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Papal deeds speak louder than papal words
National Catholic Reporter | 11/08/2002 | John L. Allen

Posted on 11/8/2002, 1:12:00 AM by sinkspur

It’s the nature of the office that a pope has to watch what he says.

Ironically, the 1870 declaration of infallibility at the First Vatican Council has probably inhibited papal freedom of speech more than any king or emperor ever could. Since even his “ordinary magisterium,” or regular teaching expressed in audiences and letters, is considered to enjoy a divine seal of approval, popes feel compelled to sweat over every phrase. Once it drops from his lips, it passes into tradition, and hence it must be “just so.”

That’s inevitably a prescription for caution. Popes rarely speak off the cuff, and when they do, pulse rates in Vatican offices head for the sky.

Gestures, on the other hand, are by definition far more ambiguous. A pope can be himself in his actions in a way he never can be with his words. For that reason, often what a pope does is a better indicator of where his heart is than what he says. The pontificate of John Paul II illustrates the point.

Consider, for example, the December 1996 visit of the Archbishop of Canterbury, then George Carey, and several of his brother Anglican bishops to Rome. On the occasion, John Paul II gave Carey a gold pectoral cross, the same gift he offers to Catholic archbishops on their ad limina visits. He offered silver pectoral crosses to the other Anglicans.

It was a kind gesture with just one glitch: According to Catholic theology, Anglican bishops aren’t the real deal, and hence have no business sporting the symbols of the bishop’s office. Most recently, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith made this point in a commentary on the 1998 document Ad Tuendam Fidem. It pointed to the invalidity of Anglican ordinations as an example of not-yet-declared infallible church teaching.

Notre Dame theologian Fr. Richard McBrien has argued that this leaves two possibilities. Either the pope holds a different view about the validity of Anglican ordinations, or he is guilty of the canonical offense of falsifying the sacrament of holy orders by complicity in the fiction that the Anglicans really are bishops.

Most observers believe John Paul was trying to encourage unity between Catholics and Anglicans, whose dialogue since the Second Vatican Council (1962-65) has been a model of civility, even ahead of an ability to spell out quite yet the theological basis for that unity.

Other examples of actions speaking louder than words might include the pope’s respectful, prayerful visit to the Grand Omayyad Mosque in Damascus in May 2001, not long after the Vatican document Dominus Iesus had asserted that non-Catholics are in a “gravely deficient situation”; or his March 2000 visit to the Western Wall in Jerusalem amid acrimonious debates between Jews and Catholics.

Recent weeks in Rome have offered two more examples of the pope’s “watch what I do, not always what I say” style.

On Oct. 4, in conjunction with an international conference marking the 700th anniversary of the birth of St. Bridget of Sweden, John Paul II took part in a gala vespers service in St. Peter’s Basilica.

Present for the occasion were 13 Roman Catholic bishops, plus nine Lutheran bishops from Sweden, Norway and Denmark, one other Lutheran clergyman, and three non-Catholic prelates (two Orthodox, one Anglican). There were, in other words, an equal number on both sides.

The two sets of prelates were dressed in liturgical vestments, and they processed in and sat down with equal dignity. It was difficult to avoid the impression that the pope was recognizing some kind of brotherhood in holy orders for the Lutheran and Anglican prelates that official Catholic theology would struggle to explain. Privately, several of the Lutherans said that they experienced the event as an unofficial form of papal recognition.

John Paul’s public comments on the occasion were not so daring. “In a spirit of brotherhood and friendship I greet the distinguished representatives of the Lutheran churches,” he said. “Your presence at this prayer is a cause of deep joy. I express the hope that our meeting together in the Lord’s name will help to further our ecumenical dialogue and quicken the journey towards full Christian unity.”

At the level of symbolism, however, the pope seemed to be saying more.

Two days later, Patriarch Teoctist of the Romanian Orthodox church arrived in Rome for the start of a weeklong visit, reciprocating the pope’s May 7-9, 1999, visit to Bucharest. John Paul welcomed Teoctist to the public Mass of thanksgiving for the canonization of Opus Dei founder Josemaria Escriva Oct. 6, standing to embrace him in brotherly fashion before a crowd of 200,000, then ensuring that Teoctist was seated in an exact duplicate of the papal throne.

It was not the behavior of someone worried about underscoring his own primacy.

In fact, all the week’s choreography seemed designed to make the two prelates seem like equally eminent heads of churches. The high point came with the signing of a joint declaration between John Paul and Teoctist on Saturday, Oct. 12.

