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Tuesday, April 17, 2018

THIS IS CERTAINLY VERY POSITIVE AND HOPEFUL


Say what you may about Pope Francis, he has recovered the Church's role in the world beyond Catholicism as had been the role of the Vatican for decades. Unfortunately, under Pope Benedict, this seem to fade not so much because of Benedict himself, but those who chose to support his ministry. Pope Benedict was betrayed on many fronts.

So this is good news from the pen of Sandro Magister a Vaticanisto:

What Had Never Been Said In Saudi Arabia. A First For Tauran

Tauran


Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran, president of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue, has been in the capital of Saudi Arabia since April 13, and will stay there until April 20, thereby repaying the visit made to the Vatican on September 20, 2017, by the secretary general of the Muslim World League, the sheikh Muhammad bin Abdul Karim Al-Issa.

Welcomed by Prince Muhammad bin Abdurrahman bin Abdulaziz, vice-governor of Riyadh, Cardinal Tauran gave at the headquarters of the Muslim League, during his meeting with the sheikh Al-Issa, an address without precedent in the history of relations between Christianity and Islam, not because of the things that were said but because of the place where they were pronounced.

It was in fact the first time that in Saudi Arabia, the homeland of Wahhabism, one of the most radical currents of Islam, a leading representative of the Catholic Church has spoken out in public and with clarity on capital questions like freedom of religion and equal rights for believers of all faiths.
Here is a brief anthology of the things that Cardinal Tauran said in Riyadh, printed in “L'Osservatore Romano” of April 17.

ON THE CLASH OF CIVILIZATIONS

“What is threatening all of us is not the clash of civilizations, but rather the clash of forms of ignorance and radicalism. What is threatening coexistence is first of all ignorance; therefore, to meet together, speak, build something together, are an invitation to encounter the other, and also means discovering ourselves.”

ON OPENING THE HOLY PLACES TO ALL

The cardinal recalled how the Christian sacred places, “in the Holy Land, in Rome or elsewhere, together with the numerous shrines in many parts of the world,” are “always open to you, our Muslim brothers and sisters, to believers of other religions, and also to every person of good will who does not profess a religion.” Besides, he added, “in many countries the mosques are also open to visitors,” and this, he said, “is the kind of spiritual hospitality that helps us to promote mutual understanding and friendship, contrasting prejudice.”

ON THE TRUE MEANING OF MARTYRDOM

“Religion is the dearest thing a person has. This is why some, when they are called to choose between keeping the faith and remaining alive, prefer to accept paying a high price: they are the martyrs of all religions and of every time.”

ON FUNDAMENTALISM

“In all religions there are forms of radicalism. Fundamentalists and extremists may be zealous person, but unfortunately they have deviated from a solid and wise understanding of religion. Moreover, they consider those who do not share their vision as unbelievers who must convert or be eliminated, so as to maintain purity. They are misled persons who can easily go on to violence in the name of religion, including terrorism. They become convinced, through brainwashing, that they are serving God. The truth is that they are only  hurting themselves, ruining the image of their religion and their coreligionists. This is why they need our prayer and our help.”

ON EQUAL TREATMENT AMONG ALL THE RELIGIONS

After clarifying that “religion can be proposed, never imposed, and then accepted or rejected,” Cardinal Tauran identified as one of the fields in which Christians and Muslims must be in agreement, seeing that “in the past there has been a great deal of competition between the two communities,” that “of common rules for the construction of places of worship.” In fact, all the religions must be treated in the same way, without discrimination, because their followers, together with the citizens who do not profess any religion, must be treated equally,” he remarked in referring to the always relevant theme of “full citizenship” for all. In part because “if we do not eliminate the double standards of our behavior as believers, religious institutions and organizations, we will foster Islamophobia and Christianophobia.”

ON THE CONDEMNATION OF TERRORISM BY RELIGIOUS LEADERS

“Spiritual leaders have a duty: to keep the religions from being at the service of an ideology, and to be able to recognize that some of our coreligionists, like the terrorists, are not behaving correctly. Terrorism is a constant threat, and because of this we must be clear and never justify it. The forms of terrorism want to demonstrate the impossibility of coexistence. We believe the exact opposite. We must avoid aggression and denigration.”

