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Obviously, although I completely disagree with don Alessandro Minutella that Jorge Bergoglio is not a legitimate pope and that Benedict XVI still is pope - and the consequences
he draws from this error - I am sympathetic to most of his views. And I do wish he would stop preaching that all Masses are invalid where the reigning pope is named by
the celebrant in the Canon of the Mass, for the reasons I have earlier explained.
Those who read Aldo Maria Valli's interview with Minutella will have formed an idea about this doubly excommunicated priest, an idea that I think cannot be totally dismissive. They
may be even less dismissive after reading the following exchange of arguments with Fr. Cavalcoli summarized by the latter himself in the letter to Tosatti dated Jan. 12, 2019...
Don Minutella says Fr. Cavalcoli
has turned Rahnerian all of a sudden
Translated from
January 13, 2019
A debate has been building up in the social networks and on various blogs between don Minutella and Fr. Giovanni Cavalcoli. The latter, a Dominican theologian, has sent us a summary of the exchange so far, which I gladly publish here, for the benefit of my readers.
Minutella: I have been able to read with more calm the reply of the Dominican theologian Cavalcoli to statements I have made which are widely shared by many Catholics. In particular, he claims that I am wrong when I underscore that Vatican II was a pastoral and not a dogmatic council, and therefore, in my opinion, its declarations are not binding.
He says Vatican II had ‘dogmatic constitutions’ like Lumen gentium and Dei verbum, which is true, but Cavalcoli seems to miss the point – I hope not willfully – that it was not the intention, thank God, to give them a binding character, as the Council of Niceae in 325 did with the dogma of the Consubstantiality of the Son with the Father (omousios tò Patrì), or as the Council of Trent did with the dogma of Trans-substantiation, in the 16th century. These, like other dogmas declared by previous ecumenical councils, are binding. And whoever denies these truths of the faith, yesterday as today, incurs excommunication.
Now I ask Fr. Cavalcoli: What binding dogmatic proclamations did Vatican II impose? Not one. To the point that Ratzinger could speak of the attempt [by the ‘progressivists’] – which now seems to have been adopted by Fr. Cavalcoli – to make the entire Council itself a ‘superdogma’, given the absence of a binding nature in any of its documents.
In other words, the 20 ecumenical councils before Vatican II did bind the faithful, on pain of excommunication, to the doctrinal declarations which they issued. But all this, by the grace of God, did not happen with Vatican-II. It is certainly not don Minutella who has invented for himself that Vatican-II was not a doctrinal council.
This was stated by both John XXIII and Paul VI, among the many eminent spokesmen for Vatican-II, including an increasingly stunned Hans Urs von Balthasar (who is no heretic as the most inveterate but misinformed traditionalists claim), who lamented precisely that the Council Fathers had not made binding declarations, and an increasingly saddened Ratzinger who in the post-conciliar period, seeing the damages produced by its many wrong misinterpretations, seemed ‘a voice in the wilderness’.
Therefore, the declarations of Vatican II remain simply orientations and pronouncements but not binding in terms of faith. [Therein lies the dispute.] And this applies to everything concerning post-Conciliar decisions that led a disappointed Paul VI himself to speak of a profound winter in the Church, where a spring of the Spirit was expected.
[At this point, in support of don Minutella and what I have always thought myself, later reinforced by Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI’s teachings, I wish to quote from John XXIII’s opening address to Vatican II on October 10, 1962:
"The greatest concern of this Ecumenical Council is this: that the sacred deposit of Christian doctrine should be guarded and taught more efficaciously. That doctrine embraces the whole of man, composed as he is of body and soul. And, since he is a pilgrim on this earth, it commands him to tend always toward heaven…
That is, the Twenty-first Ecumenical Council, which will draw upon the effective and important wealth of juridical, liturgical, apostolic, and administrative experiences, wishes to transmit the doctrine, pure and integral, without any attenuation or distortion, which throughout twenty centuries, notwithstanding difficulties and contrasts, has become the common patrimony of men. It is a patrimony not well received by all, but always a rich treasure available to men of good will…
Our duty is not only to guard this precious treasure, as if we were concerned only with antiquity, but to dedicate ourselves with an earnest will and without fear to that work which our era demands of us, pursuing thus the path which the Church has followed for twenty centuries.
The salient point of this Council is not, therefore, a discussion of one article or another of the fundamental doctrine of the Church which has repeatedly been taught by the Fathers and by ancient and modern theologians, and which is presumed to be well known and familiar to all. For this a Council was not necessary.
