CDF Notification: Fr Jon Sobrino SJ

From today's Bolletino:

1. After a preliminary examination of the books Jesucristo liberador. Lectura histórico-teológica de Jesús de Nazaret (Jesus the Liberator) and La fe en Jesucristo. Ensayo desde las víctimas (Christ the Liberator) by Father Jon Sobrino, SJ, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, because of certain imprecisions and errors found in them, decided to proceed to a more thorough study of these works in October 2001. Given the wide distribution of these writings and their use in seminaries and other centers of study, particularly in Latin America, it was decided to employ the "urgent examination" as regulated by articles 23-27 of Agendi Ratio in Doctrinarum Examine.

As a result of this examination, in July 2004 a list of erroneous or dangerous propositions found in the abovementioned books was sent to the Author through the Reverend Father Peter Hans Kolvenbach, SJ, Superior General of the Society of Jesus.

In March of 2005, Father Jon Sobrino sent a Response to the text of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith to the Congregation. This Response was studied in the Ordinary Session of the Congregation on 23 November 2005. It was determined that, although the author had modified his thought somewhat on several points, the Response did not prove satisfactory since, in substance, the errors already cited in the list of erroneous propositions still remained in this text. Although the preoccupation of the Author for the plight of the poor is admirable, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith has the obligation to indicate that the aforementioned works of Father Sobrino contain notable discrepancies with the faith of the Church.

For this reason, it was decided to publish this Notification, in order to offer the faithful a secure criterion, founded upon the doctrine of the Church, by which to judge the affirmations contained in these books or in other publications of the Author. One must note that on some occasions the erroneous propositions are situated within the context of other expressions which would seem to contradict them3, but this is not sufficient to justify these propositions. The Congregation does not intend to judge the subjective intentions of the Author, but rather has the duty to call to attention to certain propositions which are not in conformity with the doctrine of the Church. These propositions regard: 1) the methodological presuppositions on which the Author bases his theological reflection, 2) the Divinity of Jesus Christ, 3) the Incarnation of the Son of God, 4) the relationship between Jesus Christ and the Kingdom of God, 5) the Self-consciousness of Jesus, and 6) the salvific value of his Death.

The whole thing is worth reading - it strikes me as a fine example of how a Christological text should be examined and evaluated with discernment and I'm sure that the critiques applied to Sobrino's writings could easily be applied to many other contemporary theological authors. It is worth noting that in addition to highlighting those areas where Sobrino explicitly contradicts a magisterial or creedal statement, the orientation of his method is also subjected to criticism:

2. In his book Jesus the Liberator: A Historical-Theological View, Father Sobrino affirms: "Latin American Christology…identifies its setting, in the sense of a real situation, as the poor of this world, and this situation is what must be present in and permeate any particular setting in which Christology is done" (Jesus the Liberator, 28). Further, "the poor in the community question Christological faith and give it its fundamental direction" (Ibidem, 30), and "the Church of the poor…is the ecclesial setting of Christology because it is a world shaped by the poor" (Ibidem, 31). "The social setting is thus the most crucial for the faith, the most crucial in shaping the thought pattern of Christology, and what requires and encourages the epistemological break" (Ibidem).

While such a preoccupation for the poor and oppressed is admirable, in these quotations the "Church of the poor" assumes the fundamental position which properly belongs to the faith of the Church. It is only in this ecclesial faith that all other theological foundations find their correct epistemological setting.

The ecclesial foundation of Christology may not be identified with "the Church of the poor", but is found rather in the apostolic faith transmitted through the Church for all generations. The theologian, in his particular vocation in the Church, must continually bear in mind that theology is the science of the faith. Other points of departure for theological work run the risk of arbitrariness and end in a misrepresentation of the same faith,

In addition to asking oneself what an author is saying in a particular text, we need to ask ourselves, 'Why is he saying that? What motivates him? What assumptions does he start with? To what end is he directing his writing?'
Those who have a little theological formation will appreciate how ancient many of Fr Sobrino's errors are. The same confusions and mistakes keep cropping up throughout history. One, however, which is a more 'modern' heresy than most is the question of the human conciousness of Christ and the possibility of His 'having faith'. It's extremely useful that this Notification serves as a reminder of the Church's teaching on this issue:

