St Peter's (Mönchengladbach!) becomes a climbing arena

The destruction of the image of St Peter could not be more symbolic of the secularism and decay which is overtaking the modern Church in the West.

"Evil Inside" Techno-Liturgical Experiment

Schau hier https://t.co/pDLRm0U0C9

— Gillibrand (@Gillibrand) October 30, 2017

The liturgical experiment in Suite 15 was successful. Around 100 mainly young guests enthusiastically took up the alternative service in the discotheque. Under the name "Evil Inside", the Kolping Youth and the Association of German Catholic Youth (BDKJ) had invited people to a devotional hour on St. Peters Way. 

Poverty, hunger, war, flight and expulsion - all these were addressed by the Kolping diocesan chaplain, Stefan Wissel on Saturday evening in that "Techno worship", which was understood by his visitors as an appeal to humanity. Among other things, Wissel picked up on the biblical theme of fratricide and asked whether evil in man is also slumbering. "Man stifles by his own indifference and oblivion," he denounced in his sermon. Wissel critically considered border closure within Europe and the increasingly hostile attitude towards refugees. "Lonely and abandoned", they have to endure at the borders of Europe.

 The "Techno worship" in the Suite 15 on Saturday evening took up issues such as war, flight and expulsion. The dancers of the Hoffmann ballet school realized this content artistically "What is really important to us in life?" Wissel asked. To grieve once collectively - and "continue as before?". In the end, according to his conclusion, each person contributes with his personal decision to the big picture. "You co-create good in the world or build your end in indifference and selfishness. You decide." 

 The techno service was accompanied by dancing performances by the ballet school Hoffmann. The young actors entered the stage wearing worn clothes and depicting those who fled the war and had to leave everything behind. Covered in blood and bullet holes in their T-shirts, they wandered around - not knowing where to go. "It was a great challenge for us to portray this," said trainer Bettina Hoffmann in an interview with our newspaper. In order to plan the choreography, she had been given insight into the pictures, which were then presented on the big screen during the service. So, she adapted her stage program to the scenario of war, violence and expulsion, to implement the subject in an artistic way. 

 In the opinion of the visitors, this was just as successful as the worship itself. "I'll go there more often," said 18-year-old Patrick Willner from Kelheim. "The choreography is well done and appeals to young people like me. The service is just different. " Kerstin Dietzinger from the Kolping Diocesan Youth sees this similarly. At the end of the devotional evening, she was "torn" by the images, scenes and words that accompanied the service. Furthermore, she thinks it's great that the service took place where the "life-world of young people" takes place. And even the music selection, which included even Metal and Industrial music, was the evening justice. 

 With the “Our Father" and the blessing Wissel concluded the extraordinary event.

Source

Cathcon: the chaplain appeals to Pope Francis saying that people should be met where they are......this just leaves them where they are!

"Mysticism, drama and cult music will be experimented with. Although the spoken word is not the main element as in traditional worship, it will still be a part of the sermon. Wissel sees it as an "attempt to go to the edges with liturgy" and reach out to people - especially the youth. He cites Pope Francis in a similar way, who demands that exactly those people at the margins of the church should say how they should be and how they should change. For he too does not shy away from the fact that in the meantime it would only be a "residual church".

  Source- which was an announcement of the event now taken place.

The priest subsequently resigned from Kolping for unclear, personal reasons....

Cardinal Müller comes out strongly for "Amoris laetitia"

Cardinal Müller defends "Amoris laetitia"

Only recently Cardinal Walter Brandmüller defended the "Dubia". Now, Cardinal Cardinal Gerhard Ludwig Müller speaks out and supports the Papal letter, "Amoris laetitia".

Cardinal Gerhard Ludwig Müller has defended the Papal letter, "Amoris laetitia" from criticism. Under certain conditions the reception of the Sacraments of Penance and Communion is possible, writes Müller in the preface for a book by the former Italian European minister, Rocco Buttiglione (Cathcon: he who thought female Cardinals were a good idea!. It needs discernment "beyond a slight adjustment to the relativistic spirit and a cold application of dogmatic rules and canonical provisions," said the former Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.

Buttiglione as well as Müller turn against conservative critics of the Pope, who accuse Francis of error in his letter, " Amoris laetitia " (2016) on marriage and family issues in their "fraternal correction" of heresies published in September. The volume "Well-intentioned answers to critics of 'Amoris laetitia'" appears in Italy on 10 November.