ON INTERRELIGIOUS DIALOGUE

“All authentic interreligious dialogue begins with the proclamation of one’s own faith. We do not say that all religions are equal, but that all believers, those who seek God and all persons of good will devoid of religious affiliation, have equal dignity. Everyone must be left free to embrace the religion that he wishes.” After this came the concluding appeal to join forces “so that God, who created us, may not be a motive of division, but rather of unity.”

(English translation by Matthew Sherry, Ballwin, Missouri, U.S.A.)

37 comments:

Catholic Mission said...

APRIL 16, 2018
Conservative Catholics must appeal to Cardinal Ladaria to resign as CDF Prefect or affirm the dogma EENS, Vatican Council II and the exclusivist ecclesioilogy
http://eucharistandmission.blogspot.it/2018/04/conservative-catholics-must-appeal-to.html


APRIL 16, 2018
Cardinal Luiz Ladaria's Profession of Faith and Oath of Fidelity at the time of taking office as Secretary and now Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith was invalid. : norm preceded by cardinals Ratzinger and Ottaviani
http://eucharistandmission.blogspot.it/2018/04/cardinal-luiz-ladarias-profession-of.html

Marc said...

Francis: "Everyone must be left free to embrace the religion that he wishes."

Syllabus of Errors Condemned Proposition No. 15: "Every man is free to embrace and profess that religion which, guided by the light of reason, he shall consider true."

Fr. Michael J. Kavanaugh said...

Church: The format of the mass - prayers, language used, music employed, style of vestments, etc, - can and should be adjusted as deemed necessary by the Church.

Quo Primum: "Furthermore, by these presents [this law], in virtue of Our Apostolic authority, We grant and concede in perpetuity that, for the chanting or reading of the Mass in any church whatsoever, this Missal is hereafter to be followed absolutely, without any scruple of conscience or fear of incurring any penalty, judgment, or censure, and may freely and lawfully be used. Nor are superiors, administrators, canons, chaplains, and other secular priests, or religious, of whatever title designated, obliged to celebrate the Mass otherwise than as enjoined by Us."

Marc said...

Kavanaugh: Doctrine and law are the same.

The Church: Doctrine and law aren’t the same.

TJM said...

Marc,

Kavanaugh is all for "adjustments" unless they don't go his way. He's just another liberal windsock

Henry said...

Just what is so good about "interreligious dialogue"--presumably on some sort of equal footing--between a Catholic cardinal and a Muslim sheik? Can anyone tell me something good that's ever come out of such interreligious "dialogue" (ugh!) between believers and non-believers in the one true Faith?

Fr. Michael J. Kavanaugh said...

Both doctrine and law develop/evolve as they should.

Fr. Michael J. Kavanaugh said...

Can anyone tell me what good ever came of the interreligious dialogue between Jesus the Jew and the Samaritan woman?

Or what good came of the interreligious dialogue between Saint Francis and Sultan al-Kamil of Egypt in 1219 during the fifth crusade?

Or what good came from the dialogue, not to mention the life-long friendship, between Saint Pope John Paul II and Jerzy Kluger?

"Ugh"?

Fr. Michael J. Kavanaugh said...

"In our times, when every day men are being drawn closer together and the ties between various peoples are being multiplied, the Church is giving deeper study to her relationship with non-Christian religions. In her task of fostering unity and love among men, and even among nations, she gives primary consideration in this document to what human beings have in common and to what promotes fellowship among them.”---Nostra Aetate, Documents of the Second Vatican Council, October 28, 1965

TJM said...

Kavanaugh,

Since you are soooooooooooooooo into Vatican II, what have you done about this?

"It ordered that pastors of souls teach their flocks both to speak and to sing the parts that pertain to them in both Latin and their mother tongue (SC 54)"

Marc said...

Kavanaugh, did you notice any differences between the examples you gave and the vast majority of interreligious dialogue taking place at present?

Here's a hint: Compare the content of what Francis of Assisi said to the sultan with the words of the cardinal quoted in this post.

Fr. Michael J. Kavanaugh said...

Marc, first, keep in mind the wise maxim, "Comparisons are adious."

Second, you post is based on the erroneous belief that the doctrine of the Catholic Church does not and cannot develop and evolve. You WRONGLY think that what the Church understood about her relationship with non-Christian religions 1500 or 1000 or 500 years ago is what the Church understands about its relationship with non-Christian religions today.

That is not correct and there us no necessity for it to be correct.

