Thursday, September 12, 2024

John Henry Westen has not dealt with the issue of Vatican Council II, irrational and rational, inspite of so many reminders.


From Life Site News


OPINION

In a recent article I summarized a number of arguments that lead to the conclusion that Francis does not hold the office of pope.

Lionel : John Henry Westen has not dealt with the issue of Vatican Council II, irrational and rational, inspite of so many reminders.Pope Francis justifies his actions with Vatican Council II, ir-rational which obviously creates a break with Tradition. It makes the dogma extra ecclesiam nulla salus, the Athanasius Creed and the Syllabus of Errors obsolete. So if the exclusivist ecclesiology can be changed by Vatican Council II, then Pope Francis reasons, this is the action of the Holy Spirit. It is a new revelation in the Church. So faith and morals are open to change, for him. So there is a new moral theology, new ecumenism, new evangelization, new ecclesiology etc.The conservatives support this reasoning, though un-popular.Here lies the problem. No one is asking Pope Francis to interpret Vatican Council II rationally and morally. Why ? 

In a second article, I outlined the argument from public heresy and membership of the Church in more detail. 

Lionel. Vatican Council II irrational produces heresy and schism. The conservatives are interpreting the Council irrationally like Pope Francis.

In a third article, I responded to the claim that we can attain certainty that Francis is the pope because he possesses the “universal and peaceful adherence” of the Church.  

Lionel. With Vatican Council II irrational neither is John Henry Westen able to claim with certainty that he is a member of the Church. The same accusation he makes against the pope can be made against him.

In this fourth article I wish to expand further on subject touched on in third article, namely the Catholic rule of faith.   

Jesus Christ, hanging on the Cross, opened up to His Church the fountain ofthose divine gifts, which prevent her from ever teaching false doctrine and enable her to rule them for the salvation of their souls through divinely enlightened pastorsand to bestow on them an abundance of heavenly graces. 

Lionel: John Henry Westen and Life Site correspondents, it has been pointed out numerous times, interpret Vatican Council II and the Catechism of the Catholic Church irrationally. So now there are two versions of all the Creeds, theirs and mine. There are so many reports on social media which Life Site News ignores. Their new theology is the same as that of Pope Francis and the Society of St.Pius X. This is why Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano cannot appeal against the schism-charge. They are all stuck with Vatican Council II irrational, which is being called ‘ a new Magisterium’ making the ecclesiology of the Latin Mass obsolete. No one objects on this point except for me.

Pope Pius XII, Mystici Corporis Christi, No. 31 

(LifeSiteNews) — Our Lord Jesus Christ established the Catholic Church to teach the fullness of Divine Revelation until the His Second Coming. He endowed His Church with the attributes of indefectibility and infallibility to ensure that she will not fail in her mission. Every generation of Catholics, from the time of the Apostles until Our Lord’s return, will receive exactly the same doctrine from the teaching authority which He has established.   

Truths beyond the grasp of unaided human reason have been gradually revealed to humanity since the beginning of the human race, but public revelation was brought to completion with Christ’s Apostles, to whom the fullness of the Divine Revelation was entrusted. Our Lord commissioned these Apostles to proclaim it to the entire world: 

Jesus came near and spoke to them; All authority in heaven and on earth, he said, has been given to me;you, therefore, must go out, making disciples of all nations, and baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost,teaching them to observe all the commandments which I have given you. And behold I am with you all through the days that are coming, until the consummation of the world. (Mt 28:19-20) 

The apostles faithfully fulfilled this great commission and were martyred in turn. Around the year 100AD, St John died a natural death, the only apostle to do so, and with his death public revelation ended. But the “consummation of the world” was yet to come, and therefore the mission of the Church continued. The Successors of the Apostles, led by the Successor of St. Peter, continued the apostolic mission of teaching the fullness of Divine Revelation to each new generation, and to them to the promise also has been made “I am with you all through the days that are coming, until the consummation of the world’”. 

