When it comes to canonising Francisco Franco Bahamonde, por Gracias de Dios Caudillo de España and José Antonio Primo de Rivera, possibly the Palmarian Pope was right about them. At least he showed better theological taste.
That said, I might as well explain why I am no longer Palmarian. I saw a note attributing to the Palmarian Catechism a statement that included the propositions (whether I get the words exactly right or not):
- Antichrist sees the world from the FOURTH dimension.
- The Blessed Virgin Sees the world from the EIGHTH dimension.
I have no doubt whatsoever that the Blessed Virgin has a better view of the Universe than Antichrist, but the Universe has THREE dimensions. Not four or eight. Up-down, right-left, front-back are how the three dimensions interact with our body. God also interacts with our soul, beside the dimensions of the Universe, through grace, or lack thereof. That is why I cannot take refuge with Palmarian Catholics against the requirement of devoutly honouring Roncalli and Wojtyla.
For Roncalli, the suspicion of heresy and damnation (a very grave one) rests on these propositions (not quoting exact words at all, only splitting hairs about the logical implications of them):
- The Universe is governed by blind laws of necessity.
- The laws of human morality are not governed by blind laws of necessity and therefore different from the laws of the Universe.*
I have no doubt whatsoever that freedom and responsibility do belong to us in morals, but we are not outside the Universe, and this would therefore be paradoxical if the Universe were governed without freedom and responsibility. It reminds me very much of Kant's heresy in saying that
- free will must be denied us in the phenomenal world as scientifically observed; but
- free will must be affirmed about us in the noumenal world as that which needs to be postulated for morality to hold together.
In so far as free will is a noumenal rather than a phenomenal thing, there is some grain of truth in his error, and in Roncalli's possible participation in these, but we see phenomenal traces of free will in apparent free acts, the freedom of which should NOT be explained away, precisely as we see phenomenal traces of anotehr noumenal thing, meaning, every time we hear someone speaking and open a book.
As to Wojtyla, the suspicion of grave scandal encouraging indifferentist heresies rests on the Assisi meetings of 1986 and 2002.
I am thankful I was in Rome in Pentecost or rather week before of 1986, before Wojtyla sullied the Vatican with the guilt from later on that year, when he came back from Assisi.
Hans-Georg Lundahl
Nanterre University Library
28-IV-2014
* Update: Admitted, the direct assertion that the laws of the Universe are blind is attributed to people asserting the laws of morality are of that same sort, I found the quote:
But the mischief is often caused by erroneous opinions. Many people think that the laws which govern man's relations with the State are the same as those which regulate the blind, elemental forces of the universe. But it is not so; the laws which govern men are quite different. The Father of the universe has inscribed them in man's nature, and that is where we must look for them; there and nowhere else.
In reality the universe has its movements regulated either by direct action of God (daily motion of Universe around earth is a pretty clear example) or by the action of angels obedient to God and courteous to each other, the Sun being a probable example (unless also moved directly by God) and the stars very certain examples. Here is the Latin:
Verum opinionis error praebet frequenter errorem quod multi censeant rationes, quae singulis hominibus cum sua cuiusque re publica intercedant, iisdem legibus, quibus vires et elementa mentis expertia universitatis, posse gubernari; cum huiusmodi leges, alius quidem generis, illinc dumtaxat petendae sint, ubi Parens rerum omnium inscripsit, hoc est in hominis natura.
One can demand whether he demoted the naturalistic view of nature from his own expressed opinion by not putting "iisdem legibus, quibus vires et elementa mentis expertia universitatis revera gubernuntur, posse gurbernari" but only "iisdem legibus, quibus vires et elementa mentis expertia universitatis, posse gubernari" as part of an Accusative cum Infinitive which expresses the opinion of someone else. But if he was aware this opinion is wrong, he was faulty in promoting it en passant without warning in a clearer way against it. Note, I would hardly accept a canonisation of Benedict XV either. He did not formally say "earth may not be / occupy the centre of the universe", but when talking about Dante he said en passant "even if earth not occupy the centre of the universe". But there the demotion and reluctance to directly state the worng opinion is clearer./HGL
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