But from the renewed, serene, and tranquil adherence to all the teaching of the Church in its entirety and preciseness, as it still shines forth in the Acts of the Council of Trent and First Vatican Council, the Christian, Catholic, and apostolic spirit of the whole world expects a step forward toward a doctrinal penetration and a formation of consciousness in faithful and perfect conformity to the authentic doctrine, which, however, should be studied and expounded through the methods of research and through the literary forms of modern thought.
The substance of the ancient doctrine of the deposit of faith is one thing, and the way in which it is presented is another. And it is the latter that must be taken into great consideration with patience if necessary, everything being measured in the forms and proportions of a magisterium which is predominantly pastoral in character."
Cavalcoli: Pope Benedict told the Lefebvrians that “if they wish to be in full communion with the Church, they must accept the teachings of the Council”.
It was John XXIII who planned a pastoral council. But Paul VI wished to add a doctrinal aspect with the constitutions Lumen gentium and Dei verbum. [Which did not add anything new to Church doctrine per se, but to its pastoral dissemination today.] Since then, the popes have not ceased to recommend, explain and apply the doctrines of Vatican-II [Because he insists Vatican-II was doctrinal, Cavalcoli uses the term dottrine instead of the more generic insegnamenti – both mean ‘teachings’, but insegnamenti does not falsely brand a pastoral teaching as ‘new doctrine’] – which have been included in the Catechism of the Catholic Church. [Which does not mean they were included as ‘new doctrine’ added to the deposit of faith. Cavalcoli’s reasoning is circular and leads nowhere.]
The teachings of Vatican II do not define new dogmas, yet they are true and binding, even if they do not belong to the first grade of magisterial authority, defined in John Paul II’s 1998 Apostolic Letter, Ad tuendam fidem, that is, they do not require assent of divine faith, which if not given, would be an act of heresy.
[I think Cavalcoli is taking liberties here with Ad tuendam fidem, which does not ‘grade’ magisterial authority as such, but differentiates the three levels of assent that a Catholic must profess according to the Profession of Faith formulated by the CDF on May 18, 1998, to which Ad tuendam fidem was appended.
Subsequently, Cardinal Ratzinger published a commentary on formulations contained in the Profession of Faith – which “restates the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed, and concludes with the addition of three propositions or paragraphs intended to better distinguish the order of the truths to which the believer adheres. The correct explanation of these paragraphs deserves a clear presentation, so that their authentic meaning, as given by the Church's Magisterium, will be well understood, received and integrally preserved.”
More importantly, for those, like me, who are not very good at following theological arguments in detail, Cardinal Ratzinger names specific examples of these three ‘orders of truth’ to which the believer adheres. None of his examples are from Vatican-II. Considering that he wrote the commentary in June 1998, he would have cited at least one Vatican II ‘truth’ among his examples.
All 3 documents may be read on: http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_1998_professio-fidei_en.html
]In the second and third levels described by the Apostolic Letter, it is said that the Magisterium "cannot err or deceive", even if the assent required is merely that of ‘faith in the authority of the Church’ [on “all those teachings belonging to the dogmatic or moral area, which are necessary for faithfully keeping and expounding the deposit of faith, even if they have not been proposed by the Magisterium of the Church as formally revealed”] (second level); and ‘religious submission of will and intellect’ to the third level [teachings which either the Roman Pontiff or the College of Bishops enunciate when they exercise their authentic Magisterium, even if they do not intend to proclaim these teachings by a definitive act."]
The ff is Cavalcoli’s opinion – and may well be the subject of continuing dispute.]
The level of authority of the teachings of Vatican II is of the second and third.
- Whoever denies the teachings of the second level is near heresy or suspected of heresy.
- Whoever denies the teachings of the third level rebels against the authentic Magisterium.
- Therefore, whoever rejects the teachings of an ecumenical council is not necessarily heretical – it depends on the level of authority of such teachings.
- But whoever, like Luther, maintains that the teachings of Council can be wrong, is heretical.
As for Von Balthasar, it is not true that he was not heretical, because he notoriously denied the existence of damned souls in hell, as I demonstrate in my book L’inferno esiste. La verità negata (Hell exists: A truth that is denied)( Edizioni Fede&Cultura,Verona 2010).
As don Minutella does not answer Cavalcoli’s false sally about Von Balthasar, I would recommend the interested reader to read the following essays that straighten out this misconception:
https://www.catholicworldreport.com/2018/03/31/did-hans-urs-von-balthasar-teach-that-everyone-will-certainly-be-saved/#.UpRAmGT5lIl
freebeacon.com/culture/the-harrowing-of-hell/amp/?__twitter_impress...
