29 May 2018

Caution

I am uneasy about the reports circulating about one of the cardinals elect. The text I have seen contains passages which I find it hard to understand.

More generally, it is important not to wish for ill reports to be true. We must pray that they be not true.

This has particular force when it so immediately concerns the Roman Pontiff.

He deserves our trust until, unless, it is clear beyond all doubt that something is amiss.

And we have a duty to pray for him, both when he is in the right and when he is in the wrong.

Among causes for gladness, the promotion of Archbishop Ladaria is prominent. Partly because he continues to show himself to be orthodox; also because, had he been omitted from the list of new cardinals, this would have indicated a sidelining of his dicastery the CDF, "La Suprema", within the Vatican structures. And that would be bad for orthodoxy.

12 comments:

Albrecht von Brandenburg said...

Regarding clerical marriage, people really do need to read that book by Vogels before commenting. Especially my fellow traditionalists.

Unknown said...

Part of the problem is that the cause of married priests is not being advanced for the right reasons. The unspoken motive, as everyone knows, is that in this uncatechetical age it is regarded as a milestone on the road to ordaining women. It is no good pointing out that the issues are theologically unconnected because they are inseparably connected in people’s minds. Ex Anglicans have been here before.

The spoken motive is the shortage of priests, but this conceals another unspoken element, which is not the shortage of priests but the shortage of LIBERAL priests. Liberals hate giving up sex so the celibacy rule filters out honest liberals.

Of course (as is all too apparent) it is no deterrent to dishonest liberals, which is why some conservatives are willing to sell the pass.

El Codo said...

Can the benighted be enlightened?

Justina said...

Trust is not "deserved," except by those who have proven themselves equal to it. Pope Francis, to put it mildly, has not. To recognize this reality is not to wish for bad things to be true, but to reconcile ourselves to the sad and spiritually dangerous situation that we are actually dealing with. We don't want to culpably become (if you will pardon the split infinitive) the Neville Chamberlains of the Catholic Church.

MEwbank said...

If Vogels were the sole 'authority' who needed to be consulted, one's might presume to admonish all others who have not read his reflections.

However, there are other authorities as well.

For example, Brendan Daly, "Priestly Celibacy: the Obligations of Continence and Celibacy for Priests," in Compass (2009), pp. 20-33, available online if one does a search.

Albrecht von Brandenburg said...

Ah yes, Daly. I think I've read that, but can't remember. Why don't you refresh my memory, Vis? If it's the usual legal positivist approach to law (as I remember it, although I might be wrong), well, Vogels has convincingly refuted it. Note that I converted a few of SSPX priests on this question by providing Vogels' seminal work, "Celibacy: Gift or Law?" to them, including a former seminary rector, and had a philospher trained by Garrigou-Lagrange's most brilliant student to look it over, and he found no errors.

MEwbank said...

The question is whether you truly comprehended the principles, rationales, conclusions and accurate utilization of sources by Daly, which included the work by Vogels.

However, I seriously doubt you read Daly's reflection, since you address no specifics in his well-documented and very sober reflection.

Moreover, to assert that Vogels 'convincingly refuted' the reflection by Daly is absurd, since the former's work appeared a bit over 15 years earlier than the later integrative reflection of Daly.

Finally, it is utterly irrelevant that you purportedly may have influenced 'a few of SSPX priests on this question' by using Vogels' work, nor is it pertinent to allege that a supposed 'philosopher' trained by Garrigou-Lagrange's most brilliant student' found 'no errors' in Vogels' work. Actually, Garrigou-Lagrange was a sacred theologian, and never known to have trained any philosophers.

Your responses seem to indicate you are enchanted by a single authority or book because it supports your own desired outcome, rather than one who is willing to humbly examine the scholarly evidence objectively.

Albrecht von Brandenburg said...

Vis, unless you or Daly, or anyone else dare argue that human law trumps Divine law, Vogels has not been refuted. You don't so argue??? Good, because you're a trad and not a liberal, modernist or anything else of that kind, aren't you?

Albrecht von Brandenburg said...

As to scholarly sources, Vis, have you done what I did and actually verify some of Vogels' references/sources/citations? I did, and because I found them verified, I trusted his integrity as a scholar. Unlike Pope Clement, whose Vulgate editors deliberately set out to mistranslate I Cor 9:5 in order to obscure the secukar clergy's right to marriage.

MEwbank said...


Again, you utterly fail to indicate you have read, assimilated, or comprehended Daly's comprehensive scholarly presentation, which engages sources that include Vogels and many others.

Weighing research into historical matters requires extensive knowledge of all pertinent sources and a willingness to comprehend authors and content in their contexts according to rigorous discipline in the pertinent methodologies of research.

Daly's study fulfills these requisites.

However, you again flutter around bringing up irrelevances to rationalize your posture and presumptively assert that your single source is infallible.

Since you raise the question, I only consider myself to be "orthodox" in the Faith and choose not to be simplistic by tossing around labels.

As for your passing mention of the supposed mistranslation in the Vulgate of 1 Cor. 9,5, that again is irrelevant.

But it is odd, since you posture yourself as favoring 1 Corinthians so greatly, that you would so totally ignore in those same passages what is in 7, 32-33.

Your continual postings on different websites of your repetitious limited litany of assertions concerning Vogels and your wish to make his and your own thesis accepted without question, while you show no ability to truly examine evidence that might require altering your assumptions about his presentation and your own suppositions, are truly tedious.


Albrecht von Brandenburg said...

Sheer nonsense, as usual. Daly satisfies no criteria except those that appeal to the deluded. You have not engaged with the argument, nor has anyone else, that the "law" is ultra vires papal power. Neither does it satisfy St Thomas' criteria for valid legislation (an argument Vogels does not actually make). And it is based on considerations of ritual purity, a legal fiction (no doubt fulfilling a valid function under the old law) but since superseded. These are only three considerations, any one of which is sufficient to establish the "law's" invalidity. Then there are two problems peculiar to yourself - your repetition of error in the apparent hope that it will somehow, turn into truth, and, if you have actually read Vogels and his sources, your inability to draw rational inferences. Further, as an example of your fatuity, you in all seriousness confound what St Paul admits is his own preference (even if Divinely inspired to record it), with a statement of the natural and therefore Divine Law, that is, you are scraping the bottom of the barrel of theological (and legal and philosophical) imbecility. So, change your name from "Vis pacem" to something much more appropriate, such as "Opus est mihi rationalitate". And have a look at Casti Connubii. I won't do your homework for you, but there
you'll find a highly relevant statement of theological and jurisprudential principle. Now run along and take your emotion-fuelled ruminations to some group of trads who still believe in ritual purity - after all, misery loves company.

Albrecht von Brandenburg said...

You are wrong about G-L. He did indeed train at least one philosopher, "Opus". Are you trying to show us all how many errors you can fall into?