LifeSiteNews’ Jan Bentz has translated portions of an article by the German Cardinal Walter Kasper published in Stimmen der Zeit. In it, the curial official who has become synonymous with the proposal to give Holy Communion to the divorced and remarried makes some important revelations about the aftermath of Amoris Laetitia (AL), as well as the thinking that shaped it.
I’d like to break down several statements of importance found in the article a piece at a time.
In the first part called “Discussion regarding the binding character,” Kasper critiques Cardinal Raymond Burke for his statement that post-synodal documents by the Pope are not necessarily binding. Instead, Kasper states, “This position is refuted by the formal character of an Apostolic Exhortation as well as its content.”
The questions surrounding the authoritative character of AL continue to be among those mostly hotly contested. Close friends and advisers to Pope Francis seem intent to have the exhortation perceived as an authoritative work of the Magisterium; theologians, clergy, and prelates who recognize the dangers inherent in the document state that it simply cannot be construed as such. I would here refer you back to the arguments of two American professors of theology on this issue, which I quoted last month. First, Dr. E. Christian Brugger, professor of Moral Theology at St. John Vianney Theological Seminary in Denver:
One of my seminarians recently came to me with a worried look on his face wondering whether because this was taught in a papal document he was obliged in conscience to accept it as true. I told him that Vatican II teaches that Catholics are obliged to receive the teaching of the Ordinary Magisterium, which the teaching of Amoris Laetitia constitutes, with a “religious submission of mind and will” (“religiosum voluntatis et intellectus obsequium”;Lumen Gentium 25). I said this obsequium is different from the “assent of faith” (de fide credenda) required for the truths of Divine Revelation (cf. CDF, Donum Veritatis, no. 23). Obsequium means we come to the teaching with intellectual docility, giving it a presumption of truth, with a readiness to assent to it, and, if it’s moral instruction, to apply it to our lives.
But neither intellectual docility, nor readiness of will implies that we accept the teaching of the Ordinary Magisterium without subjecting it to the authority of faith and reason. We are obliged in conscience to accept what’s true. The Holy Spirit guards the Church from error when she teaches infallibly, and so we can be confident that teachings taught infallibly are true. But the guidance of the Holy Spirit to the pope and bishops when they exercise their Ordinary Magisterium does not guard them from error.
And so we must always consider these teachings of the Church in the light of what we already know to be true concerning Catholic faith and morals. If after careful consideration we conclude that some teaching of the pope or bishops is inconsistent with the teaching of Christ or with moral or pastoral issues that the Church has already authoritatively and rightly settled, then we have no obligation to assent to it and we may be obliged to oppose it.
Dr Jessica M. Murdoch, a professor of fundamental and dogmatic theology at Villanova University, offers a similar take:
The basic principles of the Church’s doctrine of infallibility provide substantive guidance here. First and foremost, the Petrine ministry participates in the infallibility of the deposit of Revelation. This is crucial to hold in view, because Revelation is ultimately the criterion of truth. The special, divine assistance of infallibility is a privilege attached to the Holy Father as the center of unity of the Church, yet this privilege is always given for the entire Church. Besides the infallibility attached to the Pope’s pronouncements taught with the fullness of his supreme authority (the “extraordinary magisterium”), the “ordinary magisterium” can also be a source of infallible teaching, when it concerns de fide doctrine (concerning faith and morals), when it is marked by unity and unanimity, and when it is proposed to be definitive and absolute teaching. Not every teaching of the ordinary magisterium, however, fulfills these criteria. Some teachings of the ordinary magisterium can be fallible, and do not command interior assent of mind and will, if such teachings are clearly contrary to reason, or to the natural law, or to the divine positive law.
And in all of this one must keep ever in mind that the charism of infallibility is one of assistance and not of inspiration. In other words, the Holy Father cannot create doctrine, but can only explain the deposit of the faith more clearly.
Her conclusion, however, puts us almost right back where we started – in a confusion of cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops opposing bishops:
Ultimately, however, this level of discernment cannot be a matter of private judgment, but of magisterial decision. In case of real conflict between the teaching of various popes or between the teaching of one pontificate and natural or divine positive law, only the magisterium bears the obligation and authority to clarify any errors publicly.
Whatever Kasper and Schönborn say, this is a far from settled matter. But that hasn’t, and won’t, stop them from using this as a cudgel to force acceptance of the anti-Catholic novelties contained in AL.
