The Synod Post-Game Show

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JMJ

The Synod was held October 5 to 9th.

As I write this on Sept 18th - I wonder just what will happen.

Will Cardinal Kasper (and the Pope?) prevail, will there by an open schism?

Here's what Rorate reported today:

The shamelessness of Cardinal Walter Kasper is astonishing. After throwing an ideological nuclear bomb in the February 2014 Consistory of Cardinals, with a pronouncement filled with historical and doctrinal falsehoods to justify a joint attack on the dogma of the indissolubility of marriage, on Penance, and on the integrity of the Blessed Sacrament, in an interview published today, he now pretends that, with the release of the book of Cardinals (and other pronouncements by other Cardinals, including Cardinal Pell), he is the victim of "an ideological war," and that the real "target" of criticisms directed at him is Pope Francis. Therefore, he says other cardinals cannot criticize him because, in effect, he is merely speaking for the Pope. The destroyer and attacker claims victimhood status!...

Instead of taking the complete destruction of his false doctrine standing up, he runs to the Pope, and says it has always been the Pope's idea. Well, the truth is in one of these: (1) either Kasper is not telling the truth, in which case the Kasper-doctrine of Communion to "remarried" divorcees is purely his own, and he is using the Pope's name as a prop to support his crumbling edifice of doctrinal mess; or (2) Kasper is telling the truth, the so-called Kasper-doctrine on Communion to "remarried" divorcees is the Pope's alone (or a joint Bergoglio-Kasper production), and he merely presented it in the consistory to give it a non-papal face, and he now reveals it to save a little bit of his destroyed reputation. If the latter is the case, then the Synod game is up: there is no need for this expensive assembly if the decision on a completely new doctrine for the Church (a doctrine that, since it involves the repudiation of dogma, is something other than "Catholic") is taken beforehand.

What is true is that current media and communications landscape have made impossible the kind of hidden deals that allowed for the derailing by liberals from Germany and Northern Europe of the Second Vatican Council. And Cardinal Kasper and his team in the Synod are fuming about it.

The concluding excerpt and most important part of interview granted by Cardinal Kasper to Italian daily Il Mattino and published today:

[Il Mattino:] How does one consider complex situations? For example, the drama of a divorced family [sic] that has violated the indissoluble sacrament of marriage?

[Cardinal Kasper:] "They are considered one by one, the complex situations. No one must judge, but discern. The light of the Gospel helps us in the discenment of every concrete situation, at the light of mercy."

We return to the danger of a doctrinal war in the Synod.

"I certainly don't want it. They [the Cardinals who criticize him] perhaps want it. I think of a pastoral Synod."

Is that what the Pope also wants?

"Certainly. Also the Pope wants a pastoral Synod."

Did you expect this controversy regarding your address to the Consistory?

"I'm not naïve. I knew that there are other positions, but I didn't think that the debate would become, and now is shown to be also, without manners. Not one of my fellow Cardinals ever spoke to me. I, intead, [spoke] twice with the Holy Father. I agreed upon everything with him. He was in agreement. What can a cardinal do, if not being with Pope? I am not the target, the target is another one."

Is it Pope Francis?

"Probably yes."

What else do you say, finally, to your opponents?

"They know that I have not done these things by myself. I agreed with the Pope, I spoke twice with him. He showed himself content [with it]. Now, they create this controversy. A Cardinal must be close to the Pope, by his side. The Cardinals are the Pope's cooperators."

[Published today at Il Mattino, in Italian - but the full Italian transcript is provided by Il Sismografo]

Much to pray for ...

P^3