Si Si No No: They Think They've Won!

[Stone]

Si Si No No - August 1993 No.3

They Think They've Won!

Part 1

Pope St. Pius X described Modernism as the synthesis of all heresies. From the beginning of this century, it grew and infected many of the clergy and laity. It teaches that our knowledge of God cannot be certain and that faith comes out of man's need of a God. From these principles, Modernism sets out to destroy dogmas and divine revelation. It seeks to reduce Christ to mere human dimensions, and makes divine inspiration a common gift to all of mankind. This modernism, the coming together of all heresies, is now the “official theology of Vatican II.”

PART ONE: THE APPARENT VICTORY OF MODERNISM EXPOSED AND DENOUNCED BY ST. PIUS X

St. Pius X, in his encyclical Pascendi (1907) denounced those modernist "partisans of error" who concealed themselves "in the very womb and heart of the Church" insidiously spreading destruction "from within the Church itself...So that the danger today lies in the very heart and veins of the Church."

This same saint added the pain of excommunication against anyone contradicting the encyclical Pascendi or the decree Lamentabili, which exposed and condemned Modernism.

He also insisted that all bishops and religious superiors be on their guard against modernist infiltration, to carefully screen those chosen as seminary professors, as well as prospective seminarians and priests, saying:

"If any [priest] be found tainted with modernist errors...let them be absolutely forbidden from teaching anything whatsoever. Also any seminarian in any way even suspected of attachment to these condemned modernist novelties and doctrines, must be refused all access to Holy Orders" (Motu Proprio, November 18, 1907). 

Pope St. Pius X knew that the modernists sought out followers in seminaries and religious houses, where the future of the Church was formed. In order to do this, they secretly organized themselves into hidden sects.

DENOUNCED BY THE GREAT THEOLOGIAN FR. GARRIGOU-LAGRANGE, O.P.
In 1946, Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange wrote a brilliant article entitled: "Where is the New Theology Leading Us To?" To Modernism, he replied. He then proceeded to denounce this work of doctrinal corruption, saying that: "Typed sheets have been distributed among the clergy, seminarians and Catholic intellectuals, containing strange doctrinal assertions and negations." 

Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange quoted, at length, many parts of those secret sheets - a preview of all the heretical novelties that would emerge in this post-Vatican II era. One example will be sufficient: "A general convergence of all religions to a universal Christ, which will satisfy them all. This seems to me to be the only possible imaginable conversion for a Religion of the future." This is the very essence of today's ecumenism, which seeks to bring together all religions, in a Christ separated from His Mystical Body, the Catholic Church.


THE CONFIRMATION
Confirmation of this treachery comes to us today, from the very lips of those representing this New Theology. A mouthpiece of theirs is the journal Communio and in an article of November-December, 1990, the Jesuit Fr. Peter Henrici (born 1928) tells us that:

a) In Jesuit seminaries, contrary to papal instructions, the doctrine, method and principles of St. Thomas Aquinas were openly scorned and held in contempt. Henrici assures us that "the official scholastic studies of St. Thomas were merely thumbed through."

b) Behind that facade of official studies, modernist texts and tracts were secretly circulated to the most brilliant and promising seminarians.

Those same modernist concepts, secretly passed around, would later reappear as the New Theology. Those who showed interest and promise in theology, would be given the modernist Fr. Henri de Lubac's book: The Supernatural - the most forbidden of forbidden books! Then they would receive another of his books, Corpus Mysticum. This was done to inculcate them with the principle that identical theological terms could have different meanings with the passage of time or when looked at in another context. Thus we say goodbye to unchanging divine and apostolic Tradition! Goodbye to the homogenous development of dogma! Goodbye to unchangeable truths!

Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange was right in saying the novelty of this New Theology would deprive the Church of its sound Tradition. Today, the ideas and assumptions of that novelty, make up the premises of the New Tradition, which, though it is living, is no longer coherent.

These treacherous modernist theologians, then condemned, were later rewarded at Vatican II. The aggiornamento (updating) spirit of Vatican II placed the Conciliar Fathers in a position where they had to rely upon the preparatory work done by theologians prior to the Council. In other words, those Vatican II bishops who succumbed to the siren song of the aggiornamento ended up having to rely upon the works of those who had concocted and cultivated a New Theology in direct opposition to Catholic theology.

A great number of these Conciliar Fathers did not know or understand the New Theology. It had been cultivated in secrecy, in closed circles. It was hidden behind traditional sounding terms. The Fathers, ignorant of these facts, gave this often traditional-sounding, New Theology a kind of ecclesiastical orthodoxy and acceptability.


A VETERAN’S TESTIMONY
Similar expressions of modernist triumphalism are found in the work of Fr. Henri Bouillard, S.J. - a veteran of the New Theology. On the occasion of the inauguration of a center known as the Maurice Blondel Archives at the Catholic University of Louvain, Belgium, Bouillard stresses the influence of Blondel's philosophy on the New Theology: "Blondel's thoughts and ideas have, in their essential theses, progressively won the day." The orthodox teachings, brushed aside and dismissed by Blondel are "no longer valid today."


THE COUNCIL – VATICAN II
For Bouillard, the most conclusive and positive proof of the modernist victory is Vatican II, where "they abandoned the concept of looking at the natural and supernatural orders as two superimposed things neither having any kind of internal link with the other." It is interesting to note that, in none of Vatican II's major documents, will you find the use of the word, supernatural. Bouillard's affirmation is only too true, being well documented and easily proved by the official documents of Vatican II. Under the influence of Modernism, it has deliberately and studiously avoided in its most important documents (especially those dealing with ecumenism) the use of the word, supernatural. Thus its major documents implicitly approve naturalism, which is the essence of Modernism. This naturalism has also proved itself the basis of Blondel's philosophy and of De Lubac's theology.

So, we must ask ourselves today, what is being substantially proposed to us as Catholics in the name of Vatican II? The answer is that same New Theology officially condemned by Pope Pius XII. What lies hidden beneath this billboard? Nothing else but that same modernism condemned by Pius X and which leads to a radical denial of the existence of divine revelation, the divinity of Our Lord and the divine origin of the Catholic Church.


THE WINNERS
Still more recently, in 30 Days (December 1991), we find the same Fr. Henrici saying:

a) that the New Theology condemned by Pope Pius XII in the Encyclical Humani Generis, has now "become the official theology of Vatican II."

b) that the key positions in the Church are already in the hands of the actual representatives of the New Theology, whose mouthpiece is the journal Communio: "Nearly all of the theologians who have been named bishops in recent years, have come up through the Communio line. Their names form a list of important persons destined for the top careers: the Germans, Lehman and Kasper, the Swiss, Von Schonborn and Corecco; the Italian, Scola; the Belgian, Leonard and the Brazilian, Romer.”

The Jesuit professor at the Gregorian University, Peter Henrici, slyly laments: "The founding members, Balthasar, De Lubac and Ratzinger, have all become cardinals. Many of the second generation have been chosen as bishops."

He also adds such important names as that of "the Dominican theologian in the Papal residence, Georges Cottier; also Jean Duschesne, press agent for Cardinal Lustiger; the Hegelian André Léonard, Bishop of Namur" who has charge of St. Paul's Seminary, the place where Cardinal Lustiger sends his seminarians. According to 30 Days: "These are the ones (they say!) who have won."


THE BREAK
Similar cries of triumph and indirect confessions of treachery are found in post-Vatican II era, Neo-modernist literature:

A book by Fr. René Latourelle, SJ. entitled Vatican II-1962-87: Results & Views 25 Years Later, was in fact "produced by the Jesuit Universities in Rome." (from the Italian magazine Avvenire). The book has 68 contributors from 20 countries (all, but two, are Jesuits) clearly illustrating the triumph of this New Theology and the favor lavished upon it by Pope Paul VI. One of these contributors, Fr. Martini SJ., says:

"Though it's not quite a case of excommunications being followed by canonizations, nevertheless some notorious theologians who were reprimanded prior to Vatican II, later found themselves playing a major role amidst Vatican II experts, and thus had a great influence in the formulation of Vatican II decrees. In 1950, some of their books were officially removed from library shelves. After the Council, these same authors were named cardinals (De Lubac and Danielou)."

Thus do we see the Encyclical Humani Generis, of Pope Pius XII, quickly being repudiated and disowned by another Pope. Those who had always faithfully adhered to Rome's directives, now wondered to whom they owed obedience: to the Pope of yesterday who was in full agreement with his predecessors, or the present Pope, who had evidently broken with the constant and traditional direction of the Church.

More recently, on the anniversary of De Lubac's death, the Vatican newspaper L 'Osservatore Romano (September 1992) devoted an entire page to Cardinal De Lubac and “the great theses of a precursor of Vatican II.” In it we read: 

"Our thoughts turn to Blondel, Gilson, Mounier, Maritain, De Lubac, Chenv and many others, who prepared the philosophical and theological positions which later emerged in many themes of Vatican II."

Therefore, we must admit that the New Theology, officially condemned by Pope Pius XII, as being nothing but a heap of "false opinions, which threaten to overthrow the very foundations of Catholic doctrine," has now become "the official theology of Vatican II" (Fr. Henrici).

This open Neo-modernist war against the Church is a grave reality, especially since it is waged by persons occupying such high positions in the Church. The reason why we are exposing the current situation in such detail is to shake people out of their indifference or numbness, and to put them on their guard against this very real danger threatening their souls.

It is nothing less than that long-standing "often passive, but nevertheless real resistance" of the bishops themselves, which paved the way for the present crisis in the Church, a crisis that is simply the triumph of Modernism in the Catholic Church. Therefore, it is necessary to know a little more about those who think they have won and just what it is that they are after. 

They think that they have won the day simply because they do not believe in the words of Jesus Christ "And I say to thee: that thou art Peter and upon this rock I will build My Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it! (Matt 16:18)"


MAGISTERIUM SCORNED
(Translator’s note: MAGISTERIUM- The Church’s divinely appointed authority to infallibly teach the truths of Religion, “Going therefore, teach ye all nations…teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you." Matt. 28:19-20)

“The Church insists that its future priests be formed in the philosophical disciplines 'according to the method, doctrine and principles of the Angelic Doctor’ (St. Thomas Aquinas). The reason being that experience over many centuries has proven (to the Church) that the method of St. Thomas Aquinas, whether informing young minds, or sounding the depths of the deepest truths, stands high above all others by its singular merits; his doctrine is in complete harmony with Divine Revelation and in perfect accord; it is particularly useful and efficient in laying, in all safety, the foundations of Faith, as well as in reaping, in a sure and useful manner, the fruits of true progress.” - Pope Pius XII, Humani generis

Those who think themselves to be “winners” are those neo-modernists faithful (if we can use this expression) to the line of the founding fathers of the “New Theology,” and particularly to the (tortuous, involved and obscure) line drawn by the Jesuit Henri de Lubac and that of the ex-Jesuit Hans Urs von Balthasar. "The representatives of the New Theology are celebrated as if they constituted the cornerstone of the Church" rightly recorded the famous thinker and writer Dom Jules Meinvielle.

But before presenting you with these "holy fathers" of the post-Conciliar Catholic world, it would be most opportune and useful to briefly illustrate the very essence of the "new theology."


THE SIMPLE PRINCIPLE OF A COMPLEX HERESY

The German priest and theologian Johannes Dörmann, in his best book The Strange Theology of John Paul II and the Spirit of Assisi writes:

"The 'New Theology,' although many-sided and varied, is really quite simple in its principle, and that is why its multiple forms can be grouped together under the same title. Its different forms ALL HAVE ONE THING IN COMMON: THEIR STUDIED REJECTION OF TRADITIONAL THEOLOGY. (p.55)"

The author then provides us with a concise and effective explanation of what is meant by the "rejection of Traditional theology," referring to the last Council which deemed it necessary to abandon the Church's scholastic language or terminology for "pastoral" motives:

"The chief theologians (who were actually directing the Council) saw very clearly that in this question of scholastic language, both theology as well as the Faith itself were at stake. For scholastic terminology was indissolubly linked to scholastic philosophy which itself is linked to scholastic theology which is, in its turn, closely knit to the Dogmatic Tradition of the Church." (p.52)

And consequently, this abandoning of scholastic language would end up, in the last analysis, in saying farewell to the Divine and Apostolic Tradition so faithfully kept and guarded by the Church.

"This rejection or abandonment of the 'language of the Scholastic school' by the Council Fathers (Dörmann writes) constituted for them (those theologians directing the Council) the SINE QUA NON or indispensable condition which would assure a complete rupture from traditional dogmatic teachings, in order to set the 'New Theology' in place after having ceased using 'the previous traditional theology' and discarding it once and for all. (p.53)"

SHEER UTOPIANISM

And just what was the motivation of this dumping of Traditional theology? ...They were motivated by "this simple and seductive idea: a 'New Theology' consonant with modern, scientific characteristics, as well as with the modern image of the world and history. (p.55)"

In other words they were motivated by the old and constantly recurring Utopia of the Church being reconciled with the modern world, that is with modern philosophical thought, and with which Pope Pius IX (Syllabus, Proposition 80) declared that the Church cannot and must not reconcile itself, seeing its essentially anti-Christian character and outlook:""(Modern) men are, in general, strangers to truth and supernatural benefits and graces, thinking as they do to be able to satisfy themselves exclusively by human reason and in the natural order of things as they (vainly) expect to reach in them their own perfection as together with their own happiness" (Vatican I, preparatory outline of Catholic Doctrine).

"For those partisans of the 'new theology' (Dörmann continues), the slogan, 'aggiornamento' simply meant a resolute opening-up on the part of the Church to modern thought (which is totally alien to Truth as well as supernatural treasures and values) in order to end up with a completely new and different theology from which would be born a new secularized Church, adapted to its modern time. (p.54)"

This is nothing but modernist Utopianism. "Where is the new theology taking us? It is taking us in a straight line to modernism," wrote Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange O.P. in 1946.

And in fact, digging a little more deeply into the matter, we find beneath the simple principle of the new theology, that same perversion of the notion of truth which serves as the very foundation of modernism: "Truth is no more unchangeable than man himself, for it evolves with him, in him and by him. (Pope Saint Pius X, in his Decree Lamentabili, condemned proposition #58)"

From all this, Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange O.P. who, laying aside all pretense at prophesying, simply came to these logical conclusions in 1946 (16 years BEFORE Vatican II):
"And where is this New Theology headed with its new masters from whom they seek to draw their inspiration? Where is it heading if not for the road to skepticism, whims and heresy"? ("La nouvelle theologie. Ou va-t-elle?" In Angelicum #23-1946, p.136)


A BLAMEWORTHY UTOPIA

This attempt to reconcile the Church with the "modern world" cannot be considered an innocent utopia. The Magisterium of the Roman Pontiffs, has, over and over again, blocked the way to such moves, particularly Popes Gregory XVI (Mirari Vos, 1832), Pius IX (Syllabus, 1864), Saint Pius X (Pascendi; 1907) and, on the eve of the last Council, Pius XII (Humani Generis, 1950).

In this last encyclical, scorned, disavowed and buried by those very same persona whom it condemned, Pius XII, illustrating the (theological) climate preceding the Council, points out "with anxiety" and clarity the dangers of the "New Theology" which, seeking its basis outside the enduring philosophy, endangers the entire structure of Catholic Dogma. Particularly noteworthy is the fact that Pope Pius XII does not hesitate one moment to underline in red the scorn heaped upon the Magisterium, an underlying scorn borne out by its attitude:

29. But reason can perform these functions safely and well, only when properly trained, that is, when imbued with that sound philosophy which has long been, as it were, a patrimony handed down by earlier Christian ages, and which moreover possesses an authority of even higher order, since the teaching authority of the Church, in the light of Divine Revelation itself, has weighed its fundamental tenets, which have been elaborated and defined little by little by men of great genius. For this philosophy, acknowledged and accepted by the Church, safeguards the genuine validity of human knowledge, the unshakable metaphysical principles of sufficient reason, causality and finality, and finally the mind's ability to attain certain and unchangeable truth.

30. Of course this philosophy deals with much that neither directly nor indirectly touches faith or morals, and which consequently the Church leaves to the free discussion of experts. But this does not hold for many other things, especially those principles and fundamental tenets to which we have just referred (validity of human knowledge, the unshakable metaphysical principles, etc...). But never may we overthrow it, or contaminate it with false principles, or regard it as a great, but obsolete, relic. For truth and its philosophic expression cannot change from day to day, least of all where there is question of self-evident principles of the human mind or of those propositions which are supported by the wisdom of the ages and by Divine Revelation.

32. How deplorable it is then that this philosophy, received and honored by the Church, is scorned by some who today call it outmoded in form and rationalistic, as they say, in its method of thought. While scorning our philosophy, they extol other philosophies of all kinds, ancient and modern, oriental and occidental, by which they seem to imply that any kind of philosophy or theory, with a few additions and corrections if need be, can be reconciled with Catholic dogma. No Catholic can doubt how false this is, especially where there is question of those fictitious theories they call immanentism, or idealism, or materialism, whether historic or dialectic, or even existentialism, whether atheistic or simply the type that denies the validity of the reason in the field of metaphysics.34. It would indeed be unnecessary to deplore these aberrations from the truth, if all even in the field of philosophy, directed their attention with the proper reverence to the teaching authority of the Church, which by divine institution has the mission not only to guard and interpret the deposit of divinely revealed truth, but also to keep watch over the philosophical sciences themselves, in order that Catholic Dogmas may suffer no harm because of erroneous opinions."

Thus do we see confirmed that which we have been repeating for years: we have irrefutable as well as unmistakable proof that although they are members of the Catholic Hierarchy, the neo-modernists have disobeyed and continue to disobey the constant and therefore infallible Magisterium of the Catholic Church and their own "obedience" which they, in turn, seek to impose in their style of new Church, results in the moral obligation of the true and faithful Catholics to disobey the false orders of their new-style Church.


TRUE AND FALSE "RESTORATION"

From what we have just seen, it logically follows that true restoration can only come by traveling along in a reverse direction from the one which led to the rupture or breaking away from the Doctrinal Tradition of the Church: a return to constant and durable philosophy, and therefore to Scholastic Theology, therefore to the Dogmatic tradition of the Church in faithful obedience to the constant directives and teachings of the Magisterium of all the Popes. 

Those neo-modernists following the modern “line” of de Lubac and of von Balthasar are now posing as “moderates and even as “restorers,” but they categorically refuse to repudiate or renounce their “New Theology” from which – whether they like it or not - arose this crisis which today paralyses the life of the Church.

“Our line” (the one we follow) - declared, sure of himself, Fr. Henrici S.J. to (the review) 30 DAYS (December 1991) – “is the one of the extreme centre. No excessive attention (sic!) to the Magisterium, nor CONTENTION. No right, nor left. Attachment to tradition (which in the language or “Newspeak” of de Lubac and of the “new” theologians, is not - as we will see - the Dogmatic tradition of the Church) in the line of the new theology of Lyon (seat of de Lubac as well as that of the other “founding fathers” (of the new theology), which underscored the non-opposition (i.e. identification) between nature and supernature, between faith and culture, and which has become the official theology of Vatican II.”

“That same ‘New Theology’ Pope Pius XII officially condemned in his Encyclical Humani Generis as simply being a whole heap of “false opinions threatening to lay waste the very foundations of Catholic Doctrine!” It is, therefore, even more imperative to bring to light just what is behind the “moderation” of these neo-modernists of the “extreme centre,” yes, but still modernists just the same.

Hirpinus

Translated from Courrier de Rome, March 1993
[Emphasis mine.]

[Stone]

Si Si No No October 1993 No. 4

They Think They've Won!

Part II

THE NEW PHILOSOPHY OF MAURICE BLONDEL

Let is now take a look at the "holy fathers" of this new theology. The first step they take in their liberation from traditional Catholic theology and dogma is by abandoning scholastic philosophy. It is thus hardly surprising to hear Urs von Balthasar stating, "Hell exists, but is empty!" Balthasar bases himself upon the philosopher Maurice Blondel - who occupies a small place in the history of philosophy, but a very important place in the history of this modernist new theology of the Church.


A GHOST - LIKE PHILOSOPHY
Throughout his life (1861-1949), the Frenchman, Maurice Blondel, was a center of controversy, especially as one couldn't pin him down to his errors - since, like all modernists, he would wriggle and slither out of such attempt. This attitude was stigmatized by an adversary of Blondel's, Fr. Tonquedec O.P., in the Dictionnaire Apologetique de la Foi Catholique:

"Despite efforts to base my arguments with Blondel on documentary evidence, I soon realized that the public did not have access to his works. The texts I quoted were from books that were no longer available on the library shelves; nor the brochures that contained his most important articles. Furthermore, his doctrines, in being the continual object of controversy, were continually re-explained, modified, etc. The result being that his doctrine cannot be nailed down or grasped, since it changes with time and differing circumstances. Very few persons, even amongst those who study religious philosophy, are capable of grasping the meaning of the statements and writings of Blondel and his friends."

Who were Blondel's friends? The answer is Fr. Lubac and his gang: Bouillard, Fessard, von Balthasar, Auguste Valensin, etc. In other words, the founding fathers of the new theology, condemned by Pope Pius XII in Humani Generis. This new theology was, in the words of Fr. Henrici SJ., elevated to the position of the "official theology of Vatican II."


BLONDEL'S PSEUDO - APOLOGETICS DESTROYS CATHOLIC DOGMA
Blondel's followers, Lubac and his gang had their reasons for wanting to leave Blondel's philosophy enveloped in a vague fog. This would give birth to a new, vague, "Christian" philosophy." Blondel presented his philosophy as an apologetical method of winning over modern man. He says that classical proofs fail to penetrate the minds of modern men, which are penetrated by Kantian positivism. If you want to save souls, then you must go to where they are and if they have fallen into subjectivism, then it if through subjectivism that they must be sought.

This subjectivist philosophy typical of Protestantism and Modernism, so ruinous to Catholic dogma, was already condemned by Pope Pius X in his encyclical Pascendi. For Blondel, Catholic Truth rests more on the level of subjectivity than objectivity. Truth is more related to the will and experience, rather than intelligence. Hence truth is what we want and feel it to be. Faith does not pass from the mind to the heart, but from the heart to the mind! This leads us into the field of scepticism and agnosticism, which is the foundation of modernism. With this elevation of the will and feelings, man believes what he wants to believe, relying on his feelings and impressions, devoid of all objectivity. This explains the current exaltation and preoccupation with personal religious experiences such as the charismatics, pietists, pseudo-mystics, etc. The majority of the Church is tainted with this subjectivism.

Blondel does not bother with rational arguments to prove the existence of God and credibility of the Christian religion. He prefers to give the unbeliever an "effective experience " of Catholicism, to make the unbeliever who has no faith "to act as though he had the faith." In other words, to "experience" God - which is exactly what Pope St. Pius X condemned as modernism, in Pascendi.

Blondel also falls into Immanentism (the essence of modernism) when he insists that "there is nothing that goes into man that does not come from man and that does not correspond in some way with his need for personal growth and expansion."

This is the very basis for modernism, wherein the human mind is the central reality around which everything else revolves. For in modernism, the religious soul's beliefs and reasons for belief come from its own experiences and feelings - it will not accept objective arguments that are beyond its own realm of experience. If this attitude is followed to its logical conclusions, then such a soul will inevitably deny all external Divine Revelation and the divinity of Jesus Christ Himself.


THE NEW CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHY
In effect, what Blondel has done, is to go and seek-out "modern-man" in his place of habitat - the sickbed of subjectivity and skepticism. Yet, rather than helping him leave this sickbed of grave errors, he lets him wallow in those self-same errors. Blondel's new "Christian philosophy” and its offspring, the "new theology of the Church" of his followers, will replace the perennial philosophy of the Church - an objective philosophy, based on reality, carefully formed and perfected throughout the course of many centuries, by the greatest philosophical minds the world has ever seen, a philosophy that reached its summit in what we now call Thomistic Philosophy.

Pope Pius XII warned us of these new theologians in his encyclical Humani Generis, and stressed the importance of Thomistic philosophy as an aid against deviation in Catholic dogma. In his book The Intelligence In Danger of Death, Marcel de Corte, one of the most lucid thinkers of his time, echoes this same view on the importance of Thomistic philosophy:

"It is linked to Greek philosophy, which is, itself, a philosophy based upon common sense, reality and a human intelligence faithful to its purpose (i.e. to know objective truth). Whenever philosophy wanders from this, it suffers the consequences! Vatican II threw out this realist philosophy which the Church had always guarded...this 2,000 year-old solidarity between supernatural reality of the Faith and the natural reality of man's mind...a philosophy which was the axis and pivot of the Church, who is the custodian of Faith, Intelligence and Morals. All this has been swept away by the tempest of all tempests - the subjectivity of man."


ALARM BELLS!
Blondel had his critics and supporters. Amongst the former were the Catholic theologians Garrigou-Lagrange, Labourdette and De Tonquedec. One of Blondel's public defenders was Fr. Auguste Valensin SJ., who would present "doctored" quotes of Blondel when speaking in his defense. Thus opportunely eliminating anything that might serve to incriminate Blondel, before a public that was largely unaware of the true content of his doctrine. His writings were not freely available, and so people had to accept these "misquoted quotes" as being true.

For example, Valensin takes Blondel's quote of

"there is nothing that goes into man that does not come from him and that does not correspond in some way for personal growth and expansion"

and twists it into

"there is nothing that goes into man that does not correspond to his personal growth and expansion."

The opportune removal of "…that does not come from him…" is a move clearly designed to protect Blondel from the accusation of lmmanentism and Modernism.

