Liberation Theologian Boff: “Francis is One of Us”

Leonardo Boff

“Important to note in this context, however, is that Boff himself was publicly criticized and silenced in 1985 by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger – then the Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) – for his unorthodox writings that boldly go quite far against Church doctrine. Thus, in 1992, he (Boff) both formally left the Franciscan Order to which he had belonged and he also then publicly left the Catholic priesthood.” (1P5).

Dear friends, I don’t need to say much on this. Just read attentively the following interview—published by OnePeterFive—and hear for yourselves what this notorious public enemy of the Catholic Church Leonardo Boff has to say about the man you call “Pope” Francis:

Liberation Theologian Boff: “Francis is One of Us”

Maike Hickson

On 25 December 2016 the Brazilian Leonardo Boff, one of the most prominent theorists and operatives of Latin American Liberation Theology, gave a candidly revealing and manifoldly informative interview to the German regional newspaper Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger. Due to his confident, if not presumptuous, openness, the 78-year-old Boff (b. 14 December 1938) speaks about several matters of moment which we otherwise would not so easily hear about.

For example, he reveals the following:

o    How and why Pope Francis did not meet Boff in Rome, as planned, on the day before the second Synod on the Family in 2015 – because the pope was angry at the Thirteen Cardinals’ Letter and was trying to quiet the situation (and himself?) ahead of the Synod;

o    How Cardinal Walter Kasper recently told Boff that Pope Francis has some “big surprises” planned;

o      How Pope Francis intends to allow the Catholic Church in Brazil to permit married priests, as his friend Cardinal Claudio Hummes has been requesting now for some time;

o  How Pope Francis had requested from Boff material for the writing of his own encyclical Laudato Si and how the pope thanked him afterwards;

o   How Boff considers Pope Francis to be “one of us,” meaning one of the supportive sympathizers with liberation theology.

In the following, therefore, I shall translate parts of this important interview. The words of Leonardo Boff will speak for themselves. Important to note in this context, however, is that Boff himself was publicly criticized and silenced in 1985 by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger – then the Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) – for his unorthodox writings that boldly go quite far against Church doctrine. Thus, in 1992, he both formally left the Franciscan Order to which he had belonged and he also then publicly left the Catholic priesthood.

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Q: Liberation Theology of Latin America – one of whose most prominent representatives you certainly are – has now received new honours [and encouraging support] from and through Pope Francis. [Is there now to be] A rehabilitation also for you personally, after your years-long struggles with Pope John Paul II himself and with his highest defender of Doctrine, Joseph Ratzinger, who later became Pope Benedict XVI?

Francis is one of us. He has turned Liberation Theology into a common property of the Church. And he has widened it. Whoever speaks today of the poor, also has to speak of the earth, because it, too, is now being plundered and abused. “To hear the cry of the poor,” that means to hear the cry of the animals, the forests, of the whole tortured creation. The whole earth cries. Also, says the pope – and he thus quotes one of the titles of one of my books – we have to hear simultaneously the cry of the poor and the cry of the earth. And, for sure, both need to be liberated. I myself have dealt in the recent past with this widening of the Liberation Theology. And that [this environmental dimension] is also the fundamentally new aspect in Laudato Si.

Q: ….which is now in the “ecological encyclical” of the pope promulgated in the year 2015. How much Leonardo Boff is in Jorge Mario Bergoglio?

The encyclical belongs to the pope. But he has consulted with many experts.

Q: Has he read your books?

More than that. He asked me for material for the sake of Laudato Si. I have given him my counsel and sent to him some of what I have written. Which he has also used. Some people told me they were thinking while reading: “Wait, that is Boff!” By the way, Pope Francis directly told me: “Boff, don’t send the papers directly to me.”

Q: Why not?

He said: “Otherwise, the Sottosegretari (the employees of the Vatican administration, editors [of the Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger]) will intercept them and I will not receive them. Rather, send the things right to the Argentine Ambassador [at the Holy See] with whom I have a good connection, then they will safely land into my hands.” For that, one needs to know that the current Ambassador at the Holy See is an old friend of the pope from his time in Buenos Aires. They have often drunk together mate [a special drink from Argentina, a sort of tea]. Then, one day before the publication of the encyclical, the pope had someone call me in order to thank me for my help.

Q: A personal meeting with the pope is still outstanding?

He [Pope Francis] has sought a reconciliation with the most important representatives of the Liberation Theology: with Gustavo Gutierrez, Jon Sobrino, and likewise with me. I have said to him with respect to Pope Benedict – respectively Joseph Ratzinger – “But that other is still alive, after all!” He did not accept this. “No,” he said, “Il Papa sono io” – “The pope, that is me!” We were welcomed to come. That is where you see his courage and his decisiveness.

Q: Why then has your visit not yet worked out?

I had received an invitation and I even had already landed in Rome. But just that day, immediately before the beginning of the [second] Synod on the Family in 2015, 13 cardinals – among them the German Cardinal Gerhard Müller – rehearsed a rebellion against the pope with a letter addressed to him which then, o surprise!, was published in a newspaper. The pope was angry and he told me: “Boff, I have no time. I have to establish calm before the synod begins. We will see each other another time.”

Q: But also with the hoped-for calm, that did not really work out, either, did it?

