THE CHURCH MILITANT - BELEAGUERED BY BERGOGLIANISM

As the 'youth synod' opens
by Robert Royal

WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 3, 2018

Note: I am in Rome for the Synod on “Young People, Faith, and Vocational Discernment,” which begins today. I’ll be here, Deo Volente, essentially the whole month of October. It’s an inopportune time for such an event:
- Tthe abuse crisis – and the involvement in that crisis of several bishops participating in the synod – have damaged the Church’s credibility with young people.
- The “Working Document” (Instrumentum Laboris) is cumbersome and deeply flawed – more sociology than theology – as our friends Archbishop Chaput and George Weigel have argued.
- And the “Instrumentum” betrays signs of wanting to move the Church more in the direction of secular culture rather than moving the culture in the direction of the Church.

But the show goes on. The Catholic Thing will be bringing you regular synod reports (daily, if warranted) from Rome, as well as our regular columns during October. This is a crucial moment: Oremus pro invicem. – R.R.



There was a time when Synods were blessedly boring affairs. Priests, bishops, cardinals, even popes would catch up on their sleep, or correspondence. It’s said that Pope John Paul II even sketched out a book while the proceedings of one such event droned on. Pope Francis has decided to make them much more active – and contentious – affairs.

Just yesterday, Cardinal Baldisseri, Secretary General of the Synod of Bishops, questioned the “loyalty and honesty” of Philadelphia Archbishop Charles Chaput. After the tumultuous 2015 Synod on the Family, Chaput was elected to the Council of the Synod of Bishops (basically the planning committee) with the most votes for any single candidate by the bishops of the whole world. His recent offense? Substantial criticisms of the Working Document intended to guide the month’s proceedings.

Pope Francis’s own latest document on synods, the apostolic constitution Episcopalis Communio (Italian, no English yet) seems to aspire to make them almost perennial, like sessions of Congress or Parliament. That text also at least seems to devolve some authority to bishops meeting as a body – an authority that can even become part of the Church’s magisterium – if approved by the pope.

That may look, to some, like a good development, a kind of opening towards decentralization and democracy in a Church that, in many respects, resembles an elected monarchy. But caution is called for. In the modern world, we’ve made a shibboleth of democracy, though wise heads – from Aristotle to America’s Founding Fathers to several modern philosophers – have long warned that carefully thought out institutional arrangements are needed to make such things work.

There’s some doubt whether that kind of clarity has been brought to bear on things as this Synod opens. On Monday, at a Vatican presentation of the Synod on Youth, it was even unclear what the procedures would be for the bishops to vote.
- Would it be on the overall final document, a text produced by a small group of drafters chosen in advance and – as thirteen cardinals protested in a letter to the pope before the previous synod – therefore easily manipulated to produce a desired outcome?
- Or will there be real debate on specific provisions and paragraphs as in the past, thus allowing the bishops meaningful input into what such a document will say – and not say?

That such basic questions have not been considered – and resolved – well in advance of the process that begins today does not bode well for the outcome.

Other, less trusting voices in Rome suggest that gaps in procedure have been left, not out of inattention, but on purpose, so that the final products may be massaged as desired. One of the desired outcomes – again, say the darker voices – is that something on accepting (i.e., “accompanying”) LGBTQs and beyond will appear for the first time in a Vatican document, with the approval not only of the pope but of bishops from various countries.

There is further reason for worry. We’ve seen how multiple Protestant bodies have essentially abandoned Christian moral teaching through the influence of popular assemblies. And this is not only a matter of the conclusions that they reached – inevitable as they almost are once you take current culture as the standard and Christian tradition as malleable.

The mere fact that the Church debates, at the very highest levels, “the value of homosexual relationships,” Biblical teaching on divorce, the very words of Genesis “male and female he created them,” contraception and abortion, and other such hot-button questions raises an even larger issue.
- Is Christian teaching ultimately just a series of time-bound, historically conditioned guidelines, changeable as social conditions change?
- Or – as we have always believed – is it the revelation of the eternal in time, a communication from God that seeks to guide us out of the murkiness of a world darkened since the Fall?
- And unfixable by approaches that falsely give the impression that what we face are merely practical human problems?

These are all serious and foundational questions. And when you add into the mix – as is the case this month – questions about how to reach young people whose specific views and general mentality have been almost entirely shaped by a toxic culture that finds nothing normative in God, nature, or human nature, it’s not hard to see the potential for explosions, intended and unintended.