However, good and sound theologians, such as Garrigou-Lagrange, Labourdette and De Tonquedec, spotted Blondel's errors and raised the alarm. They refuted this "new Christian philosophy" and pointed out its ruinous consequences for Catholic dogma and its incurable opposition to the Magisterium of the Church. Today, "those who think they've won" try to reduce all this to a mere personal feud between several theologians and deny it as being of any importance for the Church. Yet this is far from being the case. The enlightening refutations of Blondel's philosophy, by the above-mentioned theologians, prove the contrary and the present crisis in the Church shows how right those "clairvoyant" theologians were!


THE CRUX OF THE MATTER
In 1946, the celebrated Dominican theologian, Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange publicly refuted Blondel's errors and privately wrote to him asking him to "retract his (false) definition of truth before dying - if he didn't want to spend too long in Purgatory." Publicly, Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange had said:

"It is not without a serious responsibility that he (Blondel) has called the Church's traditional definition of truth, which has been accepted for centuries, a figment of the imagination. Furthermore, by substituting this true notion of truth with an erroneous notion of truth, will inevitably bring error to anything that is built upon that false notion."

One of these erroneous fruits that grew out the capital error of Blondel is what the present-day Church calls "the Living Tradition." This erroneous notion of Tradition ignores the Church's logical and indispensable link that must exist between what the Church teaches now and what the Church has always believed and taught. This is because, based on Blondel's false notion of truth, progress in dogma and understanding of truth is in a continual state of evolution or development.

Consequently, due to this continual development, there can be no fixed, definite, unchangeable truths.

Already in 1924, Fr. De Tonquedec had pointed out a remarkable resemblance between Blondel's ideas and the ideas condemned by Pope St. Pius X in the encyclical Pascendi. Tonquedec says that Blondel managed to wriggle out of a personal anathema by his characteristic vague expressions, hesitations and contradictions. A seemingly heretical statement would be contradicted a page or so further on.

Was Blondel in good faith? Fr. Tonquedec thought not, with good reason. For Blondel would often deform the teaching of St. Thomas Aquinas and twist it round to mean the opposite. Added to this we have his categorical denials of ever having been opposed to orthodox Catholic thought. The typical modernist plea of "You don't understand me!" with repeated attempts at explaining himself to his critics or those who refuted his erroneous doctrine. In fact, his whole life was one long attempt at giving his ideas an orthodox sense or meaning. This continual wriggling and self-justification under the microscope has produced a host of differing opinions of Blondel. Some believed that he was sincere in his explanations, yet the wiser and better-informed critics were not fooled at all!

The ecclesiastical journal L'ami du Clerge (March 4,1937,p.137) wrote that the later works of Blondel were nothing else but a reflection of his earlier erroneous ideas - going on to say that "he has not changed an iota of his doctrine."

Fr. Tonquedec was of the same opinion, who also said of Blondel's later works:

"Unfortunately, I find it impossible to accept Blondel's present interpretation of his works…which defends the orthodoxy of his writings.... Nobody who has read his entire works can accept that.... This philosophy is very new, very bold, very exclusive and on the whole erroneous." (Dictionnaire Apologetique)

Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange comes to the same conclusion in his article "Where is the New Theology going to?" With regard to Blondel's new notion of truth, Fr. Lagrange asks: "Have Blondel's latest works corrected this false notion of truth? We have to say that they have not!"


THE CONFESSIONS OF "THOSE WHO THINK THEY'VE WON"
These tenacious critics of Blondel were not wrong! Today, the "new theologians" confirm their fears. We quote from the Central Archives of Maurice Blondel:

“After his two works entitled ‘Action' (1893) and 'Letter' (1896), Blondel was often accused of being a 'modernist' by persons who misunderstood everything. In the face of these detractors, Blondel too often gave a too weak and minimal interpretation of his works."

On December 20, 1931, in a letter to De Lubac, Blondel asked him if he thought that some of his (Blondel's) theses "went over the top." In his letter of April 3, 1932, De Lubac replies to the contrary. He chides Blondel for being too timid in the face of the criticism and restraint that came from other theologians. De Lubac asserts that all this impedes the free development of a spontaneous Catholic mind. He goes on to say:

"I admire the painstaking care by which you criticize yourself and I am saddened by the thought that this might delay future important works, that we await with such impatience." (Henri De Lubac, Memoire autour de mesoeuvres, p.21).

Bewitched by the magic flute of his "friend," Blondel takes courage and by return of post (April 5, 1932) he confesses that:

"It's now over 40 years since I started tackling these problems, at which time I was not sufficiently armed. At that time, Thomistic philosophy was reigning intransigently. Had I said then what you want me to say now, then I would certainly have been too reckless and would have jeopardized the cause we defend - for I would have incurred many inevitable censures. It was necessary to take my time, in order to let my thought mature and in order to tame the minds that rebelled against it. The delays that sadden you are, in view of this double aspect, excusable... It is necessary to embrace traditional ways and views, so that they may be used as a point of departure or a springboard for a 'renewal'... Therefore, I am not totally to blame for the prevarication and timidity that you so deplore in this child of a 'new generation' and master of a theology that I have not yet managed to possess!"

Thus we see Blondel, using the usual modernist ploy, of deliberately hiding his true thoughts so as to officially remain with the bosom of the Church and to attempt a "renewal" from within. In this correspondence between Blondel and De Lubac, we see exposed all the secret maneuvers of modernism - which seek to avoid exposure and censure. It was to his own misfortune that Blondel ran into De Lubac and his gang. For the latter saw in Blondel's new "Christian Philosophy" the foundations for their "New Catholic Theology." And in Rome, they could count on the sympathy of the Vice-Secretary of State, a certain Msgr. Montini - the future Pope Paul VI. We'll speak of that later!


Translated from Courrier de Rome April 1993

[Stone]

Si Si No No - December 1993 - No.5

They Think They've Won!

Part III

HENRI DE LUBAC - A MASTER WHO HAD NEVER BEEN A DISCIPLE: HIS LIBERAL INCLINATIONS AND THEOLOGICAL DEFORMATION

Let us now turn our attention to the father of the "new theology," Henri de Lubac, SJ. We shall begin with his philosophical formation, for this will clearly underscore his scornful attitude and contempt for authority, as well as for all the directives coming from Roman officials who were truly Catholic. All this took place even in those early years when the present day crisis in the Church was only being prepared. In order to combat the modernists' attacks against the Church, Saint Pius X had ordered the "immediate removal of any and all modernist (or suspected modernist) members of teaching staffs, in seminaries or houses for the formation of members of religious orders. He also commanded to be excluded from ordination "anyone who could even be in any way suspected of having the least attachment to doctrines (already) condemned by the church, as well as anyone favoring harmful novelties. (Motu Proprio, November 18, 1907)"

Henri de Lubac

If these orders had been duly complied with, the young de Lubac would never have been ordained. He, himself, in his book, Memoire autour de mes oeuvres, (Jaca Books, Milan), acknowledges his sympathy or liking for "Catholic liberalism," which had already been repeatedly condemned by several Roman Pontiffs. This fondness for liberalism prompted him to "run after those turbulent systems and tendencies of modern thought" (P. Parente, La theologie, ed. Studium).

Writing, for example, about Cardinal Couille, de Lubac states: "I glorified him since my adolescence on account of the memory of Monsignor Dupanloup, whose colleague he was" [1802-1878; he was one of the leaders of Catholic liberalism. - Translators note]. Msgr. Dupanloup, that "hero," or rather, the man who de Lubac had considered a "saint" in his youth, had in reality been a leading figure of liberal thought throughout Vatican Council I (Dec.8, 1869 -July 18, 1870). He left that Council before the end in order not to be present at the solemn proclamation of the dogma of Papal Infallibility, to which he was vehemently opposed.

On the other hand, referring to Msgr. Lavallee, Rector of the Catholic Faculties of Lyon, de Lubac writes, "what has always bothered me to no end with him was. ... His reputation as an (extreme) traditionalist" (p.5). This loathing, this horror for "Integrism" and "integrists" (i.e. those Catholics holding to Tradition in its entirety) will never leave de Lubac until the end of his life, as we shall presently see. 

Against the mounting modernist attacks, Saint Pius X, as well as all of his successors, had confirmed time after time the obligation of "religiously following the doctrine, method, and principles of Saint Thomas Aquinas" (Saint Pius X, Motu Proprio, cited. Also Pius XII, Humani generis, 1917 Code of Canon Law, 1366,2). But in the Jesuit centers of religious formation attended by de Lubac, little importance was attached to these orders coming from Rome. Indeed, they were held to be of no account, of no importance at all. Thus, it was in the course of his philosophical studies in Jersey (1920-1923), the young de Lubac would "passionately read ‘L’Action’, ‘La Lettre' [concerning apologetics], as well as other works written by [the modernist] Maurice Blondel (1864-1949). Though a praiseworthy exception, some of our professors whose prohibitions were usually severe, nevertheless permitted, without encouraging us however, to follow Maurice Blondel's philosophy" (Memoire, p.10).

Furthermore, on page 192 of the same book, he writes, “Amongst the lesser-known [modernist] authors of the day, we were especially 'crazy' about Lachelier , who was recommended to us by Fr. Auguste Valensin more for his style than for his ideas [but that style was permeated with those ideas]. Let us bear in mind that in those days, as far as the students were concerned, such [modernistic] readings constituted, in the main a forbidden fruit. But thanks to indulgent professors and counsellors, they were never considered to be a clandestine or underground activity.”

Thus, it was that the young de Lubac, instead of receiving a serious and sound philosophical formation which constitutes that essential foundation for a serious and sound formation in Theology, suffered a serious deformation "thanks to overly-lenient professors and counsellors," through the avid reading of 'philosophers' contaminated with immanentism and subjectivism.


“MASTERS” WHO HAD NEVER BEEN STUDENTS

The damage caused by such a warped and corrupt 'formation' could only be as enormous as it was irreparable:

"Since the traditional doctrine taught by Saint Thomas (Aquinas) is the strongest, as well as being the most enlightened and sure in its principles, let us follow the Church on this important point. Our duty is clearly to arm ourselves with this strength and light in order to rule out any and all risky or false theories. Do we not often sadly see just the opposite? Some people 'study' in a haphazard or careless manner, a drab and lifeless philosophy or theology, completely lacking in cohesion or consistency, and then dabble in the writings of Saint Thomas and in Tradition. This contact can in no way be called a true and valid formation; moreover, it utterly distorts and nullifies from the very outset any effort in acquiring scholastic and traditional ideas."

"The Church insists on a solid formation based on Thomism and Tradition" (The Study of Tradition, Aubry). Since Saint Thomas Aquinas has proven to be such a sure, richly productive and incomparable guide, he is the one person, first and foremost, to whom we must turn. It is his pure doctrine that most constitutes the solid foundation of theological formation. To be truly formative, studies in Thomism must not come nor be considered as a secondary and optional matter" (Lauvaud: La Vie Spirituelle, p.174, quoted by J .B. Aubry in L'etude de La Tradition, p.100).

This fatal deficiency or lack of a solid philosophical and theological formation constitutes the basic or "original fault" clearly manifested by all "new theologians."

Henre Bouillard, a veteran of de Lubac's group of followers, offered the following "testimony" on the occasion of the inauguration of the Centre d'Archives Maurice Blondel (Archive Center of Maurice Blondel), given at Louvain, March 30-31, 1973:

"I was one of the young students of theology who, in the early 1930's, used to secretly obtain carbon copies of ‘L’Action' [Blondel's main work], a book which could simply not be found in book shops in those days. This book was suspect and it’s reading was difficult without a competent guide. But deeply disappointed with the scholastic philosophy as well as with the apologetics taught in the seminaries at that time [badly taught or taught without conviction by professors who were also themselves fascinated by the 'modern philosophy'], we looked there [into Blondel's 'new' philosophy] as well as elsewhere for an initiation into modern thought and we were especially looking for the means, which we could not find elsewhere, to understand and to justify our [new] faith." Even as a professor, Bouillard continued, "I must admit that, in the main, my lessons were largely based on Blondel's philosophical thought. Other theologians [his friend, de Lubac amongst others] had long ago set themselves on this [modernist] course, and others were now doing the same. I must, therefore, witness not only to all that Blondel taught me, but also to the great influence he has had on numerous theologians, and through these, on theology in general" (Centre d' Archives Maurice Blondel, Inauguration days, March 30-31, 1973. Texts of speeches, p. 41.).

Thus, it was with good reason that Father Garrigou-Lagrange, referring to de Lubac, de Brouillard and their like-minded friends said, "We do not think that they have abandoned the doctrine of Saint Thomas Aquinas; they never adhered to it because they simply never understood it. This is all just as worrying as it is distressing" ("La Nouvelle Theologie ou va-t-elle?" in Angelicum 23, 1946).

As always, the "innovators" (modernists), as Saint Alphonsus so aptly put it, "expect to be taken for masters, although they were never even disciples" (A.M. Tannoia. Vita; Book 2; chapter 55).


FALSE OBEDIENCE AND CONTEMPT FOR ROME

Inevitably, together with these modernist "novelties," the young de Lubac became filled with scorn for those "Roman" directives. "Amongst those [modernist] philosophers," he writes, "whom I followed at the time of my formation, I am particularly indebted to Blondel, Marechal, and Rousselot" (Memoire). None of those three, however, was known for his orthodox views by members of the Holy Office nor, for that matter, by the Jesuit's headquarters in Rome (Ibid, p.13). And referring to Pierre Charles S.J., de Lubac writes, "in our view, his prestige had increased [indeed!] on account of the disrepute into which he had fallen [in the eyes of the Roman authorities]. The same may be said for Father Huby, following the case of 'Les yeux de la Foi' (the Eyes of Faith), one of Rousselot's works which the Jesuits, Charles and Huby, tried over and over again to have published in the face of solid opposition from ‘Rome.’” (Ibid p.14).

Later on, de Lubac learned how to be really disobedient under the appearance of the most formal obedience. De Lubac explains,

“Father Podechard, the most obedient of the sons of the Church, had just completed a course on Jahweh's servant at the theological faculty in Lyons. I mentioned that he should have written a book on it and have it published. ‘That is impossible’, he answered. ‘For what reason is it impossible?’ ‘Because there are, in my writings, crucial positions that are not at all admitted or tolerated these days. You see, Father, on the Biblical questions, the Church and I are not at all in agreement and, therefore, one of us must remain silent. It is only normal that it should be myself.’” (p.17).

All of this did not prevent "the most obedient sons of the Church" from speaking without such restraints or precautions in his lectures, for he set forth before those young ecclesiastics the very same modernist theses that he knew full well had often been condemned by the Church.

De Lubac learned this lesson very well and, in time, also learned to camouflage or conceal his real disobedience under the mask of a formal submission to the Church's teachings. Thus, it was not without good reason that Pope Pius XII, in Humani generis, warned that the "new theologians" were teaching modernistic errors "in a prudent and secretive manner...although they express themselves with prudence in their printed works, they nevertheless speak much more openly in their notes which they hand out in private, in their courses and conferences" (Ibid). All of this also holds true in the case of Von Balthasar; all of which serves to explain how the Catholic world, with Vatican II, finally "woke up" modernist without even so much as a groan (cf. Saint Jerome: "The world woke up Arian and groaned").


BLONDEL'S "INTELLECTUAL SYMBIOSIS"

Abandonment of Scholastic philosophy was the "new theology's" first step in its rejection of the Church's dogmatic Tradition. This step, as we have previously seen in our last issue, was made by Maurice Blondel. The second step, i.e., the repudiation of Traditional Catholic theology, was undertaken by Henri de Lubac.

"Modernist theologians," wrote Saint Pius X, "criticize the Church because She most obstinately and most definitively refuses, both to submit or adapt or alter her dogmas to the opinions of  [modern] philosophy." On the other hand, "having discarded the ancient and traditional theology, they (the modernist theologians) busy themselves in projecting a spotlight on a new theology faithful in all points to the frenzied delusions of the modernist philosophers" (Pascendi).

In fact, all theology presupposes or involves a philosophy, and de Lubac's "new theology" presupposes or rests upon Blondel's "new philosophy."

On April 8, 1932, Henri de Lubac, S.J. wrote to Blondel informing him that henceforth it was possible to "develop a [new] theology of the supernatural, because your philosophical work has prepared or opened the way for it" (op. cit. p.26). Quite recently, the L'Osservatore Romano devoted an entire page in its presentation (naturally full of praise and approval) of a new book, Henri de Lubac: Theology and Dogma in History-The influence of Blondel, ed. Studium, Rome.

The author, A. Russo, an Italian student of the German Walter Kasper (who is also counted amongst "Those who think they have won"), writes that the exchange of letters between de Lubac and Blondel "offers us an example of an intellectual symbiosis rarely seen in the history of thought" (p.307). However, in reality, it is a repetition of an old story, "birds of a feather flock together."

Many things served to unite Blondel and de Lubac: the same lack of confidence in the cognitive value of human reason (anti-intellectualism or even agnosticism and scepticism); the same lack of intellectual rigor (already noted by Father de Tonquedoc, S.J. in Blondel's works and is easily noted in de Lubac's writings); the same inferiority complex in the face of "modern man" (who, identified with the modern philosopher) is infected with the cancer of scepticism and subjectivism; that same fear of intellectuals, hidden under the apologetical anxiety of a "pacifying apostolate" (Blondel), of "remaining or of being thrown out" by a culture which refuses to hear Christ and His Church. They also shared the impossible view of reconciling or adapting modern pseudo-philosophy with the Catholic Faith as Saint Thomas had conciliated the philosophy of his time with our Holy Faith. However, Blondel and de Lubac had never realized that Saint Thomas had purified a philosophy, able to be refined, since it was fundamentally sound; but not even a genius like Saint Thomas (compared to whom Blondel is but a mouse at the foot of a mountain) could ever hope to weed out and purify those sophisms of the modern philosophers.

There is no conflict between the Faith and right reason (Denzinger 1799), but there does exist a conflict between the Faith and modern "philosophy," since this modern "philosophy" has strayed so far from sound reason. Wishing to "re-read" or revise the Faith along the lines of modern "philosophy," simply means to dissolve or ruin the Faith in a pool of modernist errors, without, however, liberating "Christian thinking," nor liberating Christians themselves from the ostracism of modern culture. All of this concerns error, which is not susceptible of conversion. As far as the victims of error are concerned, it must be said that it is very difficult to lead those back to the Faith who, like the modern philosophers, are deceived in their principles. (Summa Theologica IIa IIae; Question 156, Article 3, ad 2). In any case, those who are mistaken in principle need to be corrected at the level of those principles. Establishing the erroneous principles of agnosticism, subjectivism, etc., as the foundation for a "new Christian philosophy," and, thus, a "new theology," will inevitably lead to equally erroneous conclusions, since it is impossible to draw true conclusions from false principles. Thus do we see that the "intellectual symbiosis" found between de Lubac and Blondel, could only lead to very unhappy results and not only for the two persons directly involved.


CONTEMPT FOR THE INFALLIBLE MAGISTERIUM

Above all else, de Lubac and Blondel shared the same contempt for the infallible Magisterium. This scorn becomes quite evident when we consider that they were upholding (or more precisely, insinuating and diffusing in a more or less clandestine manner) their "novelties;" not against a different theological school on genuinely debatable questions, but rather against the Church's infallible Magisterium, in matters already possessing a constant and infallible teaching, as well as repeated condemnations, by several Roman Pontiffs, of contrary views.

Blondel and de Lubac, considered the supernatural as being a fundamental and essential thing for man, a necessary perfecting of nature without which nature would find itself frustrated in its essential aspirations, and, therefore, in an abnormal state. As a consequence of this error, they denied the possibility of admitting, even by simple hypothesis, a state of "pure nature." In doing so, they found themselves in opposition to the universal and constant doctrine of the Church regarding the gratuity of the supernatural (in other words, the supernatural as a free gift from God). If the supernatural were an absolute necessity of nature, it would no longer be free or gratuitous; it would then be owed to nature. If it is thus due to nature, it would no longer be supernatural, but…natural. As a matter of fact, naturalism is the very foundation of modernism, just as it also is the basis of the "new theology."

The gratuity of the supernatural has been constantly taught by the Church and upheld or defended by her against the errors of Luther and Baius, who also erroneously appealed to Saint Augustine just as Blondel and de Lubac have now done. [N.B.- Michel de Bay (Baius), 1513-1589, was a Flemish theologian and Chancellor of Louvain University and a forerunner of Jansenism. Influenced by protestant views on original sin, predestination, and grace, his interpretation of Saint Augustine in the form of 76 propositions was condemned as heretical by Papal Bull in 1567.]

In his struggle against modernism, Pope St. Pius X again confirmed the constant teaching of the Church,

"We cannot help but deplore and most deeply regret once more that there are Catholics to be found today (here, Fr. de Tonquedoc could not help but think of Blondel) who although repudiating immanence as a doctrine, do, in fact, make use of it nevertheless as a method in their apologetics; and who do so, we declare, with so little self-restraint, that they seem to admit in human nature, as regards the supernatural order, not only to a capacity and a suitability [things which Catholic apologists have always taken care to emphasize], but rather to a true and strictly rigorous necessity."

Catholic philosophers, apologists, and theologians can admit in human nature no more than "a capacity or a suitability" (obediential potency) to receive the supernatural. Exceeding these limits will only serve to dislodge the very keystone of Catholic theology, which will then inevitably bring about the ruin of everything else - as we see nowadays when the "supernatural" is no longer that of Blondel and of de Lubac, but has changed into the "anthropological aspect" and "anonymous Christians" of Karl Rahner (1904-1984); or into religious indifferentism or "ecumenism"; and into the secondary importance of the Church as the means of Salvation (Courrier de Rome; no.131 [321], pp.2-7. "Eulogy of Father Henri de Lubac, one of the fathers of Vatican II."). The encyclical Pascendi came out in 1907. In 1932, Blondel, in evident contempt for the Church's infallible Magisterium, was still brewing-up, or as he put it, "ripening" his heterodox concept of the supernatural. At the time of his death, de Lubac, once praised and exalted as a model of "obedience" and "fidelity" to the Church, now in open contempt for the Magisterium, prompted Blondel to set up his naturalized supernatural as the formation of his "new theology."

In the same way, when these two modernists present and broadcast a "new" notion of "truth" (vitalist and evolutionary), they are well aware that this same notion has long-since been condemned by Pope St. Pius X, in Pascendi (Denzinger, 2058 and 2080) and later by the Holy Office on December 1, 1924. Yet, they continued imperturbably and rashly on their path of self-delusion.


THE REFORMERS

What is really striking in the attitude of Blondel and de Lubac lies precisely in their way of passing themselves off as the indisputable criteria or models of truth against the age-old Magisterium of the Church: their cause is that of "authentic Christianity" (Blondel to de Lubac, 4-15-1945, and 3-16-1946, in A. Russo op.cit., p.373). They consider themselves to be prime movers of the return to the "most authentic tradition" (de Lubac in A. Russo op.cit., p.373), those who have brought new life back to the "ancient doctrine" (Ibid.). According to them, the "Christian thought" and the Church's Magisterium had necessarily deviated from that "ancient doctrine" in the course of the centuries, Pope Gregory XVI condemns this attitude, calling it "an absurd and most offensive allegation against the Church itself” (Pope Gregory XVI in Mirari vos). In his encyclical Pascendi, Pope St. Pius X gave a precise description to the modernists' warped conscience, which robs them of all hope of a possible repentance:

"What is imputed to them as a fault they regard as a sacred duty...Let authority rebuke them if it please - they have their own conscience on their side...and, thus, they go their way, reprimands and condemnations not withstanding, masking an incredible audacity under a mock semblance of humility. While they make a pretense of bowing their heads, their minds and hearts are more boldly intent than ever on carrying out their purposes - and this policy they follow willingly and wittingly, both because it is part of their system that authority is to be stimulated but not dethroned, and because it is necessary for them to remain within the ranks of the Church in order that they may gradually transform the collective conscience" (Pascendi 27).

And again:

"Although they express their astonishment that we should number them amongst the enemies of the Church, no one will be reasonably surprised that we should do so, if, leaving out of account the internal disposition of soul, of which God alone is the judge, he considers their doctrines [which are the objective criteria upon which one judges], their manner of speech, and their action. Nor, indeed, would he be wrong in regarding them as the most pernicious of all the adversaries of the Church" (Pascendi, 3).

THE WEAPONS OF SCORN AND DEFAMATION OF CHARACTER

De Lubac, like Blondel (Courrier de Rome, April, 1993) makes use of the modernist tactics in order not to reveal himself and his doctrines too much so as to "remain within the ranks of the Church so that they may gradually transform the collective conscience" (Pascendi).

Despite all these tactics, the great Thomistic theologians of the day instantly understood exactly where his novelties would inevitably lead to. Immediately, the future Cardinal Journet noted that "de Lubac is no longer able to distinguish philosophy from theology" (Memoire, p.7), or even the natural from the supernatural, and later on takes him for a "fideist." (Ibid. p.20)

De Lubac had little difficulty in answering the "excellent" Charles Journet (ibid. pp.7 and 20), but such was not the case with the other Thomistic theologians. To their arguments, de Lubac will respond with the weapons of contempt and defamation of character.

In 1946, Father Garrigou-Lagrange sounded a solemn warning, 

"Where is the new theology taking us? It is taking us straight back to modernism...that which is true is no longer what it is, but what it is becoming, and is always changing and this is leading to complete relativism" (La Nouvelle Theologie... op.cit.).

