Posted on 02/07/2024 8:56:44 AM PST by ebb tide
In comments critics call “straw man” arguments, Pope Francis has stated that outrage over Fiducia Supplicans is “hypocrisy.”
The Pontiff made the remarks in an interview he gave to the weekly Italian journal Credere, which is due to be released February 8, but a preview of which was issued to the press today.
Speaking to Credere’s editor, Fr. Vincenzo Vitale, Pope Francis gave his thoughts on a number of topics including Fiducia Supplicans and blessings of homosexual couples, the role of women in the Church, and a Church which is “close” to people.
Asked about the controversial document, Pope Francis replied: “No one is shocked if I give a blessing to an entrepreneur who maybe exploits people, and that is a very serious sin. Whereas they are scandalized if I give it to a homosexual…. This is hypocrisy! The heart of the document is welcome.”
Prior to these lines – as revealed in more extensive comments from the interview released by Vatican News – Francis stated, “Always in confessions, when these situations arrive, homosexual people, remarried people, I always pray and bless. The blessing should not be denied to anyone. Everyone, everyone, everyone.”
“Be careful,” he continued. “I’m talking about people: those who are capable of receiving Baptism. The most serious sins are those that disguise thmselves with a more ‘angelic’ appearance.”
However, Francis’ answer to Credere appears to misrepresent both Fiducia Supplicans and the opposition which it has received. In the preview of his answers provided to the press, the Pope presents a scenario of blessing an individual on his own, whilst Fiducia Supplicans expressly speaks about the blessing of “couples.”
His complaint has already been swiftly criticized by clergy and lay commentators as being a “straw man” argument, for he was defending a form of blessing – of an individual on his own – which no one was opposing.
Authored by CDF prefect Cardinal Victor Manuel Fernández, Fiducia Supplicans states in section 31 that “within the horizon outlined here is the possibility of blessings of couples in irregular situations and of same-sex couples.”
Fernández outlined that such blessings should not imitate or be confused with marriage. He also added that there should not be an expectation of “the same moral conditions for a simple blessing that are called for in the reception of the sacraments.”
The widespread opposition to Fiducia Supplicans has spread throughout the Church to all corners of the globe, as clerics of all ranks refused to implement the blessings of homosexual couples proposed in the text which the Pope approved.
READ: FULL LIST – Where do bishops stand on blessings for homosexual couples?
In recent weeks, both Fernández and Francis have attempted to calm the waters by arguing that the the proposed blessings are not of the union of two people, but of the two people themselves who make the request together. Francis stated to the CDF assembly in late January:
I would like to emphasize briefly two things: the first is that these blessings, outside of any liturgical context and form, do not require moral perfection to be received; the second, that when a couple spontaneously approaches to ask for them, one does not bless the union, but simply the people who together made the request.
Not the union, but the people — of course taking into account the context, the sensitivities, the places where people live and the most appropriate ways to do it.
The CDF’s 2021 note which ruled out the possibility of blessings “unions of persons of the same-sex,” stated that blessings could be provided to individuals who came alone, seeking a blessing.
Written by former CDF prefect Cardinal Luis Ladaria SJ, the note read that:
The answer to the proposed dubium does not preclude the blessings given to individual persons with homosexual inclinations, who manifest the will to live in fidelity to the revealed plans of God as proposed by Church teaching. Rather, it declares illicit any form of blessing that tends to acknowledge their unions as such.
In this case, in fact, the blessing would manifest not the intention to entrust such individual persons to the protection and help of God, in the sense mentioned above, but to approve and encourage a choice and a way of life that cannot be recognized as objectively ordered to the revealed plans of God.”
LifeSiteNews will provide further coverage of the Pope’s extended comments upon their release.
Ping
I waver between thinking that Bergoglio is dumb as a box of rocks and thinking he knows his logic is crap but says it anyway just to troll his critics.
Obviously the flaw in his analogy here is that if the “exploitative entrepreneur” gets a blessing it’s of himself as an individual, not his “exploitative entrepreneurism.” Blessing the homosexual union, on the other hand, is totally different thing and would be analogous to the pope turning up to bless the Dickensian child-labor factory run by the “exploitative entrepreneur”... which he obviously wouldn’t do.
Everyone deserves a blessing and hell is/will be empty. Got it. Such an orthodox pope that one.
The gays and priests are quite capable of meeting individually or as a couple for counsel, but that is not AT ALL what they are interested in.
Their intent is to confuse, deceive, demoralize, and scandalize believing Catholics, especially children.
It is transparent and a horrible sin on the part of Francis, the bishops, and all priests who are not in vocal opposition.
If it was run by the CCP he would.
Bergoglio is no genius, but his tactic here is a common one for leftists trying to defend the indefensible — misrepresent the critic, deflect from the issue at hand, and change the subject to one more his liking.
I wonder if he would bless a mafia crime family.
It’s more of a red herring (fallacy of distraction by changing the subject) than a straw man, but yeah. Reminds me of Bill Clinton or Biden, who lie so effortlessly and reflexively that they don’t even have to think about it. It’s their default mode.
Bad Jesuits.
I don’t think he’s dumb but he’s nowhere near Benedict or even John Paul’s league. When he reads the orthodox texts prepared for him by others, he’s not bad. But in interviews or when he ad libs or adds something to the text ... lookout, Wow! is possible. Maybe he should take Athanasius Schneider’s advice: A pope should speak very little.
Frankie is evil and clever. Never doubt that. He does not come out with anything specific, he speaks in ambiguity, on purpose. Always in wishy washy uncertainty to undermine the doctrine and the faithful. His father the devil does the same. He is evil
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