Even in the best of circumstances, it would be hard to see how we would get from where young people currently are to the fullness of the Catholic faith. And we are far from the best of circumstances.

Several members of the pope’s C-9 cabinet of Cardinals themselves have problems as large as the rest of the Church. And the failed efforts at the simplest reforms: financial transparency, accountability for sex abuse, and the mere administration of the Vatican, don’t exactly inspire confidence that Rome can lead us towards a better future.

And as if all this were not enough, there’s a lot of pressure on the American delegation to the Synod. Unlike in the past, there seem to be fewer bishops on hand who will press for traditional teaching against well-entrenched forces seeking innovations and worse. Not all the American delegates can be counted on, but despite all our problems at home, we still have a vital and viable Church, at least for the moment. That’s not the case in many parts of the world today. Our bishops will have a lot riding on their shoulders.

Pope Francis has asked Catholics to pray the Rosary every day this month “in communion and penance, as a people of God, in asking the Holy Mother of God and St. Michael the Archangel to protect the Church from the devil, who always aims to divide us from God and among us.”

And we might also pray that those charged by God Himself with the responsibility to bring us all together do not add to the already large divisions that trouble the whole Church.



What is that? #Synod2018

October 3, 2018

For the opening Mass of the Synod, this (see photos) is what Francis carried, rather than a crosier or a ferula.

First impression…

It looks like a V with a nail through it.

V…

V…

Viganò?


Scottish young people’s
Letter to a Synod bishop

October 3, 2018

The UK’s best Catholic weekly, the Catholic Herald, has the text of a letter signed by 107 “young people” aged 18-35 in Scotland, to Archbishop Cushley of St Andrews and Edinburgh in Scotland.

Some of their statements are, I think, not what the riggers …er, organizers of the Synod want to hear.

The full letter to Archbishop Cushley. My emphases and comments:

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Your Grace,

We write to you in advance of the upcoming Synod of Bishops on “Young People, the Faith and Vocational Discernment”. As young Catholics across Scotland, we would like to express our hopes and concerns for the future of the Church in this country.

In some of the discourse surrounding the synod, we have noted a trend of suggesting that difficult aspects of the Church’s teaching, in matters of morals and matters of faith, need to be downplayed, or even put aside, in order to be relevant to people’s lives and sensitive to their difficulties.

Some even imply that priests who hold to orthodox teaching are out of touch with the lives of lay people, and of young people especially. However, it is in fact this line of thought that is utterly in contradiction to our lived experience.

What made us become and/or remain Catholic, against ever increasing cultural pressure, are those aspects of the faith that are uniquely Catholic, not things that can be found in social clubs, in NGOs, or in political parties.

What matters is precisely the Church’s claim to truth; Her liturgy and Sacraments; Her transcendent doctrine, communicated in teaching but also through beauty and goodness; Her understanding of the human person, laid out so powerfully for the modern world by St John Paul II; [whose body of teaching this pontificate’s Team seems bent on erasing] and Her moral teaching, that while so very challenging, also offers the only path to true joy and human flourishing as we see in the lives of the saints. These are the things that convince us that here is something worth the sacrifice, something good for us and for every human being.

Young Catholics are inspired by the heroic virtue espoused by the Church, in opposition to the cynicism and pessimism of postmodern culture. A faith that merely legitimises the habits we would otherwise have anyway is simply not worth it.

Far from being “out of touch”, it is those priests who proclaim orthodox teaching in its fullness with joy and courage who have brought the light of Christ into our lives, and really offered us His Mercy – the remedy for a broken world, which does not pretend human brokenness is irremediable, but truly heals and gives the grace we need to live new lives of virtue. To those priests, we are unendingly grateful.

Sadly, far too few young people have encountered this fullness of the faith lived out visibly and confidently. A young Catholic father in America recently wrote to Archbishop Chaput [He’s that guy whom Francis warned against in his conversation with Archbp. Viganò. He’s the guy who dared to raise his voice in the last Synod and who has commented on the Instrumentum Laboris of this Synod.] that “The disastrous effect that Beige Catholicism (as Bishop Robert Barron aptly describes it) has had on my generation can’t be overstated.”

God has, in His mysterious ways, providentially and gratuitously blessed us with encounters, pastors, and formation that many of our peers have not had. [The implication is that there are not enough priests of the kind they describe. Why is that, I wonder.] We desperately want to share this great gift with so many lapsed and non-Catholics among our family, friends, and colleagues, who have not rejected Catholicism but a poorly-understood shadow of it. If the synod is to bear fruit, it is with this task that it must help us.