Moreover, in a personal letter, this great Dominican reminds Blondel, now quite advanced in age, of his grave responsibility before God. But in vain. De Lubac makes use of that same letter "to defame and discredit" its author, (A. Russo. op.cit.) and promptly intervenes in order to reassure the fretting, worried Blondel:

"That letter which he [Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange] has just sent you can be explained, at least in part, by the frustration he has suffered in seeing one of his articles refused by the (Thomistic) Review itself! He is no longer simply the narrow-minded person that we used to know. He has become an absolute maniac; for several months now, he has been busy fabricating a spector of heresy, in order to give himself the satisfaction of rescuing orthodoxy. He appeals to common sense, but he is the one who now lacks common sense. We can answer him that the simple fact of belonging to an order [Dominican] having 'Veritas' as its motto, does not confer upon him any privilege of infallibility." "You are not responsible for any of those theological deviations that he has simply imagined. At this moment, a strong integrist backlash is making itself felt, as denunciations, accusations, and gossip of all kinds converge in the room of Father Garrigou-Lagrange" (Quoted by A. Russo, op. cit. p.354).

Finally, on July 28,1948, he reaches the point of speaking of Father Garrigou-Lagrange's "simplistic views on the absoluteness of truth" (Ibid. p.356). Whereas Pope Pius XII, on the 17th of September, 1946, personally intervening on this very same question, set forth those same "simplistic views" identical to those expressed by Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange: views which have always been held by the Church regarding the absoluteness of truth. In a short but earth shattering, speech to the Fathers of the Society of Jesus, Pope Pius XII had expressed his unmistakably clear views on "the New theology, which must evolve just as everything evolves, as it progresses without ever being fixed once and for all." The Holy Father warned that "if we were to embrace or share such opinions, what would become of the immutable or unchangeable Dogmas of the Catholic Church? What would become of the unity and stability of the Faith?" (Acta Apostolicae Sedis, 38,S., 2,13,1946. p, 385).

Sad to say, this Pontifical warning fell on deaf ears. Equally unheeded by de Lubac (meanwhile, Blondel had died) was the encyclical Humani generis (1950), reaffirming the immutability of truth while condemning outright de Lubac's "new theology of the supernatural." Commenting on this great encyclical, de Lubac wrote,

"This (encyclical) seems to me, like many other Church documents, to be very unilateral, which didn't surprise me. That's to be expected from that form of document. But I didn't see anything in it that struck me" (Memoire, op.cit. p.240).

To the lucid, even brilliant, criticisms and warnings coming from his great adversaries (Garrigou-Lagrange, Lalsbourdette, Cordovan, de Tonquedec, Boyer, etc.) he could only answer by contempt, defamation and attacks on their good reputations.

Writing to his provincial on July 1, 1950, he pleads, "It is true that I have been attacked by several theologians, who in general, are but little esteemed due to their notorious ignorance of Catholic Tradition or for whatever other motive" (Memoire, p.210). Further on, he speaks of "obstinate criticisms" of a group "bent on his destruction." (These are the same tactics used by "those who think they have won.") This reminds us of the unfair and insulting caricature of Father Garrigou-Lagrange published by Father Martini, S.J., who treated Pope Pius IX in the same manner in his book Vatican II- Bilan et Perspectives (Vatican II - An Appraisal and Prospects). 

De Lubac makes use of a "transverse" and identical system in the case of his companions of whom he sets himself up as defender. One example: whenever Teilhard de Chardin, S.J., who makes up his new theology through "science" (just as de Lubac makes up his new theology through "history"), is criticized for his theological errors, de Lubac steps forth crying that the real fault lies in "the ignorance of his critics on the actual state of science as well as in the problems derived thereof!" (pro-memoria note to his superiors, March 6,1947 in Memoire, p.1780).


THE POST-CONCILLIAR CRISIS AND DE LUBAC'S "EXAMINATION OF CONSCIENCE"

Neither the warnings and official condemnations from the Roman Pontiffs nor the learned arguments of his eminent theological adversaries could serve to even scratch his self-assurance of being a "reformer." It would take all the dreadful disasters of the post-conciliar era to shake his unjustified self-confidence. Pope Paul VI, in his famous speech of June 30, 1972, on "the smoke of Satan in the Temple of God," gave us a good idea of the state of soul of de Lubac (and of Von Balthasar, for that matter), a speech also constituting the belated confession long in preparation and just as obstinately pursued:

"We thought that after the Council (Vatican II), there would finally come a day of sunshine in the history of the Church. On the contrary, alas, there came a day of clouds, of storms, and of darkness instead."

The obvious impossibility of bridling or controlling the anti-authority protesters, together with the world-wide disasters heaping up around them, finally gave the lie to all the rosy illusions of the modern "reformers" and compelled de Lubac to make an "examination of conscience," as he has recorded in his book Memoire Autour De Mes Oeuvres, already quoted above. He remains, however, light years away from what could be called his conversion. At the very most, he admits that

"this new age (of modernism) is no less [indeed!] subject to all sorts of aberrations, blunders, illusions, as well as the assaults of the spirit of evil" and he continues: 

"What I am able to perceive nowadays from all this turmoil, from all these assaults, does not cause me to curse my years of activity, but they do make me wonder and pose this question: Would I have not done better by taking into consideration more seriously, since the very beginning, my condition of believer, my role as priest and member of an Apostolic Order, in short, my vocation, to concentrate, mainly and most decidedly my intellectual efforts on that which constitutes the center of Faith and of the Christian life, instead of dispersing them in more or less peripheral domains as I did according to my tastes or the events of the day? ...Had I done so, would I not have prepared myself to intervene with a little more competence and especially with moral authority in the great spiritual debate of our generation? Would I not then, at this moment, find myself a little less unfit to light the way for some and to encourage others? 

For seven or eight years now, I have been literally paralyzed by the constant fear of facing, in a practical and concrete manner, those many essential and burning (moral) questions of today. Has it been a case of wisdom or one of weakness? Have I been right or wrong? Have I not finally ended up, despite myself, in the integrists' camp which horrifies me?" (p.389).

Amidst so many doubts coming to haunt him, there seems to be at least one that did not bother de Lubac's conscience; that is, that "integrism," the horror of which paralyzed him, was simply nothing other than Catholic orthodoxy, faithfully and infallibly kept and preserved by the Church, and that he scorned in order to disperse his efforts in "more or less peripheral fields" according to his "tastes or according to the events of the day" pretending all the while - which is even worse - to be a "master" in the Church without ever having been a disciple:

"Blind they are and leaders of the blind, puffed up with the proud name of science, they have reached that pitch of folly at which they pervert the eternal concept of truth and the true meaning of religion; in introducing a new system in which they are seen to be under the sway of a blind and unchecked passion for novelty, thinking not at all of finding some solid foundation of truth, but despising the Holy and Apostolic Traditions, they embrace other and vain, futile, uncertain doctrines, unapproved by the Church, on which, in the height of their vanity, they think they can base and maintain truth itself' (St. Pius X, Pascendi quotation from the encyclical Singulari nos of Pope Gregory XVI, June 25, 1834).

- Hirpinus (to be continued)

Translated from Courrier de Rome May 1993



An excerpt of three paragraphs from Pope Pius XII’s encyclical Humani generis rebuking Henri de Lubac and the new theologians.

Paragraph 26.  Some also question whether angels are personal beings, and whether matter and spirit differ essentially. Others (e.g. Henri de Lubac, etc - Editor’s note.) destroy the gratuity of the supernatural order, since God, they say, cannot create intellectual beings without ordering and calling them to the beatific vision. Nor is this all. Disregarding the Council of Trent, some pervert the very concept of original sin, along with the concept of sin in general as an offense against God, as well as the idea of satisfaction performed for us by Christ. Some even say that the doctrine of transubstantiation, based on an antiquated philosophic notion of substance, should be so modified that the real presence of Christ in the Holy Eucharist be reduced to a kind of symbolism, whereby the consecrated species would be merely efficacious signs of the spiritual presence of Christ and of His intimate union with the faithful members of His Mystical Body.

Paragraph 27. Some say they are not bound by the doctrine, explained in Our Encyclical Letter of a few years ago, and based on the sources of revelation, which teaches that the Mystical Body of Christ and the Roman Catholic Church are one and the same thing. (Encyclical, Mystici corporis christi, Acta Apostolicae Sedis, Vol XXXV, p.193 ff.) Some reduce to a meaningless formula the necessity of belonging to the true Church in order to gain eternal salvation. Others finally belittle the reasonable character of the credibility of Christian faith.

Paragraph 28. These and like errors,…have crept in among certain of Our sons who are deceived by imprudent zeal for souls or by false science. To them We are compelled with grief to repeat once again truths already well known, and to point out with solicitude clear errors and dangers of error.

In these excerpts from Humani generis, Pius XII condemns the new theologians and demands the study of St. Thomas Aquinas.

Paragraph 31. If one considers all this well, he will easily see why the Church demands that future priests be instructed in philosophy “accordingly to the method doctrine, and principles of the Angelic Doctor,” (1917 Code of Canon Law, canon 1366,2.) since, as we well know from the experience of centuries, the method of Aquinas is singularly preeminent both for teaching students and for bringing truth to light; his doctrine is in harmony with divine revelation, and is most effective both for safeguarding the foundation of the faith, and for reaping, safely and usefully, the fruits of sound progress. (Acta Apotolicae Sedis, Vol. XXXVIII, 1946, p.307)Paragraph 32. How deplorable it is then that this philosophy, received and honored by the Church, is scorned by some, who shamelessly call it outmoded in form and rationalistic, as they say, in its method of thought. They say that this philosophy upholds the erroneous notion that there can be a metaphysic that is absolutely true; whereas in fact, they say, reality, especially transcendent reality, cannot better be expressed than by disparate teachings, which mutually complete each other, although they are in a way mutually opposed. Our traditional philosophy, then, with its clear exposition and solution of questions, its accurate definition of terms, its clear-cut distinctions, can be, they concede, useful as a preparation for scholastic theology, a preparation quite in accord with medieval mentality; but this philosophy hardly offers a method of philosophizing suited to the needs of our modern culture. They allege, finally, that our perennial philosophy is only a philosophy of immutable essences, while the contemporary mind must look to the existence of things and to life, which is ever in flux. While scorning our philosophy, they extol other philosophies of all kinds, ancient and modern, oriental and occidental, by which they seem to imply that any kind of philosophy or theory, with a few additions and corrections if need be, can be reconciled with Catholic dogma. No Catholic can doubt how false this is especially where there is question of those fictitious theories they call immanentism, or idealism, or materialism, whether historic or dialectic, or even existentialism, whether atheistic or simply the type that denies the validity of the reason in the field of metaphysics.

GLOSSARY

FIDEIST - One who holds the doctrine that says that all knowledge rests upon supernatural faith, thus denying the role of natural reason in gaining knowledge.

SYMBIOSIS - A biological term meaning the intimate association of two dissimilar organisms from which each organism benefits.

SOPHISM - A piece of plausible but false reasoning intended either to deceive or to display intellectual virtuosity.

[Stone]

SiSiNoNo - February 1994 - No.6

They Think They've Won!

Part IV

URS VON BALTHASAR: THE FATHER OF ECUMENICAL APOSTASY

Let us now focus our attention upon still another representative of the "New Theology" exalted today as being the "cornerstone of the Church" (J. Meinville), that ex-Jesuit from Switzerland: Urs von BaIthasar. If Maurice Blondel can be said to personify the typical modernist philosopher and apologist, and Henri de Lubac represents modernist theologians, Urs von Balthasar is the very incarnation of the pseudo‑mystical and ecumenical aspect of modernism.

We have presently in hand the book Urs von Balthasar‑Figura a Opera (Figure and Works) written by Karl Lehmann and Walter Kasper, those eminent representatives of the "New Theology." This book was written, as we read on the dust cover, "by his friends and disciples" (Henrici, Haas, Lustiger, Roten, Greiner, Treitler, Loaser, Antonio Sicari, Ildefonso Murillo, Dumont, O'Donnel, Guido Sommavilla, Rino Fisichella, Max Shonborn... and Ratzinger) with the intention of rediscovering all of the worth and importance of his [von Balthasar's] works as well of his person." Let us also discover them, for they are indeed very important.


BRILLIANT, BUT MEANINGLESS

Even as a very young man, he had a great passion for music and, like Montini, for literature much more than for philosophical and theological studies (ibid. pp.29 ff.). Only Plotinus' "mystical" philosophy could hold any "fascination" for him. On the contrary, both Scholastic Philosophy and Theology used to rouse his "raging" horror and disgust:

"All my studies in the course of my formative years in the Jesuit Order constituted a fierce and bitter struggle with the desolation of Theology, with what men had done to the glory of Revelation; I could simply not bear this expression of God's Word. I would have wished to strike out left and right with the fury of a Samson, and with his awesome power I would have sent the temple crashing down on us all. But, since my mission was only beginning, there was no possibility of imposing my plans; I just had to live with my infinite indignation as long as things remained the way they were. I mentioned practically nothing of it to anyone. Przywara, however, understood everything even without openly revealing it in words; as for the rest of them, no one could have understood me. I wrote the Apocalypse with that fury which proposed to destroy a world by sheer violence, with the intention of rebuilding it at all costs from the ground up" (ibid. p.35, quoted from the introduction to Erde und Himmel (Earth and Heaven).

The "mission" of this future demolisher of the Faith was taking shape. For the moment, the result of all this was that his studies with the Company of Jesus ended up with only "an ecclesiastical Bachelor's degree in Theology and Philosophy: von Balthasar never won a doctorate in these disciplines" (ibid. pp.33‑34). On the other hand, however, the young von Balthasar had also learned to jump on the bandwagon of all those restless systems and tendencies of modern "thought." In this, he received no small encouragement from "the great modernist theologians of his student years" (ibid. p.35). Erich Przywara at the University of Pullach‑Munich, who compelled him to "oppose Augustine and Thomas to Hegel, to Scheler, to Heidegger" (Urs von Balthasar, Prufet Alles, p.9) as well as encouragement from Henri de Lubac in the study center in Lyon Fourvieres.

"By chance and to my consolation - writes von Balthasar ‑ Henri de Lubac lived in the same house with us. He was the one who, besides our scholastic study material, referred us to the Fathers of the Church and used to generously lend us all (Balthasar, Danielou, and Bouillard) his very own studies and notes" (ibid.).

Thus it was that von Balthasar, "his ears stopped up with cotton wool, read all of (Saint) Augustine" and learned, through those generously loaned notes of de Lubac, to oppose with great affection, Patristics (i.e. the study of the writings of the Fathers of the Church as well as the science of their contents) to Scholasticism as personified in Saint Thomas Aquinas whose religious terminology would never allow such interpretative games as those which the "new theologians" were playing with the texts of the Church Fathers" (cf. Figure et Oeuvre p.36).

It was at this same period that von Balthasar became acquainted with French poetry: Peguy, Bernanos, and Claudel which he would translate over a period of twenty years. Having completed his "studies," he who, according to de Lubac, was "the most gifted, the most talented man of our century" (a ploy used by the modernists in bestowing upon one another a halo of non‑existent greatness: see Saint Pius X in Pascendi) set out on his career with but a sprinkling of knowledge, as vast as it was superficial, in fields wherein he later proved to be but a trifler, a dabbler. Father Labourdette, O.P., in a pointed remark, described one of von Balthasar's first articles as "a brilliant but empty page" (ibid. pp.47, 48).

Armed with this "original fault," von Balthasar was now ready to swell, to increase the numbers of modernist ecclesiastics,

"who, by a false zeal for the Church, lacking the solid safeguards of philosophy and theology, thoroughly imbued with the poisonous doctrines of the enemies of the Church and lost to all sense of modesty, put themselves forward as reformers of the Church; and, forming more boldly into line of attack, assail all that is most sacred in the work of Christ, not even sparing the Person of the Divine Redeemer, Whom, with sacrilegious audacity, they degrade to the condition of a simple and ordinary man" (Pope St. Pius X, Pascendi).

Lacking a solid formation in both philosophy and theology, an avid fan of poetry and music, von Balthasar set out, with unbelievable superficiality, to combine theology with literature, thinking to create a "theology all his own" using the same type of imagination as is used by an artist on his masterpiece.

"Only very much later on," he writes, "after the determination of my vocation was behind me and I had completed my philosophical studies at Pullach (under the influence of Erich Przywara) and my four years of theology at Lyon (inspired to do so by Henri de Lubac) with my fellow students Danielou, Varillon, Bouillard, and many others, did I come to realize just how great an aid, to the conception of my theology, was to become my knowledge of Goethe, Holderlin, Nietzche, Hofmannsthal, and especially the Fathers of the Church, to whom I was directed by de Lubac."

"The fundamental assumption of my work Gloria, was the ability to see a "Gestalt" (a complex form) in its coherent totality. Goethe's viewpoint was to be applied to the Jesus phenomena (sic!) and to the convergence of New Testament theologies" (Il nostro compito ‑ Our Task - Jaca Book, p.29).

THE CONQUEROR OF THE (POORLY) CONVERTED

On the 26th of July 1936, von Balthasar was ordained a priest in the church of Saint Michael in Munich. In 1939, he followed once again the 30 days spiritual exercises, but with Father Steger, who, "in German circles, was one of the first to understand Ignatian spirituality, not ascetically, but mystically instead" (ibid. p.37).

This tendency of his, for mysticism, had already showed itself in his encounters with the philosophy of Plotinus (205‑270, Roman philosopher of Egyptian birth), which would later prove to be so much the more damaging for von Balthasar, since he was "lacking the solid safeguards of both philosophy and theology" (Pascendi)

Soon after this, he was appointed chaplain to the students at Basel (Switzerland) where he once again busied himself with music and poetry (German, this time). He now set himself about organizing courses for the students: inviting, among others, such speakers as Congar, de Lubac, and Karl Rahner (1904‑1984, modernist theologian whose ideas carried the day at Vatican II); to bring these evening meetings to a close "he would take his place at the piano, rendering Mozart's Don Juan by heart..." (ibid. pp.39).

It was in Basel where he met the Swiss Calvinist theologian, Karl Barth (1886‑1968) who insisted on the necessity of returning to Scriptures, as well as the need of adapting them to our modern times. This Protestant theologian "becomes (after Przywara and de Lubac) the third great source of inspiration of Balthasar's theology."

Barth's theory of predestination he writes ‑ "attracted and drew me powerfully and without cease" (Unser Auftrag, p.85), but that aspect which influenced him most of all was "Barth's radical Christo-centrism" (Figure et 0euvres, cit.p.43), from which came an ecumenism intended to gather everyone around a Christ separated from His inseparable Church, a Christ Who ends up being Luther's solus Christus, although filtered, as we shall see, through Hegel.

Vatican II, however, was still relatively far off in the future and, therefore, "in those years, meeting with Protestants in Switzerland was almost always and inevitably with prospective converts" (Henrici, S.J. ibid.p.44). Thus do we find, in 1940, von Balthasar baptizing (in spite of himself?) Beguin, a leftist, who, in 1950, was to succeed Mournier, a philo‑communist, at the head of a journal by the name of Esprit (N.B. The Osservatore Romano of March 3rd, 1979, reported that Beguin and Esprit prepared Vatican II).

Even more important and worthy of note is the fact that von Balthasar baptized the "convert" Adrienne von Speyr, doctor, twice married (her second marriage was to Professor Kaegi), a "woman noted for her wit and sense of humor as well as for her tongue, highly regarded in society" (ibid.p.45). It was not long before von Balthasar acquired his reputation of "conqueror of the converted" (op. cit.p.44). We would rather think it would be more precise to add: poorly or inadequately converted.

We have already mentioned Beguin. Concerning Adrienne von Speyr, we do well to mention even more explicitly that, in the same way that de Lubac was in an "intellectual symbiosis" with Blondel, so was von Balthasar in a "theological and psychological symbiosis" with Adrienne von Speyr (op. cit. p.147).



IN TANDEM WITH ADRIENNE

Immediately following her conversion (Adrienne's), rumors and tales of miracles began to spread about miracles, which obviously occurred during conversations, discussions and visits at her home. People whispered about (celestial) visions with which she seemed to be favored. As popular reports had it, "she had long and regular meetings with her spiritual director (von Balthasar)" (ibid.).

In order to publish Adrienne's mystical written works, von Balthasar founded a journal known as Johannes, then, together with Adrienne, he set up "Johannes," a secular institute. Following this, and still for Adrienne's sake, since his superiors evidently did not see clearly ... Adrienne von Speyr's "mysticism," von Balthasar, on the very eve of his solemn profession, quit the Company of Jesus, choosing instead "direct obedience" to God.

From that moment on, von Balthasar worked in Adrienne's shadow, living in her husband's house, as he busied himself with literature, esthetic theology as well as with her (Adrienne's) "mystical" dictations, until 1960 Neo‑modernist general mobilization in "feverish" preparations for Vatican II: "Radio, TV: there was just no end to the hustle and bustle as well as to the urgent requests for my writings!" (ibid.p.59)



CONTRADICTION IMPOSSIBLE WITH GOD

"This is not the place"‑ we read on p.51-"to submit Adrienne's charismata to a critical and detailed theological examination."

Indeed, on the contrary, it would rather have been both the ideal time and place to do so, since von Balthasar himself declares: "Her work and mine are not at all separable: neither psychologically nor philologically. For they constitute both halves of a whole which has as its center a unique foundation" (p.60, quoted by Rechenschaft). And he begins Il nostro compito (Our Task) by writing, "The main goal of this book is simply to prevent any attempt of separating my work from that of Adrienne von Speyr, after my death" (p.130).

Our readers will recall the sensational eyewitness accounts of Adrienne von Speyr's two Italian "housekeepers," which testimony appeared in the Italian magazine Avvenire and Il popolo de Pordenone (see Courrier de Rome #141 (331), December 1992). We will not hark back to that. It is enough to say, as it should have been apparent to von Balthasar that all that needed to be done was to apply the Church's criteria to such cases to reject out of hand and declare Adrienne's "mysticism" to be utterly false.

Also, leaving aside the strange side of her "charismata," such as (a) the "stigmata" which she is supposed to have received while still Protestant, (b) the "possibility afforded to her confessor (von Balthasar) in being able to "transfer Adrienne back" to each one of her different life periods in order to record her biography," © her virginity recovered, according to her, after two marriages, etc...

It is quite sufficient for us, as it should have been for von Balthasar, to apply the fundamental criteria in order to judge any so‑called "revelation" in the Church: "Any revelations opposed to dogma or morals must be held to be absolutely false. With God, contradiction is impossible" Antonio Rojo Marin, O.P., Teologia della perfezione cristiana (Theology of Christian Perfection, p.1077).

In the light of this fundamental rule, let us now examine, amongst many others, two particular outstanding points at the heart of two very grave conciliar and post‑conciliar deviations:

1) Adrienne von Speyr's "theology of sexuality."

2) her conception of the Church, the "Catholic."


ADRIENNE AND VON BALTHASAR SAY GOD CAN CONTRADICT HIMSELF

According to von Speyr or to von Balthasar (we agree with von Balthasar that it is impossible to separate them), Adrienne is supposed to have received the heavenly mission of "re-thinking" the "positive value of the so‑called corporeity (or sexuality) within the religion of incarnation" (Urs von Balthasar, Il nostro compito p.25).

Except for the fact that this "positive value" is so "positive" that she ends up by nullifying the consequences of original sin as well as the Holy Ghost's solemn warning that "he who loves danger will perish in it." "The recommendations or exhortations of keeping away from one another, not to see one another, are, as far as the corporal domain is concerned, nowadays worn out," she writes in her journal (p.1703; see Il nostro compito p.91). All of this clearly flies in the face of the Church's traditional teachings in the field of morality.

True to her "sexual revolution," Adrienne conceived and expressed her "spiritual" relationship with von Balthasar through the crudest of sexual terms. Thus does she describe the genesis or origin of “Johannes,” their secular institute, “as a period of pregnancy, where the institute is the child, Adrienne the mother and von Balthasar the father” (Communio May-June 1989,p.91)

According to Adrienne, this is how “Ignatius” (i.e. Saint Ignatius) explained the above relationship to her: “even though (Adrienne and von Balthasar) were virgins, this was a means by which a man could mark a woman” (Communio, May-June 1989, p.91 et seq. quoting par.1645 of Erde und Immel, Adrienne's posthumous work).

And, in order to put to rest any doubt as to the language attributed by the "mystic" Adrienne to "Ignatius," she wrote the following "Man's spiritual fecundity is to be deposited in the woman's body that she may bear fruit. In this sense Hans Urs von Balthasar's fertility was deposited in the stigmata, which Adrienne had received for him” (ibid., from Erde und Immel, II, par.680).

All of this is quite sufficient for us to reasonably ask ourselves if we are not here in the presence of a case of pseudo‑mystical sensualism. At this point, however, it is especially important to underline and call to the reader's attention the fact that in "the intelligence (or understanding) of the positive value of one's corporeity" on Adrienne’s part, is to be found one of the causes, if not the determining one, of the present‑day exaltation of sexuality unfortunately so much in fashion even with the religious, and hiding behind the popular slogan of "affective integration."

And von Balthasar? What about him? He also could not bear the thought "that the significance of the masculine and feminine body could be in any way diminished” (A. Siccari O.C.D. Communio, Nov-Dec. 1991,p.89).

And, in his aesthetically pleasing conception of theology, he lamented: "And whatever became of the ‘eros’ in theology as well as the commentary on the Canticle of Canticles (understood as an erotic poem, of course) which constitutes a part of the center of theology?" (Figura e Opera, p.58 sq.). There is, however, something even worse. Von Balthasar is very much aware of the fact that the "mystical theology" of his visionary friend can in no way at all conform to Catholic doctrine. "In Adrienne's global theological works," he writes, "are to be found certain passages which, out of context, could sometimes seem to be quite strange"­ - and which remain thus even in their context (Il nostro compito, p.14).

Then, in the preface, he clearly admits that Adrienne's works are "at the outset, astounding and maybe even disconcerting or bewildering for some readers" (ibid.p.9). Yet, all of this was not sufficient to raise doubts in von Balthasar's mind regarding Adrienne's charismata, on the contrary... his doubts were now directed towards Catholic doctrine! "Things," he wrote, "are often such that today's theology is not (or is not yet) able to grasp or to comprehend what is indicated in Adrienne's visions or in her dictations" (ibid.p.16).

