Pope Benedict Vs. Francis Part 3

AM+DG

 

The English Denzinger site (which was run by (20) priests, and which (strangely??) has not been active for a few years, was invaluable and priceless in terms of comparing everything Francis claimed to what authentic Church Teaching says.

The following is an example of one article I had saved. It is very long, so I will post just a few bits every day. The following continues from yesterday’s post.

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Benedict XVI…

…judges Francis’ idea that Jesus is only mercy

• Justice and charity coincide in God

Justice and mercy, justice and charity on which the Church’s charity is hinged, are two different realities only for the human person. For we distinguish carefully between a just act and an act of love. For us ‘just’ means ‘what is due to the other’, while ‘merciful’ is what is given out of kindness. One seems to exclude the other. Yet for God it is not like this: justice and charity coincide in him; there is no just action that is not also an act of mercy and pardon, and at the same time, there is no merciful action that is not perfectly just. How far God’s logic is from our own! And how different is his way of acting from ours! (Benedict XVI. Address in the Rebibbia district prison, Rome, December 18, 2011)

• The parable of the rich man and poor Lazarus shows how earthly wickedness is overturned by divine justice

Today, Luke’s Gospel presents to us the parable of the rich man and poor Lazarus (Lk 16: 19-31). […] The story shows how earthly wickedness is overturned by divine justice: after his death, Lazarus was received ‘in the bosom of Abraham’, that is, into eternal bliss; whereas the rich man ended up ‘in Hades, in torment’. This is a new and definitive state of affairs against which no appeal can be made, which is why one must mend one’s ways during one’s life; to do so after serves no purpose. (Benedict XVI. Angelus, September 30, 2007)

• God is the one who proclaims justice forcefully

Dear brothers and sisters, human justice and divine justice differ greatly. People are unable of course to apply divine justice. However they must at least look at it, seeking to understand the profound spirit that motivates it so that it may also illumine human justice and thereby prevent the inmate from becoming an outcast, which unfortunately happens all too often. […] God is the one who proclaims justice forcefully but at the same time heals wounds with the balm of mercy. The parable in Matthew’s Gospel of the laborers, called to work by day in the vineyard (Mt 20:1-16), enables us to understand the difference between human and divine justice because it makes the delicate relationship between justice and mercy explicit. The parable describes a farmer who hired laborers to work in his vineyard. But he did so at different times of day so that some of them worked all day and others only for an hour. When the time came to pay their wages the owner of the vineyard elicited amazement and started a discussion among the laborers. The matter concerned the generosity — considered unfair by those present — of the vineyard owner who decided to give the same remuneration to the workers hired in the morning as to those hired in the afternoon. In the human perspective this decision was an authentic form of unfairness, from God’s viewpoint an act of kindness, because divine justice gives to each what he is due and includes in addition mercy and forgiveness. (Benedict XVI. Address in the Rebibbia district prison, Rome, December 18, 2011)

• Injustice: its origin lies in the human heart in a mysterious cooperation with evil

The Evangelist Mark reports the following words of Jesus, which are inserted within the debate at that time regarding what is pure and impure: ‘There is nothing outside a man which by going into him can defile him; but the things which come out of a man are what defile him … What comes out of a man is what defiles a man. For from within, out of the heart of man, come evil thoughts (Mk 7:14-15, 20-21). Beyond the immediate question concerning food, we can detect in the reaction of the Pharisees a permanent temptation within man: to situate the origin of evil in an exterior cause. Many modern ideologies deep down have this presupposition: since injustice comes ‘from outside,’ in order for justice to reign, it is sufficient to remove the exterior causes that prevent it being achieved. This way of thinking – Jesus warns – is ingenuous and shortsighted. Injustice, the fruit of evil, does not have exclusively external roots; its origin lies in the human heart, where the seeds are found of a mysterious cooperation with evil. (Benedict XVI. Message for Lent 2010, October 30, 2009)

• Justice signifies full acceptance of the will of the God, and equity in relation to one’s neighbor

At the heart of the wisdom of Israel, we find a profound link between faith in God who ‘lifts the needy from the ash heap’ (Ps 113:7) and justice towards one’s neighbor. The Hebrew word itself that indicates the virtue of justice, sedaqah, expresses this well. Sedaqah, in fact, signifies on the one hand full acceptance of the will of the God of Israel; on the other hand, equity in relation to one’s neighbour (cf. Ex 20:12-17). (Benedict XVI. Message for Lent 2010, October 30, 2009)

…judges Francis’ idea on the poor being the heart of the Gospel

• Christ lives in the Sacred Scriptures

The Church knows well that Christ lives in the Sacred Scriptures. For this very reason – as the Constitution stresses – she has always venerated the divine Scriptures in the same way as she venerates the Body of the Lord (cf. Dei Verbum, no. 21). (Benedict XVI. Address for the 40th anniversary of the Dogmatic Constitution on Divine revelation Dei Verbum, September 16, 2005)

• God’s love for man is the heart of the Gospel

The Letter to the Hebrews has set us before Christ, the eternal High Priest, exalted to the Father’s glory after offering himself as the one perfect sacrifice of the New Covenant in which the work of Redemption was accomplished. St Augustine fixed his gaze on this mystery and in it he found the Truth he was so ardently seeking. Jesus Christ, the Incarnate Word, the Sacrificed and Risen Lamb, is the Face of God-Love for every human being on his journey along the paths of time towards eternity. The Apostle John writes in a passage that can be considered parallel to the one just proclaimed in the Letter to the Hebrews: ‘In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the expiation for our sins’ (I Jn 4: 10). Here is the heart of the Gospel, the central nucleus of Christianity. (Benedict XVI. Homily during the pastoral visit to Vigevano and Pavia, Italy, April 22, 2007)

• The Gospel transmits a universal message: ‘Make disciples of all nations’

The Church, in other words, must constantly rededicate herself to her mission. The three Synoptic Gospels highlight various aspects of the missionary task. The mission is built first of all upon personal experience: ‘You are witnesses’ (Lk 24:48); it finds expression in relationships: ‘Make disciples of all nations’ (Mt 28:19); and it spreads a universal message: ‘Preach the Gospel to the whole creation’ (Mk 16:15). Through the demands and constraints of the world, however, this witness is constantly obscured, the relationships are alienated and the message is relativized. (Benedict XVI. Address to the Catholics engaged in the life of the Church and society, September 25, 2011)