Liberal Jesuits Found Newman Institute in Uppsala, Sweden

The Eponymous Flower ^ | 09/02/2010 | Tancred

[mas cerveza por favor]

Oh, so your answer is “it’s self-evident” and they mention Karl Rahner? I’ve got news for you. That’s not evidence.

Here is the evidence on the heterodoxy of Karl Rahner, implicitly denying the doctrine of original sin:

Cardinal Siri explains that in 1953, Rahner [...] "seems to admit [...] the doctrine of original sin” [...] By 1970, however, in his Theological Meditations on Mary, Rahner writes:

“The dogma (of the immaculate conception) does not mean in any way that the birth of a being is accompanied by something contaminating, by a stain, and that in order to avoid it Mary must have had a privilege." [...]

Cardinal Siri goes on to show the fallacy of Rahner’s teaching: “... if man at his birth” says the Cardinal, “ is not accompanied by a stain, of what stain does the Bull of Pius IX speak? How can one claim, as Rahner does, that there was not any stain to avoid and that Mary did not need a privilege?”

In short, this is nothing more than Rahner’s implicit denial of original sin. It also undermines the infallibility of Papal pronouncements, since Rahner’s words clearly contradict Pius IXs solemn definition.

http://www.cfnews.org/rahner.htm

[0beron]

No, I just know that when it’s raining the ground gets wet. You must be mentally-ill, because you deny a lot of evidence already out there as to the depravity and decadence of the Jesuit Order...Either that, or you benefit financially from the continued snake-oil business that the Jesuits are involved in.

And it wasn’t just Cardinal Siri who condemned Karl Rahner, even Montini condemned him.

Anyway, you’re an apologist for a dying cause. The sooner the Jesuits go away, the better.

No one who has any concern for their child’s eternal well-being should either send their child to a Jesuit school or seminary, no one.

[Houghton M.]

I denied no evidence because you presented none. I pointed out that your own evidence contradicts you.

And now you cite events from 40 years ago as evidence?

And resort to calling me mentally ill?

Sounds like you’re plumb out of ideas to defend your indefensibilities.

Why don’t you ask Tancred for some help. He’s full of clear and convincing evidence for the stuff he scatters over the internet.

[Houghton M.]

Oh, and I’m not an apologist for a dying cause.

See, I’m not making a defense of the liberal Jesuits of 40 years ago. You are the one lambasting a dying cause, namely, the liberal Jesuits of 40 years ago. They are in fact dying off and the next generation is different.

But you are so stuck in the past that you deny that a demographic shift could be taking place among the Jesuits like it is in the rest of the Church. There’s a lot like you out there.

You are like the Dwarfs in C. S. Lewis’s _The Last Battle_”

They got taken in once by Shift the Ape and realized it. That’s to their credit. But their response to that was to decide never again to trust anyone. So they end up in paradise but refuse to see it for what it is and thereby create their own hell.

You are creating your own Hell in the Church by refusing to acknowledge the possibility of change for the better. Granted, there was immeasurable harm done by Jesuits as well as many others. And some Jesuits and many others continue to do great harm right now. And will continue to do so in the future.

I do not deny that. I just question the wisdom of declaring an instutition evil without any clear evidence, simply on the basis of the past record of the Jesuits.

Go find out something concrete about Fr. Geister and get back to me. Until you do, all we have to go on, concretely, is a pro-life fundraiser and an Opus Dei faculty member. Oh, I forgot, some other faculty member read some of Thomas Merton. (Guilt by association where even the associated one was off the rails only later in his life—the early Merton was solidly orthodox—until you find out just what this other faculty member likes about Merton, his Mertonophilia has no probative force.)

Oh, and I forgot, one of the faculty members is GASP, a woman. Clear evidence of eeeeeeeevvvvvvvvvviiiiiiiiiilllllllll. Give me something concrete about her evilness.

But it’s easier to call me mentally ill.

[Houghton M.]

Give me a break.

The Newman Institute is Jesuit-founded. (Not Jesuit run—or did that escape you? It’s not run by or owned by the Jesuits, merely has one Jesuit as its founder. But I don’t imagine details matter much to you.)

The Newman Institute is founded by a Jesuit.

Karl Rahner was a Jesuit.

Karl Rahner was heterodox on one point. (Orthodox on others—or do you deny that? If so, you are intellectually dishonest.)