All of which he could say only by admitting that Catholic doctrine is liable to evolve into self‑contradiction, seeing that Adrienne's "mystical theology" is not obscure, or rather, not only obscure, but in utter opposition with Catholic theology. Unfortunately, von Balthasar failed to apply (maybe because he did not know them) the necessary theological criteria to see his way clearly through Adrienne von Speyr's "mysticism," but he did share, together with Blondel and de Lubac, that new vitalist and evolutionist notion of truth which claims that in God and therefore in the development of Catholic doctrine "contradiction is possible."

This will appear even more clearly in the second point which we intend to examine and which will help us to understand the storm of ecumenical madness which has, in its unabated fury, swept along many highly‑placed dignitaries of the Catholic Church.



THE NON‑CATHOLIC "CATHOLIC"

Adrienne maintained that Heaven had entrusted an ecclesiastical mission to von Balthasar and to herself. Urs von Balthasar mentions this in Il nostro compito (p.61). In a "Marian" vision, Adrienne says to God: " We both (Adrienne and von Balthasar) wish to love You, to serve You, and to thank You for the Church You have entrusted to us."

These last words, Adrienne continues, were uttered in an improvised manner and were dictated by the Mother of God, that is to say, by us (the Mother of God and Adrienne):

"we spoke those words both of us together, and for a fraction of a second, she placed the child in my arms, but it was not only the child, it was the Una Sancta (the Church) in miniature, and seemed to me, to represent a unity of everything that has been entrusted to us and which constitutes a work in God for the Catholic."

And just what are we to understand by this other "child" of Adrienne and von Balthasar, this "Church" called "Catholic" that God is supposed to have entrusted to them? In the introduction of Barbara Albrecht's book, La Mystique Objective d’Adrienne von Speyr (Jaca Book, p.72), we come across this astounding affirmation concerning Adrienne the "mystic":

"Even though [Adrienne] clearly and decisively broke away from a Protestant form of Christianity by some interior necessity, her own concept of ‘Catholic’ is lacking in any sort of confessional limits whatsoever."

Therefore, although Adrienne's break from Protestantism was clear and decisive, her conversion was, on the contrary, anything but clear and decisive, unless we are forced to give to the word "Catholic" a new meaning altogether different from that which it had in the past.

Incidentally, it is worth noting that what Barbara Albrecht has written, tallies perfectly with the published testimony of Adrienne von Speyer's truly Catholic housekeeper, who clearly affirmed: "I, also, have read ...this story about a `Mystic.' And I do not like any of this at all. Why do they write such stupid nonsense? Madam (Adrienne) was not (truly) of the Church do you know that she used to go to Mass only twice a year, at Christmas and Easter? (Il Popolo di Pordenone, August 16,1992). See also Courrier de Rome, no. 141 (331), December 1992: "Summer Misfortunes," Hans Urs von Balthasar and Adrienne von Speyer.

This same concept of the word "catholic," stripped of “any confessional determination whatsoever” is also to be found in von Balthasar's writings, wherein he declares his indebtedness to Adrienne for it. In his book Katholisch (Catholic) a work also published in 1975, he writes, "this little volume is meant as an homage to my masters (and mentors) E. Pryzwara and H. de Lubac, as well as to Adrienne von Speyer, all of whom, in the face of a scholastic theology, revealed to me that dimension of catholic reality vast as the world itself."

In this "catholicity, which leaves nothing out" (ibid. p.32), everything finds its place together with its justification: the true as well as the false religions, the Catholic Church and the heretical and/or schismatic sects, the sacred and the profane, religion and atheism. In a word: truth and error, goodness and evil. Exactly as in Hegelian dialectics.


THE ICEBERG

Going more deeply into the matter, the review Communio admits that today Urs von Balthasar stands exalted in his role of "theologian of beauty" and "is simultaneously criticized for his impenetrable and complicated style" (May-June, 1989, p.83). Moreover, according to Communio, what we do know and what is said about him "constitute only the tip of the iceberg ‑ and honni soit qui mal y pense (evil be to him who evil thinks)."

Let us turn therefore our attention to that submerged part of the iceberg, that is to say, to that which is concealed beneath that obscure and complicated style in order to find out if there is actually any reason to think evil of it.

At first sight, von Balthasar's writings seem to be obscure and impenetrable while his behavior defies all understanding. For example, while working at demolishing Catholic theology and Catholic Rome, he bitterly and fiercely criticizes Karl Rahner and the so‑called "anti‑Roman complex"; he preaches an ecumenism as wide ranging as possible which embraces even pagan and idolatrous religions while criticizing the post‑conciliar Catholic's "tendency to liquidate" the Church.

However, all one needs is to have the right interpretative or explanatory key to his particular theology and everything becomes crystal clear. This key is to be found in idealism in general, as well as Hegelian logic in particular, which is diametrically opposed to Aristotelianism as well as to Thomistic logic and simple common sense.

Whereas, in fact, Aristotelian logic is founded upon the principle of identity and non‑contradiction, according to which opposites exclude one another, Hegelian logic is based exactly on this contrary principle: opposites not only do not exclude one another, but they constitute the very soul of reality, being necessary although abstract moments of reality. It is a synthesis of opposites wherein the said opposites (affirmation and negation; "thesis" and "antithesis") will break through their limitations and find their true reality.

Urs von Balthasar applied to ecclesiology this obscure and impenetrable logic because he was not at all acquainted with the "fear of contradiction," a fear which is inborn in anyone possessing good common sense, but which is totally lacking in the preoccupations of…present day ecumenism. All those "Churches," all those diverse "religions," those "atheisms" with their contradictions cause von Balthasar no fear at all. They should not, according to his way of thinking, frighten anyone since they simply constitute the moments (thesis and antithesis, affirmation and negation) of that process which will inevitably lead, through intrinsic or inherent necessity, to that synthesis which will be the "Catholic" one ("the catholicity which leaves nothing out," that universality which excludes absolutely nothing of any kind) and in which the true Church of Christ will (finally, after two thousand years) be achieved.

Once we have this "key" in hand, von Balthasar's "impenetrable" theology becomes unmistakably clear and everyone can fathom and realize at last the tremendous enormity of that iceberg as it sails against God's Holy Church.


FROM "PHILOSOPHICAL DELIRIUM" TO ECUMENICAL MANIA

Only out of Hegel's "philosophical delirium," could the present-day ecumenical delirium be born. The truth is that with the above‑mentioned key in hand, it is now possible to discern and comprehend all of von Balthasar's enigmas as well as today's brand of ecumenism of which he is the "master" and "author." We also now see, in fact, why in the ecumenical dialogue "only one thing remains: we must rely on the various Church and theological structures and rivalries between them" (Figure et Oeuvre, p.417).

It is the necessary interplay of opposites which alone leads to synthesis:

"If this formula is to be taken to heart... we must rely... on rivalries," writes von Balthasar, "it will require much from those who struggle in a Christian way for catholicity: they should make it a point of attaching themselves [Catholics as well as non­ Catholics] to no particular system which a priori we would consider to be all encompassing, offering the widest perspective and leaving behind any opposing points of view" (ibid. quoted by Aunspruch auf Katholizitat, p.66).

This encompassing of all will only be attributed to the "Catholic" position, which will constitute the synthesis, and will not be attributed to any of the presently existing systems (including today's Catholic "system"), which are simply theses and antitheses destined to be overreached by utterly vanishing into a synthesis.

Of the "systems" presently in place, only two things are asked: on the one hand, in order to favor or facilitate the synthesis, "the slackening and thawing" of their own fixed stand regarding a point of view excluding opposite points of view; on the other, "competition," that is, the promotion of "rivalry" between systems, including those "anonymous forms of Christianity" (ibid. pp.69‑70).

In fact, what is known as the synthesis springs forth as a result of the interplay of opposites. All of this remains incomprehensible to Aristotelian‑Thomistic logic, which, unlike Hegelian logic, is the logic of common sense.

Now we are in a position to understand why the present day ecumenism (take Assisi for example) puts the various "religions" on an equal footing, while at the same time separating them ("we do not want anything to do with syncretism" ‑ and this is true.) This ecumenism exhorts Buddhists to be good Buddhists, Catholics to be good Catholics (according to the New Theology, of course!), Protestants to be good Protestants, etc.

Thus are "competition," the interplay of "rivalries," of contradictions and of oppositions deemed essential in that process leading to the Ecumenical Super‑Church, the "catholic" synthesis of all the world's religions wherein only the contradictions and oppositions will become obsolete and disappear.

Now we are also able to understand why von Balthasar, just like de Lubac, went through his own personal post‑conciliar "crisis" which, however, led neither of them to conversion (see Figure et Oeuvre, cit. pp.434 ff.). For it simply could not fit into his own brand of logic (which he had borrowed from Hegel) that Catholics would simply sell off their identity ‑ Catholic being also or rather above all, "communion between (opposites) which seem to exclude one another" (Communio, July‑August, 1992, Urs von Balthasar; Communion: a programme).

Thus, (according to him) contrasts are essential in bringing about the said "communion," exactly in the same way as in Hegelian logic, wherein thesis and antithesis are essential in the attainment of the synthesis. If the thesis were to withdraw from the "competition," it would then also become (an) antithesis, and there would never be a synthesis realized (see Figure et Oeuvre, cit. pp. 417‑18).

This is why the Catholic Church (according to von Balthasar) must not "put between parentheses" but rather "integrate" (this is the key word for von Balthasar) into the "catholic whole" (that is, von Balthasar's Super‑Church) all that which is considered today as being a "Catholic surplus" (ibid. p. 446). In his highly publicized, obtrusive and quite misunderstood book The Anti‑Roman Complex, carrying the incredible yet highly revealing subtitle (which is in most cases omitted) How is the Papacy to be integrated into the Universal Church?," von Balthasar suggests precisely the manner in which to integrate "this element, which seems a burden and a nuisance, into the Catholic whole," which is most clearly and un-mistakenly not the Holy Catholic Church.

This is the method that he suggests: the Church must no longer be only of Peter, but also of Paul, of Mary and of John (ibid. p.447). And thus does the primacy of jurisdiction, (dogmatically) defined by Vatican I, disappear behind some vague primacy of charity invented by von Balthasar (and by his "separated brethren"), and in favor of which John‑Paul II has, for many years now, been traveling all over the world and explaining to journalists that he has not only received Peter's charisma, but also that of Paul!


THE APOSTASY

Yet, it is quite sufficient to know the catechism of the Catholic Church (this does not refer to the new one) to realize and understand that von Balthasar's ecumenism is nothing but a veritable proposition leading directly to apostasy.

Christopher Schonborn, editorial secretary (Let the reader be warned!) for the New Catechism, on the occasion of the first anniversary of von Balthasar's death, explained and illustrated this so‑called ecumenism in Saint Mary's Church in Basle, Switzerland (see Figure et Oeuvre cit. pp.431 ff).

And just what is meant by von Balthasar's ecumenism? It consists in "the integration in the whole of the Catholic" (ibid. p.448), a Catholic, which does not yet exist and remains for the moment "but a promise, an eschatological hope." Here, in fact, is how Schonborn explains the "ecumenical significance" of the "figure" of Mary in Balthasar's ecumenism: "In Mary, the Church appears as the holy and immaculate Church, in which the full figure of the Church, its ‘Catholicity,’ is not only a promise, an eschatological hope, but rather its fullness already achieved."

Thus, in flagrant contradiction with the constant and infallible Faith of the Church repeated by Pope Pius XI in Mortalium animos, and contrary to the dogma that each Catholic is duty‑bound to profess, (Credo Ecclesiam Unam, Sanctam, Catholicam), the catholicity is not (according to von Balthasar) a reality which has already been existing for two thousand years, but rather a reality which is yet to be realized. It is simply "a promise, and eschatological hope," in which we are not told why we should have any trust, for if things were really so, all the promises of immediate realization made by Our Lord Jesus Christ would have come to nothing.

In what, then does the actual Catholic Church consist, according to von Balthasar? It consists simply in one "system" amongst so many others; in one of the many "ecclesial configurations," theses or antitheses, and which will, one day, become obsolete and utterly vanish in the "catholic" just as will all the various sects, idolatrous and pagan religions together with all of the different "marxisms."

In fact, according to von Balthasar, in Catholicism no less than in Protestantism, "the negation of the other, the refusal of communion" has supposedly produced "a unity which in substance merely consisted in their gathering about a rigid point of view" (see Figura et Oeuvre p.407).

He considers the Catholic Church as being "the Roman realization of Catholicity" (ibid. p.405). The Catholic Church, exactly in the same way as the heretical and/or schismatic sects, Judaism itself and the other "anonymous forms of Christianity," constitutes "the whole in the fragment," wherein the whole is the "Catholic" and the Catholic Church is but one of the many fragments, which inevitably recalls the whole.

"Each fragment," writes von Balthasar, "immediately recalls to mind that sacred vessel from whence it came. Each piece is read by the mind, starting from the entire vessel still intact" (Figure et Oeuvre, p.409), and the Catholic Church is simply considered to be but a "fragment," a "piece" amongst others.

And so, it is now clearly seen why we are no longer taught that Christ's Church is the Catholic Church, but rather, we are continually taught with Vatican II (see the New Catechism) that the Church of Christ "subsistit in," that is, subsists in the Catholic Church, exactly in the same way as "the whole in the fragment."

[Fr. Hesse's Commentary on this error of Vatican II described above as it appears in Lumen Gentium: Lumen Gentium 8 “This Church [the Church of Christ] constituted and organized in the world as a society, subsists in the Catholic Church, which is governed by the successor of Peter and by the Bishops in communion with him, although many elements of sanctification and of truth are found outside of its visible structure.” 

Fr. Hesse: The word subsists doesn’t tell us much in English, but in Latin “subsistere” means to exist, to be present, to lie underneath. You could say for example that the grass is subsistent to my way of walking. But it could also be subsistent to someone else’s way of walking and not just to mine. So when you say that the Catholic Church “subsists” in the Catholic Church, it is phrased that way deliberately so as not to exclude Protestants, Orthodox, etc. The architects of Vatican II were too clever to say that the Church of Christ “contains” the Protestants, the Orthodox and all those other non-Catholics. So they said that it can be found in the Catholic Church in a way that does not exclude the others. But it is defined dogma that the Church of Christ is the Catholic Church, the two are identical. Nothing outside the Catholic Church is part of the Church of Christ and nothing of the Church of Christ is outside the Catholic Church. The two are identical. thecatacombs.org/thread/2/errors-vatican-ii-fr-hesse]

This is why in "ecumenical dialogue," Catholics, in matters of Faith, must, just as in all the other religions, learn: "For Catholics, it is supremely imperative that they silence the voices of those who suggest and refer us to some missing piece ("fragment") or some almost worthless piece attached to the integrity of the Faith" (Urs von Balthasar in Klein Fibel, p.92, quoted in Figura e Opere, p.444)

That is why today ‑ as Romano Amerio has written:

"they openly declare that unity must not come through individual conversions but through agreements reached by large bodies [the various theses and antitheses] such as are the Churches, and this unity must not be achieved by a return of the separated brethren to the Catholic Church, but rather ‘by a movement of all confessions towards a center to be found outside of each one of them [the evolving synthesis]" (R. Amerio, Iota Unum, Nouvelles Editions Latines, p.461).

At this point, his propositions favoring apostasy, that is, the abandonment of the entire Doctrine of the Faith, have become simply flagrant. Indeed, where are we to find Divine Revelation in all its purity and integrity, if not in the Catholic Church? Such an underhanded proposal calling for the exodus of Catholics from the Catholic Church is tantamount to apostasy: "Faith in Jesus Christ will not remain pure and uncontaminated unless it be sustained and defended by faith in the Church, pillar and ground of the truth (I Tim. 3:15)" (Pius XI, Mit Brennender Sorge).


CONTEMPT FOR THE MAGISTERIUM

In conclusion, it must be noted that von Balthasar, following the example of Blondel and de Lubac, cultivated "his" theology in open contempt for the Magisterium of the Church, particularly for Pope Saint Pius X, who in his encyclical Pascendi (1907), condemned that brand of ecumenism, which leads inevitably to the naturalism of the modernists. He was also filled with scorn for Pope Pius XII, who in Humani generis condemned any attempt at conciliating idealism, and therefore Hegelianism, with Catholic theology while also condemning that ecumenism in which they would have been "unified, yes, but in a common ruin."

“Just where is the new theology, inspired by its new masters, leading to? Where, indeed, if not directly to the path of scepticism, fantasy and heresy?" wrote Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange in 1946. And the new "masters" were Hegel and Blondel, whom Fassard, (a member in de Lubac's "gang") used to call "our Hegel" (see A. Russo, H. de Lubac: Theology and Dogma in History: The Influence of Blondel).

But nowadays in the field of ecumenism, we have passed the stage of fantasy and have reached the point of sheer delirium.

In one of the most scandalous "ecumenical" documents, "Useful suggestions for the proper presentation of Judaism" by the Commission for Relations with Judaism presided over by Cardinal Willebrands, (see Courrier de Rome, no.64 [254] October 1985), we read that Catholics and Jews "even if they start off by holding different points of view [i.e. opposite] tend toward analogous [sic!] or similar goals: the coming or the return of the Messiah." This represents exactly the thought (if it can be so called) of von Balthasar, who like Hegel, seeks a way of bringing into accord opposites by doing violence to the reality of facts:

"Peter, the renegade, leaving it up to the Lord to judge, seeks solidarity [sic!] with the Jews [who crucified Jesus Christ]... together with you Jews, we Christians are also awaiting the coming ‑ second coming of the Messiah" (Urs von Balthasar, Communio: A Program, reprinted in Communio, July‑August 1992, p.57).

Nevertheless, von Balthasar, together with his new theology comrades, could never have imposed their foggy misconceptions and delusions, lacking as they are in the strength or virtue of reason as well as in the power of divinely revealed truth, if Giovanni Battista Montini (Pope Paul VI) had not acceded to the throne of Peter, but... this inept philomodernist theologian put his very high authority at the service of the "new theology" while his successor has been its euphoric propagator throughout the world. But we will be coming back to this later.

- Hirpinus

Translated from Courrier de Rome June 1993



GLOSSARY

SYNCRETISM - The attempted reconciliation of conflicting or opposing beliefs.

DIALECTICS - Any play of ideas bringing together opposites and attempting to resolve them.

[Stone]

SiSiNoNo - April 1994 - No.7

They Think They've Won!

Part V

THE MONTINI-DE LUBAC ALLIANCE: PAUL VI AND THE MASTERSTROKE OF SATAN

The "new theology," as our readers who have followed us thus far have been able to discover, is not, as Pirandello would say, something to be taken seriously in itself. On the other hand, what is extremely serious is the fact that in order to force itself upon the Catholic world, it was and still is able to count on the strength of the one who is the successor of Peter in the Church. It is, therefore, of utmost importance to make a careful and close study of "Satan's master-stroke": the putting of the supreme Authority of the very person whose divinely-appointed task it is to defend the Faith, at the service of Modernism, the "synthesis of all heresies" (Saint Pius X).

GIOVANNI BATTISTA MONTINI - "DEVOTEE OF THE NEW THEOLOGY"

In 1970, Father Raymond Dulac wrote, "It was (often) whispered that Giovanni Battista Montini (who would later become Pope Paul VI) was a keen devotee of the 'Philosophies of Action' which were made popular here through the efforts of Laberthonniere, Blondel and Ed. Le Roy." ("The New Presentation of the Novus Ordo Missae." Courrier de Rome, #74).

These "whispers" have now been confirmed to a large extent by the book Paul VI Secret (ed. Desclee de Brouwer, 1979) in which the author, Jean Guitton, a personal friend of Pope Paul VI, has gathered and published after Pope Montini's death, those intimate notes that he had taken in the course of their friendly chats. The upshot of all these notes was that Montini proved himself to be a breathless, wonder-stricken admirer of the "new theology," and specifically of de Lubac's brand.

On page 110, he says:

"September 8, 1969: the Pope speaks in praise of Fr. de Lubac. He speaks highly of his spirit, as well as of the soundness and vast extent of his research; he is surprised that some people view him as already out of date" [such is the fate awaiting theological innovators].

On page 141, he writes:

"April 28, 1974: The Pope, in my presence, praises today's theologians to the skies. He quotes Manaranche, de Lubac, whom he considers the very best, also citing Congar, Rahner (whom he finds quite confused), as well as Cardinal Journet (whom he judges to be a bit too scholastic)."

This aversion for scholasticism, together with his admiration for the "new theology" was not an unusual state with Montini.


A LETTER FROM PIUS XII

At the critical time, when the most bitter of controversies raged in France concerning the orthodoxy of Blondel, he received a letter (as shown) from the Secretariat of State of Pius XII where Monsignor Montini was substitute at the time. This same Blondel was perverting the eternal, unchangeable notion of truth, while bringing down the supernatural to the natural level, and who, while taking up the rule of a "good samaritan," was busy taking care of modern man even while he himself was sinking into the quicksand of "modern philosophy."

Montini to Blondel

The Vatican,
December 2, 1944

Dear Professor,

Your trilogy on Christian Spirit and Philosophy, the first volume of which you have already published, is proving to be a veritable monument of great and beneficial apologetics; and how could the expression of your filial homage to His Holiness [Pius XII] not be pleasing to him? No one can miss the importance of such a subject wherein the relations between Christianity and philosophy, those between Faith and reason, as well as those between the supernatural and natural are studied with such sagacity. Simultaneously, you underscore very well their 'incommensurability’ without however, excluding their 'symbiosis' nor that unique end which no man is legitimately able to elude. This end (of man) constitutes a mystery full of the infinite goodness and mercy of God and which all noble and concerned souls cannot fail to embrace to their own greater intellectual and moral progress as well as to their greater and true happiness.

Your philosophical speculations, therefore, totally respectful as they are of the transcendence of revelation, are fruitfully applied to the entirety of the mysteries of the Faith, making them better known to a generation overly imbibed with the autonomy of reason whose failure is all too evident today. You have done this with as much talent as faith, and with the exception of a few expressions which theological rigor would have wished to be couched in more precise terms, your speculation can and must bring to cultivated circles a precious contribution to a better understanding and acceptance of the Christian message, which remains the unique path to salvation as much for individual souls as for society itself.

As a matter of fact, today's tortured world is so much in search of truth and the ways leading us the most surely to it! And while we are on the subject, would it not be opportune to recall to mind once again that, even considering it from the sole point of view of philosophy, the speculation, the speculation proceeding from traditional philosophy does really offer to those apparent antinomies found in the universe, positive solutions which are the most suited to satisfy (man's) intelligence, without pretending, of course, to quench a thirst for a greater light? [...] Your intellectual charity, comparable to that of the good samaritan, seeking as it does to take care of wounded humanity while striving to understand it and speaking its own language, will efficiently contribute to replacing it in the inevitable and saving perspectives of its divine vocation.

And so, greatly delighted at the good news regarding your improving state of health, the Holy Father expresses his wishes that you may have the strength required to bring your important work to a successful conclusion, and most cordially gives you His Apostolic Blessing.

Please accept, dear professor, the respectful assurance of my religious devotion.

Giovanni Battista Montini,
Substitute

MORE MONTINI THAN PACELLI

Thus, it was that Blondel's work, "with the exception of a few expressions which theological rigor would have wished to be couched in more precise terms" was approved all together and by someone at the highest level in the Vatican, both disarming and silencing most effectively his critics and detractors, who had been severely reproving him in the name of the constant and unchangeable doctrine of the Church.

To Blondel's opponents (de Tonquedoc, Labourdette, Garrigou-Lagrange, etc..) as though the very foundations of the faith were not at stake but merely a theological dispute on points still debatable, this letter gave the little satisfaction of faint praise to traditional philosophy under the timid form of a question and without excluding the possibility of "a greater light." And what of all those rigorously well-researched critical studies on all of those as well as explicit deviations of Blondel's thought? They were all simply thrown into the wastepaper basket in an unbelievably offhand manner.

There was, however, a "but" in all of this. That letter sent to Blondel certainly constituted a kind of recognition sent in the name of Pius XII, but bearing Montini's signature together with that expression of his "religious devotion." [Is this the same 'devotion' Fr. Le Roux recently asked for from the faithful for their priests and parishes?]

Actually, the content of his letter is more Montinian than Pacellian. Later on, when Pius XII would personally speak on the "new Theology" and the "new philosophy" underlying it in his address to the Fathers of the Society of Jesus (1946) and then again most solemnly in his encyclical Humani generis (1950) (Cf. Courrier de Rome, no.146 of May, 1993). He expressed a judgement completely opposed to the contents of the above letter and did so in an incomparably more logical manner.

Moreover, concerning Montini's evident dishonesty and obvious breach of faith during all those years spent in the papal secretariat of state, there can be no doubt at all due to the stack of concordant and irrefutable testimony available today coming from sources never known to be hostile to him in any way.


PIUS XII's "DISTRUST"

Among those mysteries involving the isolation marking the pontificate of Pius XII, there is the particularly striking case of Montini's hasty dismissal from the Roman Curia. It is known that he was named Archbishop of Milan, but what is very significant is the fact that Pius XII refused to make him a cardinal, although Milan is a cardinalate see. Thus, Pope Pacelli simultaneously removed him from the Secretariat of State and excluded him from the next conclave, making it abundantly clear to his successor, by this tacit refusal of making him a cardinal, that his ousting had been a “promoveatur ut amoveatur” (a promotion-removal) and this for very grave reasons.