The dogmatic theologian, Müller points to situations in which an abandoned spouse has "no other way out than to trust a kind-hearted person". Moreover, a Catholic could come to the conclusion that their marriage, which was concluded in earlier years, was "not sacramentally valid" and that the new connection, especially when marked by children and a "cohabitation lived together over time", represents a genuine marriage before God,

It may also happen, according to Müller, that the invalidity of the former marriage cannot be proved by the church. Nevertheless, it is possible that the "tension between the public / objective status of the "second " marriage and the subjective guilt" opens a way to receive the Sacraments. This leads to the "pastoral distinction" in the non-public space.

God is particularly close to the man who is "on the road to repentance" and who "assumes responsibility for the children of a woman who is not his legitimate wife and who nevertheless does not fail to provide for her" , This also applies to someone who does not "make it through weakness and not out of stubborn resistance to grace" to "comply with all requirements of the moral law".

A "sinful action" would not be legitimate or even culpable. But their imputability as guilt can be diminished if the sinner appeals with humble heart to the mercy of God and asks, 'Lord, be merciful to me sinner,' "the Cardinal said.

However, a graduated application of the church law to a "concrete person in their existential living conditions" is not easy to implement in practice, emphasizes the cardinal. This is often not properly grasped in the consideration of the Papal letter, "Amoris laetitia". Also, Müller opposes that a stubborn sinner "wants to assert rights before God he does not have".

Source

Cardinal Brandmüller - long interview on impending Church crisis

Interview in leading German newspaper which appeared today

Cardinal, at the moment the waters are rising very high in the Catholic Church. The Pope is suspected by some of heresy and celebrated by others as a Lutheran reformer. The stumbling blocks are questions of sexual morality as addressed in the Papal letter, "Amoris laetitia" on marriage and family. The debate is held in a very fierce and fundamental manner around the world, since one bishop's conference is against the other, when it comes to the admission of remarried divorced to the sacraments. From a secular perspective, it is first of all interesting to see how in the 21st century one can still expect to standardize sexual life, provided the partners have reached agreement among themselves.

We should, I think, first ask this fundamental question: What is religion? What does a Catholic understand by religion? Religion in today's understanding is for many a merely psychological, socio-cultural phenomenon.

According to Catholic understanding, religion, however, is not a product of the human mind, nor is it an attempt to illuminate existence by means of philosophical reflection. Religion is the response of the human being to a call coming from outside. And thereby the question about God is put, accordingly the Creator, without which man would not exist. This God, according to the self-understanding of Christianity as a religion of revelation, has revealed himself to man. And indeed, by going himself along the plane in which people exist. According to a general Christian conviction, God became man in Jesus of Nazareth, entered history in order to meet man and to carry out his definite self-communication. The answer of man to this self-communication of the Creator is religion, which, of course, also influences the way of life.

But then the quarrel begins. God does not speak clearly, if one assumes his existence. Revelation has to do with interpretation as it is about language. Are there not different theological schools? In fact, the problem at issue here seems to go far beyond questions of sexual morality. Is it not the core question of the reasons why someone - an institution, a single person - can claim to be able to speak bindingly in the name of God? And could not it be that this age-old religious-critical question now also breaks out within the Papacy for the first time, which is why a letter like "Amoris laetitia" is deliberately kept blurred?

First of all, there is a natural law basis on which marriage, love, family can also be perceived.

The appeal to natural law, however, merely shifts the question: Who interprets it with what reasons?

The law of nature, to which Catholic dogmatic theology refers, sees marriage as a bond of life between man and woman with the aim of the spread of human life. This natural marriage is lifted by Christ into a supernatural, divine sphere and made a sacrament. Sacrament is an outward sign that is used by Christ to show and effect a grace in the soul of man. Sacraments effect what they express. According to this view of the Church, which cannot necessarily be shared by agnostics and atheists, but in this view marriage is no longer a matter only between man and woman and society, but a matter between man and woman and God, who gives them, as it were, the authority to continue his creation. The Apostle Paul says: Christian, sacramental marriage is a real reflection of the relationship between Christ and his Church. We proclaim here a message which surpasses human reason but does not contradict it.

As a poetic view of love, one would like to leave it like that. But as a normative presupposition, this view of life encounters harshly with that self-determined conception of gender relations as it prevails today. The love-relations have radically de-traditionalized. The cultural choices for the child, male partner or female partner, for hetero- or homosexual connections, are decoupled from biological prescriptions. Also, one can mutually agree on these matters. Is the loosening of sexual morality in the theological sign of mercy, as Francis evidently strives for it, not to lead the way, if the Church wants to have something to say to man in the future?

