July 2014 Print

by SSPX priests

 

The Synod on the Family has been in the news now for months. But is this the first Synod of the kind? Or has there been some history behind it?

It was during Vatican Council II that Pope Paul VI himself decided to establish the Synod of Bishops: “The advanced information that We Ourselves are happy to share with you is that We intend to give you some institution, called for by this Council, a ‘Synod of Bishops’, which will be made up of bishops nominated for the most part by the Episcopal Conferences with our approval and called by the Pope according to the needs of the Church, for his consultation and collaboration, when for the well-being of the Church it might seem to him opportune.”

The Synod of Bishops then expresses its “opinion on very important and serious subjects” (Paul VI, Address to Cardinals, 24 June 1967). In the 40 years since, the Synod has met every two, and later on every three, years. Whereas earlier on, it touched on topics which involved the whole Church, the later synods have dealt with the problems relative to a specific continent. Unfortunately, this collegial tool has been de facto a platform for the avant-garde theologians to publicize their disparaging and (im)moral theories, which allowed the conciliar Popes to sound a more reproachful and conservative note when it was time to draft the final document. This may sound familiar to our reader as the typical revolutionary strategy: three steps forward, two backward.

 

What is the forecast regarding this coming Synod?

It is very likely that Pope Francis is disposed to use the Synod to make some revolutionary changes, unless there is a real backlash from cardinals and bishops. Among these, Cardinal Müller has spoken quite forcefully against Cardinal Kasper’s reckless proposals on Communion for the divorced and remarried (see 1st article of this issue).

Needless to say, heavy clouds are quickly gathering on the horizon. On June 26, the Vatican released its Working Document, Instrumentum Laboris. Besides a few good items, three most radical proposals are brought forward:

A new “pastoral solution” to allow divorced and remarried Catholics to receive Holy Communion;
A new “pastoral approach” that permits the baptism of children from same-sex couples, thus indirectly legitimizing these unions;
A recasting of natural law in “new language,” which threatens to undermine our entire ethical foundation of true morality.

 

What is the theological value of this meeting? Does it qualify as a magisterial act of the Church?

The Synod is mainly a consultative body, and its proceedings have no “magisterial” weight. The Synod has its extended blathering of dialogue. Not all the world’s bishops attend, but only delegates from various countries. In any case, all of these speeches and interventions are gathered and placed on the Pope’s desk. It gives the impression of a world-wide consultation and collegial approach. The Pope then sifts through and produces virtually what he wants, usually set in the form of an Apostolic Exhortation.

 

We have already dealt extensively on the first problem of Communion for remarried divorcees in articles of this issue. The second is certainly a mine field. What about the third issue? What are we talking about when we speak of the natural law?

The natural law is not so much a matter of faith as a truth of reason. It is, in fact, an objective reality written in the nature, not of this or that man, but in human nature itself considered as such, in its permanence and stability. In this sense it is not a law imposed by man or by force from the outside, but engraved in the genes and soul of every man. Natural Law is the sum total of those universal and mandatory judgments which bind them to do good and avoid evil, and discovered by all men of right reason from human nature.

All the popes after Vatican II have strongly rested their moral teaching on the natural law. Paul VI in Humanae Vitae referred to the natural law in order to reiterate that, according to the Church, “every marital act must of necessity retain its intrinsic relationship to the procreation of human life.” In Evangelium Vitae, John Paul II explains that: “every person sincerely open to truth and goodness can, by the light of reason and the hidden action of grace, come to recognize in the natural law written in the heart (cf. Rom 2:14-15) the sacred value of human life from its very beginning until its end.”

Finally, Benedict XVI, in February 12, 2007, referred to the importance of this doctrine: “there is an urgent need to reflect upon the question of natural law and to rediscover its truth” which “is common to all mankind....All legal systems, both internal and international, ultimately draw their legitimacy from their rooting in natural law, in the ethical message inscribed in human beings themselves. The natural law is, definitively, the only valid bulwark against the abuse of power and the deceits of ideological manipulation.”

 

From the statements of these recent popes, it seems as if the natural law is a fixed item in the Church’s teaching, not an object of “manipulation,” to use the words of the late Pope?