Time, however, has begun to lift the veils covering this mystery. In his book, Paul VI Secret, Jean Guitton (an intimate friend of Paul VI), referring to the uproar raised by the memorable encyclical Humanae vitae, writes of Paul VI,

"He is going through a trial similar to the one inflicted on him by Pius XII: the one of diffidentia. In the case of Pius XII, the distrust came from the summit since Pius XII seemed to have lost the trust he had previously placed in him. Paul VI feels that his encyclical Humanae vitae is about to inflict upon him a trial in the reverse order, where the mistrust will be coming no longer from the summit, but from the bottom" (Paul VI Secret p.144).

A Jesuit by the name of Martina, in his book Vatican II - An Appraisal and Prospects, also mentions Pius XII's "distrust" of Montini. On page 29, he refers to

"the eviction of Montini, the 'substitute,' who was 'promoted' Archbishop of Milan, (but) never named cardinal, and never even once received by the Pope (with whom he had previously had daily contacts over a period of several years) in private audience."

MANEUVERS TO THE LEFT

In his turn, in the book, Pius XII in the Eyes of History, Monsignor Roche, a close collaborator of Cardinal Tisserant, reveals a precise motive for Pope Pius XII's "distrust": Montini, the substitute, flying in the face of the Pope's specific orders and (of course!) without his knowledge, had established secret contacts with Stalin in the course of the Second World War.

Pius XII was later informed of this treachery via the good offices of the protestant Archbishop of Upsala, who had received direct evidence to this effect through the Swedish Secret Service. Later on, in 1954, the Holy Father received a secret report from the Archbishop of Riga who had been imprisoned by the Soviets. This message indeed confirmed that "there had been made in his name (the Pope's) contacts with the persecutors by a highly placed personality in the Secretariat of State."

In the wake of Montini's treachery, Monsignor Roche continues,

"his (Pius XII's) grief and bitterness were such that his very health was severely shaken and so he resigned himself to the idea of governing alone the work of external affairs of the Vatican's Secretariat of State" (cf. Courrier de Rome, no.53, October 1984; "The Montini-Stalin agreements of 1942" and Si Si, No No of April 15, 1986, p.5: "An Historical Fact: Msgr. Montini's Treachery").

We can now be quite certain, therefore, that Montini was politically active behind Pius XII's back and these covert activities were favoring the political left in order to achieve those utopian ideals of his youth:

"It is possible to collaborate with the left, but not with the right" (see Frappani-Molinari. Montini Giovane [The Young Montini], ed. Marietti).

ALSO AGAINST HUMANI GENERIS

It is now unmistakably clear that Montini went behind the back of Pius XII as he set about achieving those philo-modernist and utopian dreams of his youth which had prompted him to associate (and he was the only priest to do so) with Count Gallaratti-Scotti's salon. This was the same Gallaratti-Scotti who represented the essence of modernism in Lombardy and Montini, having become Paul VI, and whose tenth anniversary after death was celebrated in these unmistakable terms by L'Osservatore Romano on July 7, 1976:

"In his (the Count's) last years, a great consolation came to him from the Vatican Council since he felt that all that bitterness of spirit that he had endured in his younger days [coming from all those condemnations of Modernism] had not been suffered in vain; the Church was now well on to its hard and difficult way in which, nevertheless, many things we had been hoping for in the past were now in the process of becoming a living reality."

Now it is Jean Guitton himself who is going to expose Montini, while still Substitute, in the very act of treachery against Pope Pius XII and his encyclical Humani generis. In his book, Paul VI Secret, he faithfully transcribed that very same evening, those notes which he had taken down during a chat with Msgr. Montini concerning the great encyclical against neo-modernism, which had just been published.

To Guitton's expressed fear that Humani generis might be interpreted as an obstacle to the "progress of thought," Montini, still Proto-Secretary of State under Pius XII, answers:

"You have doubtlessly noticed for yourself the shades of meaning to be found in this pontifical text. For example, the encyclical never once refers to errors (errores). It speaks only of opinions (opiniones)[as if errors were not also and precisely opinions!]. This indicates that the Holy See does not aim at condemning actual errors, but rather those ways of thinking, which could give, rise to errors, but which in themselves remain respectable.

On the other hand, there are 3 reasons why this encyclical should not be deformed: first, there is the expressed will of the Holy Father. The second reason is the French episcopate's frame of mind, which is so broad-minded and receptive to contemporary currents of thought.

Without doubt, any given episcopate is always liable (for it is in direct contact with souls, since it must be faithful to its mandate, which is a pastoral charge, as they say)...it is liable, I say, to broaden the ways of doctrine and the faith [in this sentence is to found, in embryonic form, the entire 'spirit' of Vatican II's pastoral care]. And, admittedly, it would be justified in doing so. Here is Rome; we also have the duty of watching over the doctrinal aspects (of the Faith). We remain particularly sensitive to everything, which could corrupt the purity of (Catholic) doctrine, which is truth. The Sovereign Pontiff must keep the deposit of the Faith, as St. Paul says. And now for the third reason. It will be short; the French are intelligent."

BETRAYAL

Montini the Substitute's dishonesty proved to be of unequalled gravity. Pius XII, in Humani generis, had condemned the "new theology" in the gravest and most solemn of terms as he had underscored its fatal consequences for the Faith. He had also charged, so as not to be wanting in his "sacred Duty," the bishops and the superiors general of the religious orders, "and binding them most seriously in conscience" to take most seriously "that such opinions be not advanced in schools, in conferences or in writings of any kind, and that they be not taught in any manner whatsoever to the clergy or to the faithful." The teachers of Catholic institutes, continued the Pope, "know that they cannot with tranquil conscience exercise the office of teaching entrusted to them, unless in the instruction of their students they religiously accept and exactly observe the norms which we have ordained."

And there we have, barely a stone's throwaway from the Pope, in the very bosom of the Secretariat of State, Montini unscrupulously declaring that these errors condemned by Pope Pius XII were, on the contrary, "respectable" opinions. Indeed, he was actually promoting them by confidentially assuring people that such was the "formal will" of Pius XII himself.

Montini claimed that he [Pius XII] had drafted Humani generis alone and in spite of himself. Given the weighty task of authority, he could not allow himself to do otherwise (a typically modernist theory of authority, to which we will presently return), but also claimed that Rome trusted in the French episcopate's "broad-mindedness" which would favor the widening of the "ways of doctrine and of the faith" and - with one last wink - he, Montini, was fully aware that the French were "intelligent," and... a word to the wise is enough! And so, thus it was that as Pius XII slammed the doors to neo-modernism, Montini, his Substitute in the Secretariat of State, was busy opening them again behind his back.

Yet, once again betrayal was standing at Pius XII's door. G. Martina S.J .in his previously quoted work, Vatican II-An Appraisal and Prospects, (pp. 56-57) after having drawn our attention to the interpretation of Humani generis as proposed by the Substitute Montini to his close friend Jean Guitton, continues,

"But [Montini's] effort to dilute the purpose and aim of that solemn pontifical document was not to succeed thanks to Pius XII, who went straightaway to the editor of Civilta Cattolica to protest against the underhanded efforts being used to minimize his encyclical, which did not simply constitute a grave and solemn warning, and who also deplored and complained of the shocking carelessness of those agents and members representing the Society of Jesus to whom he had turned in 1946, exhorting them to faithfully follow his Pontifical orders."

Disciplinary measures were immediately taken against de Lubac and his "gang" by the Society, as well as against Montini by Pius XII, who promoted him to Archbishop of Milan, but who never named him Cardinal; neither did he ever wish to receive him in private audience thereafter.


POWER OF AUTHORITY AT THE SERVICE OF ERROR

Things being as they were, and coming back to the letter "of Pius XII" to Blondel, we can hardly be surprised to learn one day that Pius XII, who had never even signed it, knew practically nothing about it and what he did learn, he learned only bit by bit, and badly at that. Montini, who was acting as if he were the Pope without being so, put the supreme authority of Peter's successors at the service of the "new theology." And from that very moment, the effects of that betrayal have proven to be extremely disastrous.

On July 8, 1945, La Documentation Catholique published a letter carrying the signature of the Substitute Montini and under the title of "the Pope's letter to Blondel," together with a highly flattering account of Blondel's "main works and doctrine." This statement (falsely attributed to Pope Pius XII!) deplored those

"two erroneous exclusivisms: rationalism and... Catholic theology which for opposite reasons had shown "ostracism" and "incomprehension" towards Blondel's new "Christian philosophy" which on the contrary - the article triumphantly concluded - has been completely ratified by this statement of His Holiness Pope Pius XII which we are pleased to publish at this time."

Shortly after this, Bruno de Solages, Rector of the Catholic Institute of Toulouse and a friend of de Lubac, entering the fray in Blondel's defense, confronted Father Garrigou-Lagrange with the argument of...authority: that is, the letter "sent by Pius XII via Monsignor Montini" "significantly praising" Blondel's works (cf. A. Russo, Henri de Lubac...p.347). Then, in 1946, Gerard Phillips, writing in Erasmus (pp. 202-205) used this same letter in defending the naturalized supernatural of de Lubac:

"If Fr. de Lubac has resolutely refuted the possibility of pure nature, he is not any more blameworthy than the Augustinian authors whom the Holy See, on more than one occasion, has seen to protect, just as it has recently done in favor of Maurice Blondel" (quoted by H. de Lubac in Memoria Intorno Alla Mia Opera [Memoirs concerning My Works] Jaca Book, p.68).

In Italy, Monsignor Natale Bussi, whom Mgsr Rossano later unmasked as being a philo-modernist (cf. Courrier de Rome no.134, April 1992), in the Italian translation of Falcon's apologetics (ed. Paoline 1951), annihilated the strict as well as rigorous refutations of Blondel's errors by the following asterisk added to note 1 on page 39:

"Obviously, we are not able to fathom Blondel's ideas by the use of those developments which L. Laberthoniere (condemned by the Holy Office) has brought to the principle of immanence although Blondel, in the last few years, received assurances from the highest (Vatican) authorities regarding the orthodoxy of his doctrine. These assurances were given in a letter dated December 2, 1944 coming from the Secretariat of State (of the Vatican), a letter expressing, however, one single remark concerning several of Blondel's own expressions which theological rigor would have wished to be stated in more precise terms."

"SATAN'S MASTERSTROKE"

In short, "Pius XII's" letter, carrying Montini's signature, constituted an early type of testing-ground for the post-conciliar disasters: the "new theology" would be in a position to sweep away all resistance and impose itself on the Catholic world only on the support, even if ever so "discreet," of the Catholic Church's supreme authority. It was afforded this opportunity with Montini's accession to the Chair of St. Peter.

Ever since his exile to Milan, the archbishop of Milan (Montini) never ceased stirring up the "new theologians" against Pius XII and his encyclical Humani generis (against neo-modernism), and finally, under Pope John XXIII, he was able to favor them even more, given the influence he had over Roncalli (Pope John XXIII). In his work, Henri de Lubac - Sin Organisches Lebenswerk, Urs von Balthasar bears witness to this fact in the following terms:

"In 1946,Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange launched a full-scale attack against de Lubac and his friends as well as their "new theology" and Pope Pius XII, now really annoyed, joined in the fray with the L'Osservatore Romano publishing his speeches. Jannsens, the Father General, showed himself loyal to de Lubac, but as the attacks coming from all quarters and from all countries intensified, the more his behavior took on a diplomatic hue. They even went so far as to scrutinize that which could possibly appear suspect in other works. With the advent of Humani generis, papal thunderbolts came crashing down upon the Lyons Scholasticate and de Lubac was singled out as the chief scapegoat... his books, henceforth defamed, were taken off the shelves of the libraries of Society of Jesus and withdrawn from bookstores..."

Then, little by little - according to von Balthasar - the climate began to clear up in favor of the neo-modernists:

"From Archbishop Montini came words of support and encouragement. It was he who later on, having become Pope Paul VI, insisted that de Lubac speak on Teilhard de Chardin at the close of the Thomistic Congress in the great chancery Hall... To the point of John XXIII's naming de Lubac as consultor in the drafting plans for the Commission on Theology together with Fr. Congar."

Having been made Cardinal by John XXIII who thus paved the way to the Pontifical Throne in spite of Pope Pius XII's efforts to deny him this possibility, Montini was finally elected Pope Paul VI and immediately set out to put all the strength of his newly-acquired authority - and what authority! - at the service of the "new theology.”


THE PERSISTENCE OF THE “HESITANT POPE”

Enthroned as Paul VI, Montini began to open wide the conciliar doors to the "new theologians" to a much greater extent than he had previously succeeded in doing through his influence over John XXIII.

"Many well known theologians [some still under suspicion by the Holy Office and some having already been condemned] absent at the beginning (of Vatican II) began to gradually join the circles of experts (periti), thanks to Paul VI's discreet influence as he showed them his favor and received them in private audiences, concelebrated with them and praised them for their close collaboration" (R. Latourelle S.J., Vatican II – An Appraisal and Prospects, ed. Citadelle-Assise, a joint project carried out three university institutes of the Society of Jesus in Rome together with the participation of the Paul VI Institute of Brescia).

Paul VI exerted the same "discreet influence" on the Council Fathers who not knowing what was actually happening and putting all their trust in "Peter" were gradually being brought around to the point of accepting and ratifying that very same "new theology" which Pius XII had already condemned in Humani generis.

Recalling to mind that which the Jesuit Henrici (recently named bishop!) wrote:

"As for the 'aggiornamento' [aggiornamento: an updating, especially with regard to the policy of modernizing Roman Catholic institutions, one of the goals of the Second Vatican Council, 1962- 1965], the Council Fathers had to depend (they could not do otherwise) on the work previously done by the theologians before the Council...To those texts approved by the Council, the Council fathers gave, so to speak, a kind of ecclesiastical authentication. If those texts seemed strangely new, it was only because the work of the (new) theologians as well as the state of Catholic theology at the end of the 1950's were, to a great extent, unknown to those who were strangers to these new texts and ideas (and many council Fathers could be found in this group). Another reason why these texts seemed new was the fact that now a part of the results of this work, which until quite recently had been (strongly) censured (by the Church), was henceforth considered as being orthodox" (Communio, Nov.- Dec. 1990).

The "prudence" shown by Paul VI who, as Msgr. A. Bugnini testifies, only wished to avoid foreseeable as well as undesirable reactions (cf. A. Bugnini La Reforme Liturgique, pp. 297-299), served to bolster the legend of his being a hesitant or indecisive Pope, but the facts are there, proving that Paul VI knew what he wanted. He acted with "discretion," indeed, but also with a still greater obstinacy:

"With a stubborn and methodical firmness which gives the lie to an equally stubborn legend, he [Paul VI] steers the barque," de Lubac wrote with admiration in 1963. (Memoirs Concerning My Works, Jaca Book, p. 420).

Among some of the greatest of de Lubac's opponents stood the Rector of the Gregorian University (in Rome), Father Charles Boyer, whom we have already quoted. In the following lines, de Lubac himself reveals with just what "discretion" and "firmness" Paul VI humiliated and forced this highly-skilled and well-known theologian to surrender in humiliation while at one fell swoop, he rehabilitated without any form of reason other than his own (papal) authority, those two representatives of neo-modernism, de Lubac and Teilhard de Chardin, whose works had been previously condemned by a monitum from the Holy Office:

"In Teilhard Posthume," de Lubac writes, "I referred to a conference that I was asked to make on him in Rome in 1963. The invitation had been extended to me by Fr. Charles Boyer, Prefect at the Gregorian. I have just come across his letter. When we realize that Fr. Boyer was formerly Teilhard's greatest adversary in Rome (and just as much mine!), this letter takes on its full meaning. (See letter below)

BOYER TO DE LUBAC

The Roman Pontifical Academy of St. Thomas Aquinas and of the Catholic Religion
Rome. June 10, 1963

Reverend Father,

Pax Christi. You must have already received the notice concerning the sixth International Thomistic Congress. I well understand that your various occupations have prevented your taking any interest in it. But here is the reason that I venture to bring it to your notice once again.

Having been received by the Holy Father [Paul VI] in the last few days, I have had the opportunity to see for myself the high esteem he has for yourself and for your writings. At the same time, he expressed, albeit with certain reservations, an opinion on Fr. Teilhard (de Chardin), which would not have displeased you. Further considerations on this matter have led me to think that, at this Congress, we should hear an exposition casting a favorable light on Teilhard de Chardin's thought on our theme ("de Deo"). No one could do this better than yourself.

I beg you, therefore, to simply participate in our congress which will take place just prior to the opening of the fourth session of the Council: from the 6th to the 11th of September. (If you prefer), you could come for the last days (of the congress), and if too pressed for time, you could merely read a paper on the subject..."

(Henri de Lubac. Memoirs Concerning My Works, p. 451).

Thus, it was that de Lubac, thanks to Paul VI's will of iron and at the invitation of one of his (former) most courageous adversaries was able to exalt Teilhard de Chardin S.J. in the stately hall of the Chancery at the end of the...Thomistic congress! Nothing could have served better to highlight the veritable triumph of the "new philosophy" and the "new theology" over "traditional philosophy" and Catholic theology! Henceforth, the road to "scepticism, fancy and heresy" was opened.

It was with that same "stubborn and methodical firmness" that Paul VI bent to his will, discouraged and crushed (as in the case of Archbishop Lefebvre) all other resistance and, what is even worse, placed the Vatican's key posts in the hands of the "innovators" in view of strengthening, in the future, their grip upon the Church by a whole series of reforms including those relative to the election of the Roman Pontiff.

In the presence of all these disasters mounting about him, Paul VI also seems to have gone through his own personal crisis, but again, in his case, as it was for de Lubac and the "new theologians" it was not to result in his conversion, but rather in a vain attempt to deny his responsibility for the part he willingly played in the rising tide of so much ruin and destruction, the blame for which he sought to shift upon the "abusive" innovators.

However, we will discuss the point in more detail later on. For the moment, it will be sufficient to recall by way of demonstration of the aforementioned tragedy, that in 1976, that is, two years after the ringing warnings concerning the Church's "self-destruction" and "the smoke of Satan" in the Temple of God, and two years before his own death (1978), Paul VI wrote the following lines to de Lubac on the occasion of the latter's 80th birthday:

"You have, dear son, built a monument more lasting than bronze for the admiration and utility of the enquiring minds of researchers."

How true it is that the modernist perversion of the intellect robs us of our last hope of repentance!

- Hirpinus (to be continued)

Translated from Courrier de Rome, July/ August 1993


GLOSSARY

ANTIMONY - A contradiction between two ideas; self-contradiction or paradox

[Stone]

Si Si No No - August 1994 No. 9

They Think They've Won!

Part VI

CARDINAL RATZINGER: A PREFECT WITHOUT FAITH AT THE CONGREGATION FOR THE FAITH

CARDINAL RATZINGER - THE "THEOLOGIAN"

Pope Paul VI's discretion and persistence most effectively handed over supreme control and power to the "new theology" in the Catholic world. There is absolutely no room for doubt on this score. However, the triumph of this "new theology" has not meant a triumph for the Catholic Faith. The German theologian Dormann, referring to the last Council (The Theological Way of John Paul II and the Spirit of Assisi) writes, "Never before has a Papal encyclical, written barely fifteen years previously, been repudiated in so short a time and so completely by those very persons whom it condemns, as Humani Generis (1950)." The Jesuit and "new theologian" Henrici has given us a portrait of the present situation:

"Nowadays, when theological professorships are in the hands of our Concilium [see glossary below] colleagues, almost all of the theologians who have been named bishops in the last few years have come from the ranks of Communio (a more moderately progressive journal)…Balthasar, De Lubac, and Ratzinger, the founders [of Communio], have all become cardinals" (30 Days, December 1991).

Presently, in the Church-affiliated universities, including Pontifical universities, the founding fathers of the "new theology" are being studied; doctoral theses are being prepared on Blondel, De Lubac, and Von Balthasar. The L'Osservatore Romano as well as Civilta Cattolica praise these modernists and their ways of "thought" and the Catholic press falls in line: Everyone falls into line with the one occupying Peter's throne.

At the present time, a "new theologian" holds the exalted position of President of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, formerly known as the Sacred Congregation of the Holy Office: Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger.

For convenience's sake, let us distinguish between Ratzinger the "theologian" and Ratzinger the Prefect. Actually, in this case, such a distinction is not valid; for we are not dealing here with debatable questions, but with matters of Faith. On the other hand, a Prefect of the Congregation for the Faith who doesn't have the Faith himself would simply go against common sense, besides the fact that Ratzinger the Prefect is in complete accord with Ratzinger the "theologian."

Ratzinger the "theologian's" work, Einfuhrung in das Christentum, which was published in France under the title La Foi Chretienne, hier et aujourd'hui (The Christian Faith, Yesterday and Today) is considered to be his fundamental work. Its Italian version (Introduzione al Christianismolezioni sul Simbolo Apostolico), which is already in its eighth printing, is on sale in Catholic bookstores. It was edited at the Queriniana de Brescia, exclusive editors of the "new theology" literature.

Here is how Ratzinger's fundamental work is presented in his The Ratzinger Report: with Vittorio Messori:

"A kind of school book, continually re-edited, which has formed a whole generation of clergy and laity, drawn as they were, by absolutely "Catholic" thinking while also being absolutely open to the new climate of Vatican II."

We must, at this point, stop to consider some fundamental notions, enough at any rate to get an exact idea of the "theology" of the present Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.


A FRIGHTFUL PROBLEM

It is of Divine and Catholic Truth, that God became man and more precisely, the Second Person of the Most Holy Trinity, Who is God as is the Father and the Holy Ghost; that He (the Second Person) took on a human nature and that therefore, in Our Lord Jesus Christ, there are two natures (the human and the divine) united in one Divine Person. This union is called the hypostatic union. Which the Church has always and everywhere put forward for our belief and which She has defended against heresy (for example in the Councils of Ephesus, Chalcedon, and Constantinople V).

What are we to say, therefore, when we are obliged to face the fact that the present Prefect of the Congregation for the Faith professes quite the contrary in his books of theology - that in Jesus, it is not God Who became man, but rather, man who became God? As a matter of fact, in Ratzinger's mind, just who is Jesus Christ? He is that "man in whom the definitive reality of man's being is manifested, and who, by that very fact, is God at the same time."

What does this mean - if not that man, in his "definitive reality" is God and that Christ is a man, who is, or better yet, became God by the sole fact that in Him has come to light that "definitive reality of man's being"? (La Foi Chretienne, hier et aujourd'hui p.126).


GOD IS MAN AND MAN IS GOD

Moreover, the problem is put clearly before us and is affirmatively resolved by Ratzinger himself who asks:

"Do we, then, still have the right to re-absorb Christology [that part of theology devoted to the study of Christ and His work] into theology [the methodical study of those truths revealed by God]? Must we not rather passionately acclaim Jesus as man and consider Christology as Humanism, an Anthropology? Or could authentic man, simply because of the fact of being completely and authentically man, be God and could God be, precisely, authentic man? Could it be possible that the most radical humanism and the Faith in the God of Revelation merge together here to become one and the same thing?" (p.130).

The answer is that the struggle concerning these questions, and which continued throughout the first five centuries of the Church,

"has, in the ecumenical Councils of that period, resulted in an affirmative [sic!] answer to all these questions" (p.140).

The main question, without misrepresenting the author's idea, could be put in the following words: Authentic man, precisely by the fact that he is fully such, is God, and consequently, God is an authentic man.


A COHERENT "CHRISTOLOGY" IN ITS HERESY

Ratzinger's entire Christology is developed in a coherent manner around this fundamental thesis. It would also be quite difficult to give a different explanation to those statements, which, in his book Christian Faith, Yesterday and Today, are to be found time after time, and amongst which we will now quote the following in fairness to the author as well as to our present study.

"The heart of this Christology [based on the Scriptural texts of St. John] of the Son would be as follows: 'The fact of being a servant is no longer presented as an action, behind which the person of Jesus would remain confined in itself; it penetrates the whole existence of Jesus so that His very being is service. And precisely because this whole being is service only, it is a filial being. In this sense, it is only here that the changes in value due to Christianity have come to term; only at this point does it become unmistakably clear that he who puts himself entirely at the service of others, who commits himself to total unselfishness as well as to voluntary self-deprivation, that is the true man, the man of the future, where man and God are at one" (p.152).

"The being of Jesus is pure actuality of relations 'from' and 'for.' And by the very fact that this being is no longer separable from its actuality, it coincides with God; it becomes at the same time exemplary man, man of the future through whom we are able to perceive just how little man has begun to be himself [that is to say, God]" (p.153).

It was the "primitive Christian community" which for the first time applied Psalm 2 to Jesus: "Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee. Ask of me and I will give thee the gentiles to be thy inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession." This application - Ratzinger tells us - was simply to explain the conviction that:

"He who has placed the sense of human existence, not in a self-affirming power, but rather in an existence radically consecrated to others, as proven by the Cross, it is to Him alone that God has said: 'Thou art my son, this day - that is to say, in this situation [on the Cross] - I have begotten thee' and he concludes: "The notion of son of God...through the explanation of the resurrection and of the Cross through Psalm 2, came in this manner and under this form into the confession of Faith in Jesus of Nazareth" (p.147).

And that will be quite sufficient for us for the moment.


THE REVERSAL

To Ratzinger's way of thinking then, Jesus is not God because of His being the natural Son of God, born of the Father before all ages, "begotten not made, consubstantial with the Father," because His person shares from eternity the infinite Divine Nature and therefore possesses its infinite perfection. Ratzinger's concept of Jesus, on the contrary, is that of a man who "came to coincide with God" when on the Cross he incarnated "being for others," the "altruist by automasia."

What distinguishes Him, from other men, lies only in the degree of human development attained by Him and does not depend on that gulf separating man from God, the Creator from the Creature. Ratzinger rejects the Church's Christology, labelling it as

"a triumphalist Christology having simply no use for the man [sic!] crucified and servant, ready to invent once again, in his place, the myth of an ontological God" (p.152).

