Cardinal Schönborn on Amoris Laetitia

[St_Francis]

Essentially yes I would go along with that.
These disciplines were formulated as the prudential application of unchanging moral norms/precepts to the conditions of the time.
Conditions, which called for the original rules to be made so as to protect unchanging moral norms/precepts, slowly changed until such time that contrary practises were no longer seen to be at odds with the moral precepts which were being upheld.

I don’t see how that necessarily follows or why it is relevant. The Pope can validly change Canon Law over night if he wishes to. He didn’t though did he.

Can you see that your principles of “reason” for your above argument are based on the implicit conclusion you have already decided is correct?
Shouldn’t reasoning be the other way around…in which case it seems more reasonable to assume your principles have speed wobbles.

But what is clear is that conditions in the Church have changed remarkably since the 1960s where Catholic remarried turning up in Church (Communion or not) was unheard of and were treated as outcasts.

Now significant numbers of same are in the bosom of the Church and many bishops Cardinals and Popes have first hand family experience of such Catholics and realise grace still abounds for many of these despite appearances. Some have publicly “come out” emotionally on this very point.

This is a completely new experience for the Church, conditions are not what they were for the last 1930 years. So it has been ready for a sudden shift of the tectonic plates for at least the last 50 yrs. Its past time and it had to happen.
Sorry for the short warning Rau - the warning signs were always there for those with eyes to see and ears to hear.
It was for me - maybe you not so much, and less for the Pope gainsayers amongst us…

How do bishops, cardinals, and popes know that “grace still abounds” for specific people?

 

[Blue_Horizon]

How do bishops, cardinals, and popes know that “grace still abounds” for specific people?

Because they say so, especially Pope Francis in a Magisterial document.
By specific they don’t actually name anyone of course, but they clearly hold it as nonsense to assume all are lost in recidivist sin and lives of no merit whatsoever.

Just as Jesus opined to the Scribes and Pharisees re adulterers, gluttons, tax collectors and wine bibbers.
That’s why I am a Christian.
Maybe I am wrong but if I am then I am in good company .

 

[St_Francis]

Because they say so, especially Pope Francis in a Magisterial document.
By specific they don’t actually name anyone of course, but they clearly hold it as nonsense to assume all are lost in recidivist sin and lives of no merit whatsoever.

Just as Jesus opined to the Scribes and Pharisees re adulterers, gluttons, tax collectors and wine bibbers.
That’s why I am a Christian.
Maybe I am wrong but if I am then I am in good company .

My understanding of your previous post was that what you were describing was members of the hierarchy seeing grace abounding in their own family and among their own friends. decided to take some action.

What I want to know is, how do people see that grace is abounding for someone specific? How can I tell if grace abounds for Jack but not for Jill?

 

[Rau]

…So it has been ready for a sudden shift of the tectonic plates for at least the last 50 yrs.

I’ve no resistance whatsoever to change in connection with this issue - just an expectation that the processes of change be robust. When cardinals write Dubia that are not answered, when Bishops “here” understand something different from Bishops “there”, then we don’t have a robust change process.

JP II said that the Church, in adopting its practices (on this issue) professes “her fidelity to Christ and to His truth” - which is to say therefore that such was at stake. * Perhaps if AL had expressed why an alternative practice (which in some cases at least is quite at odds with JP II’s prescription) also professes “fidelity to Christ and his truth” then much consternation would be eliminated.*

 

[Blue_Horizon]

I’ve no resistance whatsoever to change in connection with this issue - just an expectation that the processes of change be robust. When cardinals write Dubia that are not answered, when Bishops “here” understand something different from Bishops “there”, then we don’t have a robust change process.

Rose tinted rear view mirrors re Church history I suggest.
It has ever been so - and far worse than this relatively peaceful transition.

 

[Rau]

Rose tinted rear view mirrors re Church history I suggest.
It has ever been so - and far worse than this relatively peaceful transition.

I never mentioned history Blue, let alone a rose-tinted view of it - you introduced that claim so you could knock it down.

 

[Blue_Horizon]

I never mentioned history Blue, let alone a rose-tinted view of it - you introduced that claim so you could knock it down.

“When cardinals write Dubia that are not answered,”

Your view of history clearly suggests they need to be and its somehow bad not to .

when Bishops “here” understand something different from Bishops “there”,

Its rose tinted history to think otherwise. and its been far worse than this.
It was ever so .

Its your hidden set conclusion seeking to give truth to dubious supporting arguments once again. Cart before horse etc etc.

Goodnight Mary Ellen, Elizabeth, Rau.

 

[Rau]

Your view of history clearly suggests they need to be and its somehow bad not to .

Its rose tinted history to think otherwise. and its been far worse than this.
It was ever so.

Only you speak of history - so feel free to tilt away. I refer to events in the present, and all - according to some - over a matter of discipline which you find comparable to women wearing veils.

 

[pnewton]

Like women wearing a veil was a practice, or communion on the tongue?

This practice only has a similarity to the above, but it is nothing like these practices. The doctrine behind the practice is more extensive when we examine who can receive communion.

 

[Blue_Horizon]

My understanding of your previous post was that what you were describing was members of the hierarchy seeing grace abounding in their own family and among their own friends. decided to take some action.

What I want to know is, how do people see that grace is abounding for someone specific? How can I tell if grace abounds for Jack but not for Jill?

If you do not get or agree with the point made thus far as a likely self evident truth of pastoral experience, like the likely happy fate of unbaptised babies, nothing further I say is likely to assist you.

So far as admission to Communion is concerned it isnt about identifying and confirming the presence of sanctifying grace. I think we all know that deep down, though significant numbers do still conflate the two matters if not challenged. As the relevent Canon re the minister’s due make somewhat clear.