The pope feels the sharpness of the headwind from his own ranks, especially coming from the U.S. This Cardinal Burke, Leo Burke, who now – together with your retired Cardinal Meisner from Cologne – has already written another letter [to the pope]; he is the Donald Trump of the Catholic Church (laughs). But, unlike Trump, Burke has now been neutralized within the Curia. Thanks be to God. These people really believe that it is up to them to correct the pope. As if they are above the pope. Something like this is unusual [sic!], if not unprecedented in the history of the Church. One may criticize the pope, one may have discussions with him. That is what I have often done. But, that cardinals publicly accuse the pope of the spreading of theological mistakes or even heresies, that is – I think – too much. That is an affront with which a pope cannot put up. The pope cannot be judged, that is the teaching of the Church.

Q: With all your enthusiasm for the pope – what is it with these Church reforms which so many Catholics have expected from Francis; but where, in fact, not so much has yet happened?

You know, as far as I understand, the centre of his interest is not any more the Church – and certainly not the internal operation of the Church – but, rather, the survival of humanity, the future of the earth. […] I believe that there is a hierarchy of problems for him. When the earth perishes, all the other problems have also been taken care of. But, with regard to the questions within and about the Church: wait and see! Only recently, Cardinal Walter Kasper, a close confidant of the pope, told me that soon there will be some great surprises.

Q: What do you expect?

Who knows? Perhaps a diaconate for women, after all. Or the possibility that married priests may be again engaged in pastoral care. That is an explicit request from the Brazilian bishops to the pope, especially from his friend, the retired Brazilian Curial Cardinal Claudio Hummes. I have heard that the pope wants to meet this request – for now and for a certain experimental period in Brazil. This country with its 140 million Catholics should at least have 100,000 priests. But, there are only 18,000. Institutionally, this is a catastrophe. No wonder that the faithful now go in droves to the Evangelicals and the Pentecostals, who fill this personal vacuum. If now all these thousands of already married priests might again exercise their office, this would be a first step toward an improvement of the situation – and, at the same time, it would be an impulse [and a sign] that the Catholic Church now loosens the fetters of obligatory celibacy. [my emphasis]

Q: If the pope were to make a decision in this sense and direction – would you yourself, as a former Franciscan priest, also again undertake priestly duties?

I personally do not need such a decision. It would not change anything for myself because I still do what I have always done: I baptize, I give Christian burials, and if I happen to come into a parish without a priest, then I also celebrate Mass together with the people.

Q: Is it very “German” to ask whether you are permitted to do that?

Up to now, no bishop whom I know has ever either criticized it or forbidden it. The bishops, on the contrary, are happy and tell me: “the people have a right [sic] to the Eucharist. Just keep doing it!” My theological teacher, Cardinal Paulo Evaristo Arns – who just died a few days ago – was, for example, of a very great openness. He went so far that, when he saw married priests sitting in the pew during Mass, he had them come to the altar and he then concelebrated the Eucharist with them. He did it often and said: “You are, after all, still priests – and you will remain so!”

[End of translation]

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Comment:

In the context of this blunt interview – and with Boff’s apparently newly discovered “orthodox” criticisms of those people who now even dare to criticize a pope – it might be worth recalling and reading what Leonardo Boff had earlier said, back in 2001.

For, in that 2001 interview with the Internet site Communità Italiana, he also spoke bluntly concerning both Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger himself – then Head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith under Pope John Paul II – and Ratzinger’s own putatively provocative defence of certain traditional positions and doctrines of the Catholic Church:

What I can say is that the dominant tendency in the Vatican under this pontificate [of John Paul II] is highly fundamentalist. A Cardinal like J. Ratzinger who publishes an official [Vatican] document in which he says that the only true Church is the Catholic Church and that the rest are not even churches, that the only legitimate religion is the Catholic religion and that the others have no faith (they are only convictions and beliefs) – he commits religious terrorism [sic] and is in grave theological error, as well. [my emphasis]

The poignancy – and irony – of these Boff comments increases when one considers that, in 1970 in Munich, it was Cardinal Ratzinger himself who was one of the committee of select professorial guides of Leonardo Boff’s own doctoral dissertation de Ecclesia: concerning “the Church as Sacrament” in light of some of the world’s purported experiences. The main title of Boff’s dissertation, in German, was: Die Kirche als Sakrament im Horizont der Welterfahrung.

In the larger context of this recent 25 December 2016 interview with Leonardo Boff, we also would like to remind our readers of the work of the Vatican specialist, Dr. Sandro Magister, who has repeatedly pointed to the possibility, even the probability, that Pope Francis himself will grant Brazil the permission to allow for married priests. We also remember that we ourselves earlier reported how – right after the publication of the 13 Cardinals Letter by way of Dr. Magister himself – there also came trustworthy reports about Pope Francis’ own outburst of anger over that polite, but firmly orthodox, initiative of the cardinals. Thus in his confident bluntness, Leonardo Boff now unexpectedly confirms the earlier work of journalists, both of Dr. Magister himself and, in a small way, of mine own.

—1P5

                 

For the scandalous "Encyclical" of "Pope" Francis, Laudato Si, see:  On the Anti-Catholic Encyclical of Francis I

“If a Pope would formally profess heresy, he would cease, by that act, to be the Pope. It’s automatic”. (Raymond Cardinal Burke).