Bentz continues:
According to Kasper – and indeed he is right, as evidenced by the post-synodal discussions concerning the document – critiques of Amoris Laetitia boil down to the question of “remarried” divorced Catholics receiving Communion.
As Kasper points out, the question is addressed by two different camps: One opinion is held by “conservatives,” some of whom (including German philosopher Robert Spaemann) see Amoris Laetitia as a break from the tradition of the Church, whereas others (including Cardinal Gerhard Müller) say the publication does not change the position of the Church.
Another (held by Italian theologian Rocco Buttiglione) says the doctrine of the Church is developed further but not on the line of Pope John Paul II. Yet others acknowledge a “careful development” that is paired with a lack of “concrete guidelines.” The last position among the “conservatives” is Norbert Lüdecke (Canon Law, Bonn, Germany) who says it is up to the individual conscience of the remarried divorced person to decide if he or she may receive Communion or not.
Kasper goes on to cite Buttiglione that Cardinal Christoph Schönborn presents the “decisive interpretation.” This citation refers back to a publication in L’Osservatore Romano. The same position is taken by Fr. Antonio Spadaro, SJ in La Civiltà Cattolica, among whom Kasper wants to count himself.
Kasper critiques the “alleged confusion” as having been caused by a “third party” who has “alienated themselves from the sense of faith and life of the people of God.” He continues to say that “behind the pastoral tone of the document lies a well thought-out theological position.”
Kasper appears to make an important distinction here — namely, that it is neither the “conservative” critiques nor those insisting that AL changes nothing who are providing the most substantial opposition to the exhortation, but rather a “third party”. And who might this be? The 45 theologians who have offered theological censures against the implicit heresies in the document? Publications like this one, which have asserted that the document needs not to be clarified, but rather rescinded? Any of a number of other faithful Catholic analysts, theologians, priests, or publications which have made clear the dangers in AL?
Kasper claims that those who are causing “confusion” over the exhortation have “alienated themselves from the sense of faith and life of the people of God.”
I would counter that Cardinal Kasper and his friends have alienated themselves from the Son of God Himself, and the Church He established as His Mystical Body and Bride.
Kasper continues:
The Cardinal praises the “realistic, open, and relaxed way of dealing with sexuality and eroticism” in Amoris Laetitia that does not seek to “indoctrinate or moralize.” “With a grain of salt, one can say that Amoris Laetitia distances itself from a primarily negative Augustinian view of sexuality and turns toward an affirming Thomistic view on creation.” Kasper repeats his opinion that the moral ideal is an “optimum,” yet is unreachable by many. “Oftentimes, we have to choose the lesser evil,” he states, “in the living life there is no black and white but only different nuances and shadings.”
I don’t know how to describe these remarks, other than to say that they’re just…gross. “Eroticism”? Really? What occupies this man’s mind? A papal document that intentionally does not seek to “indoctrinate or moralize”? Considering that the pope is the guardian of doctrine and the highest moral authority on earth, such a claim means that Kasper believes that the pope has utterly failed in carrying out the duty of his office.
And then we find ourselves back — yet again — contemplating the foolhardy notion of the moral law as a noble but unattainable ideal. Such excuse-making about grave sin is the work of Satan; it is a willful cooperation in moral evil, makes those who promote it accessories to the sin of others, and it leads souls to Hell.
Of course, we’ve heard the “no black and white” language elsewhere recently, from no less of an authority than Pope Francis himself:
“Future priests need to be formed not with general and abstract ideas, which are (overly) clear and distinct, but this fine discernment of spirits, so that they can help people in their concrete lives,” the Pope said in a speech to Polish Jesuits, published Aug. 25.
Seminarians and future priests, he said, “need to truly understand this: in life not everything is black and white, white and black. No! In life shades of gray predominate. We must then teach how to discern within this gray.”
Does anyone still honestly believe at this point that Francis and Kasper are not on the same page?
Kasper then takes aim at Familiaris Consortio (#84) when he says:
Instead of choosing the path of John Paul II and Benedict XVI (“who had adhered to John Paul II’s decision”) to not allow “remarried” divorced Catholics to receive Communion and instead to insist that they practice abstinence in their sexual relations, Pope Francis “goes a step further, by putting the problem in a process of an embracing pastoral [approach] of gradual integration.”