All Jesuits are heterodox because Karl Rahner was heterodox.

Ergo, the founder of the Newman Institute in Uppsala must necessarily be heterodox. Never mind that we have no evidence one way or another as to his heterodoxy or orthodoxy.

He has to be heterodox because he’s a Jesuit and all Jesuits are heterodox.

Never mind that I cited some non-heterodox Jesuits and know of dozens of others, beneath the radar, in the next generation.

No, I must be venally profiting from Jesuit snake oil.

Or mentally ill.

Just don’t make things too personal now.

[Houghton M.]

Let’s be intelligent here. This might be evidence of Karl Rahner’s heterodoxy.

But it cannot by any stretch of the imagination be evidence of the heterodoxy of the Newman Institute in Uppsala.

I wrote that Oberon and Vladimir had provided “no evidence.”

In the context it would be clear to anyone reading intelligently that the “no evidence” referred to the Newman Institute question.

And you chime in with evidence of Rahner’s heterodoxy. That can only be evidence of the Newman Institute’s heterodoxy if Rahner’s putative heterodoxy somehow contamimates all Jesuits anywhere in anything they do.

YOUR EVIDENCE WOULD MEAN THAT FR. MITCH PACWA IS HETERODOX. THAT FR. FESSIO IS HETERODOX.

So your evidence is no evidence with regard to the issue at hand.

[Houghton M.]

My apologies. I see that Oberon called me mentally ill and venal. You did not. You just employed dubious logic—guilt by association.

[0beron]

No, it’s a sincere level of concern either for your mental health or your moral health, because either you’re a complete knave or a fool.

Despite the overwhelming evidence, you insist on us believing in the sanity and orthodoxy of a newly founded Jesuit school when there isn’t a single other such institution in entire world.

Clearly, there’s something very wrong with you.

[0beron]

You’ve gotten all kinds of evidence.

The fact that you don’t find Merton problematic, but even worthy of serious study by Catholic students is damning enough.

I think if we sat down and lined up where we both stood in terms of politics, philosophy and religion, we’d both be very much at odds indeed.

I’m not interested in maintaining a fictitious alliance between modernism and Catholicism. That seems to be your game.

[mas cerveza por favor]

You just employed dubious logic

I did not need to employ logic. The words of Cardinal Siri and Rahner himself were damning enough.

I wrote that Oberon and Vladimir had provided “no evidence.” In the context it would be clear to anyone reading intelligently that the “no evidence” referred to the Newman Institute question. And you chime in with evidence of Rahner’s heterodoxy. That can only be evidence of the Newman Institute’s heterodoxy

Rahner had already been mentioned in the thread as connected to the university. Here is a textbook for the course on Fundamental Theology:

Rahner, K., Foundations of Christian Faith: Introduction to the Idea of Christianity.

Another of the textbooks used was written by Kasper the friendly heretic.

http://www.newman.se/kursplaner/Fundamentalteologi,%202009.pdf

[Houghton M.]

You don’t read well, do you? I find the late Merton problematic. The early Merton is sound. I’ve actually read him. Have you?

So now you call me a modernist? And a political liberal?

I’m a Tridentine Rite Catholic to the right of just about everyone I know. When I entered the Church I did so via the Roman Catechism and the Council of Trent documents. I take a second seat to no one in my traditional Catholic bona fides.

But I also am trained to make distinctions where distinctions are in order. Catholic moral theology requires me to put the best construction on people’s actions until I have evidence to the contrary.

If you will just find some damning evidence for the Newman Institute, I’ll join you in con-damning it.

But what you do is rash judgment. It’s wrong. You must have learned it from Tancred.

And now, having failed to provide evidence for your rash judgement regarding the school, you rush to rash judgment on me.

You don’t know me from Adam. You have no business making claims about my doctrinal orthodoxy and my political beliefs. What you have done is immoral according to traditional Catholic moral theology.

[Houghton M.]

So you accuse Kasper of heresy? Man you are quick with the damning.

Pharisee.

[Houghton M.]

You aren’t sincere about anything. You just throw bombs. Spare me your false pieties.

[Houghton M.]

No, I did not insist on the sanit and orthodoxy of this Institute. I merely pointed out that you have provided no evidence of heresy and some evidence of orthodoxy.

Guilt by association is rash judgment. It’s a sin.

[Houghton M.]