8. Citing Leonardo Boff, Father Sobrino affirms that "Jesus was an extraordinary believer and had faith. Faith was Jesus’ mode of being" (Jesus the Liberator, 154). And for his own part he adds: "This faith describes the totality of the life of Jesus" (Ibidem, 157). The Author justifies his position citing the text of Hebrews 12:2: "Tersely and with a clarity unparalleled in the New Testament, the letter says that Jesus was related to the mystery of God in faith. Jesus is the one who has first and most fully lived faith (12:2)" (Christ the Liberator, 136-137). He further adds: "With regard to faith, Jesus in his life is presented as a believer like ourselves, our brother in relation to God, since he was not spared having to pass through faith. But he is also presented as an elder brother because he lived faith as its ‘pioneer and perfecter’ (12:2). He is the model, the one on whom we have to keep our eyes fixed in order to live out our own faith" (Ibidem, 138). These citations do not clearly show the unique singularity of the filial relationship of Jesus with the Father; indeed they tend to exclude it. Considering the whole of the New Testament it is not possible to sustain that Jesus was "a believer like ourselves". The Gospel of John speaks of Jesus’ "vision" of the Father: "Not that anyone has seen the Father except the one who is from God; he has seen the Father". This unique and singular intimacy between Jesus and the Father is equally evident in the Synoptic Gospels.

The filial and messianic consciousness of Jesus is the direct consequence of his ontology as Son of God made man. If Jesus were a believer like ourselves, albeit in an exemplary manner, he would not be able to be the true Revealer showing us the face of the Father. This point has an evident connection both with what is said above in number IV concerning the relationship between Jesus and the Kingdom, and what will be said in VI below concerning the salvific value that Jesus attributed to his death. For Father Sobrino, in fact, the unique character of the mediation and revelation of Jesus disappears: he is thus reduced to the condition of "revealer" that we can attribute to the prophets and mystics.

Jesus, the Incarnate Son of God, enjoys an intimate and immediate knowledge of his Father, a "vision" that certainly goes beyond the vision of faith. The hypostatic union and Jesus’ mission of revelation and redemption require the vision of the Father and the knowledge of his plan of salvation. This is what is indicated in the Gospel texts cited above.

Various recent magisterial texts have expressed this doctrine: "But the knowledge and love of our Divine Redeemer, of which we were the object from the first moment of His Incarnation, exceed all that the human intellect can hope to grasp. For hardly was He conceived in the womb of the Mother of God when He began to enjoy the Beatific Vision".

Though in somewhat different terminology, Pope John Paul II insists on this vision of the Father: "His [Jesus’] eyes remain fixed on the Father. Precisely because of the knowledge and experience of the Father which he alone has, even at this moment of darkness he sees clearly the gravity of sin and suffers because of it. He alone, who sees the Father and rejoices fully in him, can understand completely what it means to resist the Father's love by sin".

Likewise, the Catechism of the Catholic Church speaks of the immediate knowledge which Jesus has of the Father: "Such is first of all the case with the intimate and immediate knowledge that the Son of God made man has of his Father". "By its union to the divine wisdom in the person of the Word incarnate, Christ enjoyed in his human knowledge the fullness of understanding of the eternal plans he had come to reveal".

The relationship between Jesus and God is not correctly expressed by saying Jesus was a believer like us. On the contrary, it is precisely the intimacy and the direct and immediate knowledge which he has of the Father that allows Jesus to reveal to men the mystery of divine love. Only in this way can Jesus bring us into divine love.

There's lots of interesting stuff in the notification - an analysis of it in a classroom would provide a very useful lesson in Christology and theological method. (It would be fascinating to learn who precisely drafted this Notification.) I also find it interesting (although I don't think the notification says this explicitly) that the condemned position of Sobrino in section VI of the Notification seems to lead to a form of Pelagianiam. The great mysteries of Christianity stand and fall together.

Pink Martini

I'd never heard of Pink Martini until Jane of Alle Psalite linked to this Youtube video:

Magnifique!