“Amoris Laetitia envisages which forms of exclusion from ecclesiastical, liturgical, pastoral, educational, and institutional services can be overcome,” Kasper explains. He posits that when John Paul II gave permission for remarried divorced to receive Communion – if they lived as brother and sister – this was “in fact a concession.” The Cardinal reasons this by saying, “Abstinence belongs to the most intimate sphere and does not abolish the objective contradiction of the ongoing bond of marriage of the first sacramental marriage and the second civil marriage.” [emphasis added]
I recall reading that section of Familiaris Consortio and struggling mightily with it; how could people who have lived together in a sexual relationship continue to live together in continence without being in a perpetual occasion of sin? We have published testimonies of the possibility of such a life lived virtuously, but this is clearly a less than ideal set of circumstances, with nothing but the will to keep couples from falling back into the sin of adultery. Kasper also notes that that Canon Law no longer levies excommunication of the “remarried,” itself an innovation of the 1983 code under the promulgation of John Paul II. In these assertions, Kasper makes the attempt to co-opt John Paul II’s own gradualism into the development of Amoris Laetitia — a claim that seems simultaneously underhanded and not without a certain measure of justification.
Kasper finally admits what we already know about the practical effects of AL on the practice of admitting the “remarried” to the sacraments:
Therefore, Kasper states that “Amoris Laetitia lays the groundwork for a changed pastoral praxis in a reasoned individual case.” Yet he also says the “Papal document does not draw clear practical conclusions from these premises.” According to Kasper, the Pope leaves the question open, and the very fact of leaving it open is “in itself a magisterial decision of great consequence.”
Kasper explains that the direction of Pope Francis is clear: “One does not need to focus on footnotes. Much more important is that the gradual integration, which is the key topic in question, is directed essentially towards admittance to the Eucharist as full-form of the participation of the life of the Church.”
Kasper quotes Francis’ statement from an in-flight press conference on April 16 wherein he responded to the question if in some cases remarried divorced can receive Communion with the poignant words: “Yes. Period.” This answer is not found in Amoris Laetitia but ‘corresponds to the general ductus.’” [emphasis added]
It seems that we have at last come full circle. In February, 2014, when Cardinal Kasper gave the consistory keynote that introduced us to the idea of a push for Communion for the Divorced and Remarried, we could see that it wasn’t just talk. Time after time, Francis made clear that he supported the agenda, at first by silence, then by action, and finally by words.
The coup is complete. They got what they wanted. And just like every other doctrinal perversion that has come along in the past 50 years, they will try to shove every understanding but this one down the memory hole and call it “development.”
Since it’s on the laity now, I implore you all: don’t let them get away with it. Fight it wherever you go. After all, Sister Lucia told us that this is the final battle. But there is hope:
[T]he final battle between the Lord and the reign of Satan will be about marriage and the family. Don’t be afraid, she added, because anyone who operates for the sanctity of marriage and the family will always be contended and opposed in every way, because this is the decisive issue. And then she concluded: however, Our Lady has already crushed its head. [emphasis added]
Forgive me here. I am not as pious or worthy as many and I pray for forgiveness of my many errors and temperament. That said – God gave me eyes, ears and a brain. The way I see it – this pope is an idiot, a deceiver and no one I will blindly follow. He is not following the guidance of the Holy Spirit and I will not follow him. I will pray for guidance and use my own mind, doing my best to serve God and in the end being judged. I trust in God and I’m good with that.
Cf.
– #AmorisLaetitia: My Papa Offers Me A Mistress
– For All the New/Novel Doctrine in #AmorisLaetitia, Let Pope Francis Be Accursed!
– The father of Lies
1) La Civiltà Cattolica link broken. Is it this? – http://www.laciviltacattolica.it/articoli_download/extra/INTERVISTA%20SCHONBORN%20INGLESE.pdf
2) Better (from the Horse’s mouth) links to Buttiglione in L’Osservatore Romano:
– http://www.osservatoreromano.va/en/news/joy-love-and-consternation-theologians
– http://www.news.va/en/news/some-comments-on-the-apostolic-exhortation-amoris
Those links are in Bentz’s piece, and only copied here. I don’t feel that I can take the liberty of replacing them and still format that as a block quote. If he updates the links, I can use his new ones.
On what:
1) We ought with firm faith believe and profess;
2) We with firm faith also believe;
3) We firmly accept and hold;
4) We adhere with religious submission of will and intellect,
Cf. CONGREGATION FOR THE DOCTRINE OF THE FAITH » PROFESSION OF FAITH.