Third, I am glad to see that you follow so closely the Church's interreligioys dialogues, at least the vast majority of them.

TJM said...

Marc,

Notice how Kavanaugh always dodges the question if he is faithfully implementing SC at his parish?

Fr. Michael J. Kavanaugh said...

Odious

Marc said...

Kavanaugh, Do you remember when you were the one who suggested comparisons? It happened when you posted at 8:56. Amazingly, it took just over an hour for you to reject your own argument.

Help me out here: Is that an example of development or evolution?

TJM said...

Kavanaugh,

It is odious that you are not implementing SC in your parish. Thanks for sharing.

Fr. Michael J. Kavanaugh said...

Sorry, I offered and made no comparisons. Henry said "Ugh," I said not, and here are examples.

The evolution from Mortalium Animos to Unitatis Redentigratio is the example you seek.

Henry said...

If Fr. K could have come up with an example of good fruit from "interreligious dialogue" in the sense of the post-Vatican II "ecumenism" that I infer he's somewhat into, he obviously would have done so by now.

I didn't think he could. So why not conclude it's all been just an expensive and misguided waste of flannel-mouthed time that ignores our Christian mission to convert those outside the fold of the one true Church of Christ, not to "dialogue" (ugh!) with the poor unfortunates?

Fr Martin Fox said...

Two unrelated comments:

1. I see "Catholic mission" doesn't just spam my blog. I delete him every time.

2. It seems to me the thing to celebrate in the Cardinal's visit to Saudi Arabia is that it may betoken more freedom of worship for Christians there. The Cardinal is hardly giving anything away: Muslims already enjoy freedom of worship in Christian countries. Maybe you think they shouldn't, but in the main, they already do, and the prospects of that changing anytime soon -- at least at the Church's initiative -- are pretty poor. So if the Church can, via diplomacy, bring some spiritual succor to the long suffering Christians in Arabia, wonderful!

TJM said...

Henry,

Bingo!

Fr. Michael J. Kavanaugh said...

Henry, you might consider the following item from the NCRegister:

Interreligious Dialogue Benefits the Common Good and the Formation of Young People

http://www.ncregister.com/blog/jpshimek/interreligious-dialogue-benefits-the-common-good-and-the-formation-of-young

Fr. Michael J. Kavanaugh said...

Pope Benedict spoke of the good of interreligious dialogue:

https://www.archbalt.org/society-benefits-from-tolerance-interreligious-dialogue-pope-says/

Fr. Michael J. Kavanaugh said...

Cardinal Tauran on the good of interreligious dialogue:

http://www.pcinterreligious.org/interreligious-dialogue---source-of-harmony-unity-and-the-good-of-society_178.html

Fr. Michael J. Kavanaugh said...

Archbishop Michael Fitzgerald, one of my teachers, wrote: "Perhaps here too one could speak about something that is multifaceted. There is not just one purpose of dialogue but rather a number of aims. There is first the aim of helping people of different religions to live together in peace and harmony. This is a task which is ever more urgent in a world becoming increasingly multicultural and multireligious. It is a task which implies, as we know, overcoming prejudices, battling against indifference, creating understanding. This first level of dialogue should not be lightly dismissed. Can it not be taken as an anticipation of that peace which we know will reign in the next world? It is therefore already a way of bringing about God's kingdom."

The whole article: https://www.bc.edu/content/dam/files/research_sites/cjl/texts/cjrelations/resources/articles/fitzgerald_Oct03.htm

TJM said...

Kavanaugh,

Interfaith dialogue is difficult when priests like you have trained a generation or two of religious illiterates. When Catholics don't know their own faith, what's the point other than fuzzy good feelings. This interfaith dialogue is a distraction for lazy clerics

Fr. Michael J. Kavanaugh said...

Archbishop Michael Fitzgerald, one of my teachers, wrote: "Perhaps here too one could speak about something that is multifaceted. There is not just one purpose of dialogue but rather a number of aims. There is first the aim of helping people of different religions to live together in peace and harmony. This is a task which is ever more urgent in a world becoming increasingly multicultural and multireligious. It is a task which implies, as we know, overcoming prejudices, battling against indifference, creating understanding. This first level of dialogue should not be lightly dismissed. Can it not be taken as an anticipation of that peace which we know will reign in the next world? It is therefore already a way of bringing about God's kingdom."