- We need to ensure that our local Catholic communities are permeated with a Catholic worldview, and unashamed that such an orientation is very different from the prevailing cultural trends.
- The sacramental life, beyond just Sunday Mass, needs to be obviously and visibly the foundation of Catholic existence.
- We must draw on our rich heritage to ensure the liturgy is celebrated with beauty and splendour [Like the stick Francis carried at the opening of the Synod?] so as to reveal and draw us into the profound mysteries taking place.
- We need to see the various vocations lived out fully and joyfully, with parishes and dioceses forming a living iconography of faith, so that we can discern God’s will for our own lives, not in isolation but in an ecclesial context.

Young people need the chance to get to know our priests as priests – not just as administrators, nor presiders rushing from church to church, nor again merely as pals, but as fathers, whose fatherhood is rooted in their sacramental identity as men called and set apart to absolve and to offer the Holy Sacrifice. [Set apart?!? Like… yikes!… clerics?!?] Young Catholics find priests who live their vocation to celibacy faithfully and joyfully to be highly credible witnesses to the joys and challenges of life in Christ.

The Church must be proactive and not merely reactive in facing the crisis affecting marriage and the family.
- To a large extent, Catholic married life has come to be treated as little different from secular relationships.
- Our economic and social structures are based almost entirely around a presumption of contraception, and this makes it extremely difficult for any couples who live faithfully according to God’s commandments. - So many of our generation are living with the consequences of broken families, and this has engendered a cynicism about marriage.

However, these young people have never been shown an alternative and therefore the Church has a great opportunity and obligation to clearly, confidently, and joyfully proclaim the truth about marriage.

Young Catholics have a right to hear these truths at a local level so that our parishes are consciously supportive of the vocation to holiness in married life. This is vital since it is firstly in the family that vocations are fostered and it is on this foundation that an authentic renewal of Catholic culture and the life of the Church will be built.

There is no doubt that discovering and living out one’s vocation is very difficult in the modern world, as indeed it has been in every age. However, we know that God’s grace is enough for us and we hope and pray that a renewed faith and confidence in this will suffuse the Church and inspire young people to discern and live out their vocations faithfully.

Entrusting the synod to the intercession of St John, youngest of the Apostles, we assure you of our prayers.

Yours sincerely in Christ,

SIGNATORIES

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A SYNOD WITHOUT FAITH: An article published in Italy's Il Foglio on Sept. 29.

Meanwhile, more from Archbishop Chaput - who is obviously resigned to the fact that he can never hope to be named a cardinal in this Pontificate - restating
his objections to the synod which has just opened (despite his and other prominent Catholics' calls earlier for the pope to just call off this synodal assembly
because of the low credibility bishops have right now related to the still unresolved clerical/episcopal sex abuse mess in the Church. Sandro Magister introduces
Mons. Chaput's new article as follows:

A synod off the rails:
The criticisms of the Archbishop of Philadelphia

Oct. 3, 2018

Today is the beginning of a synod with a rather vague title: “The young, faith, and vocational discernment.” But even more flimsy is the document on which the synod fathers have been called to “work.”

The document is called, sure enough, “Instrumentum laboris,” working instrument, and it is the outline for the discussion to follow. Which for that matter has already begun, with strong criticisms that have been focused precisely on the formulation of this preparatory text.

These criticisms have been voiced above all by the archbishop of Philadelphia, Charles J. Chaput, elected by the previous synod from among the select intercontinental group of bishops charged with organizing the current synod.

And then, seeing that the synod would be held no matter what, he published on Saturday, September 29, the following critique of the “Instrumentum laboris,” choosing as his platform the Italian opinion daily “Il Foglio”.

In Chaput’s judgment, the preparatory document of the synod “needs to be reviewed and revised,” because “as it stands, the text is strong in the social sciences, but much less so in its call to belief, conversion, and mission.”

The critique of Chaput - whose thinking is shared by the four bishops whom the episcopal conference of the United States has elected as its representatives at the synod - greatly irritated the Vatican control center, to the point that Cardinal Lorenzo Baldisseri, secretary general of the synod at Pope Francis’s beck and call, directly attacked Chaput, although without using his name, during the press conference for the presentation of the assembly, on Monday, October 1:

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“Someone has said at first to cancel the synod and then that the ‘instrumentum laboris’ is not well made. However, he’s just one. And then the person in question has said that he does not agree because he had a theologian study the text. But the person in question is a member of the ordinary council of the secretariat of the synod, and was present at the time when the draft text was presented, and if he had any objection he could have expressed it, and we could have calmly inserted it. So I do not understand why he has made these statements. So much for loyalty and honesty.”