The Gospel of Jesus Christ opens horizons which, without which, what we call revelation, are initially inaccessible to natural reason. This means that a contradiction between Gospel and social plausibility cannot come as a surprise. Jesus himself speaks plain text in the context when he speaks unmistakably of the indissolubility of marriage and the reprehensibility of adultery. So, when I am Catholic, I move within this framework. It is a framework which takes into account the reality of the possible failure of a marriage and allows for the separation of the table and the bed in the event of the incompatibility of the spouses.

Going out to yes, once again marrying no? Is not that an exasperating conviction remote from life, which would be corrected by "Amoris laetitia", perhaps in theologically sloppy manner but none the less authoritatively?

As I said, Jesus himself speaks of the indissolubility of marriage and the reprehensibility of adultery. Though the possibility of failure has always been taken into account in the church framework. This has often happened, that one of the married partners turned out to be unbearable in the literal sense. But there is no possibility of remarriage. It did not exist in the whole of Christian history up to Luther.

The separation of table and bed reminds of the English aristocracy, where one always said in relation to the spouse: divorce never, murder at any time. When I get to know my neighbour in the stairwell and am no longer with my wife and am "separated from bed and table", but move to the neighbour - what is then happening?

Adultery.

And if I remain with the neighbour for the next ten years, without repentance, but with feelings of happiness?

Then this is a concubinage. Continued adultery.

How would that be placed in the hierarchy of the offence?

A serious sin.

But not comparable to remarriage?

No, because the concubinage is always solvable - also humanly, socially. You just go out and go somewhere else.

Does this position not seem quite formalistic to you? Nor does it seem to be compatible with a language of love.

Yes, but excuse me! Christianity, especially in its Catholic form, is an annoyance for the world. And Christ was and remains a challenge to the world. Christianity and the Church are not on the panting hunt for plausibility and applause. That will not do.

What then do you say to those who say: If we do not change now, then we are going to go down.

Oh, you mean the church is going down?

Well, here it is, to put it carefully, here and there the impression remains.

Excuse me, what does the Gospel stand for? The Gospel does not prognosticate a glorious triumph of faith and the Church, but the great fall. I need not to even open the Apocalypse of John, the four Gospels suffice. And the decisive factor is that the Church as such does not perish. "Fear not, little flock," says Christ, "for my Father hath promised to give you the kingdom." These are things which we must recognise and say with all clarity. And this constant cramping effort to cause no offence, in all things to be childish, is not compatible with the Gospel, with the existence of the Christian in this world. The cooling of love is discussed in the Gospel. Do we have a warming of love? We have such a coldness of love that we kill unborn children and the old, demented, sick people. Is that cooling of love? I think so. Today we are doing for what for years people have been sentenced to death.

Do you mean systematic euthanasia as well as the possible help in death from dementia?

Of course.

In your "Dubia," in which you with other cardinals have addressed your doubts to the, Pope, you refer to the encyclical "Veritatis splendor" of John Paul II and the doctrine of the "moral absolute". So, there are things that never depart, no matter how aggravating circumstances and good intentions may be. Among these, killing of innocent people, torture, or even adultery. Whether or not you are in the right or wrong about "Amoris laetitia" – your polite remarks to the Pope, your "Dubia" will appear to us unobjectionable. Instead of the requested clarification, however, there were threats and insinuations, your questions were referred to as Pharisaic questions. The chairman of the Central Committee of the German Catholics said that "it was a question of vile and shabby trick questions and traps".

We take it easy about that.

But you understand that the making public of the questions addressed to the Pope is questionable?

That may be, but the publication of the questions took place after a month of waiting for an answer, including an acknowledgement of receipt, which has never been done. And especially with regard to the fact that many believers had and have the same questions and are waiting for an answer. We, the Cardinals do not live outside the world. We have many connections. What do you think of the many phone calls, letters, queries we get? In these, among other things, it is also asked: Why do you not do anything, you cardinals? After all, we have taken an oath of office and are the official adviser to the Pope. We asked for audience and did not get an answer.

We see rightly that the dispute over "Amoris laetitia" is at the core of a footnote in which, according to your opinion, the transcendent doctrine is overridden by a loophole, inasmuch as the circumstances and intentions of an action entitle the taking of “so-called in themselves bad actions - killing innocent, torture, adulteration - to make a "under certain circumstances" action permitted?