Ye cannot halve the Gospel of God's grace

This is a fascinating poem of John Henry Newman with the most un-poetic title 'Liberalism'.. As an Anglican he travelled to Italy and whilst there fell seriously ill. His recovery lead him to the conclusion that he was spared by Divine Providence for some mission back in England. He believed that he had a role to fight against Liberalism (or the 'Anti-Dogmatic' principle) in the Church of England.
On his return home, he wrote the following verses in Palermo:

Ye cannot halve the Gospel of God's grace;
Men of presumptuous heart! I know you well.
Ye are of those who plan that we should dwell,
Each in his tranquil home and holy place;
Seeing the Word refines all natures rude,
And tames the stirrings of the multitude.

And ye have caught some echoes of its lore,
As heralded amid the joyous choirs;
Ye mark'd it spoke of peace, chastised desires,
Good-will and mercy,—and ye heard no more;
But, as for zeal and quick-eyed sanctity,
And the dread depths of grace, ye pass'd them by.

And so ye halve the Truth; for ye in heart,
At best, are doubters whether it be true,
The theme discarding, as unmeet for you,
Statesmen or Sages. O new-compass'd art
Of the ancient Foe!—but what, if it extends
O'er our own camp, and rules amid our friends?

US Military in the News

Kudos to Marine Gen. Peter Pace for not being afraid to speak his mind:

A senior US army chief has said he supports the Pentagon's ban on gays serving in the military.
Speaking in an interview published by the Chicago Tribune newspaper, Marine Gen. Peter Pace said he believed homosexual acts were "immoral".
(snip)
Marine Gen. Pace said: "As an individual, I would not want (acceptance of gay behaviour) to be our policy, just like I would not want it to be our policy that if we were to find out that so-and-so was sleeping with somebody else's wife, that we would just look the other way, which we do not. We prosecute that kind of immoral behaviour."

Also in the Telegraph:

US Army recruiters are targeting teenage paintball enthusiasts in an attempt to fill the gaps in military ranks.
Paintball contests, in which camouflaged players charge around the woods splattering each other with gas guns that fire paint pellets, are now more popular in America than surfing, snowboarding or even baseball - attracting 10.4 million participants.
Spotting the pastime's similarity to charging around Iraq in camouflage shooting real guns, the army hopes that some of the "weekend warriors" can be tempted to make a more serious commitment to soldiering.

It's Out!

The Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation Sacramentum Caritatis (The Sacrament of Charity).

Boy Bishop!

Westminster Cathedral has revived the tradition of the Boy Bishop - read about it at Solomon, I Have Surpassed Thee.

Church organist required for jungle meteorite hunt

From the Times:

Wanted: one organist for concert in remote Bolivian jungle accessible only by raft. Must be prepared to face rapids, alligators and 30C (86F) temperatures. Ability to swim a bonus.
Church organists are rarely an essential part of expeditions into the Amazonian rainforest, but a team of scientists about to embark on a journey to a far-flung meteorite impact site in Bolivia believe that one will be key to achieving their mission.
Colonel John Blashford-Snell, a professional adventurer who made headlines in 2000 when he took a grand piano 350 miles (560km) along the Amazon River as a present for the Wai Wai tribe in Guyana, intends to deliver a pedal organ to the isolated Ojaki community as a way of persuading its people to help his expedition.
The colonel’s team, which will also help to install a clean water supply and perform medical duties for the Ojaki people, are reliant on local expertise to build bridges to the impact site, which is five miles wide. The locals are religious and have asked the visitors to install an organ in their newly built church.
The organ — a pedal-powered Harmonium donated by St James’s church in Milton Abbas, Dorset — will be flown to La Paz and then transported by lorry 120 miles over the Andes to the Beni river. It will then be loaded on to a 59ft (18m) boat for a 430-mile journey over rapids and more dangerous, man-made hazards.

Palazzo Massimo

Check out Roman Miscellany - he's done a post with some splendid pictures of the annual feast at the Palazzo Massimo which commemorates a miracle of St Philip Neri.
If you are in Rome on Friday 16th of March, it would be sinful to not stop by the Palazzo.

An interesting survival

From the Times:

A medieval painting of the Last Judgment has been restored to its rightful place in a Wiltshire church after an absence of 450 years. The work is known as a doom board — it is believed to have been painted shortly after the Black Death in the 1390s — and only a few survive. Most were destroyed during religious reforms in the reign of Edward VI, but parishioners at St James the Great, in Dauntsey, hid theirs behind plaster. It has now been restored at a cost of £120,000.