The Sacred Magisterium of the Catholic Church is divinely protected. It will never fail to transmit the entirety of Divine Revelation. And with its authority to teach, comes the obligation of the faithful to receive its teaching. As Our Lord said when he sent out his disciples: 

He that heareth you, heareth me; and he that despiseth you, despiseth me; and he that despiseth me, despiseth him that sent me. (Lk 10:16)

Lionel: The objective mistake in the 1949 Letter of the Holy Office is not part of the Deposit of the Faith. It has an objective error which cannot be Magisterial. It says not everyone needs to be a member of the Catholic Church for salvation since it assumes there are objectively known exceptions. The dogma extra ecclesiam nulla salus and the Athanasius Creed says everyone needs to enter the Church and does not mention any exceptions. It was common sense over the centuries that the baptism of desire referred to an invisible person in our human reality.

Sources of Divine Revelation 

The ultimate source of Divine Revelation is God. The source from which we receive it is the Sacred Magisterium, that is, the teaching of the Successors of the Apostles, and, pre-eminently, the pope, the Successor of St Peter.  

However, the pope and bishops in each generation must have sources in which they find the doctrine that they are to teach for, as Monsignor Van Noort remarks, “it is obvious on the one hand that they never personally heard Christ Himself or the apostles teaching through the Holy Spirit, and equally obvious on the other hand that they do not get the doctrine of Christ by way of fresh, direct revelation.”[1]

Therefore:  

[T]he only possible answer is that this doctrine comes to them from preceding generations by way of tradition.[2]

Tradition means handing down. The Successors of the Apostles have received the content of the Divine Revelation from their predecessors, and they hand on it to those who follow them. This transmission from one generation to the next is protected by the charism of infallibility to ensure that nothing is lost, and that nothing is added.  

St. Paul, in his Second Letter to the Thessalonians, spoke of these traditions, exhorting: 

Stand firm, then, brethren, and hold by the traditions you have learned, in word or in writing, from us. (2 Thess 2:15)  

Divine Revelation is contained both in written documents and in oral preaching. The written revelation consists of the inspired writings of the Old and New Testaments. This is called Sacred Scripture.  

The oral preaching is called Sacred TraditionSacred Tradition is the handing down of the gospel by the teaching of the Successors of the Apostles. However, it is not only found in their oral preaching but in the written monuments of this preaching.   

The primary monuments of Sacred Tradition are the acts of the magisterium: the official acts of the Apostles, of the Successors of St. Peter, and of the other Successors of the Apostles, whether as individual heads of local churches, or gathered together in councils. The Sacred Liturgy is also a primary monument of Sacred Tradition, because it is established and regulated by the authority of the Successors of the Apostles. 

The secondary monuments of Sacred Tradition are writings such as those of the Fathers and Doctors of the Church, of theologians, and of other ecclesiastical writers, all of which are witnesses to the doctrine preached by the Successors of the Apostles. Christian art and architecture are also secondary monuments of Sacred Tradition, because they too witness to the faith preached by the Sacred Magisterium.  

Therefore, we can speak of two sources of divine revelation from which the Sacred Magisterium finds its doctrine: Sacred Scripture and Sacred Tradition

Fine modulo

Twentieth century Spanish theologian Joachim Salaverri S.J. summarized them as follows: 

Holy Scripture, or the written word of God, is the deposit of revealed truths inspired by God, which are contained in the holy books of the Old and New Testament.

Divine Tradition, or the handed on word of God, is the deposit of revealed truths attested by God, which in the continuing preaching and faith of the Church are perennially preserved by God.[3] 

These sources taken together are called the deposit of faith, for as Salaverri explains:  

A source or fount of revelation, like a fountain of water, in general is said to be a deposit or place in which divine revelation is contained or from which it can be drawn.[4]

Lionel. Vatican Council II, irrational is common in the Catholic Church. It is not part of the Deposit of the Faith. Vatican Council II interpreted irrationally would be traditional, Magisterial and in harmony with Tradition.-Lionel Andrades


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