Of course you employed logic. Otherwise your point was meaningless. For your claim to make any sense you had to employ an implicit chain of reasoning, which I, to help you out, made explicit.

Let me try one more time. Okay, so Cardinal Siri damns Rahner.

What does Rahner have to do with the Newman Institute?

NOTHING. Nada, zero, in actual fact. He’s been dead for a while.

So, unless you intended to make no sense, and in light of the context you provided, you had to be assuming that

Rahner is bad.
Rahner was a Jesuit.
Newman Institute was founded by a Jesuit.
Newman Institute is bad.

Otherwise, your citation of Siri on Rahner
is
just
plain
irrelevant.

Which is it? Relevant through a chain of stupid guilt by association logic?

Or irrelevant, in which case, why did you post irrelevancy?

[Houghton M.]

Exactly where is the heresy in this particular book by Kasper? Evidence?

Do you even know what heresy is? Did you know that even a person who proclaims or writes heresy can at the same time write other things that are orthodox? Holy Mother Church makes precisely that distinction.

She also uses the word heretic very specifically. Not all error is heresy and not all who say or write erroneously are heretics. Heresy requires persistence in error after being warned that one is in error.

Just when and where was Kasper warned that he was in error and just how did he persist in it?

Ratzinger disagreed with him on local/universal church issues and I agree with Ratzinger and disagree with Kasper. That doesn’t mean Kasper is a heretic or that everything he wrote is erroneous.

Where in this particular textbook is Kasper heretical?

If you answer that we can begin to talk about the sin of the Newman Institute in using this book.

[Houghton M.]

Have you read Rahner’s Foundation of Christian Faith?

Just what is heretical in it? I don’t particularly like it but it’s not heretical. Many Rahnerians are in error, esp. on the Anonymous Christian stuff and Rahner on a few points was in error, but heretic (persitence after being warned), no, he was not and anyone who says he was doesn’t know what he is talking about. In my view Rahner was not the greatest theologian of the twentieth century but much of what people attribute to him is not by him at all but by those who claimed him as their source.

You just cruise around picking up slogans and throw them against the wall. You don’t know beans about Rahner’s or Kasper’s theology, now, do you? You just know the name:

Rahner BAD. Kasper BAD. Merton BAD. John Paul II BAD. Benedict XVI BAD. (Benedict would take EXACTLY THE POSITION I’VE TAKEN HERE ON KASPER AND RAHNER: some of their stuff is bad theology and he has argued with them, but other parts of their stuff, Benedict would say, is very good. But you know better than Benedict, I’m sure.)

EVERYONE BAD, BAD, BAD, BAD EXCEPT MAS CERVEZA POR FAVOR. MCFF HEAP BIG GOOD. EVERYONE ELSE BAD. ME GOOD, YOU’SE GUYS BAD.

[0beron]

Yeah, if you can’t see how German Idealism and the Tubingen School is problematic in someone who’s actually chosen Rahner’s epistemology as a subject for his Doctoral thesis, there’s something wrong with you.

Cardinal Kasper has been saying things that reek of heresy for the better part of two decades.

And yes, early Merton, whatever Merton, is problematic, but I wouldn’t expect someone like you who hurls the epithet “pharisee” in regard to someone calling Cardinal Kasper heretical either doesn’t know what of he speaks, or is striking a pose.

You’re no Traditionalist.

[mas cerveza por favor]

Exactly where is the heresy in this particular book by Kasper? Evidence?

I did not say that the book contained heresy, but that the author is heretical. Here is one small portion of the evidence:

Kasper: "the Church believes that Judaism, i.e. the faithful response of the Jewish people to God's irrevocable covenant, is salvific for them, because God is faithful to his promises."

http://www.ratzingerfanclub.com/covenant_and_mission.html

Just when and where was Kasper warned that he was in error and just how did he persist in it?

I do not pretend to know Kasper's interior disposition and so did not accuse him of formal heresy, but he has consistently pronounced material heresy over many years. The repeated misrepresentations of Church teaching by such a high-ranking official has certainly led many into error and perhaps damnation.

[mas cerveza por favor]

Have you read Rahner’s Foundation of Christian Faith?... You don’t know beans about Rahner’s or Kasper’s theology, now, do you?

There is no sense in wasting time wading through textbooks of known material heretics. Ordinary Catholics such as myself have grown highly suspicious of the modern theologians, as a group. Can you blame us?