The text of the declaration was itself interesting. “Our aim and our ardent desire is full communion, which is not absorption, but communion in love. It is an irreversible path that has no alternative: It is the way of the church,” the declaration reads.

It gets down to brass tacks, calling for a relaunch of the international Catholic-Orthodox dialogue, currently in a deep freeze after a disastrous session in Baltimore in July 2000. Those talks were paralyzed by accusations of proselytism against Catholics in Orthodox nations, debates over Eastern churches in communion with Rome, and most notoriously, differing views of the limits of papal power.

More important than the wording, however, may be the way the declaration was issued. The pope’s repeated gestures of humility and fraternity, always careful to treat Teoctist like an ecclesiastical equal, were designed to assuage Orthodox fears about a Roman “imperial papacy.” In that sense, John Paul’s conduct reflected a reformed papacy that Catholic theological language is not yet able to describe.

To understand what the pope is trying to communicate, therefore, sometimes it’s a good idea to keep the pictures but turn down the sound.


TOPICS: General Discusssion
KEYWORDS: catholicchurch; catholiclist
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To: patent
We have spent countless hours back and forth on this. You are presently deliberately falsifying my presentations. They are informal for the most part, off the cuff, colloquial, true--but they are not ill-informed. I mentioned yesterday, for instance, the libations in the Togo forest. You had never heard of such an incident. When you are so lacking in awareness that you do not know about an event this notorious, how is one to argue with you? You simply lack facts that ought to be at your fingertips. I can't offer citations for every sentence I utter. Even when I provide them, you spend hours with long citations of your own, nit-picking ad infinitum. It is not a game I care to play. As for the 40 theological errors of past popes uncovered by Vatican I and mentioned by Sungenis, I recall reading somewhere else that these popes were in material, not formal, heresy. Of course, I will have to track down that quote as well to suit you--which is not easy when one is constantly reading and sending forth posts by the dozens. There just aren't enough hours in the day. In any case, these exchanges are informal forums, not scholarly exercises per se, and it is in that spirit that I engage others. If that does not suit you, I suggest you post your remarks elsewhere. It is unreasonable to expect anything more. I do not myself expect anyone else to constantly dredge up evidence for matters which ought to be generally known.
21 posted on 11/11/2002, 1:29:38 AM by ultima ratio
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To: patent
Did you read the article Narses posted yesterday on the libations? It appeared in The Remmant. Must Michael Matt, the editor, withdraw his allegation also? How about Bishop Fellay who mentioned the libations in a recent letter? Is he also lying? Perhaps the problem is you don't read anything but Novus Ordo propaganda. Try pulling your head out of the sand.
22 posted on 11/11/2002, 1:34:31 AM by ultima ratio
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To: Cicero
Nobody argues the Pope has a right to meet with anybody he wants to. He can lunch with animists and witchdoctors all he wants. What traditionalists like myself object to is his venerating their gods. That is idolatry.
23 posted on 11/11/2002, 1:50:25 AM by ultima ratio
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To: ultima ratio
Quit spreading malicious gossip about the Pope..
24 posted on 11/11/2002, 2:06:10 AM by Irisshlass
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To: patent
Here is an excerpt from Bishop Fellay's letter. He mentions the libations here. They were mentioned in negotiations with Rome as well.

Monsignor Bernard Fellay, Feast of the Sacred Heart 7 June, 2002

...For us, it is truly scandalous acts, deeds and statements that have forced us to refuse all novelties and to re-double our attachment to the centuries-old teaching and discipline of the Roman Catholic Church, our Mother. So here is the answer to the Cardinal's fivefold rebuke of April 5:

Firstly, we are not setting ourselves up as judges of the Holy See by merely laying out the facts, such as the Pope's visiting the Synagogue or the mosque, kissing the Koran, POURING OUT LIBATIONS in the Togo forest, receiving the tilak in India, gestures profoundly upsetting Catholics in their Faith. The same is true of numerous other statements and documents. If to mention such facts is to set oneself up as judge, then one must even stop thinking!