As regards those things we adhere with religious submission of will and intellect, this is key from the document linked above:
This becomes clear in light of this infallible teaching of the Church:
And captured and well explained by Dr Jessica M. Murdoch in the article above (thank you @skojec/1P5):
“The Cardinal praises the “realistic, open, and relaxed way of dealing with sexuality and eroticism” in Amoris Laetitia that does not seek to “indoctrinate or moralize.” ”
The Pope’s function of binding and loosing relates precisely to the fields of doctrine and morals, yet here Kasper affirms that AL does not seek to “indoctrinate or moralize.” How then can the accursed document be a “binding” part of the magisterium? The old idiot is as self-contradictory as Frankenpope.
Do not follow these instruments of the antichrist – they are pursuing the wide and easy road to damnation.
So the Ten Commandments given us by Christ Our Saviour are no longer applicable because they are too hard to follow. If that is the collective opinion of this pope & hierarchy then let them leave their positions immediately – they occupy them under false pretences (as we all know). They do not care about the Children of God but the children of Satan. Our priests must join with us in speaking out more forcefully about this demonic situation our prelates have led us into & urge PB to put a stop to it & to reveal the Third Secret of Fatima forthwith. He has nothing to lose & spiritually everything to gain by coming clean about this Marxist/Masonic/Modernist ideology we have been cursed with. Realistically he has little time left to do so – hopefully he’ll do the right thing & succumb to God’s Will & Our Lady’s request. Lund is upon us & Italy is being shaken with earthquakes. Is no-one going to take heed?
Ah, Steve, but there’s the rub right there. How does one fight, on a large scale, at least, against an establishment Church and an establishment Catholic media built upon the fundamental, immutable (in their eyes) notion that the Pope, whomever he may be at a given time, may not be opposed or argued with under any and all circumstances, for to do so (in their eyes) is to argue with Christ Himself? And some go a step further, arguing and (erroneously, in my view) invoking canon law to maintain that the laity have no right at all to disagree with a bishop or cardinal, as to do so (in their view, again) is tantamount to publicly criticizing the Apostles themselves.
We’ve reached critical mass here, ladies and gentlemen. Based on the renewed audacity and boldness of the uber-progressives at the highest levels of Church authority—which, we were all told, had been soundly trounced and pounded into near extinction under the previous two pontificates—can we conclude anything other than we are now on the precipice of civil war for the soul (for lack of a better word) of Christ’s Holy Church? If we think it has been bad thus far, we haven’t, I fear, seen anything yet. Does anyone doubt for a second that those who dare oppose the New Regime of Mercy!™ will not be thoroughly and totally punished? We have seen what has happened to the few bishops and cardinals who have dared to not tow Francis’s line (Burke, Schneider, Sarah); if the villains within the Vatican can get away with doing this to their own brother bishops, what won’t they do to us simple laymen and women?
It’s going to get ugly very, very quickly. The only things that will see us through, as I see it, are (1) the traditional Mass and sacraments, wherever one can obtain them (even if only online); (2) devotion to the Sacred Heart of Our Lord; (3) the Rosary and other devotions to Our Lady and her Immaculate Heart (oh, how it must ache with the onslaught of countless swords each and every hour of each and every day); and (4) online communities such as this. We may be scattered throughout the world, but as St. Paul teaches, “[F]or as the body is one, and hath many members; and all the members of the body, whereas they are many, yet are one body, so also is Christ” (1 Cor. 12:12).
So, Cardinal Kasper, and all others who think like you, even if it be the Pope himself. I say to you: Non serviam. This bastardized, false Mercy!™ you peddle is not the Faith Our Lord left His apostles. If refusing to go along with your agenda makes me an unfaithful Catholic, then so be it.
I couldn’t have written it any better:-)
There is indeed, more we can do as laymen. We can go to our parish priests, our bishops, and have discussions with them, objections, concerns, as to what we are seeing and what is being presented to us. We have to fight, fight for our faith, and not sit passively by, accepting all this heresy. Make appointments with your priests, send emails, letters, whatever you are comfortable with, but let’s take a stand for our faith! Even if just one priest, as a result if our contact, questions or disagrees with his bishop over this, have we not won one small battle?
News flash: Abrogation of 6th and 10th Commandments under consideration by Vatican.
