Posted on 01/17/2018 6:00:59 PM PST by ebb tide
(For the education of the audience, not you whom I know already knows this:)
A heretic is one who professes heresy. Heresy is defined as:
Can. 751 Heresy is the obstinate denial or obstinate doubt after the reception of baptism of some truth which is to be believed by divine and Catholic faith…
I can identify plenty of things that he has done that are facepalm moments. I can think of many things that he has preached that are plain wrong and go against the consistent teaching authority (Magisterium) of the Church. I can think of plenty of things that he has done (or has avoided doing) that have been scandalous (words or actions that have the tendency to lead another into sin).
But does he stubbornly (obstinately) deny or doubt a truth that must be believed by "divine and Catholic faith?" (A significantly shorter list than a truth that must be accepted with a "religious submission of the intellect and will.")
As far as his internal belief/denial, none of us can say one way or the other through our ordinary faculties. Likewise, none of us are in a position to be granted the graces to know so through divine revelation.
As far as his external utterances, I am neither a bishop nor a doctor of sacred theology, so I'm not in a position to make a formal evaluation of whether his words are reflective of one who denies a truth which is to believed by divine and Catholic faith. With that, I can't think of examples where he has repeatedly said/written things that have clearly violated clear dogma that must be accepted and not questioned: has he repeatedly denied the divinity of Christ, has he denied the Virgin Birth, has he denied the Real Presence, and so on and so forth?
There is a big difference between being wrong and scandalous (for example, being squishy about admitting people who have been civilly "divorced" and civilly "remarried" to Holy Communion) and being heretical (for example, denying the words of Christ that marriage is a lifelong bond between husband and wife). I can thing of plenty of examples of "wrong and scandalous" -- can't really think of repeated examples in the second category.
Now you pay a whole lot closer attention to this stuff than I do, so you may have examples of the second category. But even then, we must honestly ask, are either of us in a position to make such a proclamation? Don't know about you, but I'm not a bishop and I'm not a doctor of Sacred Theology, so I'm not qualified to do more than worry about the state of my own soul and the state of the souls of the family members for whom I am responsible. And that's pretty much a full time job.
And EVEN IF I was a bishop, or a doctor of sacred theology, I would have to keep in mind the words of Gratian in his Decretum:
If the Pope, remiss in his duties and neglectful of his and his neighbor’s salvation, gets caught up in idle business, and if moreover, by his silence (which actually does more harm to himself and everyone else), he nonetheless leads innumerable hoards of people away from the good with him, he will be beaten for eternity with many blows alongside that very first slave of hell [the Devil]. However, no person can presume to convict him of any transgressions in this matter, because, although the Pope can judge everyone else, no one may judge him, unless he, for whose perpetual stability all the faithful pray as earnestly as they call to mind the fact that, after God, their own salvation depends on his soundness, is found to have strayed from the faith.
Frankly, in light of heresy, what concerns me far more than the words of this pope are how those words are expanded upon, twisted, misreported (and then actions based upon the misreporting), and so on. It's the Second Vatican Council versus the "Spirit of Vatican II" all over again.
Far too much verbosity, far too little clarity, and far too many pronouncements on things that are not really "faith and morals" issues and far too few pronouncements on things that are "faith and morals" issues. Then this diarrhea of the mouth/pen allows those who would twist and pervert far too much room to twist. That is not good. That is destructive. But is it heresy? No.
Well said. Thanks.
Only here do I disagree with you.
I personally think that Francis is guilty of many material heresies, e.g. unsaved souls don't go to hell; they are merely extinguished, behind closed doors the Persons of the Holy Trinity argue amongst themselves, the Blessed Mother may have despaired during Her Son's Passion, that Jesus Christ faked anger when he overturned the tables in the temple, etc.
The question is: Is he a formal heretic?
There are arguments that he is by what he has recently published in Acta Apostolicae Sedis regarding adulterers and “Evangelii Gaudium”.
But like you, I'm in no position to judge him on material or formal heresy.
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