In his most recent letter about his visit with Archbishop Vigano, Inside the Vatican‘s Robert Moynihan relates something Vigano told him that caught my attention:
And yet, now, as the October Amazon Synod draws near, and Catholic theologians increasingly find its working document a text based not on Christo-centric Christian revelation, but on observation of and respect for nature without any direct mention of Christ and his saving mission of incarnation, crucifixion, resurrection, this same Vigano is deeply troubled.
“Where is the Christian message here?” Vigano asks me, fixing me with his intense gaze under bushy eyebrows.
And he gives his own answer: “In fact, the figure of Christ is absent. The Synod working document testifies to the emergence of a post-Christian Catholic theology, now, in this moment. And this is very troubling. It is against everything I have worked for and believed for all my life.
“Let’s consider the history of the Jesuits,” Vigano continues. “That is something I am studying now with great care. In fact, if you would like to know the synthesis of my thought, it is this: What we are now seeing is the triumph of a 60-year-old plan, the successful execution of a well-thought out plan to bring a new sort of thinking into the heart of the Church, a thinking rooted in elements of Liberation Theology containing strands of Marxism, little interested in traditional Catholic liturgy or morality or theology, but rather focused on ‘praxis’ in the field of social justice. And now this plan has achieved one of its supreme goals, with a Jesuit on the See of Peter…”
The emphasis is mine. The implications are deserving of consideration.
The message is “to be continued,” as Moynihan often does, but I didn’t want to wait until the rest comes out to share this fascinating insight with you.
I’m very, very curious about what he’ll say in the next part.
