells us: love your enemies; do good to those who hate you; bless those who curse you; pray for those who mistreat you (cf. vv. 27-28).

In addition to this, the Liturgy is very tradition, mostly in Latin and the new cardinals, most of them, are wearing very "frilly" surplices under their mozzettas. This style of surplice one never sees Pope Francis wearing and he forbade Guido and the other MC's from wearing them from day one of his papacy, something they wore quite often under Pope Benedict who himself used frequently!

But the other intrigue this morning is that after the consistory, the cardinals along with Pope Francis are going to visit our other Pope, Pope Benedict at His Holiness' residence. Should anything be read into this considering the papal crisis we are now experiencing with the four cardinals going very public with their plea to the pope to make clear the Church's moral teachings only to be dismissed and thus they are seeking a sort of canonical correction of Pope Francis, something very rare or non-existence in the history of the papacy and cardinals.

Time will tell where all this is leading! Oh to be a fly on the wall! Here is the full text of Pope Francis' homily this morning with my highlighted emphasis:

Homily of His Holiness Pope Francis
Consistory for the Creation of New Cardinals
19 November 2016

19 November 2016

The Gospel passage we have just heard (cf. Lk 6:27-36) is often referred to as the “Sermon on the Plain”. After choosing the Twelve, Jesus came down with his disciples to a great multitude of people who were waiting to hear him and to be healed. The call of the Apostles is linked to this “setting out”, descending to the plain to encounter the multitudes who, as the Gospel says, were “troubled” (cf. v. 18). Instead of keeping the Apostles at the top of the mountain, their being chosen leads them to the heart of the crowd; it sets them in the midst of those who are troubled, on the “plain” of their daily lives. The Lord thus shows the Apostles, and ourselves, that the true heights are reached on the plain, while the plain reminds us that the heights are found in a gaze and above all in a call: “Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful” (v. 36).

This call is accompanied by four commands or exhortations, which the Lord gives as a way of moulding the Apostles’ vocation through real, everyday situations. They are four actions that will shape, embody and make tangible the path of discipleship. We could say that they represent four stages of a mystagogy of mercy: love, do good, bless and pray. I think we can all agree on these, and see them as something reasonable. They are four things we can easily do for our friends and for those more or less close to us, people we like, people whose tastes and habits are similar to our own.

The problem comes when Jesus tells us for whom we have do these things. Here he is very clear. He minces no words, he uses no euphemisms. He tells us: love your enemies; do good to those who hate you; bless those who curse you; pray for those who mistreat you (cf. vv. 27-28).

These are not things we spontaneously do in dealing with people we consider our opponents or enemies. Our first instinctive reaction in such cases is to dismiss, discredit or curse them. Often we try to “demonize” them, so as to have a “sacred” justification for dismissing them. Jesus tells us to do exactly the opposite with our enemies, those who hate us, those who curse us or slander us. We are to love them, to do good to them, to bless them and to pray for them.

Here we find ourselves confronted with one of the very hallmarks of Jesus’ message, where its power and secret are concealed. Here too is the source of our joy, the power of our mission and our preaching of the Good News. My enemy is someone I must love. In God’s heart there are no enemies. God only has sons and daughters. We are the ones who raise walls, build barriers and label people. God has sons and daughters, precisely so that no one will be turned away. God’s love has the flavour of fidelity towards everyone, for it is a visceral love, a parental love that never abandons us, even when we go astray. Our Father does not wait for us to be good before he loves the world, he does not wait for us to be a little bit better or more perfect before he loves us; he loves us because he chose to love us, he loves us because he has made us his sons and daughters. He loved us even when we were enemies (cf. Rom 5:10). The Father’s unconditional love for all people was, and is, the true prerequisite for the conversion of our pitiful hearts that tend to judge, divide, oppose and condemn. To know that God continues to love even those who reject him is a boundless source of confidence and an impetus for our mission. No matter how sullied our hands may be, God cannot be stopped from placing in those hands the Life he wishes to bestow on us.

Ours is an age of grave global problems and issues. We live at a time in which polarization and exclusion are burgeoning and considered the only way to resolve conflicts. We see, for example, how quickly those among us with the status of a stranger, an immigrant, or a refugee, become a threat, take on the status of an enemy. An enemy because they come from a distant country or have different customs. An enemy because of the colour of their skin, their language or their social class. An enemy because they think differently or even have a different faith. An enemy because… And, without our realizing it, this way of thinking becomes part of the way we live and act. Everything and everyone then begins to savour of animosity. Little by little, our differences turn into symptoms of hostility, threats and violence. How many wounds grow deeper due to this epidemic of animosity and violence, which leaves its mark on the flesh of many of the defenceless, because their voice is weak and silenced by this pathology of indifference! How many situations of uncertainty and suffering are sown by this growing animosity between peoples, between us! Yes, between us, within our communities, our priests, our meetings. The virus of polarization and animosity permeates our way of thinking, feeling and acting. We are not immune from this and we need to take care lest such attitudes find a place in our hearts, because this would be contrary to the richness and universality of the Church, which is tangibly evident in the College of Cardinals. We come from distant lands; we have different traditions, skin colour, languages and social backgrounds; we think differently and we celebrate our faith in a variety of rites. None of this makes us enemies; instead, it is one of our greatest riches.