The main point is footnote 352. And now I am being told that the entire moral theological tradition of the church can be overridden by a footnote. In doing so, one refers to the church fathers.

This reforming enterprise is not, in fact, inelegant. One leaves the traditional doctrine, and the Catechism truths unaffected, but loosens their commitment, their binding force. According to this, Cardinal Walter Kasper had hit the bull's eye when he said that nothing was changed by this letter, "Amoris laetitia," and yet everything has changed.

What you put there as instances does not effectively sting. It was based on a single author who, on his part, had worked not only sloppily but ideologically. And then I will be told that one is relying on the fathers. I say: That which does not exist. The whole is a dishonest story, which is manipulation of the sources. And, as a historian, one is particularly allergic to this. You should never do that.

Does the impression deceive or do you believe that the pontificate of Francis church-historically to be an episode that will be corrected by his successors?

The question, as you once said before, is: Is there a binding, obliging authority in religious questions? Such exist. When Jesus took leave of his disciples, he said, "I am with you every day, even to the end of the world, go and teach all nations. And then he says, "It is good for you that I go, for then the Spirit of truth can come, the Spirit who will lead you into all truth, which will always be with you. That is, the apostles are the authentic preachers of the Gospel of Christ. The Apostles' successors today are the Pope and the Bishops. So, there is an ecclesiastical teaching authority which proclaims bindingly in the authority of Jesus Christ, which is the gospel of Jesus Christ. This proclamation occurs in such a way that it is binding in conscience.

Because there is no room for discussion in the line of your presentation?

If I say "no" to the proclamation, I risk my eternal salvation, so it is a dogma. A dogma can be proclaimed in a certain form by a General Council or even by the pope alone under certain conditions. It is the dogma that marriage is a sacrament and consequently indissoluble. Do not forget that it was the Council of Trent (1546 to 1564), which, in the context of the marriage scandal of Henry VIII, and the “allowed" double marriage of Philip of Hesse, approved by Luther and Melanchthon, proclaimed the permanent doctrine of the Church as formal dogma,

What does that mean in concrete terms? And how important would a contradiction be in the concern for the afterlife?

That is to say, whoever asserts that one can enter into a new relationship during his lifetime of his lawfully married wife is excommunicated because this is an erroneous teaching, a heresy. Whoever claims it. And whoever does it, sins heavily. And then it comes to the situation whoever is aware of a serious sin - can only go to the Eucharist - if they have done penance before, has confessed, and has been absolved. If, then, one thinks to be able to contradict the defined dogma of a General Council, then that is already a serious matter. Just that is called heresy - and this means exclusion from the church - because of leaving the common ground of faith.

And who, even as a Pope, who simply considers the world of yesterday and says: I am a man of today?

Whoever thinks this has long been overtaken by the social, cultural development, takes their stand on classical modernism of 1900. They should do so quietly. It is not Catholic any more. These theological modernists - that is, modernists in the technical sense, not now in general - have done nothing other than to adopt Hegel and evolutionism. The evolutionist concept in theology means that man constantly develops upward, from one cultural level of consciousness to the next. And with him religion develops. So that tomorrow it may be true, that which was yesterday's mistake. And vice versa. The modernists, in the course of the twentieth century, have transferred these theories of development to theology. And we already have the unholy theological mess of today

The liberal Freiburg theology, Magnus Striet, wrote at the beginning of the year in the Herder Correspondence. "If it is presently heard that" Amoris laetitia "had not altered the doctrine of the Church, but only deepened understanding, it was already astonishing. One wants to please openly say that it is changed with this letter.

Of course, he is right. There are actually people who can still think. I have great concern that something explodes. The people are not stupid. The mere fact that a petition with 870,000 signatures to the Pope with the request for clarification, that fifty scholars of international rank remain without answer, raises questions indeed. This is really hard to understand.

In this connection, the critics point out that the Pope who behind the smiling façade is an authoritarian type, who has a dubious way of dealing with staff. He therefore exchanges theologically highly trained staff for less crafted people. This included a thorough direction of the Synod when the foundations for "Amoris laetitia" had been discussed in Rome, combined with Jesuit refinement. 

Yes, such criticism is being made to an increasing extent, even in Ross Douthat's articles in the New York Times. There are journalists who say that the atmosphere in the Vatican was totally transformed. One speaks only with the closest friends. When you are on the telephone, use the mobile phone. What can I say?

What do you think of the construction of the "emeritus pope", as Joseph Ratzinger claims?