Choir Wars

From the Times:

A Church of England clergyman who was exasperated by the increasing dissonance among his choir has decided to silence them.
The discord that led the Rev Colin Randall, Team Rector of Wellington in Somerset, to suspend the weekly singing at St John’s Church developed over styles of worship.
The choir had established a reputation for cathedral-standard music. It excelled at difficult psalms and anthems as the congregation listened.
Mr Randall, by contrast, preferred the entire church to join in with more modern classics such as Graham Kendrick’s Shine, Jesus, Shine. Disagreement over the two approaches built up, and any harmony was shattered for good last year when Mr Randall sacked the choirmaster, Colin Drummond, after 13 years of diligent service. Half the choir then left in protest.
Mr Randall claimed the be-haviour of a small number of remaining singers was “so lacking in Christian discipleship” that he felt obliged to put an end to their Sunday singing for the foreseeable future.
(snip)
Mr Randall publicly thanked the choir members for their commitment and hard work and said that he looked forward to reinstating weekly singing once a new director of music was in place. He hoped that the new director would recruit new members, including children and young people.
Mr Randall declined to comment yesterday but said that the decision had followed “some months of thought”. He said he would come to an agreement with Val Williams, the choir leader, about services for which the choir would sing, such as Easter Sunday.
The parent of one former choir member said: “Colin [Drummond] was brilliant. He educated and brought the children on and invited the children and parents to his home a couple of times a year, but he was good with everyone.”
Mr Drummond, whose wife and two sons also left the choir, said: “I am very saddened. Less than a year ago we had a large choir that was well known for its outreach, particularly among young people in Wellington. Now there is nothing.”
John Andrews, communications officer for the Diocese of Bath and Wells, said the problem was about styles of worship. “There is a slight history down there,” he said, adding that any choir would “drift” without a choirmaster.

Interesting Legal Question...

From the Times:

A Roman Catholic teenager has brought a landmark legal action against a council for sending her to live with Protestant foster parents.
The young woman, identified only as “AR”, is seeking damages of £70,000 from Highland council for housing her with two sets of Protestant foster parents after she was taken into care aged 8.
Now 18, she has been granted legal aid to mount a case against the council and was yesterday given the go-ahead for it to be heard in the Court of Session in Edinburgh, Scot-land’s supreme civil court.
In a written ruling after a brief hearing last Friday, Judge Lord Uist appeared to admit yesterday that the case was unprecedented, saying that it involved “novel and difficult questions of law”.
(snip)
Legal papers were served on Highland council this year, while documents lodged before the court yesterday said only that the council had failed to accommodate the girl’s religious needs.
According to the papers, the council failed to ensure that she could follow “her religious persuasion throughout the period she was looked after and accommodated”.

Chris Bliss Juggling...

Biretta doff in Mark Shea's direction.
As someone who can barely drink a cup of coffee without scalding himself, consider me duly astonished.

Benedict's Memoirs of JPII

If the Telegraph is to be believed, the Pope has been quite frank about some of the things that happened during John Paul's reign:

In a new book of memoirs about his predecessor, Pope Benedict recalls the events of the World Eucharist Congress at Bologna in 1997, a gathering of 300,000 young Catholic pilgrims who were to be exposed to the singer's iconoclastic songs and their "completely different" message.
Pope Benedict wrote: "The Pope appeared tired, exhausted. At that very moment the stars arrived, Bob Dylan and others whose names I do not remember.
''They had a completely different message from the one which the Pope had.
"There was reason to be sceptical - I was, and in some ways I still am - over whether it was really right to allow this type of 'prophet' to appear."
(snip)
Pope Benedict's new book, John Paul II, my loved predecessor, is published by Edizione San Paulo and will be sold with Famiglia Cristiana, the Catholic newspaper, next week.

Bringing you all the really important stuff...

Rocco has the skinny on the new head of 'CEI' (The Italian Episcopal Conference) - Archbishop Angelo Bagnasco. The sharp-eyed among you will note the little stars set into the collar of his cassock. This shows that the photo was taken when he was Bishop to the Italian Armed Forces. Military chaplains in Italy get to wear these little stars on their cassocks or habits.
Rocco also reports that a leaked copy of some indult (Indult? What indult?) is circulating about the City.

Savoy Showdown...