Then as to the liturgical reform of 1966, some Cardinals at the time went so far as to say that "it departed significantly from Catholic theology, both as a whole and in detail" (Ottaviani Intervention). And even recently Cardinal Ratzinger took it upon himself to say that "this extension of papal power in the domain of the liturgy gave the impression that the Pope, basically, was omnipotent over the liturgy, especially if he was acting based on a mandate from an Ecumenical Council. The results of this impression were particularly visible after Vatican II, that the liturgy is in fact something given and not a reality to be manipulated at will, had completely disappeared from the consciousness of western Catholics. Yet Vatican I in 1870 had defined the Pope to be not an absolute monarch but the guarantor of obedience to the revealed Word. The legitimacy of his power was bound up above all with his transmitting of the Faith. This fidelity to the deposit of the Faith and to its transmission concerns in a quite special way the liturgy. No authority can 'fabricate' a liturgy. The pope himself is only the humble servant of its homogenous development, its integrity and the permanence of its identity" ("Spirit of the Liturgy", Ad Solem, 2001, p. 134).

Then as far as the continuity of modern doctrines with the past is concerned, here is what persons "above all suspicion" say concerning religious liberty, key text of Vatican II: "it cannot be denied that a text like Vatican II's 'Declaration on religious Liberty' says, at least as far as the words go, something quite different from the 'Syllabus' of 1864, in fact just about the opposite of sentences 15, 77 and 79 of the 'Syllabus'" (Fr. Yves Congar, "The Crisis in the Church and Archbishop Lefebvre", Cerf, 1976. p.51)

Then as to the definition of the Church in Vatican II's "Lumen Gentium” again Cardinal Ratzinger says, "One cannot when all is said and done, fully resolve from a logical point of view the difference between 'subsistit and 'est'" ("Ecclesiology of the Conciliar Constitution 'Lumen Gentium'", in "Documentation Catholique", # 2223, p. 311)

Then on the concept of tradition in Vatican II's "Dei Verbum", again Cardinal Ratzinger writes: "Vatican II's refusal of the proposal to adopt the text of Lerins, familiar to and as it were sanctified by two Church Councils, shows once more how Trent and Vatican I were left behind, how their texts were continually re-interpreted... Vatican II had a new idea of how historical identity and continuity are to be brought about. The static 'semper' of Vincent of Lerins no longer seems to Vatican II adequate to express the problem" (L.Th.K.., vol. 13, p. 521).

Then on the Council's key text "Gaudium et Spes", Cardinal Ratzinger describes it as a Counter-Syllabus, in other words the opposite of the Catholic Church's authoritative "Syllabus" of 1864. The Cardinal writes ("Principles of Catholic Theology", Tequi, 1982, p. 426), "If we seek an over-all analysis of 'Gaudium et Spes', we could say that it is (linked with the texts on religious liberty and on world religions), a revision of Pius IX's 'Syllabus', a sort of Counter-Syllabus... Let us recognize here and now that 'Gaudium et Spes' plays the part of a Counter-Syllabus insofar as it represents an attempt to officially reconcile the Church with the modem world as emerging since the French Revolution of 1789".

Thus far Cardinal Ratzinger. For our part, we believe in the homogeneous development of doctrine, as the Church has always taught. But the Catholic Faith, which does not do away with the law of non-contradiction, obliges us also to reject any heterogeneous development of doctrine.

In conclusion, we see how far Cardinal Castrllón has gone wrong... All of us desire the Church's unity, a unity grounded in the Faith, carried out around Peter confirming his follow bishops in that Faith, and consummated in the union of Catholics in the Eucharist. To preserve that unity, all of us, to obey our Catholic conscience, have had to avoid driving onto the broad and easy highway proposed by the Conciliar reforms. It is to ease our conscience that we are where we are, and our conscience would be in no way eased if we were to suddenly set out on a path which, precisely in order to stay Catholic, we have refused for 30 years.

In the name of the Faith of our baptism, in the name of our baptismal pledges to which we promised to remain faithful, we say "No" to anything that does not ensure our salvation. Such is our right. Such is our duty.

May the Sacred Heart fill you with his burning charity, with an unfailing love for the Church and for its hierarchy however much they are presently making us suffer, with a love for souls, souls to be saved at the price of our uniting with Our Lord's Sacrifice, the Holy Mass that will make us ever stronger in the Faith and in Our Lord's love, bringing about reparation and satisfaction. All for Jesus, all for Mary, all for souls.


25 posted on 11/11/2002, 2:09:11 AM by ultima ratio
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To: ultima ratio
When you are so lacking in awareness that you do not know about an event this notorious, how is one to argue with you?
If the event were truly so notorious there would be proof it occurred. You offer nothing. The proof you offer is no different than if I said Bishop Williamson beats small children. Then on some other website, such as TCRNews, they said Williamson beats small children with a stick. Then, in some other website, they say Williamson beats small children while humming pagan worship hymns. Would you, on that basis, take it to be true? Of course not, they offer no proof, other than their mere say so. But here, you believe anything about the Pope. Why?