 

[awsiukiewicz]

In a talk in Western Ireland on the 15th July, Cardinal Schönborn spent four hours discussing Amoris Laetitia and the controversy surrounding it.

Some interesting highlights from the Crux article:Schönborn revealed that when he met the Pope shortly after the presentation of Amoris, Francis thanked him, and asked him if the document was orthodox.

“I said, ‘Holy Father, it is fully orthodox’,” Schönborn told us he told the pope, adding that a few days later he received from Francis a little note that said: “Thank you for that word. That gave me comfort.”
Double-take: the Pope asked the Cardinal ***after ***it was published if AL was orthodox and was ***comforted ***when assured it was?
“The question of these dubia is for me mainly a question of procedure,” he said at a press conference before the talks at Limerick’s cathedral house. “That cardinals, who should be the closest collaborators of the pope, try to force him, to put pressure on him to give a public response to their publicized, personal letter to the pope - this is absolutely inconvenient behavior, I’m sorry to say. If they want to have an audience with the pope, they ask for an audience; but they do not publish that they asked for an audience.”

On Amoris’s mixed reception, Schönborn said he wasn’t surprised at bishops disagreeing “because the reception of an important document takes time.” Pointing to the Second Vatican Council’s document on other religions, Nostra Aetate, he said 50 years later “it’s still very much in debate and the document has not given us the solution to everything.”
So giving Communion to sexually active remarried divorcees is a ‘question of procedure’?
Francis at one point in the synod described the question of communion for the divorced and remarried as a “trap,” because it stopped people looking at the concrete situation, Schönborn reported, adding that Amoris asks, first of all, that each case is examined with its own particular characteristics.

But before the question of communion can be addressed, an examination of conscience is needed (Amoris suggests five searching questions). “The question of communion can come after that.”

There may be cases when the sacrament can be given, [my emphasis] he said, but they needed discernment - for which Amoris gives guidelines.
Ah!

 

[awsiukiewicz]

what a crock…fancy words…I was taught that there was no such thing as divorce in the Catholic Church and the only way to continue on into married life post civil divorce was to apply through the annulment process which I am guessing now is somewhat moot. and I’ve read a copy of the Cardinal’s request for clarification with the Pope and it could not have possibly been more respectful and dignified. A formal request for an ‘audience’ with the Holy Father…what…the Pope shakes hands, hugs and smiles with almost any/everybody from any and all denomination including but not limited to self proclaimed atheist (which of course is not necessarily bad in it’s essence), but the point is these Cardinals surely deserved to be acknowledged. It is self evident that anyone that does not totally agree with every controversial statement made by the Pope is banished and replaced. I guess we are just in different ‘camps’ but deny that the Church is in Crisis is simply beyond me. We can of course go back in history and note many instances where things were awry but that seems somewhat superfluous at this point.

 

[Blue_Horizon]

Double take:

Double-take: the Pope asked the Cardinal after it was published if AL was orthodox and was comforted when assured it was?

What is the problem? That you “double take” suggests the problem may not be with the Pope but perhaps, at least equally likely, with the mistaken world/Church view of the double-taker surely?

 

[Blue_Horizon]

what a crock…fancy words…I was taught that there was no such thing as divorce in the Catholic Church

If you define which of the multiple possible understandings of “divorce” that you interpreted your Sunday School teacher to be speaking of back then we can perhaps more accurately analyse your understanding on this point.

But perhaps you are just venting here and are not really interested in understanding things more clearly.

and the only way to continue on into married life post civil divorce was to apply through the annulment process which I am guessing now is somewhat moot.

If you are “guessing” I think it would be better to make some real effort and research to inform yourself before regurgitating mere emotional impressions here that don’t actually aid anybody’s accurate understanding of the situation which is clear enough.

Why on earth would a neutral person, after reading the available material on these matters, think a discernment process is not going to encourage divorced and remarried Catholics to approach the marriage tribunal if they have not already done so .
Short answer, you are simply emotionally venting perhaps and so opine silly things.

and I’ve read a copy of the Cardinal’s request for clarification with the Pope and it could not have possibly been more respectful and dignified.

You seem to have little idea what you are talking about and it seems you don’t care to inform yourself either. It has always been equally polite and traditionally so, for the Pope not to respond. THAT is his response, and so is equally polite and respectful. All the recent Popes have standing Dubia that they have never responded to. Its normal. Get used to it.

What isn’t normal or traditional or polite is speaking to the laity and media when one’s dubia are declined in this way. All this information is easily researched and found on the Net. You seem to deem your limited life, pastoral experience and lay education sufficient for understanding these things and critiquing a live Pope. Its just plain embarrassing reading these uninformed and not wanting to be informed jejeune views.

 

[I_trust]

. You seem to deem your limited life, pastoral experience and lay education sufficient for understanding these things and critiquing a live Pope. Its just plain embarrassing reading these uninformed and not wanting to be informed jejeune views.

I find your posts condescending.

 

[pnewton]

and the only way to continue on into married life post civil divorce was to apply through the annulment process which I am guessing now is somewhat moot.

This has never been proposed by anyone.

 

[Blue_Horizon]

I find your posts condescending.

I fight fire with fire when i have to.

But let me guess…you agree with the unsubstantiated views and uncontrolled emotion of the poster who condescedingly disparages Pope Francis?

 

[I_trust]

I fight fire with fire when i have to.

But let me guess…you agree with the unsubstantiated views and uncontrolled emotion of the poster who condescedingly disparages Pope Francis?

Nope

 

[Blue_Horizon]

Nope

But you won’t explain what it is all the same…

 

[Justin_Swanton]

Double take:
What is the problem? That you “double take” suggests the problem may not be with the Pope but perhaps, at least equally likely, with the mistaken world/Church view of the double-taker surely?

And surely not? Surely?