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Properly speaking - unlike what Baldisseri said - Chaput did not “have a theologian study” the document. He instead made his own the criticisms of the “Instrumentum laboris” that a theologian had sent him some time ago. A theologian whose name has not been made public, but whom Chaput himself called “a respected North American theologian” in presenting him to the readers of “First Things". [I am convinced that the theologian author is our now familiar Fr. Weinandy, a Franciscan Capuchin like Mons. Chaput.]

Magister proceeds with summarising the main points made by the theologian in his article. He also links to the original English article from which the Il Foglio translation was made, as follows:

A synod without faith:
One does not serve the Pope and the Church
through sentiment and sociology
by Archbishop Charles J. Chaput

American Catholics have always had a special love for the Holy See. Two of the reasons are obvious: Until technology abolished distance, Rome was safely 4,500 miles away; and unlike her role in Europe, the Church in the United States has never been politically dominant, with all the ugly baggage that implies.

A third reason has been six decades of impressive men in the Chair of Peter.

So when Pope Francis visited Philadelphia at the end of the 2015 World Meeting of Families, nearly a million people turned out to welcome him. Many were families with teens and young children. Many waited hours in line, in the heat, to get through security. Francis was visibly surprised and moved. I was standing beside him. I witnessed it.

Three years later, thanks to a former U.S. cardinal, a Pennsylvania statewide grand jury report, and abuse problems in Chile and elsewhere, the Church is in turmoil. In this turbulent environment, the Holy See will host a world synod of bishops, October 3-28, in Rome. Keyed to the theme of “young people, faith, and vocational discernment,” a more ironic, and more difficult, confluence of bad facts at a bad time for the meeting can hardly be imagined.

This does not mean the synod need fail in its work. Francis’s personal appeal and the goodwill it can engender remain strong. Viewed globally, the Church’s outreach to young people has more than enough bright spots. In the United States, groups like the Fellowship of Catholic University Students (FOCUS), the Thomistic Institute, and others have a strikingly positive record with young adults.

This is why many young priests, like those who wrote an open letter to delegates of the impending synod earlier this month, see an opportunity in the synod’s subject matter. As they make clear, the synod’s success depends on a profound confidence in the Word of God and the mission of the Church, despite the sins of her leaders.

The young American clergy who signed the open letter are a lesson in conviction. Men who commit themselves to the Catholic priesthood at a poisonously negative time, a time when the reputation of bishops can hardly be deeper in the tank, are either fools or men of God.

I know some of these young men. They are not fools. When they say, “our culture is all too eager to sell us false idols. Only the Gospel, lived in its radical vigor, can satisfy. Christ alone is the answer to the challenges for our generation,” they mean it, and they will act on it – no matter how skeptical the audience; no matter how implausible they sound to secular ears.

It’s in the light of their faith, and the faith of other young men and women like them, that the synod’s “Instrumentum Laboris” or “working document,” needs to be reviewed and revised. As it stands, the text is strong in the social sciences, but much less so in its call to belief, conversion, and mission.

In a sense, this isn’t unusual. All synod working documents are works in progress. All undergo discussion and adjustment by the Synod Fathers. This is important, because the 2018 text does seem to lack some quite vital elements.

To borrow the words of one theologian, the document seems to suffer from a range of “serious theological concerns . . . including:
- a false understanding of the conscience and its role in the moral life;
- a false dichotomy proposed between truth and freedom;
- a pervasive focus on socio-cultural elements, to the exclusion of deeper religious and moral issues;
- an absence of the hope of the Gospel; and
- an insufficient treatment of the abuse scandal".

Comments like these sound harsh, but they are not wholly unwarranted. A synod that deals with issues of sexuality and young people should also deal -- honestly and thoroughly -- with the roots of a clergy sexual abuse disaster involving minors.

These are serious matters. Hopefully the 2018 gathering will allow them to be engaged candidly and the text sufficiently improved to ensure the synod’s success. The Francis pontificate has been described as God’s medicine for Churchmen whose notion of the Christian life has grown ill from an overdose of abstraction.

In like manner, neither the Pope nor the Church is served – particularly in a time of humiliation and crisis – by an overdose of sentiment, accommodation, and sociology. Faith demands more than that.