You hate the Pope, but like Williamson. Therefore, you require no proof about the one, but doubt anything bad about the other. So far, the whole proof you have offered is no proof at all. This is rather incredible, given it’s the Pope, there is proof of everything he does. At least you guys could try to make some up, take a shot at credibility. Your original statement:

I know there were early Christians who were martyred precisely because they refused to pay homage to false gods. I don't need anyone to try to interpret the Pope's pouring out libations in the Togo forest. It was an act of idolatry that I can see the act for myself,
Your first attempt to back up this claim was from Sungenis:
For example, during prayer with an African Animist on August 8, 1985, John Paul writes: "The prayer meeting in the sanctuary at Lake Togo was particularly striking. There I prayed for the first time with animists."
Sungenis doesn’t say anything about libations, and the Sungenis statement “I prayed for the first time with animists” does not even remotely enable one to track down the quote. It does not cite a document, letter, who it would have been too, anything. All it gives is the date this supposedly happened on. If you are going to claim JPII wrote something, the very least you, or your source, could do is provide some support. Finally, if he did this at all, it still provides absolutely no comment, much less proof, as to HOW he prayed with them.

Your next attempt is from the article Narses posted, written by another Traditionalist from way out there. He states:

And twice, at Kara and Togoville-at Kara this happened just before Holy Mass!--you took a dry gourd and poured a libation of water and maize flour onto the ground, a rite expressing a false religious belief.
Again, not one citation, but at least one makes up the same story you are trying to make up. It would be nice, however, to see a shred of proof from you for once.

Finally, you cite to Bishop Fellay, who similarly makes a bald statement without any proof. Are we to accept it as true simply because Fellay says so? That would be hard, to say the least:

Firstly, we are not setting ourselves up as judges of the Holy See by merely laying out the facts, such as the Pope's visiting the Synagogue or the mosque, kissing the Koran, POURING OUT LIBATIONS in the Togo forest, receiving the tilak in India, gestures profoundly upsetting Catholics in their Faith. The same is true of numerous other statements and documents. If to mention such facts is to set oneself up as judge, then one must even stop thinking!
As always, no proof, just an allegation from a bishop that JPII excommunicated. A little like an convict claiming the judge who sentenced him is crooked, don’t you think? Oh wait, JPII is the Pope who judged him, and sentenced him, to be excommunicated. Kind of a lot like that.
You simply lack facts that ought to be at your fingertips.
I’m not the one making the allegation. It shows just how anti-Catholic you are that you think I have to disprove any ugly allegation you chose to make about the Pope.

You chose to slander a man, you have to back it up, or you are a charlatan.

I can't offer citations for every sentence I utter.
Obviously.
Even when I provide them, you spend hours with long citations of your own, nit-picking ad infinitum. It is not a game I care to play. As for the 40 theological errors of past popes uncovered by Vatican I and mentioned by Sungenis, I recall reading somewhere else that these popes were in material, not formal, heresy.
The only quote you’ve provided, from Sungenis and not from Vatican I, doesn’t even claim that all 40 popes were in material heresy.
If that does not suit you, I suggest you post your remarks elsewhere.
There you go again, trying to tell me to go away. I will keep responding to you as long as you keep making things up. Get used to it, I’ve been on this website longer than you have, been told the same things by newbies like yourself before. We expect truth and facts on Free Republic, not innuendo and lies. Again, get used to it. If you can’t handle it, go to Democrats Underground, they’ll like your style.
It is unreasonable to expect anything more. I do not myself expect anyone else to constantly dredge up evidence for matters which ought to be generally known.
This is no more generally known than that Williamson beats small children.

patent  +AMDG

26 posted on 11/11/2002, 3:31:15 AM by patent
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To: ultima ratio
Getting into a boat, Jesus crossed over the sea and came to (1) His own city.
2 And they brought to Him a paralytic lying on a bed. Seeing their faith, Jesus said to the paralytic, "(Take courage, son; your sins are forgiven."
3 And some of the scribes said to themselves, "This fellow (6) blasphemes."
4 And Jesus knowing their thoughts said, "Why are you thinking evil in your hearts?


As Jesus went on from there, He saw a man called Matthew, sitting in the tax collector's booth; and He said to him, "( Follow Me!" And he got up and followed Him.
10 Then it happened that as Jesus was reclining at the table in the house, behold, many tax collectors and sinners came and were dining with Jesus and His disciples.
11 When the Pharisees saw this, they said to His disciples, " Why is your Teacher eating with the tax collectors and sinners?"
12 But when Jesus heard this, He said, "It is not those who are healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick.
13 "But go and learn what this means: '(I DESIRE COMPASSION, AND NOT SACRIFICE,' for I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners."

