Catholic Replies
Q. As a longtime subscriber to The Wanderer, I am puzzled that your writers don’t hesitate to criticize and disagree with bishops and cardinals on particular issues, but when it comes to the Pope you automatically close shop, yet he is human just like the bishops and cardinals. There is no teaching in our Church that says one cannot disagree with a Pope, except when he speaks ex cathedra [infallibly]. Some of the writings and pronouncements of the post-Vatican II Popes are in direct contradiction to the writings and statements of some pre-Vatican II Popes on certain issues.
So who is one to believe? Both groups can’t be right. All these Vatican II Popes reigned over a Catholic Church that was at its lowest ebb of faith in the 2,000-year history of the Catholic Church, or at least since the Arian heresy. For example, time and time again Pope Francis utters statements that are irresponsible and enable the secular media to exploit them. He should never have left the statement “who am I to judge?” regarding homosexuals hanging in the air. He should have followed it up by denouncing homosexual acts as a very serious sin.
Also, it has been proven that in a telephone conversation, Pope Francis gave an Argentinean woman permission to receive the Eucharist, although she was divorced and remarried. When is The Wanderer going to be more objective in assessing the Popes? — J.M., Missouri.
A. These remarks are excerpted from much longer letter, but they accurately reflect the sentiments of J.M. Let’s see if we can reply to some of the points he made.
First of all, Popes are indeed human just like bishops and cardinals, but their position gives them considerably more authority since it was only to Popes that Jesus said, “Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven” (Matt. 16:19). Jesus also told the first Pope, St. Peter, to “feed my sheep” (John 21:17), and said that “I have prayed that your own faith may not fail” and that “you must strengthen your brothers” (Luke 22:32). So that is why we give the Holy Father more credibility, although, as you will see below, we might wish that he had been more precise in some of his statements.
Second, Catholics are expected follow the teaching of the Pope, even when he is not speaking infallibly, because he still receives the assistance of the Holy Spirit. As the Second Vatican Council said: “Religious submission of will and of mind must be shown in a special way to the authentic teaching authority of the Roman Pontiff, even when he is not speaking ex cathedra. That is, it must be shown in such a way that his supreme magisterium is acknowledged with reverence, the judgments made by him are sincerely adhered to, according to his manifest mind and will. His mind and will in the matter may be known chiefly either from the character of the documents, from his frequent repetition of the same doctrine, or from his manner of speaking” (Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, n. 25).
That this was not a novel teaching can be seen by consulting the encyclical of a pre-Vatican II Pope, Pius XII, who said in 1950 that it must not be thought “that what is expounded in encyclical letters does not of itself demand consent since in writing such letters the Popes do not exercise the supreme power of their teaching authority. For these matters are taught with the ordinary teaching authority, of which it is true to say, ‘He who heareth you, heareth me’ [Luke 10:16]; and generally what is expounded and inculcated in encyclical letters already for other reasons appertains to Catholic doctrine” (Humani Generis, n. 20).
Third, if you take a look at the Catechism of the Catholic Church, you will find that the writings and pronouncements of the post-Vatican II Popes are very much in tune with what the Church has taught from the beginning. Take the issue of contraception, for example, and note how Popes Paul VI, John Paul II, Benedict XVI, and Francis have echoed the long-held teaching that contraception is a grave evil. We would be interested to know what writings of post-Vatican II Popes are in “direct contradiction” to the statements of pre-Vatican II Popes.
Fourth, to suggest that the Vatican II Church is at its “lowest ebb of faith” since the Arian heresy is to ignore other bad periods in Church history, such as the period following the Protestant Reformation in the 16th century. This is not to say that we have not experienced confusion, heresy, and disregard of the Church’s teachings since the end of Vatican II. But is that the fault of the Popes, who have repeatedly reiterated Church teachings, or the fault of bishops, priests, theologians, catechists, and lay people who have chosen to distort what Vatican II and recent Popes have taught and to offer instead a theology more in tune with our secular culture than with what Jesus taught?
Fifth, as for Pope Francis, one can wish that he would be more careful in interviews with the media and not provide them with sound bites that have faithful Catholics scrambling to explain what he really meant. The secular media, of course, have a vested interest in making the Church look bad, so they often take the Holy Father’s quotations out of context. For example, while he did say, “who am I to judge?” it was in response to a question about the existence of a “gay lobby.”
He responded that “one must distinguish the fact of being a gay person from the fact of doing a lobby because not all lobbies are good. That’s bad. If a person is gay and seeks the Lord and has good will, who am I to judge him? The Catechism of the Catholic Church explains this in such a beautiful way. It says…‘these persons must not be marginalized because of this; they must be integrated into society.’ The problem isn’t having this tendency, no. We must be brothers….The problem is lobbying for this tendency: lobby of the avaricious, lobby of politicians, lobby of Masons, so many lobbies. This, for me, is the more serious problem.”
The Pope was not saying that one cannot criticize homosexual actions, only that he has no intention of judging persons with homosexual tendencies if they seek the Lord and have good will. Couldn’t the same be said about a person guilty of any sin who is repentant and who seeks the Lord?
Francis did mention the Catechism, and perhaps he should have quoted the Catechism’s description of homosexual acts as “acts of grave depravity” that are “intrinsically disordered” (n. 2357).
You know what a furor that would have caused, and you can debate whether he should have done so, but there is no reason to suggest that he does not agree with everything the Catechism says about homosexuality.
As for the Argentinean woman whose husband was reportedly seeking an annulment from his first marriage, it’s hard to know the facts since the information was so sketchy, and it came not from the Holy Father, but from the woman’s husband, who was not exactly a disinterested party.
In any case, Pope Francis was not changing a teaching of the Church that goes back to Christ Himself. If this woman were having sexual relations with a divorced man, she was committing adultery and, therefore, was not worthy to receive Holy Communion. If the Holy Father advised this woman to live with her husband as brother and sister until their annulment came through, and if she had any previous sins forgiven in Confession and fully intended to refrain from sexual relations, then she would not be living in sin and would be free to receive Communion. But we don’t know whether this was true or not.
What we do know is that Pope Francis has never rejected Christ’s teaching on divorce and remarriage, nor would he ever do so, but we agree that there would be far less confusion if he would be more careful when speaking to reporters.
Q. If a baby in danger of death is baptized in the hospital, but later recovers, is it necessary for the child to be baptized again in the Church? — R.M., Massachusetts.
A. No. If the baby were baptized with water, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, and the person performing the Baptism had the intention of doing what the Church intends, then the child would be validly baptized. This is true, by the way, even if the person doing the baptizing is not a Christian, or even a believer.
Should the baby get better, the parents would still bring him to the parish church for the rest of the ceremony — naming of the child and promise to bring him up Catholic, Scripture readings and homily, prayers of the faithful, litany of the saints, prayer of exorcism and anointing with oil, renunciation of sin and Satan, profession of faith, clothing the child with a white garment, presentation of a lighted candle, and blessing of the mother and father. The pouring of water, however, would not be repeated since the Baptism in the hospital was valid.