Youth Synod goes forward, seemingly
headed down a wide and dangerous path

October 3, 2018

It's underway. Despite Archbishop Chaput's call for a delay or cancellation – which the Newman Society supported – the Synod on Young People, the Faith, and Vocational Discernment is proceeding in Rome.

We have grave concerns that too many Synod organizers and gadflies with the ears of powerful officials are using it to advance their agenda to dilute Church teachings and, instead of calling young people to join the Church on the narrow path to Christ, are plotting to have the Church move to meet them on the secular world's easy, wide path.

How so? By seemingly discarding centuries of wisdom about formation and how to evangelize young people under the guise of offering a listening ear, "meeting them where they are," and attention to "practical realities," which would appear to be code for giving in to worldly concerns.

But isn't that precisely what has brought about today's crisis in the Church?

Accompanying young people down the secular world's wide path is not the way to God. Permissiveness and dependence on human relationships is tempting, but it is treacherous and full of deceivers, thieves, and (yes) predators who strive to ruin souls.

Young people don't need the Church to walk with them on this dangerous path, they need to the Church to show them the way to Christ!

Christ's way is the narrow path. It is Truth, and it is hard, except for God's grace and mercy. A formation that gives young people the tools, knowledge, and moral discipline to help carry the Cross is the true path of holiness.

Synod organizers don't seem to believe this is possible today. But they only need look at thriving parishes with traditional devotions, the growing Catholic homeschool movement, the examples of faithful Catholic schools like those recognized by the Society's Catholic Education Honor Roll, and, of course, the counter-cultural Newman Guide colleges that take their Catholic identity seriously.

These places prove that the traditional way of forming young people works! This is precisely why The Newman Society proposes faithful Catholic education as the best response to the "contemporary 'crisis of truth' [that] is rooted in a 'crisis of faith,'" as Pope Benedict explained to American Catholic educators 10 years ago.

It is a shame that the organizers of the Synod ignore this success.

And it's hard to imagine a worse time for the world's bishops to gather for a Synod on Young People.

Too many Church leaders have demonstrated an appalling lack of concern for the safety of children and young adults from predator priests and bishops. How do the Synod fathers assure parents, educators, youth ministers, and others that they speak with authority – the authority of Christ – if key Synod participants and even Pope Francis himself will not respond forthrightly and decisively to the scandals and accusations that have rocked the Faithful?

Moreover, as The Cardinal Newman Society and others like the intrepid Robert Royal have warned for months, the Synod organizers seem disinterested in taking the necessary steps to bring the authentic Truth of our Faith to young people.

Our reports on the Youth Synod's preparatory documents have exposed serious flaws in the Synod organizers' favored approaches of attending to youthful desires and permissive "accompaniment."

But even a cursory glance at the Instrumentum Laboris, or working document, for the Synod exposes a social-progressive mindset that clouds the importance of Christian formation. The document seems more about "taking care of young people" than teaching them Truth.

The "realities" for young people that are considered by the Synod's working document include globalization and diversity, social and economic inequalities, war and violence, injustice and exploitation, jobs and unemployment, intergenerational relationships, digital media, sports and entertainment, immigration, and so on.

To the extent that sexuality is discussed, there is no sense of crisis. Instead, the document seeks more "practical" conversation about fundamental teachings on sexuality.

Education gets far too little attention. When it is discussed, it is primarily in the secular context of academics and career, not with the mission of evangelization.

We hope that some of the faithful bishops attending the Synod, and there are a number of them, are able to redirect the discussions and outcome. But assuming that not much good will come out of it regarding effectively leading young people away from the secular world's siren call, families – in partnership with faithful educators and trusted priests and bishops – must go all-in on the renewal of Catholic education.

A renewal of Catholic education – by which we mean the Christian formation of young people in the home and in schools – is critical to the renewal of the Church's mission of evangelization.

The disastrous results of prior generations' rebellion against authority and moral discipline – against Truth itself – have reached a culmination in the horrific scandals among so many unfaithful priests and bishops. At least, we hope and pray this is the turning point.

Now is the time when our message of fidelity and responsible formation can resonate. It is for this reason that now – in our 25th anniversary year – the Newman Society is refocusing and redoubling our efforts on recognizing faithful Catholic education and holding it out as a model for the Church.

By setting more and more young Catholics on the narrow path, the true Way of Christ, we will once again see the heroism and the holiness of the saints. And by their example, and by the sacrifice of true educators, and with God's grace, we will see the renewal of the Church and Catholic life.