Clash of the Titans is a nearly 50-year-old fantasy action film based on ancient Greek mythology. Since 2013, quite a few Catholics have reported the sensation of being trapped in a remake of the 1970s.
Cardinal Gerhard Müller, former prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, is a giant of a man in several senses. Cardinal Victor Fernández (not so much) has been called upon by Pope Francis to step into his shoes. It’s generally agreed that, as Müller was a prelate characteristic of Pope Benedict XVI’s pontificate who survived for a time into the present era, so Fernández is the first prefect to be fully Pope Francis’s own man.
These two men have now entered the Synodal arena armed with clashing theological visions: one laser-focused on divine revelation, the inerrancy of sacred scripture and the Apostolic Tradition; the other swathed in the “recent magisterium” of Pope Francis and equally determined that our thought “be transfigured with his criteria”, particularly in matters of moral and pastoral theology.
In his first interview after assuming his new role as prefect, the then-Archbishop Fernández stated that the Pope not only has a duty to guard and preserve the “static” deposit of faith, but also a second, unique charism (hitherto unknown), only given to Peter and his successors, which is “a living and active gift … at work in the person of the Holy Father”.
“I do not have this charism, nor do you, nor does Cardinal Burke. Today only Pope Francis has it,” Cardinal Fernández told Edward Pentin. “Now, if you tell me that some bishops have a special gift of the Holy Spirit to judge the doctrine of the Holy Father, we will enter into a vicious circle (where anyone can claim to have the true doctrine) and that would be heresy and schism.” Fernández appears to believe that while the deposit of faith remains unchanged, the understanding of it held by the Church can pass through radically different, even contradictory phases. “Today the Church condemns torture, slavery and the death penalty, but this did not happen with the same clarity in other centuries. Dogmas were necessary because before them there were issues that were not sufficiently clear,” he said.
Fernández has consistently maintained an openness to the blessing of same-sex unions so long as such unions are not confused with marriage, which “at this point” the Church understands as “an indissoluble union between a man and a woman who, in their differences, are naturally open to beget life”.
Just days after Pope Francis appointed Fernández, Cardinal Müller, who has described the October Synod as “the great hour of manipulation”, confirmed the CDF had kept a file raising concerns about his successor’s orthodoxy. Müller seems less sure that it would be impossible to reach a negative verdict on the doctrine of a reigning pontiff.
Pope Innocent III famously said: “Only on account of sin committed against the faith can I be judged by the Church.” A handful of former popes have been censured for aberrant doctrinal positions or have recanted of opinions they had taught as pope. Pope Honorius I was even anathematised by three ecumenical councils and his successors.
For Müller, to preclude the possibility of an erring pontiff even in areas beyond the scope of infallibility would be to deify the Pope and transform the papacy into the strawman of Protestant apologetics. “The formal authority of the Pope cannot be separated from the substantive connection with holy scripture, Apostolic Tradition and the dogmatic decisions of the Magisterium that preceded him,” he said recently. “Otherwise, as Luther misunderstood the papacy, he would put himself in the place of God, who is the sole author of His revealed truth, instead of simply witnessing faithfully, in the authority of Christ, to the revealed faith in an unabridged and unadulterated manner and presenting it authentically to the Church.”
Blessings for homosexual couples would, in Müller’s view, cross the doctrinal Rubicon and undermine the position of the reigning pontiff. “To bless the immoral behavior of persons of the same or opposite sex is a direct contradiction of God’s Word and will; it is a gravely sinful blasphemy,” he said. Were the Synod to approve blessings for homosexual couples, “every ecclesiastical official would have lost his authority and no Catholic would be obliged any longer to religiously obey a heretical or schismatic bishop”.
The faithful are therefore faced with an Olympian struggle between two opposed theological visions: one in which black is white if the Pope says so; and another in which, in the words of Vatican I, “the Holy Spirit was promised to the successors of Peter not so that they might, by his revelation, make known some new doctrine, but that, by his assistance, they might religiously guard and faithfully expound the revelation or deposit of faith transmitted by the Apostles”.
Areas of Catholic Herald business are still recovering post-pandemic.
However, we are reaching out to the Catholic community and readership, that has been so loyal to the Catholic Herald. Please join us on our 135 year mission by supporting us.
We are raising £250,000 to safeguard the Herald as a world-leading voice in Catholic journalism and teaching.
We have been a bold and influential voice in the church since 1888, standing up for traditional Catholic culture and values. Please consider donating.