 

Burke

I’m personally surprised by the way many Catholics have been reacting to this latest “bombshell” from His Eminence Raymond Cardinal Burke in an interview published this week at Catholic World Report,—namely that “If a Pope would formally profess heresy, he would cease, by that act, to be the Pope. It’s automatic”. Many are surprised by the statement, which shows that they haven’t really been taking people like Father Paul Kramer seriously, and may certainly have been regarding the Sedevacantists as mere mad men!

Catholic World Report recently spoke with Raymond Cardinal Burke on the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception (Dec. 8th) at the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe in La Crosse, Wisconsin, which Burke founded while serving as Bishop of La Crosse from 1994 to 2003. However, the problem with the said interview is just the following:

Cardinal Burke was asked: “Just to clarify again, are you saying that Pope Francis is in heresy or is close to it?”

Cardinal Burke: “No, I am not saying that Pope Francis is in heresy. I have never said that. Neither have I stated that he is close to being in heresy.” 

OnePeterFive has defended Burke’s above statement by stating (and I quote):

“Some have taken his last point — that they are not accusing the pope of heresy — to mean that Burke and his collaborators in the dubia are softpedaling their approach to Francis. But I would counter that Burke is a very precise speaker, and that he is being technically accurate when he says this. They are not accusing Francis of heresy — yet. This is why it is imperative that he answer the questions. It would clarify the matter of whether he is, or is not, a heretic, and whether he needs to be corrected in the manner of Pope John XXII, mentioned by Burke above.”

Well I quite disagree. The errors found in Amoris Laetitia are NOT the only errors of “Pope” Francis. His errors and manifest heresies outside AL are simply innumerable, so — whether Burke was being “precise”, “technical” or not—to say that Francis “is not in heresy” is simply a resounding lie, and in fact, quite provocative. I rather think the following may serve as a right response to this statement:

“The assertion made by some, that Jorge Bergoglio is the "vicar of Christ on earth" is highly problematical (to put it mildly). Not only was Benedict's renunciation canonically defective, but Bergoglio's election, according to some eminent canonists, canonically irregular.

“Even more problematical is the matter of Bergoglio's belief system. He is no Christian, but a Deist who does not believe in objective moral standards, or supernatural dogmatic revelation. He is an infidel who rejects the necessity for faith in the revealing God.

“Revelation, for Bergoglio, is obtained through phenomenological experience. His contempt for dogmatic Christianity is visceral. His "theology" is not the theology of the Catholic Church, but of the Deists, such as Lord Shaftesbury, Gotthold Lessing, and Friedrich Schleiermacher. By Catholic standards, Bergoglio is a heathen -- an unbeliever, an infidel. Such a one, even if he had been canonically elected, such a one is to be "cast out and trampled underfoot by men"; according to Innocent III (Sermo IV).” (See: THE CASE OF THE DUALPAPACY -- "DEUX PAPESVERMOULU").

Here is the interview:

CWR: In early 2004, when then-Massachusetts Senator John Kerry was running for President and you were just beginning your ministry as Archbishop of St. Louis, Missouri, you said Kerry should be refused Communion because of his pro-abortion stance. You also said you’re always getting into trouble. Are you still getting yourself into trouble? 

Cardinal Burke: I suppose that's true, but I trust it’s good trouble.

CWR: When was last time a Pope was rebuked?

Cardinal Burke: As far as I know, and I'm not an expert in this, it was John XXII. He was corrected for a wrong teaching he had on the beatific vision. 

CWR: And who did that?

Cardinal Burke: There was a bishop involved and some Dominican Friars…

CWR: Is there a Scriptural basis for rebuking a pope?

Cardinal Burke: The classic Scriptural basis is St. Paul's rebuking of Peter [in Galatians 2:11ff] for his accommodation of the Judaizers in the early Christian Church. Saint Paul confronted Peter to his face because he would be requiring things of the Gentile Christians that are not inherent to the Christian faith. And Peter actually agreed with that, but when he was with the Judaizers he would feign the other position and so Paul corrected him, as he said, to his face.

CWR: Why do you think Amoris Laetitia chapter 8 is so ambiguous?

Cardinal Burke: The reason for its ambiguity, it seems to me, is to give latitude to a practice which has never been admitted in the Church, namely the practice of permitting people who are living publicly in grave sin to receive the Sacraments.

CWR: It seems that you have, in some ways, become the champion of Canon 915, thinking back to the controversy over Kerry and even before him to some politicians in La Crosse, Wisconsin, where you were bishop from 1994 to 2003. [Editor's note: Canon 915 of the Code of Canon Law states: "Those who have been excommunicated or interdicted after the imposition or declaration of the penalty and others obstinately persevering in manifest grave sin are not to be admitted to holy communion." For more background see Dr. Edward Peter's page about the Canon.)

Cardinal Burke: And that's certainly a very good thing of which to be the champion.

CWR: What was the initial reason for you to submit the dubia to Pope Francis?

Cardinal Burke: Some of us had raised these questions to Pope Francis in the correspondence before this because of their gravity. But then there is also the growing confusion in the Church, in many quarters and parts of the Church, and the plea from both priests and laity, that the cardinals, who are the chief advisors to the Pope, needed to fulfill their responsibility by seeking clarification about some matters which are, as long as they remained in doubt, a source of great confusion and eventual spiritual harm in the church.

CWR: There's a lot of talk that Amoris Laetitia is deliberately ambiguous and that's because the divorced and remarried already find themselves in rather ambiguous situations. How do you respond to that?