All manuals of Apologetics teach that the ordinary Magisterium is infallible in exposing the deposit of the faith and, alongside, whatever is connected to it, like the natural law. Therefore, the natural law, of which the Church is guardian, enjoys infallibility. No one in heaven or on earth, not even Christ, much less the Pope, can modify or render relative the Divine and Natural Law. The Pope’s duty is to transmit, diffuse and defend the deposit and natural morality, not to adulterate it. Those who are asking the Church to update her morality, like putting cohabitating couples on a par with the family, are asking the Church to exercise an authority which she does not have. No one can impose such things on the Church since it would be a typical case of abuse of authority.

 

Instrumentum Laboris proposes to improve the language traditionally used in explaining ‘Natural Law’. What are we to think of this project of the October Synod?

In Instrumentum Laboris, we find this: “In a vast majority of responses and observations, the concept of natural law today turns out to be, in different cultural contexts, highly problematic, if not completely incomprehensible” (n. 21). The solution suggested would be to abandon the concept and term of natural law, or “to re-read” it in accessible language. Are we to understand then that, since the Catholic world no longer comprehends the idea of the natural law, it might as well be shelved and replaced by something more suited to the current mentality?

The problem with this seemingly mere grammatical exercise is that it will trigger a full-fledged tsunami effect before long. For starters, if the concept of the natural law is lost, we will be compelled to accept the theory of gender based on the denial of the very concept of human nature. Man is thought of as a purely material entity, modifiable at will, according to the needs and interests of the moment. The natural law, which comes down from God, is replaced by positive law imposed by pressures from political and mass-media groups. Instead of reflecting on the natural and Divine Law, laws and human behavior are adapting to the opinion of fluctuating and anti-Christian trends.

In the encyclical Veritatis Splendor, Pope John Paul II, who was allegedly canonized by no less than Pope Francis, denounced the rejection of the natural law as the fruit of “a more or less obvious influence of currents of thought which end by detaching human freedom from its essential and constitutive relationship with the Truth.” This moral relativism would be destructive of all the social order built up by Christendom. Could one Pope with impunity so swiftly uproot what his predecessor had endeavored to protect?

 

Should we repeat our prayer intentions each time we recite the Rosary?

It would seem that since God is omniscient and His Providence is immutable, there is no point in telling Him in prayers that we are asking for any special favors or graces, and that we certainly cannot expect our prayers to change His eternal dispositions one iota. St. Thomas Aquinas answers these and similar objections in the IIa IIae, Q. 83, a. 2 of the Summa.

He lays down the principle in this way: “Divine Providence disposes not only what effects shall take place, but also from what causes and in what order these effects shall proceed.” Our prayers are causes of this kind, through which in God’s plan proceed the effects that God wills us to obtain through them. “For we pray, not that we may change the Divine disposition, but that we may impetrate that which God has disposed to be fulfilled by our prayers, in other words that by asking, men may deserve to receive what Almighty God from eternity has disposed to give, as Gregory says.”

Consequently, we ought to repeat our prayer intentions explicitly and often, that our prayers might be the effective instrument that God wants them to be, and “that, by our prayers, we may obtain what God has appointed” (ibid. ad 2). This repetition of intention is, of course, not necessary for God, who knows all things. It is rather necessary for us, for it places us in more complete submission to His plan, to His Omnipotence and to His Omniscience. The more we actualize the intentions of our prayers by thinking of those intentions or by expressing them verbally or in our minds, the more effectively we submit ourselves to the Almighty and the more powerful our prayers become. This follows, indeed, from St. Thomas’s answers to the objections: “We need to pray to God not in order to make known to Him our needs or desires, but that we ourselves may be reminded of the necessity of having recourse to God’s help in these matters” (ad 1).

It is consequently a grievous error to think that we ought simply to say our prayers without any special intention, for God knows everything. The more expressly, frequently and precisely we express our intentions, in conformity with the Divine Will, the more will we grow in faith and express our humility. It is upon this faith in particular that the efficacy of our prayers depends, as St. Thomas points out: “Prayer depends chiefly on faith…for its efficacy in impetrating, because it is through faith that man comes to know of God’s omnipotence and mercy, which are the source when prayer impetrates what it asks for” (II-II, Q. 83, a. 16, ad 3).

It is good to have specific intentions for our prayers, offerings, Masses and communions, that the power of obtaining graces and blessings given by Christ may not be wasted. Then we will understand the blessing of these words of Our Lord: “Ask and you shall receive; that your joy may be full” (Jn. 16:24).