“Fidelity to the Church, fidelity to its teaching; fidelity to the Creed; fidelity to the doctrine, safeguarding this doctrine. .The message of the Gospel as a gift and we need to transmit it as a gift, but not as a thing of ours: it is a gift that we received.”

On Doctrinal Questions, Francis will Favor Cardinal Müller over Kasper

By Dr. William Oddie

Pope Francis will still back Cardinal Müller. He really does believe that we cannot, in his words, use Church doctrine ‘as we please’

A recent post from Sandro Magister introduces his report on a book-length interview with Cardinal Gerhard Ludwig Müller by asking a question. This is how he poses it: “The prefect of the congregation for the doctrine of the faith refutes the ideas of those who want to permit second marriages with the first spouse still alive. He is backed up by Cardinal Sebastián, who also disagrees with Cardinal Kasper. But whose side is Pope Francis on?”

What we don’t get from Magister is an answer to his own question, so you can have one from me. Whose side is Pope Francis on? He is on Müller’s, not on Kasper’s: he will continue to defend the tradition of the Church in this matter, as he has already done.

We need to begin, however, by asking why it is that the question is being asked in the first place. The doubts over the line the Pope will take, especially at the forthcoming Synod on the family, derive mostly from the Pope’s exceptionally warm response to an address delivered by Cardinal Kasper to a consistory on the family which took place in March, in which he expounded his view that Communion should be given to the divorced and remarried. This event was not public and its proceedings were supposed to be confidential.

But there was no way they were going to remain confidential after the Pope, the following day, genially applauded Kasper’s speech (though not, it is to be noted, necessarily its conclusions) in the following words: “Yesterday, before going to sleep—although I did not do this to put myself to sleep—I read or rather re-read the work of Cardinal Kasper, and I would like to thank him because I found profound theology, and even serene thinking in theology. It is pleasant to read serene theology. And I also found what Saint Ignatius told us about, that ‘sensus Ecclesiae,’ love for Mother Church. It did me good and an idea came to me—excuse me, Eminence, if I embarrass you—but the idea is that this is called ‘doing theology on one’s knees.’ Thank you. Thank you.”

It was of course soon all over the secular press that the Pope was getting ready to allow Communion for the divorced and remarried. This conclusion seemed to be confirmed by reports that an Argentinian woman, who had written to Pope Francis to ask if she could be readmitted to the sacraments even though she was divorced and had entered into a civil partnership, was claiming that the Pope rang her up, introducing himself as “Father Bergoglio,” and after a 10-minute chat said she could “safely” receive Communion. Her partner then leaked these details on Facebook. It’s a highly dubious story, denied by the Vatican, but that too was all over the secular press.

So why am I so sure that the Pope does support Cardinal Müller’s insistence that there will be no change in the teachings of the Church, despite his warm words about Kasper’s speech? For a start, Kasper’s speech is such that you could find it interesting, even to be commended as an intellectual exercise, without agreeing with a word of it. It’s tentative, speculative; I didn’t exactly find it “serene” (incidentally, I seriously wonder if the Holy Father wasn’t teasing Cardinal Kasper when he said that “It is pleasant to read serene theology”; he’s known for his sense of humor) and if Pope Francis had actually agreed with it, wouldn’t he have used rather different wording?

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