Cardinal Burke: For those who are divorced and remarried, or I should say divorced and living in an irregular matrimonial union, if they truly understand the Catholic faith, the solution to that is not some confused approach, but the solution is to know the truth about the marriage to which one is bound, and once one knows that truth to live in accord with it. That is the only approach that can bring the faithful who find themselves in such a situation peace both with God and within the Church. This isn’t new; these situations have existed throughout the Church's history. There are always complex aspects to the situation, but the only way to address them is by acknowledging and living the truth.

CWR: Why isn’t the truly pastoral situation just to allow them to receive Communion?

Cardinal Burke: Because it doesn't respect the truth, and there can't be any possible truly pastoral situation that doesn't honor the truth taught by Christ Himself in the Gospel. So that if I'm bound to someone in a marriage and I'm living in a marital way with someone else, in adultery, pastoral care should be directed to helping me free myself from the sin of adultery. It's no help to me whatsoever and a positive harm to me to tell me, “That's all right, go ahead, and you can live that way and still receive the Sacraments.”

CWR: If a couple—where at least one has had been previously married and there was no declaration of nullity granted for the previous bond—came to you and said, “Look, we've been married for 20 years. We're in a stable relationship, we've got four children together and they're living good lives. We go to church every Sunday and the children are in Catholic schools. Why should we be denied Communion, never mind Confession?” what would you say to them?

Cardinal Burke: Because one or the other of them is bound to a prior marriage and therefore they're not free to enter another marriage or live in a marital way with another party. If they, for some reason, for example, raising children or some other valid reason, need to continue to live under the same roof, then they are called obviously to live chastely and that is as brother and sister.

CWR: Are there others, besides the four cardinals who submitted the dubia to Pope Francise, who support what you’re saying?

Cardinal Burke: Yes.

CWR: And they’re not speaking out because…?

Cardinal Burke: For various reasons, one of which is the way the media takes these things and distorts them making it seem that anyone who raises a question about Amoris Laetitia is disobedient to the Pope or an enemy of the Pope and so forth. So they...

CWR They're keeping their heads down.

Cardinal Burke: Yes, I suppose.

CWR: One prelate has accused you and your fellow cardinals of being in heresy. How do you respond to that?

Cardinal Burke: How can you be in heresy by asking honest questions? It’s just irrational to accuse us of heresy. We're asking fundamental questions based upon the constant tradition of the Church’s moral teaching. So I don't think there's any question that by doing that we've done something heretical.

CWR: Some critics say you are implicitly accusing the Pope of heresy.

Cardinal Burke: No, that's not what we have implied at all. We have simply asked him, as the Supreme Pastor of the Church, to clarify these five points that are confused; these five, very serious and fundamental points. We’re not accusing him of heresy, but just asking him to answer these questions for us as the Supreme Pastor of the Church.

CWR: In raising these questions you've been accused implicitly by the Pope and explicitly by others of legalism, of being Pharisees and Sadducees. [Smiles, chuckles] You smile because you get this all the time. Why is this not legalism?

Cardinal Burke: Simply because we are not asking the questions as a merely formal exercise, we're not asking questions about positive ecclesiastical law, that is, laws that are made by the Church herself. These are questions that have to do with the natural moral law and the fundamental teaching of the Gospel. To be attentive to that teaching is hardly legalism. In fact, it is, as Our Lord Himself taught us, the way of perfection to which we’re called. That's why He Himself said that He didn't come to abolish the law but to fulfill it [Matt 5:17].

CWR: Bishop Athanasius Schneider, O.R.C., the Auxiliary Bishop of the Archdiocese of Saint Mary in Astana, Kazakhstan and titular bishop of Celerina, who has written an open letter of support for the four cardinals and their dubia, has also said that the Church is in a de facto schism. Do you agree with that?

Cardinal Burke: There is a very serious division in the Church which has to be mended because it has to do with, as I said before, fundamental dogmatic and moral teaching. And if it's not clarified soon, it could develop into a formal schism.

CWR: Some people are saying that the pope could separate himself from communion with the Church. Can the pope legitimately be declared in schism or heresy?

Cardinal Burke: If a Pope would formally profess heresy, he would cease, by that act, to be the Pope. It’s automatic. And so, that could happen.

CWR: That could happen.

Cardinal Burke: Yes.

CWR: That’s a scary thought.

Cardinal Burke: It is a scary thought, and I hope we won’t be witnessing that at any time soon.

CWR: In hindsight, with all of the controversy that has surrounded this, should you have kept these concerns to yourself and just waited for His Holiness to answer your dubia?

Cardinal Burke: No, not at all, because the faithful and priests and bishops have the right to have these questions answered. It was our duty as cardinals, when the Pope made it clear that he would not respond to them, to make them public so that the priests and the lay faithful who had these same doubts might know that their doubts are legitimate and that they deserve a response.

CWR: Some consider you to be an enemy of Pope Francis. How do you see yourself in relation to him?

Cardinal Burke: I am a Cardinal of the Church, and one of the Pope’s principal co-workers. I have absolute respect for the Petrine office. If I didn’t care about him and his exercise of the Petrine office, I would just remain silent and let everything go as it is. But because in conscience I believe he has an obligation to clarify these matters for the Church, I made it known to him, not just on this occasion, but on other occasions. The publication of the dubia was done with complete respect for his office. I am not the enemy of the Pope.