To the "triumphalist Christology" which creates a "myth of an ontological God," Ratzinger opposes his "Christology of service" which he claims to have found in St. John and wherein the word "Son" would only convey the meaning of a "perfect servant."

On the other hand, the man Jesus, who by his perfect service, has come to "coincide with God" reveals to man that man is becoming God, and therefore there exists an essential identity between man and God.


UNMISTAKABLY CLEAR CONFIRMATION

Ratzinger's concept of Christ as the "last man," as we find confirmed in unmistakably clear terms (beginning on p.158), indeed represents the Cardinal's thought on the matter. Here Ratzinger falsifies or "twists" the interpretation of another passage of Holy Scripture (St. Paul to be exact), paying no heed whatsoever to Catholic exegesis in those passages concerning Dogma which must strictly adhere to the meaning always taught by Holy Mother Church:

"And on the other hand, what a difference in perspective is to be seen as we consider St. Paul's idea according to which Christ is the 'last man' [last Adam] (1 Cor.15: 4-5), the definitive or ultimate, who introduces man to that future which belongs to man, a future consisting in not simply being man, but to be one with God" (p.158).

And immediately after, he continues under the title "Christ, The Last Man":

"And here we have reached the point where we may attempt to summarize the meaning of the Creed: ‘I believe in Christ Jesus, the only Son of God, our Lord.’ After all these reflections of ours, we should be able, first of all, to make this affirmation: the Christian Faith acknowledges the exemplary man in [the person of] Jesus of Nazareth. Here we have, so it seems, the best way of interpreting the Pauline concept of the 'last Adam' mentioned above [which on the contrary, simply signifies the 'second Adam' the head of redeemed humanity, in contrast to the 'first Adam']. But it is precisely in his condition or status as exemplary man, as a classic example of man, that he transcends human limitations. It is only by this fact that he is the truly exemplary man" (p.158).

And this would be the motive for his theory:

"That which makes man is his open-mindedness, his opening on All, on the Infinite. Man is man by the fact that he tends to go infinitely beyond himself; consequently, he will be more man in the measure that he will be less withdrawn into himself, less 'limited' [beschrankt]. But then - let us repeat - that one is the most [perfect] man, truly man, he who is the most unlimited [ent-schrankt], who not only comes into contact with the infinite, but is one with it: Jesus Christ the Infinite Himself. In Him, the process of humanization (the evolutionary development of human characteristics) has truly reached its ultimate development" (p.159).

THE "CREDIT" DUE TO TEILHARD

Moreover, in order to eliminate any possible lingering doubts on his thought as well as the "sources" of his "theology," Ratzinger appeals to that boldest and most dreadful of the "new theologians," Teilhard de Chardin, the "apostate" (R. Valneve) Jesuit:

"It is to Teilhard de Chardin's great credit that he has rethought the whole issue of these relationships based on today's vision of the world,...to have made them accessible once again" (p.160).

There follow numerous quotations from Teilhard's writings. It will be sufficient to cite the last one as an example, which also serves as a conclusion:

"The cosmic drift is moving 'in the direction of an incredible near mono-molecular state...where each ego is destined to reach its paroxysm in some mysterious super-ego.' True, man in as much as he is an ego, does represent an end, but the direction of the being's movement, of his own existence, reveals him to be an organism destined or intended for a super-ego which incorporates him without dissolving him; only through the integration will the form of the future be able to become a reality in which man will have finally attained the goal and summit of his being [the perfect "humanization," incorrectly called "deification" or supernatural]" (p.162).

This monistic-pantheistic delirium seems to constitute for Ratzinger - incredible as it may sound, but nevertheless true - the essence of...St. Paul's Christology!

"It will be readily admitted that this synthesis, elaborated as it has been, based on today's view of the world and couched in terms doubtlessly overly biological, is nevertheless faithful to Pauline Christology whose profound meaning is now well-perceived and brought to a higher level of intelligibility: faith sees in the man Jesus in whom has been realized in some way - biologically speaking - the following mutation of the process of evolution ...from that point, faith sees in Christ the beginning of a movement which integrates more and more that humanity previously divided in the being of a single Adam, of a single 'body,' into the being of future man. It [this Faith] will see in Christ the movement towards this future of man wherein he is to be totally 'socialized,' incorporated into the Unique" (pp.162-163).

All this constitutes a complete reversal of the Catholic Faith; it is no longer God who was made man, it is rather man who has emerged as God in Jesus Christ.


THE "SOURCES"

How could Ratzinger end up with such a doctrinal turnabout? Cardinal Siri gives us the explanation in Gethsemane-Reflections on the Contemporary Theological Movement. That "cosmic monism" or "anthropocentric idealism" or "fundamental anthropocentrism" whereby Ratzinger lays waste and dissolves theology, constitutes that certain and inevitable outlet of De Lubac's error concerning the "supernatural" implied in the natural where the "supernatural" necessarily coincides with human nature's maximum development.

"In revealing the Father," De Lubac writes, "and in being revealed by Him [Jesus Christ] completes man's self-revelation…Through Christ a person reaches adulthood, man definitively emerges from the universe" (Henri de Lubac, Catholicism, pp.295-296).

This is nothing but Ratzinger's "Christology" in its embryonic state. Cardinal Siri rightly questions: "What can be the meaning of such an affirmation? Either Christ is only man, or else man is divine" (Gethsemane, p.60). We should also add that the "supernatural" which finds its explanation simply in nature (or that which is simply natural) is also to be found in the center of Blondel's "new philosophy," which seeks to explain the man's participation in the divine nature as a "return, so to speak, of God to God in us" (Letter to De Lubac, April 5, 1932).

Cardinal Siri points out that de Lubac's error (as well as that of Blondel) ultimately develops and matures in Karl Rahner, S.J., who wonders "if it is possible to try to discover the hypostatic union (that union between the human and divine natures in Christ) along the lines of the absolute perfecting of that which is man" ("Nature and Grace in the Thought of Karl Rahner," quoted in Gethsemane, p.79). The affirmative answer to all of this, before being found in Ratzinger, is to be found in Rahner himself, who "completely twists the Church's thought and Faith concerning the mystery of the Incarnation of the Word of God in Jesus Christ as recorded in Tradition as well as in Holy Scripture" (Gethsemane, p.85).

Ratzinger also falsifies the Church's thought and Faith exactly in the same sense, as does Rahner. Moreover, Ratzinger was and still is, in spite of distancing himself on occasion from his positions, Rahner's disciple (Ratzinger was indeed Rahner's faithful collaborator during the Council; see R. Wiltgen, The Rhine Flows into the Tiber).

In Rahner's works, Cardinal Siri writes,

"there clearly appears a fundamental anthropology which not only coincides with de Lubac's thought, but even goes beyond it to the extent of transforming, in the conscience of the followers of the new theology, those very articles of Faith such as those of the Incarnation and the Immaculate Conception" (Gethsemane, p.78).

Again:

"When one acts, thinks, and expresses oneself in such ways as to favor theories such as the one of essential identity between God and man [this is precisely the postulate upon which Ratzinger has based his own "Christology"], then one is no longer treading the path of truth but rather has locked himself into the rut of error [of heresy]…These are the dire consequences of having started out with an [erroneous] concept concerning a great mystery, such as the mystery of the supernatural, artificially presented [by De Lubac and his followers] as being part and parcel of Catholic doctrine… Gradually, all the principles, all the criteria, as well as all the fundamental truths of the Faith have been called into question and are crumbling away" (Gethsemane, pp.74, 82).

A RETURN TO MODERNISM

Cardinal Siri re-echoed Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P., who, as early as 1946, had already figured out and summarized the "new theology's" Christology:

"Thus does this new Christology suppose that the material world has evolved towards the spirit, and the spiritual world has evolved naturally, so to speak, toward the supernatural order as well as towards the plenitude of Christ. Thus the Incarnation of the Word, the Mystical Body and the Universal Christ are to be understood as moments or stages of Evolution…This is all that remains of Christian Dogmas in that theory which seeks to destroy our Creed in the same measure that it favors Hegelian evolutionism" (La Nouvelle Theologie: ou va-t-elle?).

And the famous Dominican theologian immediately sounded the alarm:

"Where is the New Theology leading us to? It is taking us in a straight line right back to modernism by way of whims, errors and heresy" (Nouvelle Theologie).

Ratzinger maintains, while repeating his "masters"' old party-line, that this monistic-pantheistic delirium, quite apart from "Pauline Christology" (as interpreted by Teilhard de Chardin), can be found in the "most ancient professions of Faith" as well as in St. John's Gospel and would make "clear" to us the true "meaning" of the Dogmas of Ephesus, 431 A.D., and of Chalcedon, 451 A.D. This affirmation constitutes in itself another heresy. If this were so, we would be obliged to say that the Church, in spite of its divinely promised infallibility, had lost its memory and forgot the real meaning of St. Paul's doctrine, St. John's Gospel, as well as the earliest professions of Faith, of Christological dogma and, indeed, of all of Divine Revelation itself!

But the sad truth is quite different: Ratzinger makes use of, often quite literally, as we have shown, the same old arguments of those "masters" of the "new theology." In so doing, he is simply rejecting, the "philosophy of being" in favor of the philosophy of "becoming." Thus is Ratzinger caught in the act of repudiating both Catholic Tradition and the Magisterium as he "quietly" (to use one of his favorite terms) "continues to go his way on the path of whims, error, and heresy." This path, in fact, is nothing else but that highway back to that modernism previously condemned by Pope St. Pius X which "recognizes in Jesus Christ nothing more than a man" even though "of a very high nature such as had never before been seen nor will ever be found in the future."

On the other hand, this same Modernism sees a God in man, since "the principle of faith is immanent [intrinsic] in man...this principle is God" and therefore "God is immanent in man." (Pope St. Pius X, Pascendi).

Through necessity (since we have here but one article to oppose to an entire book replete with whims, errors and heresies) we have limited our attention to Ratzinger's Christology. The reader, however, will readily understand that once this fundamental point of Christology has been thus so distorted and falsified, everything else will also suffer contamination: soteriology [that branch of theology concerned with the doctrine of salvation through Christ]: the vicarious satisfaction for sins is considered by modernism to be simply an unfortunate medieval invention of St. Anselm of Aosta (1033-1109)! Mariology [that branch of theology treating of the Blessed Virgin Mary, particularly in her relationship to the Incarnation and Redemption]: the virginal Conception is quite foggy at best, and in order to remain consistent, no mention at all is made of the Blessed Virgin's Divine Maternity, and so on through all the other articles of the Creed. All of this is to be found in Ratzinger's book, The Christian Faith - Yesterday and Today which would have been more correctly entitled Introduction to Apostasy.


THE PREFECT

But perhaps Ratzinger the Prefect (of the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith) later denied or refuted Ratzinger the theologian? Not at all; in fact, quite the contrary. His "theological" works continue to be reprinted unchanged. (The Italian version of The Christian Faith - Yesterday and Today, has already reached its eighth edition.) Ratzinger the Prefect has never yet corrected or withdrawn one iota of his writings. On these "theological works," new generations of clerics will be formed in complete ignorance of Catholic theology and will, in the future, distort the most elementary truths of the Catholic Faith.

Ratzinger the Prefect goes even farther: he sponsors and collaborates officially in the review Communio, the press organ of "those who think they have won," that same Communio which he founded together with his friends De Lubac and Von Balthasar. On May 28, 1992, Ratzinger, fortified by his prestige as Prefect of the Faith, was able to celebrate the twentieth anniversary of Communio in Rome, in the great amphitheater of the Gregorian University, in the presence of a multitude of cardinals as well as the professors of Roman theological faculties. Communio was printed in several languages, and since it is under the patronage of the prefect for the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, it serves to indicate, unofficially but clearly, to the clergy of various countries the line of belief, action, and conduct wanted by "Rome."


PARTY PLOYS

Is it simply by chance that as soon as vacancies occur in episcopal sees, they are just as quickly filled by Communio collaborators? Il Sabato (June 6, 1992), in an article celebrating Communio’s twentieth anniversary, remarked:

"Twenty years have passed. Communio has won the day [in the struggle for modernism]."

At least, this is true regarding the ecclesiastical supremacy in the Church. To those three "dissident" theologians - Ratzinger, De Lubac, Von Balthasar, - the Church has now bestowed the most coveted and prestigious of awards: the red hat of the cardinalate.

"To the most highly-skilled Communio collaborators went the episcopal promotions! Prominent amongst these are the Germans Karl Lehmann and Walter Kasper, the Italian Angelo Scola, Eugenio Corecco from Switzerland, the Austrian Christoph von Schonborn, Andre-Jean Leonard from Belgium, and Karl Romer from Brazil. A whole troop of bishop-theologians whose influence in the Church goes way above and beyond their own diocesan jurisdictions. A real 'think tank' of Karol Wojtyla's Church."

Is it simply by coincidence if "the theological chairs are presently dominated by Concilium’s fellow workers?" (30 Giorni, December 1991).

Is it not Ratzinger the Prefect who leaves them undisturbed? And all this corresponds perfectly to the' modernists' concept of authority as described by St. Pius X in Pascendi and which Msgr. Montini also outlined in his interview with Jean Guitton (cf. Courrier de Rome July- August 1993). As far as the modernists are concerned - St. Pius X declares -the doctrinal evolution of the Church "is like a result from the conflict of two forces, one of them tending towards progress, the other towards conservation." The conserving force exists in the Church and is found in Tradition; Tradition "is represented by religious authority" while the progressive force is there to stimulate evolution.

It is therefore "logical," according to modernistic logic, that those Concilium ultra-progressives as well as Communio moderates should have divided the tasks among themselves, the Concilium collaborators acting as the progressive force laying claim to the universities, the field of theological research, religious authority as well as ecclesiastical supremacy.

No room, therefore, for self-delusion: today, there actually exists no struggle whatsoever between liberal Catholics and conservative Catholics; the true "conservatives" have been effectively wiped off the official ecclesiastical map.

The sham struggle is between modernists who have gone to the very limits of their erroneous principles and their cousins, the moderate modernists who wish to go in the same direction albeit more slowly; it is not at all a question of a fight to the death, but rather of insignificant skirmishes, or more exactly, "of party maneuvers or ploys."


ROME NOW OCCUPIED BY "NEW THEOLOGIANS"

Ratzinger the Prefect, the driving force behind the modernists' express train, has filled Rome with "new theologians" who have set up shop in the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in particular, as well as in other commissions under his presidency. And so it is that, in order to “promote sound doctrine” under the prefecture of Cardinal Ratzinger, there is to be found among others, in that very same Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, a bishop Lehmann who rejects the bodily resurrection of Christ (cf. Courrier de Rome July-August 1993, "Bishops without Faith"). But for Ratzinger also, Jesus is "the one who died on the Cross and who, in the eyes of the Faith [sic!] has risen again" (The Christian Faith-Yesterday and Today, p.146).

Also it is to be noted that in the same Congregation is a certain George Cottier, O.P., a "great expert" in Freemasonry and "advocate of dialogue between the Church and masonic lodges," a certain Albert Vanhoye, S.J., for whom “Jesus was not a priest" (but He is not priest any more for Ratzinger, nor for his "master" Karl Rahner), and Marcel Bordoni, for whom remaining resolutely attached to the Christological dogma of Chalcedon constitutes an intolerable unchangeableness (sad to say, Ratzinger also shares this same view).

Ratzinger the Prefect is also President ex-officio of the Pontifical Biblical Commission, which was revived after a long period of stagnation. Two modernist secretaries have been engaged in this Commission; first, Henri Cazelles, Sulpician, a pioneer of neo-modernist exegesis, whose Introduction to the Bible was formerly severely criticized and reproved by the Roman Congregation for Seminaries (cf. Courrier de Rome, June-July 1989). He was succeeded by the above-mentioned Albert Vanhoye, S.J., as secretary to that same Commission amongst whose members are to be also found Gianfranco Ravasi, who relentlessly attacks Holy Scripture as well as the Faith itself, openly and without restraint. Guiseppe Segalla, another member, repudiates St. John's Gospel as he assails it with the most outrageous and unwarranted criticism (cf. si si no no, IV #11:2).

Another group, the International Theological Commission, is under Ratzinger's presidency. Amongst its members who are chosen on his proposition are Walter Kasper for whom those Gospel texts "where mention is made of a risen Christ whom one is able to touch with one's hands and who has meals with His disciples" are but "trivial affirmations, quite unworthy of serious consideration...which represent a danger of justifying an 'overly-rosy' paschal faith" (but neither does Ratzinger himself show any liking for a "markedly literal and terrestrial representation of the resurrection" (The Christian Faith-Yesterday and Today p.219).

Again, we have Bishop Christoph Schonborn, O.P., editorial secretary for the new Catechism and who, to mark the first anniversary of Von Balthasar's death, sang the praises of the deceased's ecumenical super-Church, the non-Catholic "Catholic" in St. Mary's Church in Basle, Switzerland (cf. Von Balthasar, Figura e Opera, ed. Piemme, pp. 431 ff.). Also Bishop Andre-Jean Leonard, "Hegelian... bishop of Namur, in charge of St Paul's Seminary where Cardinal Lustiger of Paris sends his seminarians” (30 Giorni, December 1991, p.67).


WITH (AND WITHOUT) DISCRETION

What is to be said about the more discreet, yet very effective publicity methods used by Ratzinger the Prefect in promoting the "new theology"? No sooner had Walter Kasper been named bishop of Rottenburg-Stuttgart than Ratzinger wrote to him,

"You represent, in these stormy times, a precious gift from Heaven" (30 Giorni, May 1989).

Urs von Balthasar died in June 1988, on the very eve of receiving the "well-deserved honorary distinction of the cardinalate." Ratzinger the Prefect personally delivered the funeral oration (at the cemetery in Lucerne, Switzerland) in which he praised the deceased to the skies as he bestowed upon the departed cleric the honor of theologian probatus."

On this occasion, he went on to say,

"That which the Pope wishes to express by this mark of gratitude, or rather, this manifestation of honor, remains valid. It is not longer a case of ordinary persons, of private individuals, but [it is] the Church itself in its official [sic!] ministerial responsibility which tells us that he [Von Balthasar] was, in fact, a sure and trustworthy guide on our journey towards the springs of living water as well as a witness to the Word through which we may learn of Christ and life itself” (quoted in Von Balthasar, Figura e Opera, pp.457 ff.).

Furthermore, Ratzinger the Prefect heads up the group sponsoring the opening, in Rome, of a

"center dedicated to the formation of candidates to the consecrated life," a formation "inspired by the life and works of Henri de Lubac, Hans Urs von Balthasar and of Adrienne von Speyr" (30 Giorni August-September 1990).

Finally, and in order to keep this study within limits, Ratzinger the Prefect presented the press with an "Instruction on the Theologian's Ecclesiastical Vocation," wherein he underscores the fact that this document 

"affirms - maybe for the first time ever with such clarity - that there are decisions [which have been made in the past] of the Magisterium which are not to be considered as the final word on a given subject as such, but serve rather as a mooring in the problem, and above all, also as an expression of pastoral prudence, a kind of temporary disposition" (L'Osservatore Romano, June 27, 1990. p.6).

And Ratzinger provided several examples of such temporary dispositions, which are now considered "outdated in the particularities of their determinations":

1. those "Papal declarations of the last century on religious liberty,"
2. "the anti-modernist decisions of the Pope at the beginning of this century,"
3. "the [papally approved] decisions of the Biblical Commission of that same time period."

In short, those three very same ramparts which the Sovereign Pontiff had set up against Modernism in the social, doctrinal, and exegetical domains.

Must anything else be added to prove that Ratzinger the Prefect is in perfect accord with Ratzinger the "theologian"? Yes, we do owe it to our readers to point out the fact that Elio Guerriero; chief editor of Communio (Italian edition) is in perfect agreement with us on this score. In order to illustrate the new theology's victorious march in his journal Jesus (April, 1992), he wrote,

"Anyway, in Rome we must bring to your attention the work done by Joseph Ratzinger, both as a theologian and as Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith."

The only thing left of Ratzinger the "restorer" is the myth.


THE MYTH OF THE "RESTORER"

It is not difficult to see what gave rise to this myth. In his Preface to Introduzione al Cristianismo (1968 Italian edition of Ratzinger's book Einfuhrung in das Christentum) for example, Ratzinger writes,

"The problem of knowing exactly the content and meaning of the Christian Faith is presently shrouded in a nebulous halo of uncertainty, thick and dense as has never been seen before in history." And this because "those who have followed at least in some small way the theological movement of the last decade and have kept a certain distance from the herd of unthinking souls who consider anything new as being always and automatically better," have been quite anxious to know if "our theology ...has not gone in the direction of an interpretation reducing the rightful claims and demands of our Faith which seemed overly oppressive, for the simple reason that since nothing of any great importance seemed to have been lost and so many things still remained, the new theologians could immediately dare to go still one step further" (p.7).

What Catholic who loves the Church and who is suffering such a heartache in the midst of the present universal crisis would not wholeheartedly agree with these affirmations? Already in this Preface, which has remained unchanged since 1968, we find sufficient matter to give rise to that popular myth of Ratzinger the "restorer."

But just what does he oppose to this progressive onslaught and demolition of the Faith being perpetuated by present-day (new) theology? His opposition consists in a general absolution of this very same "theology" concerning which - he declares - "one cannot...honestly ...affirm that, taken as a whole, it has taken this kind of direction." By way of "corrective action," he suggests the repudiation of Catholic Tradition along with the Church's Magisterium by which the new theology of the last few decades has succeeded in shrouding "the content and meaning of the Christian Faith. For the deplorable tendency of this new theology to reduce the Faith, Ratzinger remarks,

"We will surely not find the solution by insisting on remaining attached to the noble metal of fixed formulas of former times and which, in the final analysis, turn out to be simply a heap of metal which weighs heavily upon our shoulders instead of favoring, by virtue of its worth, the possibility of reaching true liberty [which in this way, has underhandedly replaced the truth]" (Preface to Introduzione al Cristianismo, p.8).

The fact that his foreword is certainly heading in the same direction as contemporary "theology" seems to have completely escaped Ratzinger. Long ago, Pope St. Pius X noted that all modernists are in no way able to draw from their erroneous premises truly inevitable conclusions. (cf. Pascendi).

Ratzinger is always the same: those excesses or abuses from which he keeps a "respectful" distance (often by cutting remarks) he never opposes with Catholic truth but only with some other apparently more moderate error which, however, in the logic of error, nevertheless leads inevitably to the same ruinous conclusions.

In his book Entretien Sur La Foi (Discourse on the Faith), Ratzinger labels himself as a "well-balanced progressive." He favors a "peaceful evolution of [Catholic] doctrine" without, however, "solitary breakaways ahead of the flock," yet "without nostalgia nor regret for times irretrievably past"; meaning, of course, quietly leaving behind the Catholic Faith (pp. 16-17). Although he shrinks back from extreme "progressivism," Ratzinger cares even less for Catholic Tradition: 

"We must remain faithful to the present day of the Church [l'aujourd'hui de l’Eglise], not to its past [non a l'hier], nor its future [ni au demain]" (Entretien sur la Foi, p.32).

For this reason, a Catholic who cherishes the Catholic Faith and loves the Church is able to favor or subscribe to a number of Ratzinger's central affirmations, but, on closer observation of what this "restorer" proposes in place of the current universally-deplored "abuses," he will find himself unable to approve even a single sentence. And this is because the downward neo-modernist path leads us down the same slippery slope, even though it does so more gradually, it still ends up with the very same complete rejection of Divine Revelation, that is, in apostasy. No doubt about it: the writings of Ratzinger the "Theologian" are there for all to see, demonstrating an undeniable proof of this flagrant apostasy.

- Hirpinus (to be continued)

Translated from Courrier de Rome, September 1993


GLOSSARY

ALTRUIST - A person having consideration for other people without any thought of self as a principle of conduct.

AUTOMASIA -The substitution of an epithet for a proper name e.g. “the iron duke”, use of a proper name to express a general idea, e.g. “a Solomon”.

CONCILIUM - An extremely progressive theological journal.

EXEGESIS- An explanation or commentary on the meaning of a text, especially of the Scared Scriptures.

MONISTIC - From monism, a view which reduces all reality to a simple principle or substance.

PANTHEISM - A theory that God and the universe are identical.

[Stone]

Si Si No No August 1994 No. 9 

They Think They've Won!

POPE JOHN PAUL II's PONTIFICATE:  A PERIOD OF GRAVEST TRIBULATION FOR THE CHURCH

 

A TREMENDOUS ORDEAL

And in the case where a "new theologian" should one day accede to the chair of St. Peter? In such a case, the Church undoubtedly suffers an unparalleled ordeal of stupendous gravity and proportions. And this for several reasons.

First of all, since it is a question of neo-modernism, "They lay the axe not to the branches and shoots, but to the very root, that is, to the Faith and its deepest fibers" (St. Pius X, Pascendi). Moreover, these theological errors are destined to profoundly influence the Catholic world, since Catholics are quite used to the (mistaken) idea that the pope's personal faith is identified with the Faith of the Church.
Also to be noted is the fact that in the Catholic Church, more than in any other society, has been borne out that old saying, Ad instar Principis totus componitur orbis: (The whole world falls into line with the see, the seat, of the Prince - Peter). And for this reason, a pope is able to impose de facto, without any formal imposition whatsoever, a heretical orientation to the entire Church. We have witnessed this with Pope Paul VI's "discreet" activities favoring neo-modernism or the "new theology."

The test we are now facing is one of tremendous proportions, but in no way is it insurmountable. Let us proceed step by step.

