Friday 31 January 2014

Pope Francis on Doctrine as Gift to be Transmitted

The Catholic Herald reported some good news yesterday...

Pope Francis has said that fidelity to Church teaching is a fundamental part of belonging to the Church and that we cannot use Church doctrine “as we please.”

Speaking during his homily at daily Mass today at Casa Santa Marta, Pope Francis defined the three ‘pillars’ of belonging as ‘humility,’ ‘fidelity’ and ‘special service.’

Pope Francis said that fidelity was the ‘second pillar.’ He said: “Fidelity to the Church, fidelity to its teaching; fidelity to the Creed; fidelity to the doctrine, safeguarding this doctrine. Humility and fidelity. Even Paul VI reminded us that we receive the message of the Gospel as a gift and we need to transmit it as a gift, but not as a something of ours: it is a gift that we received.”

He continued: “And be faithful in this transmission. Because we have received and we have to gift a Gospel that is not ours, that is Jesus’, and we must not – he would say – become masters of the Gospel, masters of the doctrine we have received, to use it as we please”.

Quoting Pope Paul VI, Pope Francis said that it was an “absurd dichotomy” to love Christ without loving the Church. He said: “The Christian is not a baptised who receives baptism and then goes on his way. The first fruit of baptism is to make you belong to the Church, the People of God. You cannot understand a Christian without the Church. 

“This is why the great Paul VI said that it is an absurd dichotomy to love Christ without the Church, to listen to Christ but not the Church, to be with Christ at the margins of the Church. It’s not possible. It is an absurd dichotomy. We receive the Gospel message in the Church and we carry out our holiness in the Church, our path in the Church. The other is a fantasy, or, as he said, an absurd dichotomy”.

More words like this, please, Your Holiness. It echoes much that Pope Benedict XVI said. We are all rooting for you, even if your 'right hand man' Cardinal Maradiaga seems, at times, to disagree with you.

5 comments:

Supertradmum said...

Love this and thanks for the report. Many British people have separated reason from the faith, and therefore, as living half-lives of Catholicism. Doctrine to me is merely the love of God pursued. When we love Someone, in this case, God, do we not want to learn all about Him and His Ways?

Love demands knowledge.

Our Lady of Good Success-pray for us. said...

have we a hope?

humility, humbleness V pride (unrestrained appreciation of our own worth).

I agree, this sounds like sound teaching but it doesn't square with his teachings of last week or a few weeks before that...which one is a teaching he really believes in? it still seems as if the 'Church' is a religious entity amongst other equally valid entities. 'scuse my jadedness with this papacy - when Bishop Bergoglio unequivically teaches that which is necessary for salvation and it agrees with Scripture, Tradition and Magisterium, with consistancy, my guarded jadedness might brighten a little.

http://www.fisheaters.com/lists.html#auth

Anonymous said...

The Pope is up and down like a see-saw with his teachings - one day orthodox - next day contradictory and confusing to the previous orthodox - I'm sorry this is typical of modernism as described by Saint Pius X.

A certain angst of soul is now my constant companion since this papacy began - I'm not agitated - and know Our Lord and Our Lady will triumph in the end...but that angst is just there ...a kind of foreboding..because I no longer feel secure with our Church leaders and especially the present Pope. Sorry to say it. I wish someone would truly convince me that I am totally off the mark...

Rooting for him anyway in my poor prayers, as is my duty as a Catholic.

Barbara

tro said...

There he goes again blatantly contradicting himself without skipping a beat.

What a Merry Prankster we have in Bishop Frank! LOL

Codgitator (Cadgertator) said...

Two steps progward, one step tradward. It's like playing an inverted "Red Light, Green Light". I agree that a distinct sense of malaise, based on what might best be labeled "das Unheimliche", has taken up residence in my spirit under this papacy, although it did not strike me until I looked into the Spadaro interview et sequalia. As they say, what has been seen cannot be unseen.

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