CWR: Back to this question about the Pope committing heresy. What happens then, if the Pope commits heresy and is no longer Pope? Is there a new conclave? Who's in charge of the Church? Or do we just not even want to go there to start figuring that stuff out?

Cardinal Burke: There is already in place the discipline to be followed when the Pope ceases from his office, even as happened when Pope Benedict XVI abdicated his office. The Church continued to be governed in the interim between the effective date of his abdication and the inauguration of the papal ministry of Pope Francis.

CWR: Who is competent to declare him to be in heresy?

Cardinal Burke: It would have to be members of the College of Cardinals.

CWR: Just to clarify again, are you saying that Pope Francis is in heresy or is close to it?

Cardinal Burke: No, I am not saying that Pope Francis is in heresy. I have never said that. Neither have I stated that he is close to being in heresy. 

CWR: Doesn't the Holy Spirit protect us from such a danger?

Cardinal Burke: The Holy Spirit inhabits the Church. The Holy Spirit is always watching over, inspiring and strengthening the Church. But the members of the Church and, in a pre-eminent way, the hierarchy must cooperate with the promptings of the Holy Spirit. It is one thing for the Holy Spirit to be present with us, but it is another thing for us to be obedient to the Holy Spirit. 

Also related:

 RE: OUR REPLIES TO FR. PAUL KRAMER

A Reply to John Salza and Robert Siscoe IV

Father Paul Kramer on Benedict XVI’s confusing words: ...there's much behind the scenes...

John Paul The Great: “Protestants can receive Communion under certain conditions”. Francis: “The divorced and remarried can come forward to receive under certain circumstances, too”. Is Cardinal Burke aware?

Jonathan Ekene Ifeanyi

Burke

In an interesting interview with Raymond Arroyo of Eternal World Television Network, Raymond Cardinal Burke was asked to comment on John Paul’s document Familiaris Consortio, which states (and I quote):

“However, the Church reaffirms her practice, which is based upon Sacred Scripture, of not admitting to Eucharistic Communion divorced persons who have remarried. They are unable to be admitted thereto from the fact that their state and condition of life objectively contradict that union of love between Christ and the Church which is signified and effected by the Eucharist. Besides this, there is another special pastoral reason: if these people were admitted to the Eucharist, the faithful would be led into error and confusion regarding the Church's teaching about the indissolubility of marriage.”

“Is that really what concerns you, Your Eminence, that this new document Amoris Laetitia seems to be overturning it?”

Burke, a canon lawyer, told Arroyo:

“Well, exactly what Pope St. John Paul II expresses is what the Church has always taught and practised. And my concern is that Amoris Laetitia seems in some way to permit an interpretation which would lead to a practice which contradicts the constant practice of the Church and that simply is a source of the gravest concern for me. And [in] my judgment, what needs to happen is that the faithful know that whatever is written in Amoris Laetitia cannot and does not change what Pope St. John Paul II set forth in Familiaris Consortio because what he set forth was the, or is, the constant teaching and practice of the Church and therefore it is magisterial”.

Well I personally think that this frequent quoting (or rather, idolising) of “St.” John Paul II is really getting disgusting. The problem with that, as one Sedevacantist rightly put it—in a comment on my post on FB recently—is that John Paul the Great committed EXACTLY the same sin which “Pope” Francis is committing right now but not from the marriage angle.

I still remember what we were taught about Holy Communion during my catechism days in the late ’80s. Put simply, in those days, as children, we already understood very well—even before attending the catechism class—that receiving Holy Communion is only for practising Catholics; that it is a sacrilege and a mortal sin for a non-practising Catholic to receive Holy Communion. The idea of a non-Catholic receiving Holy Communion was simply inconceivable and in fact unimaginable. Now John Paul The Great did not just give Communion to non-practising Catholics, he made it "OFFICIAL" for Protestant heretics to receive Holy Communion in the Catholic Church! Till date, no Novus Ordo Church leader has ever cared to raise the issue! (which of course MUST BE OFFICIALLY CONDEMNED BY THE CHURCH). 

In my 2015 article “Manifest reprobate “Pope” Francis tells Lutheran woman to 'talk to the Lord' in discerning whether or not to participate in Communion”  I wrote: 

“It should be noted, however, that the abominable practice of giving Holy Communion to heretics did not originate from Bergoglio. Notorious heretics John Paul II and Benedict XVI did exactly the same thing and currently Francis is merely perfecting their evil work. For instance, John Paul II was seen publicly giving Holy Communion to the Protestant Tony Blair. On March 21, 2003 the Catholic Herald stated that John Paul II had personally given Tony Blair Holy Communion—the first time in history that a British prime minister had received the sacrament from the hands of the pontiff. The story was followed by such a flurry of denials that the newspaper was forced to withdraw the “claim” in its next issue. Yet, it was perfectly true, as the Pope's biographer Garry O'Connor discovered from several sources, including the papal chamberlain's office. Did John Paul II break “his own rules” by administering communion to an Anglican? Not quite: there was, at the time, a provision that non-Catholics could ask to receive communion "on a unique occasion for joy or for sorrow in the life of a family". Tony Blair presumably made such a request! Ironically, only two weeks after Tony Blair took Communion from the heretical Pope, the Roman Curia issued fierce guidelines imposing a virtual ban on distributing Communion to non-Catholics! Ah! A ban?  But—two years after—during John Paul II's burial, Benedict XVI was also seen giving Communion to the heretic brother Roger!..."

