LifeSiteNews last evening had a remarkable story regarding Cardinal Müller. It is remarkable because who even knew that such a thing had to be said? Isn’t it obvious? But the Cardinal, chosen by Pope Benedict XVI as Prefect for the Doctrine of the Faith, is in a particular ‘hot seat.’
In the spirit of Pope Benedict, who held that office before becoming Pope, Cardinal Müller is speaking the TRUTH clearly, and the TRUTH is Christ.
There is much about Cardinal Müller that reminds me of Cardinal Burke, and much that may put him in the same kind of dangers. Cardinal Müller was one of the early identifiers of the heresy being promulgated by Cardinal Kasper of Germany, and at times he is the lone voice for doctrine. That is his role.
May God strengthen him to continue to speak out as he has, and protect him from the evil spirits who roam through the world seeking the ruin of souls.
It is not enough to read about him. Please pray for him.
Here are some of the highlights from LifeSiteNews:
“The attempt to separate the Catholic Church’s teaching from her practice is “heresy” according to the Vatican’s highest doctrinal official.”
“Each division between ‘theory’ and ‘practice’ of the faith would be a reflection of a subtle Christological ‘heresy,’” Cardinal Gerhard Müller, prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, told a recent gathering of the International Theological Commission. Such a division could only be the result of “a division in the mystery of the eternal Word of the Father, who became flesh.”
“Muller’s remarks were published earlier this month by the Vatican’s own newspaper, L’Osservatore Romano.”
“As prefect of the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the Church’s highest doctrinal authority under the pope, Cardinal Müller has been one of the principal opponents of the proposal by Cardinal Walter Kasper and the German Catholic bishops to change the practice of the Church to allow divorced and civilly remarried Catholics to receive the Sacraments without a change in their lives.”
“Catholic teaching holds that marriage is an unbreakable bond, and thus the Church does not recognize the existence of divorce. Such people, therefore, are understood to be in a state of continuous, unrepentant adultery, a mortal sin that bars them from receiving Communion or the other sacraments.”
Follow the Money
“The pressure to allow this change has grown out of Germany, where thousands of people in “irregular unions” every year are opting out of the government-sponsored Church tax for which the German Catholic Church relies for the vast majority of its income. At October’s Extraordinary Synod of Bishops, the push was expanded from allowing divorced and remarried Catholics to receive Communion, to “accepting and valuing” the homosexual “orientation.”
“The bishops, cardinals and others who have supported Kasper’s suggestion, have in the main repeated the assertion that Catholic teaching cannot be changed, but continue to insist that the practice of withholding Communion and other sacraments from those in adulterous unions can.”
If the Synod can hold out against the pressures coming from Cardinal Kasper et al (and who knows for sure who ‘al” is?), it will be of course the protection of the Holy Spirit, and Cardinal Müller’s willingness to serve Him.
Got Repentance?
If a person is convicted/convinced by the Holy Spirit and by actual grace that what he in fact has been thinking/saying/doing is objectively evil/wrong/uncharitable/unjust/disobedient and that person with the necessary help of the Holy Spirit and of actual grace sincerely desires to stop/to be forgiven and reconciled/ to change and be changed, he wills it and stops the bad and does the good by God’s grace.
It is all gift and grace; yet the reality of the saving/redeeming/sanctifying mystery of Christ crucified and risen in one’s life must evidence new life/new creature/works meet for repentance (doing works worthy of penance/works giving evidence of repentance).
How can any one who has experienced METANOIA, the grace of conversion to Jesus Christ, even suggest teaching and pastoral practice are separate; that one can act differently from what a teaching insists is right conduct?
The teaching demands the practice and the practice gives evidence to belief in the teaching.
Saint Paul the Apostle, by Holy Spirit spiration, explained the essence of his apostolic mission in this way:
“…..open their eyes that they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God, so that they may obtain forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those who have been consecrated by faith in me. And so…..I preached the need to repent and turn to God, and to do works giving evidence of repentance.” Acts of the Apostles 26:18-20
Thanks be to God for the holy faithfulness of Cardinal Gerhard Muller