 

KAROL WOJTYLA AS A "NEW THEOLOGIAN"

If Pope Paul VI proved to be an authentic admirer of the "new theologians," John Paul II is, on the other hand, personally quite in favor of the "new theology." Fr. Johannes Dörmann, the famous German theologian, absorbed in thought over the scandalous Assisi affair, has proven this to be true in his dispassionate, objective and scientific study of Karol Wojtyla's writings, L'étrange théologie de Jean-Paul II (soon to be published in English by Angelus Press with the title: Pope John Paul II's Theological Journey to the Prayer Meeting of Religions at Assisi).

This work, the first volume of a three-volume series, carefully considers the "theology" which inspired the ecumenical initiative of Assisi. The author finds that this same "theology" was already clearly evident in Wojtyla's writings whether in his capacity as professor, bishop, or cardinal. Fr. Dörmann then sets out to demonstrate that the self-same "new theology" constitutes the core recurring theme in John Paul II's doctrinal encyclicals (second volume) and has also served to inspire his pastoral trips to Africa and Asia (third volume). We will now outline the contents of the first volume:

The basic error in Pope John Paul II's "theology," which serves as the foundation of his ecumenism and therefore of the Assisi initiative, is expressed in the following: not only did Jesus Christ die for all men [as the Catholic Church teaches], but [and herein lies the innovation] each and every human being is "whether he knows it or not, whether he accepts it or not, in the faith" (K. Wojtyla, Segno di Contradizione, chap. 11). Each is, from the very beginning, since his birth, in a state of effective redemption even if he is unaware of this fact. And this holds true for all men of all ages and places.

This thesis flies in the very face of Holy Scripture, Tradition, as well as the Catholic Church's dogmatic teachings, and according to Fr. Dörmann's personal judgment, has no solid base even in the texts of the last Council. It is, on the other hand, found to be tied in with the "new theology" which affirms the unconditional salvation of all mankind, a universal redemption not only objective but subjective as well. Not only can everyone be saved, but all are, as a matter of fact, already saved (this reminds us of Von Balthasar's "Hell does indeed exist, but it is empty"). This "new" conception of subjective redemption or universal justification has served as a springboard to launch a "new" ecclesiology together with a new concept of Revelation and Faith.

 
A NEW ECCLESIOLOGY

If the Son of God, as Wojtyla the "theologian" would have it, has, by His Incarnation, united Himself to "every man," if "existence in Christ" is the religious "dimension of every human being, of every real and historical man" from the very first instant of his existence "whether he wants it or not, whether he accepts it or not" (and therefore independently of the Faith or of Baptism) is supernaturally united to Christ, it must then follow:

1. that every human being belongs, in some way or other, to the {Catholic} Church;

2. that the Church coincides with all of humanity, which, with Christ, constitutes an organism naturally supernatural, so to speak.

It is evident that the resulting notion of the Church is essentially changed under these conditions while the distinctions between nature and grace, between Church and humanity, are utterly destroyed. All of which, we might add, Blondel and De Lubac were precisely aiming at all along, since the modernists, going against the teachings of the Church considered such a distinction as an intolerable "dualism" to be discarded at all costs.

 
A “NEW” NOTION OF REVELATION
Thus, according to John Paul II's "new theology," there remains no essential difference between the Church and humanity in their "profound being" since the same "profound being" is the very same "existence in Christ." They can only be distinguished by the degree of awareness they have of their profound being (this is in substance, Karl Rahner, S.J.'s theory of "anonymous Christians" as well as Von Balthasar's "anonymous Christianities"). And here we behold the emergence of a "new" notion of Revelation.

Neo-modernism would have us believe that Our Lord Jesus Christ did nothing else than "fully manifest man to himself," not at all by revealing to man (as the Catholic Church has always done) his original state of sinner as well as his radical and essential need of redemption, which he is able to attain only through Baptism and the true Faith. Contrary to the Church's constant teaching, modernists want to make us believe that Our Lord came to make known to men their original state of unconscious but automatic and real redemption, that is, their state of being naturally "supernatural." As a matter of fact, neo-modernism claims that it is only this state of unconsciousness, which distinguishes the Christian from the non-Christian. This external "revelation" of Christ is considered to be of secondary importance and not at all strictly necessary, since there may exist, and there also does indeed necessarily exist, an interior revelation, common to all men (faithful as well as infidels) and to all religions (amongst which, therefore, we are no longer able to distinguish the true one from the myriads of false ones).

 
A “NEW” NOTION OF FAITH

In such a fool's paradise, "faith" becomes nothing more than a vague awareness of that which pre-exists in man, of some innate original "supernature" implicit in human nature. This same awareness may occur, yes, thanks to Christ's revelation; but it also may occur and indeed does necessarily manifest itself in the "faith" of the "anonymous Christians" (who, therefore, are no longer infidels) as well as in the "anonymous Christianities" (which can no longer, therefore, be considered false religions).

 
THE "THEOLOGY" OF ASSISI

It is from such a "most admired disorder" that the "irreversible" ecumenical dialogue has come about; a dialogue which, as we must add, constitutes the "new" notion of mission. From these obviously non-Christian origins appeared that scandalous initiative of Assisi, the "spirit" of which is indeed evident in Pope John Paul II's "new theology":

"Universal redemption is the common base…All religions contain true revelations, knowledge and have experience of God. Faith includes all of the 'faithful' of all religions. Faith is faith in humanity. But that ‘revelation offered to mankind in Christ,’ the Christian Faith, therefore is...the faith which truly and definitively explains the 'mystery of man,' 'the existence in Christ' [whence comes the appeal to Christ in John Paul's final speech at Assisi].

This 'offer' is not, however, at all necessary for salvation, nor is it exclusive or unique. Indeed, there are also to be found in other religions revelation, faith, and experience of God. It is on the basis of religious liberty, of inter-faith dialogue, together with fraternal exchanges of religious experience with a view of mutual enrichment that can now be seen open before us that path paved with gold leading to religious peace" (Dormann, op. cit. pp. 150-151).

Space prevents the publication of the entire quotation in this issue, so we refer our readers to Fr. Dormann's work for full data relating to this text.
 

BACK TO MODERNISM

There is no denying the fact that, with Pope John Paul II's "new theology," we have come full circle back to modernism which reduces the Faith (as well as Divine Revelation itself or at least its principles) to the level of religious sense and (religious) experience: "is it not God manifesting Himself, indistinctly, it is true, in this same religious sense, to the soul? ..." (St. Pius X, Pascendi). (This helps to explain Pope John Paul II's favoring a charismatic Church more or less based on people's feelings).

There necessarily follows the complete elimination of all trace of difference between natural and supernatural religion together with the equivalence (i.e., practical equality) of all religions, which are simultaneously able to claim to be both natural and supernatural. According to this false line of "reasoning," Christianity just like the other religions which have sprung up from religious "geniuses" would have taken its origin not from heaven, but from Christ's religious subconscious, "a man of exquisite nature, the like of which had never been seen before nor will ever be seen again" (ibid.) and from primitive Christian communities.

Revelation, for man, is simply reduced to some consciousness of his personal relationship with God and is common to all religions. Christian revelation has been the awareness of this relationship for the man Jesus; in the other religions it was for Buddha, Mohammed, etc. As for Tradition, it does not consist in the transmission of divinely revealed truths, but rather in the renewal of this personal and subjective religious experience for each and every individual in the course of time and successive generations, and in this sense, it constitutes what is now called a living Tradition.

As a consequence, "some, in a thinly disguised manner, others quite openly, hold all religions to be true…In this contest of religions, the most that can be said in favor of the Catholic religion is that it is the truest one," given the "exquisite nature" of Christ; and we should bring the non-believer to experience the Catholic religion...the same one founded by Jesus Christ, that is to say, that product of a progressive development of the (religious) germ which he brought to the world" (ibid.).

"The study of anthropology," wrote Tyrell (English leader of modernism), "does not allow us to affirm...that God has not gradually revealed Himself in each soul's moral and social life and especially in Christ's soul as well as in the life of all religions and particularly in the life of Christianity…"

In future times, religiosity will be the result of inductive reflection on past and present forms of religion, of their study in so far as they are inspired by that light of Truth which enlightens every man coming into this world, and to the extent that each one (of these forms) represents, in a special manner, an effort on the part of the Divine Spirit to make himself intelligible to man in harmony with the other degrees of his moral, mental, and social development" (Rinnovamento, July-August 1907, "Per la sincerita").

This provides us with a precise description of the "spirit of Assisi," while also bringing to light those secret motivating forces behind John Paul II's constant "pastoral" trips to Asia and Africa (including his "ecumenical" encounter with voodoo sorcerers).

"If you see me traveling the length and breadth of the whole world in my efforts to meet with people of all civilizations and religions, it is because I have faith in the seeds of wisdom which the Spirit has planted in the conscience of all these various peoples, tribes and clans; from these hidden grains will come the true resource for the future of mankind in this world of ours" (John Paul II's speech to youth in Ravenna, May 11, 1986, quoted in Tutte le encicliche dei Sommi Pontefici, ed. dall'Oglio, p.1821).

 

THE "MASTERS"

Which road did Wojtyla the theologian take on the pilgrimage to modernism? He simply followed the crooked paths and byways of the "new theology." Those who "think they have won" are today indeed much less discreet than they were in former times (e.g., before Vatican II) and so, in one of the addresses delivered at the inauguration of the "Maurice Blondel Archives Center" affiliated with the (formerly) Catholic University of Louvain, it is made unmistakably clear that for Blondel "the supernatural is not a nature to which something (grace) has been added; it is, in reality, simply the liberation of all nature, it is the participation in divine liberty" (Center d'Archives Maurice Blondel. Journees d'inauguaration 30-31 mars 1973. Textes des interventions, p. 59).

This radical distorting and tampering with the basic Catholic notion of supernature, consisting in a falsification obstinately upheld and defended by modernists such as Blondel and De Lubac, is absolutely bound to take them down that same blind alley where John Paul II's "new theology" is to be found at the present time: to the abolition of all distinction between nature and grace (if the supernatural is implicit in human nature, all men are therefore in the state of grace "whether they know it or not, whether they accept it or not through faith") and inevitably to the heresy of subjective universal redemption, to the identification of humanity with the Church, to the corruption of the idea of Revelation and of Faith, and so on.

For example, already for De Lubac, the manifestation of supernature being implied in human nature and which therefore can be explained by this same human nature turns Christ's revelation into a fact of secondary importance, of minor interest:

"From this it follows that strictly speaking, man does not need another revelation to know his God: quite apart from any supernatural intervention, this 'natural revelation' would be quite sufficient in itself": Sulle vie di Dio, p.210).This quotation from a "master of modernism" serves quite well to make us understand that the "new theology" does indeed lay the axe "not to the branches and shoots, but to the very root, that is, to the Faith and its deepest fibers" (Pope St. Pius X, Pascendi).


PAPAL AUTHORITY AT THE SERVICE OF THE "NEW THEOLOGY"

This can easily be verified by the ecumenical initiative of Assisi. However, given the extreme gravity of this assertion, we will now quote yet other facts which, taken in their entirety, will be quite sufficient to dispel any lingering doubts.

Already in the very heart of the inaugural encyclical of his pontificate (Redemptor Hominis), John Paul II reveals his thesis of a universal and subjective redemption which Pope John Paul II reads into Gaudium et Spes (no.22), and to the drafting of which he had collaborated during the Council: "By His incarnation, He, the Son of God, has in a certain way, united Himself with each man"(Tulle le encicliche dei Sommi Pontifici, ed. dall'Oglio).

And now, as if to confirm the fact that the inspiration of John Paul II has not changed, Christoph Schonborn warns us in L'Osservatore Romano that the "key text" of the new "Catechism" is taken from Gaudium et Spes (no. 22) (L'Osservatore Romano, 12-1-1993).

 We have already mentioned John Paul II's worldwide voyages. All the ecumenical initiatives and speeches of the present pontificate have their basis and explanation, not in Catholic doctrine, but in the aforementioned "new theology": everything is centered upon man and his full development which is supposed to also comprise an awareness in himself of an immanent supernature within each man independently of Faith and Baptism "whether he knows it or not, whether he accepts it or not by faith."

If Paul VI chose to celebrate Teilhard de Chardin at the closing ceremonies of the Sixth International Thomistic Congress, John Paul II went even further still: On May 12, 1981, on the occasion of the centennial of the birth of the monistic-pantheistic Jesuit, Teilhard de Chardin, the Secretariat of State sent "in the name of the Holy Father" a highly laudatory and favorable letter to the rector of the Institut Catholique of Paris. And in this message the Pope praises "the wonderful repercussions of his [Teilhard's] research and investigations as well as the marked influence of his personality and the richness of his thought." In this note, Teilhard is described as a man seized by Christ in the depths of his being, ever anxious to hold in high regard both faith and the answer of reason, thereby containing almost by anticipation, John Paul's appeal:
"Be not afraid; open, open wide the doors to Christ, those immense fields of culture, of civilization, of development."

All in all, [de Chardin was] a precursor of Wojtyla's pontificate (cf. L'Osservatore Romano, June 10, 1981, and SI SI NO NO, June 15,1981).

And yet, barely twenty years earlier, the Holy Office had promulgated a monitum against Teilhard. Even though he had restrained himself somewhat (this was at the time of John XXIII, and Montini's influence was making itself felt), he was warned that his writings "are full of such ambiguities, and even of the gravest of errors, which constitute an outrageous attack upon Catholic doctrine." And again recently, on February 11th, 1993, Pope John Paul II sent - this time under his own signature and always in the same line of (modernist) thought - a public message to the Archbishop of Aix to celebrate the centennial anniversary of the publication of Blondel's L’Action:

"As we recall that work, we wish, first of all, to honor its author who, in his thoughts as well as in his life, succeeded in blending the most rigorous critique and the most courageous [or bold-spirited] philosophical research with the most authentic Catholicism by drawing, as he did, from those rich sources of dogmatic, patristic, and mystical tradition" (L'Osservatore Romano, May 12, 1993, p.5).

This is nothing but the posthumous ratification or approval of Blondel's (and later on, De Lubac's) heretical pretensions of having discovered, after a rather long lapse of two thousand years, what is called "authentic Christianity" (cf. Courrier de Rome, 146 [336], May 1993).

Nor is this all. We have presented documented evidence of Blondel's open and obstinate contempt for the Magisterium of the Church, and have also recalled his "reflections," that is, his (vain) attempts, which never convinced anyone, to "explain" in an orthodox sense his own erroneous ideas in order not to bring down upon himself the righteous censures of the Church which would certainly have delayed as well as embarrassed him no end (cf. Courrier de Rome, 145 [335], April 1993). Pope John Paul II, however, on this same occasion, has nothing but praise for this modernist's "courage as a thinker, together with his unfailing loyalty to, and love for, the Church." And Pope John Paul II goes one step further as he urges "today's philosophers and theologians" to follow in Blondel's footsteps who "relentlessly pursued his work while untiringly and obstinately (sic) explaining his thoughts without ever repudiating their inspirations" (cf. L'Osservatore Romano op. cit.).

 
THE TACIT REPUDIATION OF HUMANI GENERIS

Under Pope John Paul II's pontificate, the other founding fathers of the "new theology" were able, already in their lifetime, to bask in their share of (the modernistic) glory. On February 2, 1983, Pope John Paul II bestowed the cardinal's hat on De Lubac who was then almost eighty years of age. This papal action constituted a de facto rehabilitation, absolutely unjustified, as well as an unjustifiable repudiation of Pope Pius XII's encyclical Humani Generis. In the Catholic world, this was taken as a certain sign of the new pope's "new" theological direction. On January 7, 1983, Present, a Parisian daily (newspaper) made the following pointed observation:

"We have often wondered for what reason Fr. Wojtyla, who had studied theology in Rome under Pope Pius XII, had, subsequently, almost never referred to that great pope's doctrinal teachings. The explanation lies simply in the fact that he had theologically chosen to follow De Lubac (one of the "fathers" of the "new theology") rather than Pius XII. This fact is more readily understood at the present time."

On the occasion of the venerated Card. De Lubac's death, L'Osservatore Romano (May 9, 1991) made public, on its first page, the contents of two telegrams sent by His Holiness John Paul II: the first one, to Card. Lustiger, Archbishop of Paris, and the other one to the Superior General of the Company of Jesus (Jesuits).

The first telegram is as follows:

"Recalling the long and faithful service accomplished by this theologian who succeeded in collecting and saving the best of Catholic tradition in his meditations on the Church and the modern world, I fervently beg Christ the Savior to grant him the reward of His eternal peace."

And the second telegram:

"For many years, I had greatly appreciated the vast culture, spirit of self sacrifice, and intellectual integrity, which have all served to make of this model religious an outstanding servant of the Church, particularly on the occasion of Vatican Council II."

There followed, on page 6, the deceased's curriculum vitae prepared by L'Osservatore Romano's editorial staff which, on the 8th and 11th of September, went right on celebrating the memory of the "father" of "new theology," previously condemned by Pope Pius XII in his encyclical Humani Generis.

While alive, Hans von Balthasar was glorified by Pope John Paul II. And not only he, but also the lady whom he had described as being his theological "better half" Adrienne von Speyr. In 1985, with the publicity being provided by L'Osservatore Romano, a symposium was held in Rome on Adrienne the "mystic," and Von Balthasar in Premessa, and Il Nostro Compito, made it publicly known that this event constituted the realization of a "desire expressed in 1983 by the Holy Father." Von Balthasar himself was promoted to cardinal (June 1988) but died on the very eve of being awarded his "well-deserved honorary distinction" (Card. Ratzinger). However, Ratzinger himself declared in his funeral oration:

"That which the Pope wished to express by this gesture of gratitude and acknowledgment or, rather, of honor, remains valid."

How can we blame him (for publicly declaring the unvarnished truth of the matter)? Nevertheless, it 'is' a fact that this gesture of gratitude, or rather, of honor, on the part of the Pope, has been addressed to the pseudo-theology of a pseudo-theologian who has wearily trudged "along the path of sheer personal fancy, of error, and of heresy". (cf. Courrier de Rome, 147 (337) June 1993; for Cardinal Ratzinger's homily, see H.W. von Balthasar, Figura e opera, p.541).

 
SUPREME CONTROL OF "NEW THEOLOGIANS" OVER THE CHURCH

In 1981, Pope John Paul II appointed the "new theologian" from Germany, Card. Joseph Ratzinger, Prefect of the Congregation for the Faith. And recently, the Pope confirmed him in this awesome office for yet a third five-year term (lustrum). This constitutes still one more clear and significant "gesture of gratitude or of honor" in favor of the "new theology." How, in these years of unparalleled crisis in the Church, has the ex-Holy Office (Congregation of the Holy Office: founded by Pope Paul III in 1542 "to combat heresy" - Ed.) defended orthodoxy (belief in the true Faith founded by our Lord Jesus Christ) against the most vicious attacks launched with impunity by the neo- modernists? Let us go back to Card. Ratzinger himself for an unmistakably clear answer to this vital question:

"The myth concerning the Vatican's severity with regard to progressive deviations appeared as being the result of wild and useless imaginings. Up to this very day and in no case whatsoever have we ever resorted to, nor imposed canonical sanctions or penalties (on anyone): we have simply limited ourselves to admonishing the guilty wrongdoers" (keynote-speech delivered at the Christian Episcopal Conference, cf. Courrier de Rome, 97 [287] November 1988).

To the "new theologians," on the other hand, Joseph Ratzinger did guarantee effective supremacy (control) over the Church (cf. Courrier de Rome, September 1993).

In 1985, there was held in Rome a Synod on the occasion of the twentieth anniversary of Vatican II (1962-1965). Still another "new theologian," Walter Kasper, another of Ratzinger's "old friends," was appointed (the official) theologian of that synod. Yet Kasper openly denies the historical authenticity as well as the reliability or trustworthiness of the Holy Gospels. Also, "in the light of the criticisms of forms" (or Formgeschichte), he considers that the miracles wrought by Jesus have simply been invented, from the calming of the tempest (Mt. 8:26) to the resurrection of Lazarus (Jn. 11), including Jesus Christ our Lord's bodily Resurrection, Whom Kasper does not even believe to be God the Son (cf. W. Kasper, Jesus le Christ and Courrier de Rome 105 (295) July-August 1989). In 1989, this same Kasper who is also a member of the International Theological Commission, was appointed Bishop of Rottenburg-Stuttgart... without withdrawing one iota of his formal heresies. There is no question here of personal favors between "old comrades," or, in any case, not only of that, but first and foremost, it is always a question of significant "gestures of gratitude" (or "honor") in favor of a very specific "theological" current (i.e., modernism). Careerists (those intent mainly on personal advancement and success in this life) know quite well to which devil they are required to sell their souls.

 
COMMUNIO'S SUPPORTER

In 1992, under Ratzinger's patronage, a celebration took place in Rome in commemoration of the twentieth anniversary of the review Communio, the official mouthpiece of "those who think they have won." On May 29th, Pope John Paul II received in audience the editors and writers from several countries and later gave a solemn speech in which he recalled "with gratitude the memory of two of its original promoters, eminent theologians of catholicity: Card. Hans Urs von Balthasar, and Fr. Henri de Lubac."

He went on to exhort the editors of Communio to always be a ferment of communion and of "unity in diversity" according to the thought of Von Balthasar. In a reminiscent mood, he confided: "In my capacity as Archbishop of Krakow, I had the occasion of encouraging and promoting the Polish edition (of Communio)" (cf. Communio June-July 1992). We can then well understand why De Lubac, while Paul VI was still very much alive, used to tell his friends, "the day when we will need a (new) pope, I have my candidate: Wojtyla" (30Days,July 1985: Angelo Scola's interview with De Lubac).

Space compels us to bring this study to a close. But before doing so, and in order to complete the overview of the present modernist crisis, let us just mention George Cottier, official theologian of the Papal Palace, and other Communio collaborators who have been appointed bishops. These pass themselves off as conservatives, when in reality they are modernists. Also, let us consider that the nominations to the various Roman Commissions and Congregations are introducing more and more "new theologians" into the councils of the Church's governing body.

Can the reader entertain doubts to the direction, which Cardinal Wojtyla increasingly gives to the Church? Even Civilta Cattolica" always considered to be the indicator of the Holy See's intentions and orientations, has transformed itself into an official "new theology" mouthpiece. Yes, the so-called Catholic press, from Avvenire to the small parish bulletin, falls in (the modernist) line, for the saying goes: Ad instar Principis totus componitur orbis (The whole world falls in line with the see, seat, of the Prince-Peter).

 
OUR PRESENT GRAVE AND FATEFUL DUTY

No wonder, then, after having taken all these clearly substantiated and irrefutable facts into consideration, that the current crisis now striking the Church has been aptly compared to the Arian crisis, which constituted “a menace for the entire Church," (St. Vincent de Lerins, Commonitorium). Any sound theologian knows that papal infallibility "does not mean personal steadfastness or firmness in the Faith," "nor does it guarantee him some personal infallibility" (Bartmann, Manuel de Theologie Dogmatique). Such a theologian is also fully aware that, in the present case, papal infallibility is completely out of the question.

Moreover, this scholar knows full well that in Catholic theology, there is also the question of the possibility of a "heretical pope," which has been the object of sharp discussions in some of the darker periods of the history of the papacy. The present ordeal, on the other hand, is particularly intense for those Catholics who, not being grounded in sound theology, are long used to erroneously extending papal infallibility to every single act of the Sovereign Pontiff, especially as a private person. An enormous ordeal indeed, but, as we previously remarked, not insurmountable. To overcome the scandal of the present hour, true Catholics must hold fast to some simple truths of the Faith:

1. God can in no way ever contradict Himself and therefore the Holy Ghost cannot nowadays nor at any time in the future inspire developments in doctrine or customs in contradiction with those He had inspired in previous times.

2. Divine Revelation ceased definitely with the death of the last Apostle, and for this reason neither the Church nor the Pope can add or remove anything whatsoever from it.

3. Neither to the Church nor to the Pope has there been promised the revelation of new truths (and even less of contradictory "truths"), but on the contrary, they have been promised God's help to announce those previously-revealed divine truths as well as in judging, on the basis of divine revelation, any and all eventual doctrinal controversies. Therefore no pope is able to contradict anything, which was formerly always to be found in the "Deposit of Faith."  "To Peter's successors, the Holy Ghost has been promised not in order that they should teach a new doctrine through His revelation but rather, with His assistance, that they should keep and explain in a faithful and godly manner the revelation transmitted through the intermediacy of the Apostles, that is to say, the Deposit of Faith, i.e., the sum total of truths revealed by Christ, taught infallibly by the Church, and witnessed by Scripture and Tradition" (Vatican I Constitution De Ecclesia, Denzinger, 1836).

4. The divine gift of infallibility has been promised not only to the present Pope but to all the popes of all times, and therefore no present Pope can contradict any or all previous popes.

5. Infallibility is not just for the Pope but for the whole Universal Church (that is, for the Church established throughout the world and at all times) (cf. Vatican I, Denzinger, 1839). Therefore no pope can contradict that which, in the Church, has always been believed, everywhere and by all (quod semper, quod ubique, quod ab omnibus creditum est).

6. That in any conceivable future conflict between the Pope of today and the Popes of yesterday, between the Pope of today and the Church of all times and places, the faithful Catholic must remain firmly attached to the Popes of all time as well as to the Faith of the universal Church as St. Thomas Aquinas rightly teaches (Summa Theologica, Part IIa IIae, Question 2, article 3).

The above basic truths are put forward to sincere Catholics by their sensus fidei as well as their common sense. We may also add that whenever a pope, instead of keeping and proclaiming divinely-revealed Truth which has always been taught since the beginning of the Church, sets out to follow his own erroneous personal opinions which contradict this Truth, he is not at that moment acting in his capacity as pope. It thus follows that he may neither lawfully require others to obey him (in his errors) nor may the faithful be obliged to follow him in his errors.