Sources close to Cardinal Kasper and Pope Francis indicate consideration is being given to elimination of the 6th and 10th Commandants due to popular demand. The source further indicated that Pope Francis said that these commandments are much too rigid and that most folks pay no attention to them. ” People must be accompanied on their journey of faith and be shown mercy regardless of their actions or beliefs.”
It was unclear when Pope Francis will make this announcement. Some speculated it would be in Sweden at the 500th anniversary of Martin Luther’s posting of his thesis and who famously said, “Does the pope set up laws?” he had asked in his essay on the church’s Babylonian captivity. “Let him set them up for himself and keep hands off my liberty.” If a priest was supposed to be celibate, what standing did he have to set up rules about sex for the laity?”
Please tell me this is published somewhere like Eye of the Tiber!
No, I just made it up. Seemed the appropriate reaction.
It should be clear to most that Cdl Kasper not only contradicts long established Church Doctrine, but the Bible itself. When is adultery not adultery? When is living like Brother and Sister a sin? Kasper argues that Pope JPII accommodated adultery, but his accommodations were quite impossible in the “real world”. A man and woman living as Brother and Sister live in a constant Near Occasion of Sin, and therefore will give-in to temptation. Instead of arguing to remove the accommodation, Kasper instead, argues that JPII didn’t go far enough. AL is just continuity of a process which JPII began. Using Kasper’s Hegelian form of theology (Hegel argued that History is a continuous flow of events, with the current epoch building and changing on past events; that is, History is a living thing always evolving), a future Pope could very well remove the Sixth Commandment in the name of Mercy.
Anyone who still thinks that Bergoglio is a Catholic is mad, insane, or merely duplicitous.
On the very odd occasion when he teaches authentic Catholicism, I will follow him (sometimes a bit of Catholicism slips out by mistake in his ramblings). But at all other times, he can just bugger off. He’s a buffoon and an idiot and much, much worse, just like Kasper he’s a heretic. I personally think they are all homosexuals and nothing in this world is so pertinacious as a queer.
Glad to hear from you again. You should drop by more often.
To be honest Ana I am sick to death after seven-eight years of Catholic blogging. I’ve even been banned by the Remnant, for daring to criticise the editorial line from time to time. You know how many times I was banned by the Catholic Herald, and by the Telegraph’s old “Holy Smoke” blog before that.
Even the Leader of those who follow the Leninist Line has had enough.
Well this Marxist/Masonic/Modernist Church gets to everyone eventually, although I thought you had sufficient VPNs & IP addresses to ride out the storm. The CH had to close its comment boxes mainly because of a troll residing in the north/west of the UK who was controlling them by the use of countless pseudo names including Meena (LOL). Deacon Augustine did a fine job in outing him – he was also on another website under yet another title but has now left. I think you should set up your own website & allow everyone to let off steam without inhibition – it would be a service in these dire times but maybe there are constraints on site owners e.g. libel & pc laws that can rebound.
VPNs are one thing. But I have to guard my peace of mind.
Your website idea — yes, a good one. Contributions please!
Uncle Joe,
The simple stakhanovite Catholic proletariat are confused by your ambiguous statements. Please could you emulate one of your unworthy successors and in the interests of glasnost say what you really think.
The Bergoglian dialectic Comrades evades all efforts to pin-point it accurately: nevertheless, the Leader of the Happy Soviet Toiler & Peasant shall attempt to do so:
Bergoglio is the first post-Christian Pope; a man so weaned on Modernism, a condemned heresy, and the peculiarities of his own personality, which hovers uncertainly on the peripheries of the autistic range, that there is simply no room in his addled mind for that body of teaching called Catholicism.
If Bergoglio was ever really the pope, he has lost the papacy due to outright heretical writings and sayings which he refuses to retract. As far as I am concerned at this point, he is not the pope or he was never the pope. I will wait for his passing, pray for his soul, and await the next pontiff.
“And then we find ourselves back — yet again — contemplating the foolhardy notion of the moral law as a noble but unattainable ideal.”
It should come as no surprise, based on the current love affair with Luther and all of these his fellow travelers, that the above quote represents Lutheran Theology not Catholic. The Commandments are not meant to be kept but rather to instill in us a sense of hopelessness in our ability to live a moral life so that we will cling to Salvation by Faith in Christ alone. Seriously, that is Martin Luther’s teaching and it is also obviously alive in well in men like Cardinal Kasper et al.
These men have more in common with Martin Luther in their approach to moral theology than they do with Catholicism.
