Rather than clarity on unchanging truths about marriage and family, laity continue to receive obfuscation ultimately financed by our own Church donations! As outlined in yesterday's unsettling article by Phil Lawler:
"Nearly every year during his pontificate, when he delivered his annual address to the Roman Rota at the start of its judicial year, Pope John Paul II would urge the tribunal judges—and by extension, the judges on marriage tribunals in every diocese—to uphold the sanctity of the marital union....Pope Benedict XVI delivered the same message, but added that tribunals could be more efficient....Pope Francis...[has encouraged] the tribunals not only to act quickly, but also...to hand out [sic] annulments more readily. And even in cases where the tribunal could not find justification for an annulment, in Amoris Laetitia Pope Francis urged pastors to allow divorced and remarried Catholics to receive the Eucharist in some circumstances.... Pope John Paul II ...[indicated] that in some cases a remarried couple might continue living together for the sake of their children, if they 'take on themselves the duty to live in complete continence, that is, by abstinence from the acts proper to married couples.' (Then-Cardinal Ratzinger added that even this solution would be inadequate if by living together the remarried couple caused scandal.).... [Many children] are troubled because their father, who abandoned their mother, now shows up at Mass every Sunday with his younger female companion, and does receive the Eucharist, under the vague dispensation offered in Amoris Laetitia. How do you explain that to the children, without undermining their faith in the Church’s commitment to the sanctity of marriage? And just by the way, how do you explain it without undermining the children’s confidence in the Church’s commitment to them, the abandoned offspring of the first marriage?' (Catholic Culture, 2/1/21) Solid questions, in my opinion!
A 2/2/21 USCCB email reminded me that "Overlapping with the Year of St. Joseph will be a 'year' of reflection on Amoris Laetitia, starting March 19th and ending with the celebration of the 10th World Meeting of Families in Rome on June 26th, 2022." I can't help but wonder what Jesus' foster father would think of all this. Why does February's email make no mention of the need to oppose the misnamed Equality Act, to support the Child Welfare Provide Inclusion Act, World Marriage Day (2/14), or National Marriage Week (2/7-2/14)?
With the seemingly dismissive treatment of authentic marriage/family, I charitably doubt that many bishops, priests, deacons, and diocesan officials have even read the recent papal addresses to the Roman Rota or Dignitas Connubii. Especially because those of Saint Pope John Paul II have become increasingly difficult to locate, I am providing links below:
- Speeches of Pope Francis to the Tribunal of the Roman Rota (2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021 (Italian))
- Speeches of Pope Benedict XVI to the Tribunal of the Roman Rota (2006 - 2013)
- Speeches of Pope John Paul II to the Tribunal of the Roman Rota (1979, 1980, 1981, 1982, 1983 (Italian), 1984 (Italian), 1986, 1987 (Italian), 1988, 1989, 1990, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005)
- "The dignity of marriage, which between the baptised 'is the image of and the participation in the covenant of love between Christ and the Church'(1), demands that the Church with the greatest pastoral solicitude promote marriage and the family founded in marriage, and protect and defend them with all the means available....[Vatican II] does not fail to point out that marriage by its nature is an institution founded by the Creator and endowed by his laws(4), and that its essential properties are unity and indissolubility, 'which in a Christian marriage by reason of the sacrament obtain a particular firmness' (can. 1056)....as John Paul II affirms, 'in a vision of authentic personalism, the Church's teaching implies the affirmation that marriage can be established as an indissoluble bond between the persons of the spouses, a bond essentially ordered to the good of the spouses themselves and of their children'(7)....it falls to the Bishops, and this should weigh heavily on their consciences, to see to it that suitable ministers of justice for their tribunals are trained in canon law appropriately and in a timely manner, and are prepared by suitable practice to instruct causes of marriage properly and decide them correctly" (Instruction Dignitas Connubii, Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts, 1/25/2005).
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