Dear brothers and sisters, Jesus never stops “coming down from the mountain”. He constantly desires to enter the crossroads of our history to proclaim the Gospel of Mercy. Jesus continues to call us and to send us to the “plain” where our people dwell. He continues to invite us to spend our lives sustaining our people in hope, so that they can be signs of reconciliation. As the Church, we are constantly being asked to open our eyes to see the wounds of so many of our brothers and sisters deprived of their dignity, deprived in their dignity.

My dear brothers, newly created Cardinals, the journey towards heaven begins in the plains, in a daily life broken and shared, spent and given. In the quiet daily gift of all that we are. Our mountaintop is this quality of love; our goal and aspiration is to strive, on life’s plain, together with the People of God, to become persons capable of forgiveness and reconciliation.

Today each of you, dear brothers, is asked to cherish in your own heart, and in the heart of the Church, this summons to be merciful like the Father. And to realize that “if something should rightly disturb us and trouble our consciences, it is the fact that so many of our brothers and sisters are living without the strength, light and consolation born of friendship with Jesus Christ, without a community of faith to support them, without meaning and a goal in life” (Evangelii Gaudium, 49).

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

The problem for Francis is that his opinion of the four cardinals who have questioned him does not matter. The Church has a remedy that if a bishop of Rome teaches heresy and becomes a formal heretic he can be judged as a heretic by a council of bishops and lose his office because a formal heretic ceases to be a Catholic and, therefore, loses his office as to be Pope a man must be Catholic. There is a form and the form first involves warning the bishop of Rome.

As I see it, the first stage of warning has taken place. Cardinal Burke and the other cardinals have not taken this step lightly or on a whim or without having a desired end. The desired end of course is that Francis uphold the Church's teaching on marriage and end the confusion. What we are witnessing is a standoff and Francis maybe, like Hillary Clinton, believes his own press and cannot see the depth of consternation he has caused in the Church and how widespread it is ...

Jan

Gene said...

I do not like Francis, and I agree with every criticism levelled against him. But, he is not the real problem, only a huge distraction. The real problem is seminary education and Priests who for decades have lived in unbelief and taught "the New Hermeneutic" of social gospel, a Jesus who was the bastard son of some Jewish girl, and a "theology" that is nothing but humanism or, at best, existential humanism. They have done this with complete impunity because no Pope, Cardinal, or Bishop has had the spine to discipline them or attack the problem at the higher level of seminary education and a pastoral practice that is patently heretical and thoroughly humanistic. This is exactly the reason for the OF and the humanistic changes made to the Mass. It was re-structured to fit the humanism of the day. I'll take Francis as Pope if they'll fix the other.

Fr. Michael J. Kavanaugh said...

"The real problem is seminary education and Priests..."

I spent three and a half years in a Catholic seminary. I was not taught "the New Hermeneutic" of social gospel, a Jesus who was the bastard son of some Jewish girl, and a "theology" that is nothing but humanism or, at best, existential humanism."

It didn't happen. Nothing "patently heretical" was ever taught.

During my time in seminary all the seminaries in the US were visited by appointees of a Vatican-called for review. These are professional educators and theologians, not disgruntled, part-time Catholics who take pot-shots at seminary norms and procedures. Guess what? Seminaries passed with flying colors. Suggestions were made for improvement, of course, and in most cases these were easily implemented.

The men and women who administered and taught in our seminaries, and those who do so today, do not deserve to be savaged by an inconsequential complainer. They are faithful and honorable men and women.

James said...

The main reason we haven't heard Tu es Petrus for a while is because it's been displaced all year by the awful Jubilee Hymn of Mercy. With luck, that'll receive its last ever outing tomorrow.

Rood Screen said...

Father Kavanaugh,

First of all, thank you for answering God's call to His priesthood.
Second, I don't understand how you were able to finish the seminary in just three and a half years. There are supposed to be two years of philosophy and four years of theology, right?
Third, there were two seminary visitations over the past three decades, both prompted by reports of troubles. I would suggest to you that perhaps some of those reports were well founded, even if your brief seminary experience was not marked by them.

Fr. Michael J. KavanaughE said...

No, Dialogue, a man need not spend 6 years in seminary. I minored in philosophy in college, so I had ample preparation before I arrived at the seminary. Today, most candidates arrive with no background in Catholic philosophy, so the first two years are spent getting them up to speed.

Also, in the time I was in seminary, 1981-1985, 7 semesters was the norm. Almost all of my classmates were there 3.5 years. A few stayed for the eighth semester mainly to finish researching/writing their masters theses.

Mine was done when I left.

Gene said...

Well, gee, Kavanaugh, how did you ever end up as a theologically/Biblically illiterate post-Vat II Priest with an antyhologist's understanding of philosophical and theological issues?

Rood Screen said...

Father Kavanaugh,

Thank you. The reason I ask is because the 1983 Code says, "those aspiring to the presbyterate can be promoted to the diaconate only after they have completed the fifth year of the curriculum of philosophical and theological studies", which leaves still another year of theology before ordination to the presbyterate. But you were already ahead of the game, it seems.

Fr. Michael J. Kavanaugh said...

What Number is that one - I can't find it...?

The requirements of the Code are adjustable to local circumstances.

242. Each nation is to have a program of priestly formation which is to be established by the conference of bishops, attentive to the norms issued by the supreme authority of the Church, and which is to be approved by the Holy See.

Programs of Priestly Formation vary from country to country, region to region, according to the needs of particular areas. While they would be similar in most regards, there is room for variations.


Rood Screen said...

Father Kavanaugh,

Can. 1032.