The royalists among my readership will be interested in the following story from the Telegraph:

While the titles and honours of the Italian royal family have not legally been recognised since 1946, when the republic was founded, Prince Victor Emmanuel, 70, has ruled over the House of Savoy since the death of his father, Umberto II, in 1983.
However, his cousin Amedeo, 63, the 5th Duke D'Aosta, strenuously maintains it is he, not Victor Emmanuel, who is the true heir to the defunct monarchy.
Last summer, Amedeo declared that he had changed his name to Savoy and would assume power. However, his attempt to seize control will be fiercely fought by Victor Emmanuel in a closed hearing at a court in Arezzo at an undisclosed date this month.
Victor Emmanuel has said Amedeo's membership of the dynasty has now been cancelled, "because of his gravely injurious behaviour towards the honour of our royal person." In addition, he denounced Amedeo and his son Aimone to the court for usurping the name of Savoy and the position of family head.
(snip)
Amedeo believes his cousin gave up the right to call himself Umberto II's heir when he married a Swiss biscuit heiress and champion water-skier without his father's permission in 1971.
To back up his claim, he has produced letters between Umberto and Victor Emmanuel, in which the last king warned his son about the consequences of marriage without his express permission.
"It could bring about the loss of all your rights to succeed as Head of the House of Savoy and your claim to the throne of Italy, reducing you to the status of a private citizen," wrote Umberto. When Umberto heard that Victor Emmanuel had married Marina Doria secretly in Las Vegas, he wrote again in panic, reminding him "word for word" of what he had said.
(snip)
His sister, Princess Maria Gabriella, has switched her allegiance and is backing Amedeo's claim. "My father asked to be buried along with the royal seal, and that was his way of showing that the dynasty ended with him," she said.

Oh, and it seems as though a portrait of Lady Jane Grey has been discovered.

Well, the Post-synodal Exhortation is coming...

The Bolletino announces the release of the Exhortation next Tuesday, 13th March. It will be entitled "Sacramentum Caritatis" (The Sacrament of Charity) and will deal with the Eucharist as the source and summit of the life and mission of the Church.
Nothing about a Motu Proprio... yet...

Something "interesting" and "fun"

The Gallery of "Misused" Quotation Marks.

The Transfiguration

Today's Gospel provides a good excuse to link to Fr Z's Patristic Rosary project and in particular his post about the Transfiguration.
Particularly notable is the reflection of St Maximus the Confessor:

The Lord does not always appear in glory to all who stand before Him. To beginners He appears in the form of a servant (Phil 2:7); to those able to follow Him as He climbs the high mountain of His Transfiguration He appears in the form of God, the form in which He existed before the world came to be (John 17:5). It is therefore possible for the same Lord not to appear in the same way to all who stand before Him, but to appear to some in one way and to others in another way, according to the measure of each person’s faith. When the Logos of God becomes manifest and radiant in us, and His face shines like the sun, then His clothes will also look white. That is to say, the words of the Gospel will then be clear and distinct, with nothing concealed. And Moses and Elijah – the more spiritual principles of the Law and the Prophets – will also be present with Him.

On the 2nd Sunday of Lent last year, Pope Benedict noted:

When one has the grace to live a strong experience of God, it is as if one is living an experience similar to that of the disciples during the Transfiguration: a momentary foretaste of what will constitute the happiness of Paradise. These are usually brief experiences that are sometimes granted by God, especially prior to difficult trials.
No one, however, is permitted to live "on Tabor" while on earth. Indeed, human existence is a journey of faith and as such, moves ahead more in shadows than in full light, and is no stranger to moments of obscurity and also of complete darkness. While we are on this earth, our relationship with God takes place more by listening than by seeing; and the same contemplation comes about, so to speak, with closed eyes, thanks to the interior light that is kindled in us by the Word of God.

For those who read Italian, the Holy Father's words at today's Angelus are particularly striking. I shall post an English translation when it is made available.

Oooooops!

From the New York Times:

ZURICH, Switzerland (AP) -- What began as a routine training exercise almost ended in an embarrassing diplomatic incident after a company of Swiss soldiers got lost at night and marched into neighboring Liechtenstein.
According to Swiss daily Blick, the 170 infantry soldiers wandered 2 kilometers (1.2 miles) across an unmarked border into the tiny principality early Thursday before realizing their mistake and turning back.

Lunar Eclipse - Saturday Night

Check out the Lunar Eclipse Computer.