The Sedevacantist (mentioned above) writes:

“But there is a problem: For the most part, the very individuals who are now oh-so upset about this obvious attack on the sanctity and indissolubility of holy matrimony and a sacrilegious administration of “Holy Communion”, appeal to none other than “Pope-Saint” John Paul II as the Catholic hero who fearlessly defended the sacraments from being given to the “divorced and remarried”, as unrepentant public adulterers are called in the Vatican II "Church."

"For example, in the official dubia submitted to Francis by “Carinals” Burke, Brandmuller, Caffarra, and Meisner, the novel teaching of Amoris Laetitia was continually contrasted with that of John Paul II’s encyclical Veritatis Splendor, and John Paul’s exhortation Familiaris Consortio was referenced several times as well. When 45 Novus Ordo academics and prelates condemned Amoris Laetitia as heretical, John Paul II again featured prominently as a supposed defender of orthodoxy and spotless sacramental practice.

"In this post, we won’t even get into all the attacks on the holy Catholic Faith that were perpetrated by John Paul II throughout his 26-year reign as “Pope”, from his nauseating “Theology of the Body” to the pan-religious indifferentism promoted at Assisi. All these things are laid out and summarized on our special topical page on Karol Wojtyla:

"What you need to know about Karol Wojtyla, “Pope" John Paul II

"In this post we will only focus on one very specific thing, one that is unknown to a lot of people out there: Almost 34 years ago, John Paul II enshrined in official Novus Ordo church law a permission for public Protestants and Eastern Orthodox to receive “Holy Communion” and other Vatican II sacraments as long as they fulfilled certain conditions (note well: renouncing their heresies and converting to Catholicism was not one of them).

"Let’s briefly review the facts on this.

"On January 25, 1983, John Paul II published the official Vatican II Code of Canon Law, which replaced the original Code compiled under Pope St. Pius X and solemnly promulgated by Pope Benedict XV in 1917. The reason for the introduction of a new Code of Canon Law was the Second Vatican Council (1962-65). Church law simply needed to be adapted to the new teachings of the council, so a revision of canon law was necessary. As a result, the new Code is a direct application of the ecumenism and false ecclesiology taught by Vatican II, and it comes with the full putative “authority” of “Pope” John Paul II.

                             

"One of the new laws in the 1983 Code gives permission to some non-Catholics to receive the “sacraments” under certain conditions. This is by no means an “abuse” of Vatican II but actually rooted in the council itself. In its decree on ecumenism, the fateful Modernist synod said:.." (See: Where were the Dubia Supporters when John Paul II allowed“Communion” for PROTESTANTS?).

                                                                                      

Is Cardinal Burke aware of all this? And the other Dubia Cardinals too? Are they aware?  

Here is the full transcript of Burke's interview with Arroyo:

Raymond Arroyo: Welcome back to The World Over Live. He is the former head of the Vatican’s highest Court, the Apostolic Signatura, and one of the world’s foremost canon lawyers. He’s also the author of a new book, Hope for the World: To Unite All Things in Christ. Tonight, Raymond Cardinal Burke reflects on the backlash he and three other cardinals are experiencing in the wake of a letter they submitted to Pope Francis asking for clarity on certain points of the Apostolic Exhortation Amoris Laetitia. Specifically, they asked whether divorced and civilly remarried Catholics without an annulment can be allowed Communion. The letter was first submitted privately to the pope, but when Cardinal Burke and the others received no response, they made the letter public. This sparked an outcry from Pope Francis’s supporters. Papal confidante Father Anthony Spadaro, for example, called the four cardinals’ letter a ‘sign of a bad spirit.’ Archbishop Mark Coleridge of Brisbane, Australia told America magazine that the four cardinals are seeking a ‘false clarity’ by failing to address the reality of those Catholics in irregular relationships. To respond, I spoke with Cardinal Burke earlier this week from the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadaloupe in La Crosse, Wisconsin. We talked about his reasons for issuing the dubia, as the questions are officially known, and what he and the others are prepared to do should Pope Francis refuse to address their concerns. Here is my exclusive and very candid interview with Raymond Cardinal Burke.

Your Eminence, thank you so much for being with us. I wanna start with this dubia that you—it’s a series of questions that you asked the Holy Father for clarity on, and the real heart of it it seems to me is this question of does it permit, does Amoris Laetitia and the pope himself, permit divorced and remarried Catholics now in irregular relationships who are sexually active to receive Communion. Now, Rocco Boutiglioni, a very outstanding layman in Rome, says yes it does. You have Cardinal Schonborn, who also seems to be suggesting that it does. What’s the problem, then?

Cardinal Burke: The problem is that to engage in sexual union with someone who’s not your spouse is a grave sin and to live in such a state publicly means that one cannot have access to the Sacraments because he or she is not living according to the truth of Christ. And there’s no way that the Church can give permission for someone to do something which Christ himself does not give us permission to do.

Raymond Arroyo: I wanna return to something that—it’s really the second point that you raise in these five questions that you submitted to the Holy Father. And in it you all mention Veritatis Splendor, which was a document John Paul II promulgated. And in it he says there are no—you cannot create exceptions to the prohibitions on intrinsically evil acts, and yet, in Amoris Laetitia, the pope says, ‘the conscience of an individual may come to see with a certain moral security that even their irregular relationship is what God himself is asking amid the concrete complexity of one’s limits.’ What does that mean to you and what does it suggest?