They are really Marxist/Masonic/Modernists who will embrace anything but the Catholic faith. Maybe a coup could be organised when they are all away in Lund commemorating Protestantism? The REAL Catholics could then take over the Seat of Peter & bring back Tradition overnight. We can still dream!
Yes indeed, it is Luther’s doctrine of the Commandments. But Kasper isn’t the only denizen of Casa Santa Marta who has waxed lyrical about the qualities of Luther. Is there a technical theological term for a Protestant Pope?
However, they have built on Luther’s errors to embrace also the heresy of Gradualism as condemned by the Council of Trent. Consequently the Commandments are no longer seen as absolutes, but are applied in gradated form in accordance with the supposed ability or inability of a subject to keep them.
Worse still, they have applied this gradualistic approach to the state of being married or not. No longer is marriage seen as a legal and sacramental state of being which either exists or does not exist, but even this holy Sacrament is reduced to an “ideal” which is reflected in all sorts of perverse simulacra such as cohabitation, same-sex relationships and public permanent adultery. Taking as their premise the false “ecumenical principle” that what “unites us is more important than what divides us”, they now apply this false logic to look for the so-called good in sinful relationships which supposedly reflects the “ideal” of marriage. AL starts planting these false premises as early as the 3rd paragraph – the whole document is a diaboloical betrayal of the Catholic Faith.
To sum up the current plight of the Church: the errors of false ecumenism have now come home to roost and are being used to undermine every aspect of moral and sacramental theology. You can be sure they will be striking at Holy Orders soon.
Whenever Kasper and his friends show their hands, I see claws.
And horns …
‘”…Who has alienated themselves from the sense of the faith and life of the people of God…”‘ Weasel words from this prelate and his pal Bergoglio. It’s a supreme irony that both those rebels against God, demonstrate the truth of Original Sin even as they contemptuously reject it out of hand. Without the “black or white” dogmas of the church, we are left with nothing but the rebellious delusions of those two(private judgement or as I prefer, subjectivity) and so many other bishops. Because they don’t have the Christian faith in their souls, they choose to decide for themselves, what is good and what is evil, just like Adam and Eve. The sin of pride writ large in their souls.
Actually I think that describes the Pope and his group – alienated themselves from the faith and life of the people God. They are so alienated that they no longer see that we are sinner who need forgiving and who need to repent.
Very very true. The sin of pride is their downfall
God forgive me, but “I spit in their general direction,” (said with a thick French accent).
Always best to say such things with a thick French accent 🙂
Which part of “Church infiltrated and hijacked by the enemies of Our Lord and His Blessed Mother” do Catholics with eyes to see and ears to hear not understand?
Gross
Our Lady of Good Success, pray for us.
“Our help is in the name of the Lord Who made heaven and earth”
I am really wondering if Francis will invalidate the Mass with an ecu-maniacal agreement.
This has been close to my thoughts as well.
Our election in the USA is a biggie and consuming much of our attention, but there is a great storm brewing in Sweden! And I believe it may be the decisive call of the Holy Spirit with a loud HORN to move our bishops and cardinals to say, ” NO!” should it come to pass, for this is an impossibility.
Prepare for the worst.
But also hope. As believers we do hope.
That is so true. But the whole point of the idea of hope is that the current situation is dire.
“And then we find ourselves back — yet again — contemplating the
foolhardy notion of the moral law as a noble but unattainable ideal.
Such excuse-making about grave sin is the work of Satan; it is a willful
cooperation in moral evil, makes those who promote it accessories to the sin of others, and it leads souls to Hell.”
—
This brings to mind the scenes from C.S. Lewis’ Voyage to Venus, in which the woman is subjected to all manner of arguments about why going onto dry land was actually the right thing to do, even though the woman had been told — like Adam and Eve and the forbidden fruit in the garden — in the that it was forbidden.
Centuries ago it was all fun and games, until someone got burned at the stake. Lucky these undocumented Catholics were born when they were. As for Pope Francis, well, I’m really leaning hard on the Holy Spirit for this one.
I see the Fatima prophecy playing out right before our eyes – “Kasper then takes aim at Familiaris Consortio (#84) when he says:Instead of choosing the path of John Paul II and Benedict XVI…” –
Cardinal: “What Sister Lucia told me:Final Confrontation between the Lord and Satan will be over Family and Marriage.”
http://rorate-caeli.blogspot.com/2015/06/cardinal-what-sister-lucia-told-me.html