The whole article: https://www.bc.edu/content/dam/files/research_sites/cjl/texts/cjrelations/resources/articles/fitzgerald_Oct03.htm

Fr. Michael J. Kavanaugh said...

Thomas Michel, SJ, writes on interreligious dialogue: http://groups.creighton.edu/sjdialogue/documents/articles/michel_developments.htm

Marc said...

I'll set aside my usual polemics for this post to state my actual opinion: The problem with religious dialogue is that the various religions posit divergent and irreconcilable positions on any number of topics. In the present age, wherein people have basically unfettered access to information, I would suggest that necessarily leads to indifference and agnosticism. In other words, people can become paralyzed by the panoply of religious choice on offer, making it impossible to determine which, if any, of these possible choices is actually true.

In such a situation, I would suggest that it is actually a positive characteristic for a religion to assert itself as singularly true. In that connection, I think this is one part of the explanation for the rise of adherence to Islam.

As a Mormon friend of mine put it succinctly: Who would want to belong to a religion that didn't claim to be The Truth? Or, as I would say it: If you're religion doesn't claim a monopoly on truth, you might as well be atheist or agnostic. Perhaps that is my conclusion since I was raised in an agnostic/atheist household. But this is merely a variation on a theme better described by Dostoyevsky, although he raised the argument to prove the opposite point.

Fr. Michael J. Kavanaugh said...

Interreligious dialogue does not presuppose that those involved do not consider the faith to which they belong to be the one revealed by God. I am a Catholic because I believe that Catholicism is the Faith inn which the fullness of God's REVELATION is to be found.

It is a fact that many world religions share, to varying degrees, in the Truth revealed by God. No one faith has an absolute monopoly if, by that is meant, that everything every other faith teaches is utterly false and opposed to Divine REVELATION.

It is the commonalities, to whatever degree, that are the foundations for dialogue.

TJM said...

Kavanaugh, when Catholics lack a basic understanding of the faith, there is nothing to dialogue about. The Catholic Church should be putting its own house in order before engaging in "dialogue." Priests like you offer nothing but the same tired crap that was taught in the 1960s and 1970s. No wonder the pews are empty.

Fr. Michael J. Kavanaugh said...

When "priests like me" offer the same that the Church offers, in this case interreligious dialogue, then we know that, despite angry nay-sayers like you, we are doing the right thing.

Marc said...

I understand the point of religious dialogue as an academic exercise -- and that is to some degree an end in itself. But I get the impression you see this dialogue as having some greater purpose than that.

Fr. Michael J. Kavanaugh said...

See above. It is not an end in itself.

Marc said...

If your goals are the same as those in the quotes you gave, it seems this dialogue is a tremendous failure. In fact, it would seem that, far from leading to greater peace in the world, the movement toward religious dialogue has been correlated with greater and more severe violence on a global scale for over a century.

That is probably because the premise on which it relies is unproven: namely, that knowledge of the “other” somehow results in less dislike. It seems that more knowledge of “other” might lead to more dislike, actually. At any rate, both are equally likely and neither can be proved. That tends to render your dialogue merely academic since it’s practical upshot isn’t tangible (and reality tends to show the opposite).

Fr. Michael J. Kavanaugh said...

..."the movement toward religious dialogue has been correlated with greater and more severe violence on a global scale for over a century."

Where is this correlation noted? Is it simply correlation, or does causality enter in?


"It seems that more knowledge of “other” might lead to more dislike..." Why? It could be argued that as Europeans have become more engaged with one another, inter-European wars are way down, no?

Marc said...

The correlation is noted by observing the events of the 20th century. As for causality, I'm not sure one could prove a direct causation. But as I mentioned, neither can one prove that religious dialogue has led to a decrease in global violence.

Why would more knowledge of the other lead to greater dislike? It is certainly conceivable that the more one learns about something, the more one detests it. Perhaps the surface is palatable, while the details are not.

It could be argued that Europeans have become more engaged with one another. That is probably the result of the advancement of perceived collective economic interest. I would note that the engagement has increased and inter-European wars are way down because no longer are there wars where Catholics are fighting Protestants, which is the main reason for many historical wars or at least served as a cover for politically-motivated wars. The ecumenical movement didn't stop inter-European wars.

Fr. Michael J. Kavanaugh said...

What events lead to correlating dialogue and violence?

The ecumenical movement may not have stopped inter- European wars. Neither has interreligious dialogue caused them or greater violence.