Cardinal Raymond Burke's recent remarks concerning Islam

[Al_Moritz]

I do not think he is outside of Catholic doctrine. It is hard to be outside of doctrine based on one sentence. Consider this. Cardinal Burke is not a polytheist. He does not believe in multiple gods. He also did not expound on his statement that somehow Muslims worship some pagan god, or some demon, as some fundamentalist believe. He correctly pointed out the reason he was saying it was not the same god, and these differences are real. That is why I was careful to say that only his* wording *is not in agreement with the two above references.

Please note that I chose my words carefully.

I did not say “he is outside Catholic doctrine”, full stop. I said “he is on this issue outside Catholic doctrine”.

As for the remainder of your post, you make some thought-provoking points which, however, cannot excuse the Cardinal’s wording.

 

[dmar198]

Yes, it is Catholic doctrine that we all worship the same God. If Cardinal Burke does not adhere to it, he is on this issue outside Catholic doctrine. As you say, it is not a place where legitimate opinions may differ.

I think Burke’s perspective can possibly defended on these grounds:

The Council Fathers did not vote on the various translations of the Vatican 2 documents, only the Latin original. (Similarly, the official text of the Catechism is the Latin, and all translations are supposed to be corrected, when necessary, according to that text.) Latin does not have a definite article similar to our word “the.” With this in mind, I think one could legitimately defend the position that the Catechism and the Vatican 2 documents only say that Muslims “worship one God,” not necessarily that they worship the same God we do.

On this note, I think it is worthwhile to show that the alternative translation “worship one God” is actually Also used by papal sources. For example, consider the way the papal book Crossing the Threshold of Hope (by St. John Paul 2) quotes the Vatican 2 document Nostra Aetate Paragraph 3: “The Church also has a high regard for the Muslims, who worship one God, living and subsistent, merciful and omnipotent, the Creator of heaven and earth.” source This contrasts with the typical English translation of Nostra Aetate Paragraph 3, which says, “The Church regards with esteem also the Moslems. They adore the one God, living and subsisting in Himself; merciful and all- powerful, the Creator of heaven and earth.” source

From this, it appears that it is possible to defend an alternate translation of the phrase “They worship the one God” so that it only says “They worship one God,” not necessarily the same one we worship. If this position is an option, which is a position that I think is defensible, then it seems to remain open to interpretation whether Muslims and Christians worship the same God or not.

To be clear, my own position is that they do worship the same God we do and that this is the classic and traditional understanding. It goes further back than Pope St. Gregory VII (from the 1000s). But I do think you can remain a good Catholic and disagree with this position, if you safeguard the infallibility of Vatican 2 by maintaining that (for various reasons) it does not actually define that we all worship the same God. I think that is a defensible position, but, in my opinion, the position that we Do worship the same God has the stronger evidence from Tradition.

Actually I wonder if the two positions are, in some sense, talking past each other. Perhaps there is One Sense in which we Do worship the same God and one sense in which we don’t. C.S. Lewis’s book “The Last Battle” argues that we do not worship the same god as non-Christians do but that all their sincere prayers end up going to the true God anyway, because nothing good can go to false gods and nothing bad can go to God. (source) This seems to Result in a similar doctrine as what we hold, while approaching it from the perspective that we do Not worship the same God. That makes me think we might Really mean the same thing, even though we are using different words.

I hope that helps. God bless!

 

[Confiteor_Deo]

From the quotes of CCC, Vatican II and the Popes all together given, it is obvious that it is Catholic doctrine. Cardinal Burke errs on this point and needs to inform himself better.

So Catholics are bound to believe that Islam has the same God we do? Why would the Church even make this a doctrine? I really doubt that this is a doctrine of the Church, especially considering Cardinal Burke obviously doesn’t think so.

 

[abucs]

There is only one God and Islam has a poorer understanding of Him.

The question is obviously how poor an understanding of God is needed until you make the decision that the understanding does not reflect the reality of God.

I don’t think the Catechism addresses this point explicitly.

 

[Al_Moritz]

On this note, I think it is worthwhile to show that the alternative translation “worship one God” is actually Also used by papal sources. For example, consider the way the papal book Crossing the Threshold of Hope (by St. John Paul 2) quotes the Vatican 2 document Nostra Aetate Paragraph 3: “The Church also has a high regard for the Muslims, who worship one God, living and subsistent, merciful and omnipotent, the Creator of heaven and earth.” source This contrasts with the typical English translation of Nostra Aetate Paragraph 3, which says, “The Church regards with esteem also the Moslems. They adore the one God, living and subsisting in Himself; merciful and all- powerful, the Creator of heaven and earth.” source

From this, it appears that it is possible to defend an alternate translation of the phrase “They worship the one God” so that it only says “They worship one God,” not necessarily the same one we worship. If this position is an option, which is a position that I think is defensible, then it seems to remain open to interpretation whether Muslims and Christians worship the same God or not.

(Emphases added.)

The option of it not being the same God is excluded by the phrase “the Creator of heaven and earth”. Also note that Pope John Paul II who has used this alternative translation (but how do we know the English translation of his book does not introduce this alternative?) has explicitly said that we worship the same God, see the quote on the first page of the thread.

Furthermore, the dogmatic constitution Lumen Gentium states:
“But the plan of salvation also includes those who acknowledge the Creator, in the first place among whom are the Muslims: these profess to hold the faith of Abraham, and together with us they adore the one, merciful God, mankind’s judge on the last day.”

The emphasized phrases exclude the alternate understanding you discuss.

 

[Al_Moritz]

One might still argue that the latin original of Lumen Gentium,

“But the plan of salvation also includes those who acknowledge the Creator, in the first place among whom are the Muslims: these profess to hold the faith of Abraham, and together with us they adore the one, merciful God, mankind’s judge on the last day.”

would allow for the alternative English translation “those who acknowledge a creator”. Not so. The Latin original reads:

'Sed propositum salutis et eos amplectitur, qui Creatorem agnoscunt, inter quos imprimis Musulmanos, qui fidem Abrahae se tenere profitentes, nobiscum Deum adorant unicum, misericordem, homines die novissimo iudicaturum."

Note the capital “C” on “Creatorem”. This excludes the possibility of understanding of the term as “a creator”.