The "Papa emeritus" as a figure does not exist in the entire church history. And that a Pope is now Such, and a two-thousand-year-old tradition is overthrown, that has not only made an impact on the Cardinal. I had guests on that Shrove Monday of 2013, an interesting table discussion. We were sitting at the aperitif and are waiting for the missing guest, as a journalist calls with the question: Have you heard it already? I even thought it was a Carnival joke.

Which of your doubts formulated in the "Dubia" -letter is the central one? How would you try to explain it to a layman?

First, "Dubia," that is, doubts, to address questions to the Pope, has always been a process to eliminate ambiguities. Completely normal. Then, to simplify the question, the question is: Can today be something good that was yesterday's sin? In addition, the question is asked whether there are actions which are always morally reprehensible, under all circumstances. For example, the killing of an innocent - or adultery? This is the end of it. If in fact the first question should be answered with yes and the second with no - then, then this would be heresy, and as a result schism. Division of the church.

Do you think a schism is actually conceivable?

May God prevent this.

Source

Cardinal Brandmüller demands Pope answer Dubia

Cardinal Brandmüller defends "Dubia"

Last year, four cardinals had made public their criticism of the Pope with their "Dubia". For this they learned a great deal of counter-criticism. One of them now defends the requests to Francis.

The Four Dubia Cardinals- two now dead.

The German Cardinal Walter Brandmüller defended the "Dubia", which he co-wrote, to Pope Francis. He understood the criticism that had triggered the publication of the questions. But the step was "only taken after a waiting for an answer", he said in the interview of the "Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung" (Saturday). "And especially with regard to the fact that many believers have had the same questions and are waiting for an answer," the Cardinal explained.

"What do you mean, what phone calls, letters, inquiries we get?", Brandmüller continued. "They also say," Why do you not do anything, you Cardinals ? "We finally made an oath of office and are by office advisers to the Pope." They had asked for an audience, but they also did not receive an answer on this, the 88-year-old said.

In the context of his view of liberal interpretations of the Papal letter, the Cardinal emphasised: "It is a dogma that marriage is a sacrament and therefore indissoluble." This means, "He who asserts that one can enter into a new marriage during his lifetime of his lawfully married wife is excommunicated, because this is an erroneous teaching, a heresy." Whosoever is aware of a serious sin such as adultery, can only go to the Eucharist if he has previously repented, confessed, and been forgiven.

He had "great concern that something would explode," said the former President of the Vatican Historical Commission. The fact that the requests of thousands of people remained unanswered, raised questions. "This is really hard to understand," the prelate said.

After all, the central question is: "Can something good if something was a sin yesterday?" In addition, the question is asked whether there really are acts that are "morally reprehensible" under all circumstances - such as the killing of an innocent or adultery. "If in fact the first question should be answered with yes and the second with no - then this would be heresy, and, as a result, schism, division of the church," said Brandmüller.

The Papal letter "Amoris laetitia" of 2016 is the reason for the "Dubia" (doubts). The Pope said that Catholics who had married again after a divorce could be admitted to the communion. The Cardinals Walter Brandmüller, Raymond Leo Burke and the now deceased Carlo Caffarra and Joachim Meisner first asked Francis personally, then in November last year publicly to clarify the interpretation and categorisation of "Amoris laetitia".

Source

Cardinal: African priests should stay in Africa and not come to Europe

"Vatican: African priests should go into the slums.  A Curial Cardinal complains that many African priests would rather work in Europe than in the slums of their homeland. He calls on the clergy to have more missionary zeal.

The Vatican calls on African priests to be more willing to stay in their home country and not to go to Western countries. Many African priests wanted to work as missionaries in Europe and the US, but were not as willing to go to the poor regions of their own country or continent, said Cardinal Fernando Filoni during a visit to Uganda, as Radio Vatican reported on Thursday.

Filoni is the Prefect of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples, the Vatican official responsible for the local Churches in Africa.
Filoni urged the African priests to visit the slums of the big cities. The Italian Curial Cardinal told priests, religious and priesthood candidates in the capital of Uganda, faith should be proclaimed not only within the church walls. What is needed is a genuine missionary zeal. The celebration of the 50th anniversary of the Archbishopric of Kampala is the occasion of Filoni's visit, which lasts until Sunday. "

Source

See also Cardinal forced to apologise for remarks about Africans. The Cardinal does not seem to be aware of the great contribution Africans make to the Church at a time of acute crisis in the European Church (and beyond).