Cardinal Burke: Well, it’s very confusing language. The only thing that it can suggest in accord with what the Church has always taught and practiced is that the conscience informs itself with regard to the teaching of Christ, whether it has to do with marriage or the Sacraments, and conforms itself then to that teaching. And in this case, no matter what the complexities of the situation may be, the party in question, the member of the faithful in question, will either rectify the irregular, immoral situation in which he finds himself and thereby be able to receive the Sacraments, or until he is able to rectify the situation, will not present himself to receive the Sacraments. There can’t be an exception because if it’s always and everywhere wrong to engage in the conjugal act with someone who is not your spouse, then if you do that and live in that way, in an habitual manner, you simply are in a condition in which you, with the help of the Church, with the help of God’s grace, you need to set your life in order and therefore begin to be able to approach again to receive Christ in the Sacraments.

Raymond Arroyo: And yet, Your Eminence, it seems as I read all of this commentary, as I read even those closest to the pope, Father Antonio Spadaro in a recent interview seemed to be suggesting that look, there isn’t a one-size-fits-all when it comes to adultery, that conscience comes into play and the Church is trying to accompany and walk with these people even in their irregular unions. The suggestion seems to be, in fact the—it’s explicit—that you really don’t need an annulment. You don’t need to nullify the first marriage and sometimes this second union may be what God is asking you. You would say what to that line of thinking?

Cardinal Burke: Well, the—it’s simply a wrong notion of conscience. The conscience does not render each of us as an individual the judge of what is right and wrong. There’s an objective order to things, and our conscience, when we are well-educated and when our conscience is well-informed, recognizes that objective order and therefore knows what’s right and what is wrong and acts accordingly. To say that I decide that something is right which for everyone else is always and everywhere wrong is simply an erroneous form of conscience and the Church’s…very popular word today of the person who finds himself in such a situation is that help which we receive in the Church to know the truth about the moral law and to respond to the grace which Our Lord always gives us—to live that truth in practice.

Raymond Arroyo: Father Antonio Spadaro who is a very close collaborator with the pope—in fact, he’s his ghost writer on a lot of these documents—he has really become the vanguard of taking down the critics of Amoris Laetitia or anyone who would even question the thinking here or the doctrine that’s implied through these pastoral adjustments. Spadaro said, and I quote, and I think he’s talking about you, that these questions, the dubia that you presented to the Holy Father, is an attempt to ramp up the tension and create division within the Church. Is that what you’re trying to do?

Cardinal Burke: No. In fact, we’re trying to address the division which is already very much ramped up, to use his phrase. Everywhere I go…many faithful, priests and bishops, and lay faithful, [with] whom I speak are in a state of very serious confusion on this matter. Priests tell me that one priest is telling the faithful one thing in Confession, other priest another thing. Only when these questions, which we have raised according to the traditional manner of resolving questions in the Church which have to do with very serious matters, only when these questions are adequately answered will the division be dissipated. But as is happening right now, as long as this continues, the division will only grow and of course the fruit of division is error. And here we’re talking about the salvation of souls, people being led into error in matters which have to do with their eternal salvation. And so Father Spadaro is very much in error in that affirmation.

Raymond Arroyo: Spadaro also said that the pope does not answer binary questions presented to him. And I wanna quote this. He says, ‘He answers sincere questions from pastors.’ Were you offended by that?

Cardinal Burke: Yes, very much so. The popes have always, all along the centuries—I’m a student of the Church’s discipline—it is the role of the pope as the pastor of the universal Church, as the guardian of the unity of the bishops and of the whole Body of Christ, to respond to such questions. To suggest that posing these questions is a sign of insincerity is deeply offensive. I can assure you that for myself, and I know the other cardinals involved, we wouldn’t raise the questions unless we had the deepest and most sincere concern for the Church herself and for the individual members of the faithful.

Raymond Arroyo: Your Eminence, many of the pope’s supporters and your critics have said he’s already answered your questions when he embraced the implementation plan of Amoris Laetitia of those bishops in Buenos Aires. In it, they said you don’t need an annulment and those who are divorced and remarried with the accompaniment of their pastor in certain cases can come forward and receive Communion. And the pope said, ‘This is exactly as it should be.’ What’s wrong with that? Didn’t he already answer your question?

Cardinal Burke: Not at all. He’s given his own opinion on the matter. The question can only be answered in terms of what the Church has always taught and practiced, as for instance is illustrated in the book which was published for the 2014 synod Remaining in the Truth of Christ. And it’s one thing [for] the pope can say what is written in Amoris Laetitia is interpreted correctly to mean that an individual priest can permit someone who’s in an irregular matrimonial union to receive the Sacraments without a firm purpose of amendment, but that doesn’t resolve the question. The question is, what does the Church teach? It’s not a matter of…some speculative idea I may have about how to approach these questions, but how does Christ in His Church address such questions? That’s, until that answer is provided, we remain in a confused state.

Raymond Arroyo: I wanna remind people of something. In Familiaris Consortio, which was John Paul II’s great document on the family, he writes:

However, the Church reaffirms her practice, which is based upon Sacred Scripture, of not admitting to Eucharistic Communion divorced persons who have remarried. They are unable to be admitted thereto from the fact that their state and condition of life objectively contradict that union of love between Christ and the Church which is signified and effected by the Eucharist. Besides this, there is another special pastoral reason: if these people were admitted to the Eucharist, the faithful would be led into error and confusion regarding the Church's teaching about the indissolubility of marriage. Is that really what concerns you, Your Eminence, that this new document Amoris Laetitia seems to be overturning it?