The Foreword to his book Dare we hope that all men be saved? (which was accompanied by his Short Discourse on Hell) underscores that the Swiss theologian begins by saying "all human beings stand under the divine judgment. Whatever else Hans Urs von Balthasar says in this book, the one thing he is quite clearly not saying is that we have certain knowledge that all people will be saved. But he will insist — in fact, it is the gravamen of his argument — that we are permitted to hope that Hell might be empty of human beings."]
Minutella: I find it significant that the post-Vatican II ‘list of sorrows’ named by an increasingly disoriented Paul VI (who by 1972 had come to state that ‘the smoke of Satan’ had somehow entered the Church) are almost analogous to those of Mons. Lefebvre, who had spoken of apostasy and the confusion of Catholic identity.
For more than 50 years now, the whole church has been living out the significance of te Third Secret of Fatima. The orientations of Vatican II were not just unproductive [for the preservation of the faith, not to mention its growth] but now constitute the fortresses from which progressivists and neo-mondernists launch their attacks. And Father Cavalcoli knows this very well.
Cavalcoli: The bitter, sorrowful and correct analyses made by Paul VI and Mons. Lefebvre of the situation of the Church after Vatican II were certainly very similar and were contrary to the futile optimism of the modernists and the goody-goodies. But the remedies they proposed were prfoundly different.
The pope proposed a correct inte rpretation and application of the Council [Vatican-II ended in 1965 – yet it seems he only realized the damage it had done in 1972 with his 'smoke of Satan homily. But this was after the worst error he made, promulgating the Novus Ordo in 1970. There was no way he could ‘lock the barn door’, as it were, after all the horses had stampeded out and wrought havoc among the faithful, the theologians, the seminaries, the clergy, and the bishops.]
Whereas Lefebvre proposed te correction of the supposed ‘modernistic’ errors of Vatican II, when the Council fact indicated the way to a healthful modernity in the light of the Gospel, such as to welcome the good and beneficial aspects of modernity while rejecting those that are evil and damaging. [Cavalcoli misses the point that Paul VI eventually saw: in the post-Vatican II years, only the evil and damaging aspects of ‘modernity’ had prevailed in the Church – in which, to begin with, abortion, contraception, divorce, female priests, and married priests were openly advocated by the ‘spirit of Vatican II’ fanatics.]
Minutella: It is curious that someone like Cavalcoli defends Vatican II orientations by defining them as dogmatic, thereby becoming all of a sudden, an exponent of Karl Rahner’s thought, who has his signature in those sibylline orientations.
So Cavalcoli who has expended himself for years in warning against Rahner, now ends up being his defender. For years, he has condemned Rahner’s theses, and now, he considers them ‘binding’. And Cavalcoli knows I speak the truth when I say that the questionable statements of Vatican II really represent the victory of the Rahnerians.
If Vatican-II orientations, particularly that of its naïve ‘dialog with the world' (whereby, Von Balthazar said, worldliness – Weltelei – has swept away the very idea of Christian witness and announcement of the faith) – if such orientations were binding, then Cavalcoli should be the first to apologize for having steeped himself in anti-Rahner criticism and, if he is to be honest with himself, should now make a public profession of faith not just to the orientations but to the ‘binding dogmas’ of the Rahnerian council. Abandoning the role of a defender of the Catholic faith, he must now profess himself a defender of Rahnerism.
Cavalcoli: After 40 years of studying Rahner [I wish he had spent as much time studying, say, St Augustine] and having published some articles abput him, I wrote a book, Karl Rahner. Il Concilio tradito (Karl Rahner: The council betrayed) ( Edizioni Fede&Cultura, Verona 2009) followed by other articles, precisely to show that although Rahner had contributed to Vatican II, which is obviously orthodox[/B] [no, it is not obviously so, and certainly, not at all by the testimony of all the ‘spirit of Vatican II' fanatics], he was able to spread his modernistic interpretation of the Council only afterwards because of te weakness and connivance of ecclesial authorities. [And who might those authorities, be, in primis, if not Paul VI? Rahner died in 1984, three years before the pope.]
Therefore in defending the doctrines of Vatican II, I am not defending Rahner at all, because as I have written, Rahner did make a positive contribution to that Council. Above all, he manifested his errors after the Council. If I criticize don Minutella in the name of the council, I do not do so because I have become a Rahnerian, but because don Minutella depreciates the teachings of Vatican II.]
[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 14/01/2019 07:12] |