The Apostles said rifts in the Church are damnable..
27 posted on 11/11/2002, 3:50:00 AM by Irisshlass
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To: narses
What more needs to be said? Well, logic allows us to regress to the worst case, which is the burning of Bruno, for refusing to recant his (looney) heresies.
28 posted on 11/11/2002, 4:00:04 AM by RobbyS
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To: Irisshlass
We are also admonished to hold to good doctrine, and reject false teachers and their falsehoods. "Test the spirits": if the words or deeds of a man plainly go against the revealed Truth, then we are to reject them. Whether or not you hold to Sola Scriptura, surely you would not accept doctrines or deeds that plainly contradict Scripture?
29 posted on 11/11/2002, 4:05:13 AM by Cleburne
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To: Irisshlass
The Pope can meet with witchdoctors and animists to his hearts content at some hotel for a luncheon or at some conference or other. What he can't do is worship with them and appeal to their gods and spirits. The whole history of the Church tells of martyrs who went to their deaths for refusing to do what this Pope has done. Your effort to justify this by citing the Gospels is pitiful. Christ would not stoop to worship with pagans, though he would not hesitate to help in their physical afflictions and to counsel them at their homes at a dinner party. That is totally different. These are not acts of worship that affirm paganism. We are talking about the First Commandment here. No pope has the authority to break a commandment.
30 posted on 11/11/2002, 8:47:14 AM by ultima ratio
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To: patent
Do you think somebody like the editor of The Remnant or the Superior General of the SSPX would have mentioned--publicly, remember--the libations if they had not occurred? They would have been soundly castigated by their respective oppositions, Michael Matt by his counterpart at the Wanderer, and Bishop Fellay by Cardinal Hoyos in Rome. But Rome remains silent on this. This is because the event actually happened and is true. You want scholarly proof. But this Pope has travelled for twenty-four years from place to place. The news stories are not always readily accessible and take time for me to dig up. You want me to do a search on the spot, instantaneously, to satisfy your suspicious mind. If Narses provides a quote in support--it's deemed inadequate. You want a blow-by-blow journalistic account or some admission by Rome. In fact, the whole business about libations is a red herring. It is sufficient to show only that this Pope prays with animists. The operative word is "with". He places their false gods on a par with our True One--something no pope in the history of the Catholic Church has ever done.
31 posted on 11/11/2002, 9:01:30 AM by ultima ratio
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To: ultima ratio
Do you think somebody like the editor of The Remnant or the Superior General of the SSPX would have mentioned--publicly, remember--the libations if they had not occurred?
Yes, I think it highly possible. People make mistakes all the time, at the very least. Others believe this or that story, and wind up restating it. It doesn’t even take dishonesty for something like this to occur.

I do not consider Mr. Matt or the Superior General of the SSPX to be infallible. Apparently you do. Is this Superior General worship? You accuse others of Pope worship all the time. It appears you have issues of your own.

They would have been soundly castigated by their respective oppositions, Michael Matt by his counterpart at the Wanderer,
Possibly, but I really doubt they respond to EVERYTHING he writes. That would make their paper a one issue paper. When was the last time they wrote about him (besides in relation to his father’s eulogy)?
and Bishop Fellay by Cardinal Hoyos in Rome. But Rome remains silent on this.
Rome doesn’t respond to the latest stories in the Enquirer about the Pope meeting the space aliens either. It has better things to do than respond to every crackpot claim about it or about the Pope. Between you and the fundies Rome wouldn’t have any time to actually run a Church.

patent  +AMDG

32 posted on 11/11/2002, 3:27:25 PM by patent
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To: ultima ratio
Your effort to justify this by citing the Gospels is pitiful

I cited scripture because that is what you remind me of a Pharisee...


Did the Pope shake hands with Castro? I'm sure he did...doesn't mean He gave Him card blanche...
33 posted on 11/11/2002, 6:40:56 PM by Irisshlass
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To: Irisshlass
You still miss the point. The Pope can meet with the devil if he wants. But he can't PRAY with the devil. I myself approved of the visit with Castro. I do not mind if the Pope meets with animists for lunch at a Togo hotel. But he prayed with them and venerated their spirits. That is idolatry.
34 posted on 11/12/2002, 2:13:46 AM by ultima ratio
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