Cardinal Burke: Well, exactly what Pope St. John Paul II expresses is what the Church has always taught and practiced. And my concern is that Amoris Laetitia seems in some way to permit an interpretation which would lead to a practice which contradicts the constant practice of the Church and that simply is a source of the gravest concern for me. And [in] my judgment, what needs to happen is that the faithful know that whatever is written in Amoris Laetitia cannot and does not change what Pope St. John Paul II set forth in Familiaris Consortio because what he set forth was the, or is, the constant teaching and practice of the Church and therefore it is magisterial.

Raymond Arroyo: And yet you have Cardinal Schonborn that’s saying, look, this is not a break but it is an evolution. It is a changing of the Church teaching, a maturation of it. Do you accept that analysis?

Cardinal Burke: No. You can’t have a maturation of a teaching which is a rupture from that teaching, which is a breaking away from that teaching. Cardinal Schonborn’s remarks in that regard do not reflect what is called development of doctrine—in other words, through the Church’s reflection she deepens her appreciation of a teaching and, and helps the faithful to practice that teaching. This case, it’s a question of complete rupture in the teaching of the Church, a complete going away from what the Church has always taught and practiced. And that you can’t call a maturation. A maturation is something organic, where you see that what the Church has been teaching about marriage now is expressed with a greater fullness.

Raymond Arroyo: Your Eminence, have you ever seen a moment in the Church where—I can’t remember a moment where you had the pope and people raising questions about teaching, legitimate questions and trying to do so respectfully. And you had this sort of political counterforce using media and tweets and columns to attack anyone who would question that teaching in any way. And I wanna point something out to you that Bishop Schneider in Kazakhstan wrote. We’ll put it up on the screen. I’d love your reaction to this. He writes, or he spoke in an interview. He said:

There is a strange form of schism. Externally, numerous ecclesiastics safeguard formal unity with the pope, at times, for the good of their own career or of a kind of papolatry. And at the same time they have broken their ties with Christ, the Truth, and with Christ, the true head of the Church. Are we in the middle of a schism and have you ever seen a political campaign like this?

Cardinal Burke: Well, certainly, I’ve never witnessed this in my lifetime. In the history of the Church there have been situations which have some similarities with the present situation, but I perceive that a mundane spirit, a worldly spirit has entered into the Church, which would divide her members into various camps: liberals and conservatives, who are the fundamentalists as some are fond of calling those of us who are striving to defend the constant teaching of the Church. This mundane spirit is very much reflected in a lot of slogans and etiquettes or—not etiquettes, that’s an Italian word—labels put on people in order to discount them. But we’re all Roman Catholics. We’re all called to follow Christ as He comes to us in His Church through the Church’s constant teaching…this politicization of the Church which is very much augmented by all of these forms of mediatic intervention are very harmful and are doing a great deal of damage to the common good of all in the Church.

Raymond Arroyo: In our final moments, I have to raise this. I was sort of struck, amazed really, at an interview the Holy Father gave where he suggested that those who are ‘rigid’—and that’s the term he uses…sort of locked in their ‘rigidity’ over doctrine and otherwise, that they suffer from a compulsion or a condition. Your reaction to that, and what are you and these your fellow cardinals do if you don’t get a positive reaction from the Holy Father and say, some answer on this point of clarification?

Cardinal Burke: Well, first of all, we—our presentation of the five questions is done with great serenity and with great respect. They are not the reactions of people who are suffering from emotional disorders. That we’re very deeply concerned about the truth of the doctrine of the faith and its integrity is not a sign of illness. What will we do? We have to continue to serve the truth with charity and so especially those of us who are cardinals, who are the principal advisors of the Holy Father, have a very solemn obligation to defend the Church from these kind of attacks at her very foundation. I mean, we have to remember that we’re talking about teaching about marriage and its fruit, the family, and to attack that teaching is to destabilize the whole Church and society in general. And so the responsibility is very great and we certainly—I only can speak for myself, but I know from my fellow cardinals who have been involved with me—we intend to serve that truth no matter what it takes. I, for my part, will never be part of a schism. I’m a Roman Catholic and defending the Roman Catholic faith is not the cause of my being separated from the Church. And so I simply intend to continue to defend the faith out of love for Our Lord and for the, his mystical body, my brothers and sisters in the Church, and I believe the other cardinals are of the same mind.

Raymond Arroyo: Are there more than just the four of you? I mean, I’m sure you’re getting letters and calls from others who support you—and you said you were willing to issue a formal correction if necessary. Is—does that still stand?

Cardinal Burke: Of course it does, that [is the] standard instrument in the Church for addressing such a situation. Yes, there are other cardinals. I don’t want to get into this business of the numbers. We have to remember, the criterion here is the truth. There have been cases, for instance, take for example the case of Henry VIII and his desire to be able to enter a second marriage without having his first marriage declared null—all of the bishops of England except St. John Fisher went along with the error, but St. John Fisher is the saint because he defended the truth. And all of us in the Church who are cardinals, bishops, we have the responsibility to defend the truth; whether we seem to be numerous or we seem to be very few doesn't make any difference. It’s the truth of Christ which has to be taught.

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