This may grieve us, but should come as no surprise. The exact notion of infallibility does not, in fact, exclude the possibility of such an unfortunate and tragic circumstance. The divine gift of infallibility simply means that God's active assistance will, with the greatest possible certitude, prevent any pope from imposing formally, ex cathedra, his own errors upon the whole Church, although he may attempt to impose them in fact if not formally (through speeches, writings, acts of his administration, etc).

When, in the course of Vatican I, the final drafting of the Constitution on Papal Infallibility was presented to the bishops, the official and chief editor, Bishop Gasser of Bressanone clearly explained its exact meaning: "If the entire Church should ever face the danger of being led astray through the bad faith and negligence of a pope... Christ's vigilance... would prevent an infallible declaration (Si per malum fidem et negligentiam pontificis, universalis ecclesia in errorem induci possit... tutela Christi...iudicium tale impediretur, Mansi 52, col. 1212-1214).

Papal infallibility, therefore, does not at all guarantee that the Faith of the whole world will never be exposed to danger by the "negligence" or even by the "bad faith" of one of Peter's successors, but only guarantees that the tutela Christi (the divine assistance) will prevent an infallible declaration, ex cathedra, in such deplorable and unfavorable circumstances. Just as it has, in fact, happened in the present crisis, beginning with Vatican II, which, the Pope assured during the Council, was to be simply of a "pastoral" nature (and not doctrinal as were all the twenty other Ecumenical Councils).

And this is why theologians (we refer here only to true and sound theologians) know that papal infallibility has absolutely nothing to do with the present crisis in the Church. This fact does not, of course eliminate the terribly harsh and cruel ordeal presently inflicted upon the faithful sons and daughters of the Church who, in order to save their souls, must maintain their own Faith intact in spite of the hardships and difficulties in these tragic times. And we must admit that these circumstances depend upon the one presently occupying Peter's Chair. These faithful souls must also now prove their fidelity to Jesus Christ as well as to His Church (which is not at all to be identified with the personal theological theories of a pope).

Today's tragedy will prove to be even graver still for the young who risk knowing only "a false 'Christian' religion, which is far removed from the true Church of Christ" (Pius XI's encyclical Mortalium Animos, which constitutes an early papal condemnation of the present-day false ecumenism).

The gravity of the hour therefore imposes equally grave obligations upon one and all, each according to his state of layman, priest, theologian, bishop, cardinal or pope. Beyond our solemn duties of prayer and penance (so insistently asked for by the Immaculate Mother of God at Lourdes and Fatima) we are all duty-bound to oppose the current modernistic ecclesial direction by resolutely defending not only our own Faith, but also that of our brethren in Christ. To this end, each person must, according to his means, come now to the aid of the Church and even remind (if one's own state in life provides the occasion and even more so if it demands it) the present Pontiff to carry out his papal duties in accordance with his high office (cf. Col. 4:17).

All of this constitutes a grave duty of charity. Failing in these sacred duties would be equivalent to mortal sin, and to act otherwise would be tantamount to betraying Christ yet once again. Such a betrayal endangers one's own as well as other souls' eternal salvation whilst making oneself a wretched collaborator in the "self-destruction" of the Church.

Hirpinus (to be continued)

Translated from Courrier de Rome, October 1993
 

[Stone]

Si Si No No - October 1994 No. 10

They Think They've Won!

Part VIII

DISOBEDIENCE TO THE INFALLIBLE MAGISTERIUM: HALLMARK OF THE "NEW THEOLOGY"

In this series of articles, we have demonstrated that although it had been solemnly condemned and fought by Pope St. Pius X (Pascendi) as well as by his successors up to and including Pope Pius XII (Humani Generis), modernism continued to smolder like a sect within the Church itself. Finally, after several decades, the lengthy disobedience which had remained more or less under cover for so long, literally exploded at the time of the "pastoral" Vatican Council II with the tragic result that the "new theology" or neo-modernism is seen to triumph everywhere today - strong indeed, but not of the strength of truth. And this only because it was favored and promoted by those in ecclesiastical authority at every level, including the summit, to the devastation of the souls it deceives and betrays (and which forbids us, one and all, therefore, to remain silent in the face of such a mortal danger).

We have seen that neo-modernism is based on Blondel's false "Christian philosophy ." This self-deceived imposter, in his illusions of reconciling the Church with the "modern world," that is, with that cancer-ridden modern philosophy, which from its very beginning was fatally struck with the pestilence of skepticism and of subjectivism, perverted, as the modernists are wont to do, "the eternal notion of truth" (St. Pius X, Pascendi) and that of "supernature" and the supernatural order. True restoration in the Church will therefore come about by a return to traditional (Thomistic) philosophy.

We later illustrated the errors of Henri de Lubac, S.J.,"father" of a "new theology" which "evolves with the evolution of things - semper itura, numquam perventura - forever en route or on a journey, without ever reaching its goal" (Pius XII, Allocution of September 17, 1946).

We also expect to have thrown some light on Balthasar's obscure pseudo-theology, which has transferred Hegel's "philosophical delirium" into the ecumenical sphere. Next, we considered the thoughts and behavior of three high-ranking ecclesiastical authorities (although of different degrees of responsibility), and who therefore bear the greatest blame for the present-day triumph of the modernists: Paul VI (whom, properly speaking, we should define as a philomodernist), John Paul II (who is, on the other hand, a devotee of the "new theology") and Card. Ratzinger.

We have tried to bring to light, even more than the modernist errors, the contempt shown to the infallible magisterium of the Church - a contempt which the "new theology" wears like a badge. This allows us to judge it for what it really is as well as for what it seeks, even those of us who are neither philosophers nor theologians. This is, in fact, what the "new ecclesiastical direction" is aiming at: the blotting out of every trace of twenty centuries of Christianity, under the pretext of a "return to primitive Christianity" or to an "authentic Christianity" in the name of a "pastoral" Council (which the modernists, post factum, are belatedly striving to change into a "dogmatic" Council!). This is done also in the name of a "living magisterium" of today which heretically claims that the magisterium of "yesterday" is dead. An obviously heretical claim, since it would necessarily lead to the conclusion that "all the faithful throughout all the centuries, all the saints, all those who have kept chastity, continence or virginity, all the clerics, levites and priests, thousands upon thousands of confessors, the countless legions of martyrs, so many busy cities and populous countries, so many islands, provinces, kings, races, kingdoms, nations, in a word, almost the entire universe incorporated to Christ its Head, have all been unaware, have erred, blasphemed and in the course of all those past centuries, have not known or have completely ignored that in which they were supposed to believe" (St. Vincent of Lerins, Commonitorium) .


THE MYTH OF "RESTORATION"

Finally, we have demonstrated that the so-called "restoration" is simply nothing but a myth having its origin in the modest, moderated, and in itself quite insignificant "conflict" between the "moderate wing" (which presently wields power and authority in the Church) and the "extremist wing" or "integrist" wing of neo-modernism. All of those illusions born of this "conflict" should, by now, have been completely swept away by our study: there is not, nor can there be, any hope of "restoration" by those neo-modernists who obstinately continue to trudge their weary way along the path of "skepticism, fantasy, and of error."

It is of course true that de Lubac, Balthasar, Pope Paul VI, Card. Ratzinger, as well as Pope John Paul II himself have all, at one time or another, deplored some of the more flagrant post-conciliar abuses.

De Lubac, for example, wrote that "the Council has been betrayed...by the actions of what I may be permitted to call a para-council" (Mimoire autour de mes oeuvres). He seems also to share Villepelet's "worries":

"The obvious recklessness of our bishops, the political deviation of their cherished 'Catholic Action,' uncontrolled liturgical disorders, internal moral decay in seminaries, privileged treatment of defrocked priests, contempt for Tradition, notorious doctrinal (the Eucharist) and moral (marriage, etc...) carelessness, the enormous responsibility of certain 'Catholic' reviews..." (ibid.).

And those other neomodernists or philomodernists, "faithful" (to speak as Henrici does) to the "new theological line of Lyon," servilely echoed their "master."

Balthasar deplored the "trend or tendency favoring the 'selling-off of post-Conciliar ecumenism (Hans Urs von Balthasar, Figure et Oeuvre, p.435). Paul VI, in a discourse before the seminarians of Lombardy actually wept over the "self-destruction" of the Church: "The Church is, at the present time, sick with worry, with self-criticism; I would even say that it is in a period of self-destruction. The Church has reached the point of striking herself with mortal blows" (Il Populo, December 9, 1968). In a private interview with Guitton (a well-known journalist and personal friend of Paul VI - translator's note), he bemoans the fact that priests "have gotten into the bad habit of using only Canon II, which is the shortest and most expedient one." And in his last discussion, he went so far as to declare:

"Inside Catholicism itself, a non-Catholic way of thinking seems sometimes to have taken the upper hand, and it is possible that this same non-Catholic thinking will in tommorrow's world be the stronger one within Catholicism itself. But this new non-Catholic thought will never represent the thought of the Catholic Church. A small flock must survive, even though it be very tiny flock" (ibid., p.168).

Card. Ratzinger, in his book Entretien sur la Foi (Discourse on the Faith), has also deplored those "solitary breakaways ahead" (p. 32) and spoken, like de Lubac, of a "Council betrayed," of an "explosion of latent aggressive and centrifugal force within the very bosom of the Church" (p.31).

And last but by no means least, Pope John Paul II, on the occasion of a conference for the Missioni al Populo (Missions to the People), come directly to the point:

"In the present day Church, it must be admitted (with realism together with a deep and sorrowful awareness, that a very great number of Christians have become troubled, disoriented, perplexed, and even deceived; ideas which are in disaccord with that revealed truth taught by the Church since apostolic times, are currently widespread: veritable heresies have even flooded the fields of dogma and morals, giving rise to doubts, confusion and rebellion; liturgy has been altered; submerged as there are in today's intellctual and moral 'relativism, ' Christians are tempted by atheism, agnosticism, by a vaguely moralistic illuminism [Illuminism: the doctrine of certain marginal religious movements founded on the belief of an interior illumination, or on "revelations" directly inspired by God], by a sociological Christianity without any defined dogmas or objective morality whatsoever" (L'Osservatore Romano, February 7, 1981).

THE DREADFUL REALITY

This declaration as well as others, taken individually, could lead, and in fact, have led many persons to believe that the time for reflecting (on the present crisis) and, indeed, the time for the restoration is at hand. Sad to say, such is not the case; it is quite the contrary. Under the cover of this so called “restoration” the revolutionary “self destruction” of the Catholic Church continues unabated. In fact, all the neomodernist "moderates" should also be included in those remarks intended for Ratzinger.

First and foremost, the "moderates" deplore "abuses" as such, and not at all in relation to their own more moderate (and therefore even more dangerous) form of modernism which they have absolutely no intention of repudiating, and which they continue to uphold with a tenacity worthy of a better cause. The "conflict," neither deep nor serious, has already been described as a simple skirmish between those who think de Lubac to be already out of date (cf. Paul VI Secret, p.110), and those who have decided to remain "faithful" to him:

"We follow the line of the extreme center. No excessive attention to the magisterium [sic!] nor disputing. Neither right nor left. Our allegiance is to that tradition in the line of the "new theology" of Lyon [cradle of de Lubac's theology] which insists on the non-opposition between nature and supernature, that is, nature and supernature are really identically same things (and consequently) between faith and culture, and which has become the official theology of Vatican II" explained very clearly by Fr. Henrici in his interview with 3O days of December 1991.

And we have shown what the "line" has proven to be in this series of articles. Therefore, when de Lubac complains that the "Council has been betrayed," he means betrayed in relation to his own personal views and expectations, not in objective relation to the Catholic Faith. When Card. Ratzinger defends the "authentic Council," he means the Council interpreted in the light of the "new theology," and not at all in the light of Catholic Tradition. When John Paul II speak of the Council interpreted in the light of Tradition, he means: in the light of de Lubac's "tradition in the line of the "new theology" or with a tradition evolving with the evolution of the times and not in the light of unchanging Catholic Tradition. Villepelet's "worries" in his book Mimoire autour de mes oeuvres, nevertheless writes immediately after,

"Our 'post-Conciliar' age is certainly, even though it is going over some rather rough bumps, being visited, by the Spirit of God; I also believe such signs are beginning to make themselves manifest more and more [sic!] and I would like to repeat on my own behalf this sentence from a person who has recently written to me: 'Hope no longer seems to me to be a duty, but (to be) a springtime" (p.389).

These illusions concerning the "springtime of the Church" are having a hard time disappearing, thanks to the "new theology." Especially when their disappearance directly depends on the humbly confessed avowal of one's own errors and personal responsibilities in the present day disaster. And in fact, the "father" of the "new theology" maintained right to the very end of his life that he had never "found the means nor felt the need to clarify anything else" (30 Days, July 1985) regarding his false notion of "supernature" (or of the supernatural order), which is, nevertheless at the base of all the errors and heresies of today's pseudo-theology, as Card. Siri masterfully pointed out in his book Gethsemani, and as L 'Osservatore Romano itself admitted (on September 8, 1991):

"Henri de Lubac is, without the slightest doubt, one of the great founding fathers contemporary Catholic theology. Neither Karl Rahner nor, even less, Hans Urs voh Balthasar, is think able without him."

As for Balthasar, even though deploring the "trend to selling off' present-day (false) ecumenism, he does not in the least renounce his "ecumenical delirium," of a "catholicity which leaves nothing out," of, a super-Church without any "confessional determination at all,"  And de Lubac, which (but now this is Pope Pius XII speaking) everybody, yes, will be united, but in a common ruin" (Humani Generis). And although Pope Paul VI weeps over the "self-destruction" of the Church, and in Paul VI Secret deplores the fact that priests are in the "bad habit" of using "the shortest and most expedient" Canon, yet does he continue to maintain that with the liturgical reform 

"not only have we retained the past, but we have once again found the source which is the most ancient, the most primitive tradition and which is also the closest to the Church's origins. Now over the centuries, the light of this tradition was 'hidden under a bushel,' and particularly at the time of the Council of Trent" (Paul VI Secret, p.158).

Unbelievable, incredible, words coming from a Pope's lips, yet tragically true. In any case, what would the Catholic Church be if it had hidden or caused to be hidden that vital Tradition, and was only now beginning to rediscover it? In such a case, it surely could not be the Church of Christ to which infallibility had been promised for the unaltered protection of the "Deposit of the Faith." And although Pope Paul VI, in his last interview with Jean Guitton, prophesying in the manner of Caiphas (Jn.11:51 ff), foresaw a general apostasy and a very small "remnant" of true faithful, yet this same Paul VI demonstrated very clearly, through his unjust judgment of Archbishop Lefebvre and the latter's undeserved condemnation, his hostility towards the "little flock" which through love for the Church disapproved of his tenacious work of destruction.

As for Ratzinger, if in his Entretien sur la Foi (Discourse on the Faith) he deplores those "solitary breakaways ahead of the pack," in the very same breath he excludes "any possibility of a return to the Church's pre-Vatican II status":

"If by 'restoration' a return to a pre-Vatican II position is meant, then there is no possibility of a restoration. The Church is marching along the road of History's fulfillment, its eyes riveted upon the coming Lord. No, we have no intention of going back nor can we do so" (Entretien sur la Foi, p.40).

And what in the world would Card. Ratzinger have liked and would still like to see? A "quiet evolution" of doctrine where "quiet" does not at all mean coherent and in harmony with two thousand years of Christianity:

"We must remain faithful to the present  day, not to its past, nor to its future. And this present day of the Church consists in the documents of Vatican II in their authenticity" (Entretien sur la Foi, p.32).

Those sections are included where those documents (cf. Nostrae Aetate, Dignitatis Humanae, etc.) are in flagrant contradiction with the constant, traditional teaching of the Church.

And even though John Paul II, at the beginning of his pontificate, deplored the fact that veritable heresies had even then (February 1981) flooded the fields of dogma and morals, he has, nevertheless declared that the new ecclesiastical course is "irreversible," and he continues to support and defend it with a resolution and firmness worthy of that cause which is its exact opposite. If needed, confirmation of what has been affirmed here is seen in the consistent behavior of those invested with (supreme) authority in the Church with regard to extreme modernists: neither Paul VI, nor Ratzinger, nor John Paul II has ever engaged his unquestionable authority to repress those very same "abuses" that each had personally and publically deplored. Then, in modernist fashion, these same authorities, after having bewailed these "abuses," seem to acknowledge that they do indeed have a stimulating role to play in the "evolution" of the Church's doctrine and institutions (cf. St. Pius X - Pascendi, and Courrier de Rome, September 1993).

Their aversion and their disciplinary measures (from ostracism to excommunication) are reserved for those who resist so as to remain faithful to the doctrine of the Church.


NOT MODERATED, BUT INCOHERENT

If, therefore, we stop to simply consider the criticism leveled at some of the post-Conciliar frenzy, we are indeed able to accept and agree with those many declarations of de Lubac, of Balthasar, of Paul VI, of Ratzinger as well as of John Paul II. If, however, we consider what those authorities seek to establish in God's Holy Church, we behold that they only seek to lay down and impose those very same bases from which have sprung the countless "abuses" which they now deplore. At this juncture, their so called "moderation" is seen for what it really is: either a typically modernist tactic to block undesired and/or delayed-effect reactions, or simply the inability of going to the very bottom of things in order to draw all the conclusions from their own modernist errors.

Already at the dawn of this century, Pope Pius X, in his encyclical Pascendi, while making a clear distinction between a "moderate" type and an integrist version of modernism, observed that the latter was more coherent than the former, both starting out with the same false assumptions; the "extreme" modernists leap immediately to find conclusions, while the "moderates," on the contrary, take it step by step. In order to dispel any illusion that it is possible to remain in a half-way position, the Holy Pontiff St. Pius X in this admirable encyclical went to great lengths to draw forth all the ruinous consequences flowing from those errors upon which modernism had been founded. For so doing, that Holy See was violently taken to task by the modernists of his day (as well as by those of today), who accused him of exaggerating the consequences and repercussions of modernism.

The simple truth of the affair, however, is that, however unable and/or unwilling as they are to go to the very bottom of the matter so as to draw all the conclusions from their own erroneous bases, this does not alter the fact that once these false propositions are laid down and accepted, disastrous consequences will inevitably follow. A "small" initial error on the level of principles will most certainly result in great and grave consequences which many, while upholding an error of principle, are utterly unable to foresee.

And yet, St. Pius X solemnly declared:

"Further, we admonish professors to bear well in mind that they cannot set aside St. Thomas Aquinas, especially in metaphysical questions, without grave disadvantage" (Pascendi, no.45).

Parvus error in principio est magnus in fine, says St. Thomas. (A small error in principle becomes great in its end results). And Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P.,develops the point,

"They (the modernists) will certainly accuse us of exaggerating, but even a slight error on first notions and principles will inevitably have incalculable consequences which were not at all foreseen by those who have deceived themselves in this manner. The far-reaching consequences of these new theories of which we have just spoken [the "new theology"] will therefore spread way above and beyond any and all estimates of those authors quoted above [de Lubac, Bouillard, Fesard, etc...]" (Where Is the New Theology Taking Us? previously quoted).

And we know only too well, through bitter direct experience, that this is indeed what we are all seeing today.


THE "ORIGINAL SIN" OF MODERNISM

There is no moderation of modernism in sight, only cunning and trickery, or at the very best, an intellectual incoherence which, however, can by no means wash away the "moderate" modernists' "original sin" (modernism). A simple and humble act of true obedience to the infallible magisterium of the Church would have saved them from their own restrained delirium.

Lacordaire, following his harrowing "liberal" crisis wrote: "

After ten years of futile efforts in trying to imagine the true role of philosophy in the Church, where have I come to? To the very same ideas held by those who, unworried and untormented, have relied more on the mind of the Church than on their own. How deeply have I felt with admiration the superiority of the Church, that inexpressible instinct pressing it on its way, together with its divine discernment always unfailing in brushing aside even the shadow of illusion!"

Then, referring to Lamennais, who had fascinated him earlier, he confessed with great humility,

"It is truly a wonder to me how a philosophy, whose fatal weakness I now perceive so clearly, had been able to hold my powers of reasoning suspended, and for such a lengthy period of time. I finally came to realize that, struggling against an intelligence vastly superior to my own, I was fighting against impossible odds. For truth is sometimes not a sufficient aid to re-establish the equilibrium of forces; otherwise, error would never triumph over truth. Therefore, there must exist in this world a power able to support weak intellects against powerful intellects, and which delivers them from the most terrible oppression, that of the spirit...I learned from my own experience that the Church is the great liberator of the human spirit; and since all the other forms of liberty spring from intellectual liberty, I finally perceived under their true light, those burning questions dividing today's world" (Lacordaire, Considérations sur le systeme philosophique de M. de la Mennais).

This is precisely where the "original sin" of the modernists (moderate or not) is to be found: relying on their own fallible intellects, rather than trusting to the infallibility of the Church which alone could preserve them from error as well as from their own intellectual weaknesses. And this is precisely what all true sons of the Church must practice to oppose the modernist "novelties": a humble submission to the Church's infallible magisterium which alone is able to free our error-prone intellect from the oppression of false beliefs. It is of the utmost importance, however, never to confuse the Church's infallible magisterium with the personal theology of a "present-day pope," especially if he proves himself to be literally at odds with that same two-thousand-year-old magisterium which has always been found to be in constant harmony with all the popes of all ages, as well as with all the bishops of every times and place who were in communion with the Apostolic See: that which has always and everywhere been taught and believed by all in the Holy Church of God.


THIS IS YOUR HOUR AND THE POWER OF DARKNESS

It is only through the resolute return to Tradition on the part of the visible head of the Church (the pope) together with all his fellow members in the hierarchy that the vital and long-hoped-for restoration will finally come to pass. This alone can overcome the present ecclesiastical crisis which has been brought about through a prolonged period of "passive but real resistance" for Catholic Rome's sound directives. Nothing short of this will ultimately serve to wipe the slate clean of the deplorable long-standing "sin against the light coming from Rome, a light shining with the doctrinal treasures of the past" (La vie spirituelle 1923, pp.174-175, quoted by Aubry in L 'tude de la Tradition, p.102).

We can all rest assured that the blessed day marking the return of Catholic Tradition will ultimately dawn bright and clear. This is of Faith. If the present desolation to which the Church is reduced is not enough to show that "those who think they have won" have, quite on the contrary, already lost, it would suffice to simply recall Christ's promise: Portae inferi non praevalebunt; (the gates of Hell will never prevail against the Church of God.) Haec est hora vestra et potestas tenebrarum, (this is your hour and the power of darkness.)

This period of darkness behind us, someday all that will remain of the "new theology" and its partisans will be but a sad and unfortunate memory.

To us who, in this hour of darkness, must orient ourselves, whoever we may be, toward the door of eternal salvation, it appertains to resist fortes in fide (strong in Faith)(St. Peter), by praying, by opening our hearts to grace, and also by helping in the spiritual necessity of this grave hour those neighbors whom Divine Providence has put in our path.

- Hirpinus.
Translated from Courrier de Rome, November 1993

A Priest's Lamentation

It is a poor priest rather advanced in age who writes to you. In my case, your maxim must be applied: what counts is "what is said"and not "who said it."1...


...My vocation was born in the midst of Catholic action and its song: Always with the pope-even unto death. What a beautiful destiny. Already, as a young priest, that was my profound attitude. In the parish, the confessional, in preaching, in teaching; every word of the pope was authoritative. It was the Magisterium.

Is it still the case today? The question arises from the disappointment I experience before a pope in continual contradiction, and sometimes, on the borderline of heresy without being fully in it. I am reminded of the diligence of your paper in pointing out the heretical explanation by the Pope of descendit ad inferos (he descended into hell).2

It was a position of the "Holy Office"; it was not the only one and it will surely not be the last. Since he speaks all the time, this exposes him fatally not only to the inexactitudes of language, but it also renders his doctrine disputable and in certain cases, suspect of heresy. Yes, it is truly difficult, even for he who lives the faith to depend on the present Pope as the expression and the faithful echo of the Magisterium of all time.

However, what is infinitely more grave and what does not seem to phase the judgment of the bishops and the cardinals, not to speak of the theologians and insignificant journalists who oppose one to another "the Pope as restorer" and "the Pope as progressive," is the various positions of this Pope. The foundation is built upon:

a) the masonic substitution of anthropocentrism for theocentrism, that is, man-centeredness for God-centeredness.

b) the total suppression, in his teaching, of subjective redemption in favor of objective redemption.

c) an ecclesiology in which everything is relevant and current (ecumenical passion, dialogue, etc.), except an authentic notion of the Church.

In fact, the consistent repetitions by this Pope concerning man are known by all. When his discourse falls on "redeemed man," it no longer concerns the man who has adhered to Christ, who lives within the Church and by its sacraments, but man as such, who "whether he knows it or not," within the Church or out of it, is "a new creation in Christ." The lack of objective solidity of his ecclesiastical vision is then, logical. The three points cited above are in direct correlation with his blurred leadership. Regarding the Church, I see an umpteenth confirmation of what I am going to write below in this recent affirmation: "As the bishops of the churches which are in Italy..." No, this is wrong! Every good catechist knows it well. Those which are here called "churches" are not so, for in each one of them the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church is present. It is a case then of "dioceses," not "churches." By this manner of denumerating, one easily forgets that Rome is the principle and the foundation of the Catholic Church's unity. This concerns "fundamental" theology. Its absence is evident. But can a pope permit gaps this serious? And what can a poor priest do when he appeals to the pope, if the latter is no longer the Magisterium?


FOOTNOTES
1.      Allusion to the maxim of Si Si No No, taken from the Imitation of Christ: Do not seek to know who said it, but pay attention to what is said."
2.      Allusion to an article of Si Si No No dated June 15, 1989, under the title "To whom must we import the discourse of the Pope at the general audience of last January?"