In 1st Corinthians 13:2, St. Paul the Apostle powerfully establishes the primacy of love in the life of the Christian: “And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing.” Because of this primacy of charity, when one reads Pope Francis’ Fiducia Supplicans: On the Pastoral Meaning of Blessings, one is initially heartened at how many times charity is mentioned, and even spoken of as the main motivation for pastoral action and discernment. It is only on reflecting, on thinking about how this “charity” is utilized within the context of the letter, that one begins to be disheartened, for one quickly realizes that Francis’ conception of charity is not only thoroughly modern, but thoroughly secular and at odds with the Catholic tradition.
Before mounting my attack, let me first acknowledge that the Declaration re-affirms the teaching of the Church on homosexual marriage, at least within the context of ritual and the sacraments (though not, importantly, within the context of pastoral blessings): “Therefore, rites and prayers that could create confusion between what constitutes marriage—which is the “exclusive, stable, and indissoluble union between a man and a woman, naturally open to the generation of children”[6]—and what contradicts it are inadmissible. This conviction is grounded in the perennial Catholic doctrine of marriage; it is only in this context that sexual relations find their natural, proper, and fully human meaning. The Church’s doctrine on this point remains firm.”
And yet, from the very beginning of this “Declaration”, the author himself acknowledges, in deeply unsettling language, that there is something radical going on here: “The value of this document, however, is that it offers a specific and innovative contribution to the pastoral meaning of blessings, permitting a broadening and enrichment of the classical understanding of blessings, which is closely linked to a liturgical perspective. Such theological reflection, based on the pastoral vision of Pope Francis, implies a real development from what has been said about blessings in the Magisterium and the official texts of the Church”(emphasis my own). In other words: what follows is firmly outside the tradition of the Church, as preserved in its Magisterium and its official texts.
In accordance with the strategy outlined above, the letter establishes two different understandings of blessings: one is ritual, grounded in the perennial teaching and practice and doctrine of the Church; the other is pastoral, grounded in so-called “pastoral charity” (which will be discussed below) and Francis’ own pastoral vision, along with his “innovative contribution to the pastoral meaning of blessings”.
The former understanding allows for no wiggle room: “From a strictly liturgical point of view, a blessing requires that what is blessed be conformed to God’s will, as expressed in the teachings of the Church.” As I say, the letter acknowledges and re-affirms this, but in seeking to establish a practice completely outside the tradition and practice of the Church—namely, the blessing of same-sex couples—the letter spends far more time developing a different understanding of blessings, a so-called pastoral understanding. The letter begins its attack on tradition with this sentence: “One must also avoid the risk of reducing the meaning of blessings to this point of view alone, for it would lead us to expect the same moral conditions for a simple blessing that are called for in the reception of the sacraments.” And still, later on, “When considered outside of a liturgical framework, these expressions of faith are found in a realm of greater spontaneity and freedom.”
Even later: “The Church, moreover, must shy away from resting its pastoral praxis on the fixed nature of certain doctrinal or disciplinary schemes, especially when they lead to “a narcissistic and authoritarian elitism, whereby instead of evangelizing, one analyzes and classifies others, and instead of opening the door to grace, one exhausts his or her energies in inspecting and verifying.”[16] Thus, when people ask for a blessing, an exhaustive moral analysis should not be placed as a precondition for conferring it. For, those seeking a blessing should not be required to have prior moral perfection.” Notice the deadly ambush on the life of the Church contained within this paragraph: that the day-to-day practice of the Church’s priests must not be rooted in certain “doctrines”—that is, priests must not be too concerned with following the Church’s truths in practice, especially when they lead to. . . . and what follows is mere pablum: “a narcissistic and authoritarian elitism”, which I can only assume means actual Catholic orthodoxy. Certainly St. Paul, that reprimander of St. Peter himself, disagrees: “teach what accords with sound doctrine” (Titus 2:1). Oh well, that was 2000 years ago, and St Paul probably wasn’t the best model of pastoral charity anyways. I humbly submit that to teach a “pastoral praxis” not rooted in sound doctrine —as Francis does here—is the very opposite of what St. Paul was encouraging Titus—and by extension, all ministers and priests of the Lord—to do.
Further on, the letter proclaims that “pastoral charity requires us not to treat simply as ‘sinners’ those whose guilt or responsibility may be attenuated by various factors affecting subjective imputability.” This statement is distressing, if only because it seems to be within Francis’ Amoris Laetitia tradition of suggesting that mortal sins may not always be mortal sins (such as adultery. For example, see Pope Francis’ letter to Argentinian bishops, affirming that a heretical interpretation of Amoris Laetitia is the only acceptable interpretation). Moreover, it seems to be another useless statement meant only to confuse, to push some hazy conception of love-as-permissiveness on the faithful, without clarifying what true charity is.
It is this unhelpful conception of pastoral charity, together with Francis’ proposal of blessings that are offered “without requiring anything”, that does so much damage to a proper theology of love and charity. In seeking to understand the damage Francis has done, let us turn to the model of all true charity, Divine Charity. God’s Love is synonymous with his nature, which means that God loves because that is His only mode of being. God exists, because He must exist, and in existing, He must love. Moreover, since there is not separation between God’s acting and His being, God’s every act is a perfect instantiation of love which transforms that which it touches in the best possible way. Now, the great saints and mystics of the Catholic tradition attest to this transformative aspect of God’s love, and to that end, articulate how the Divine Love acts in two very powerful ways within the believer: the Divine Love countenances, and it empowers.
Since God’s love is rooted in His nature, it follows that God cannot love sin, which is categorically opposed to His nature. In fact, to the extent that God’s love is synonymous with His being, and to the extent that sin is completely opposed to God’s being and to God’s intention for His creatures, God hates sin (John 8:44, Is 1:6, Ps 38:4, Rom. 6:23, 1 John 1:6, Titus 1:15). In comprehending this, we comprehend what it means that God’s love countenances and empowers: it means that in the very act of loving us, God re-affirms, strengthens, encourages us in, and approves of all that is virtuous and good, while weakening, discouraging, and denying all that is sinful and perverse in us. The very experience of God loving us is enough reason to do good, and never to commit evil. The very experience of God loving us makes us less capable of sinning and more capable of doing good.
And yet, this conception of love is completely at odds with the view of love which has emerged in our 21st century: that love is completely and solely permissive. This is why activists can accuse person A of hating person B if person A does not approve of Person B’s lifestyle (sexual, religious, otherwise)—or better yet, every single action which person B undertakes. Love, for the contemporary person, is not a form of guidance to what is truly good, it is mindless approval of what may be (and probably is) bad. Pope Francis seems to be of the 21st century camp: in his view, pastoral charity is not modeled on the charity and love of God, which, even though it is unconditional, does not accept us for who we are, but is always transforming us into who we should be. Pastoral charity does not analyze or verify or encourage others in the truths of the Church (especially not in “praxis”), but merely permits (since these blessings must have “no preconditions”) them to live an ungodly life while hoping that someday they will live a godly life.
Priests, as second Christs, as those in Persona Christi, have even more of a duty to model their charity on the charity of God, which is not permissive, since the love of God is not passive, but active. In fact, the love of God is proactive. It is always leading us, guiding us, and encouraging us to what is truly virtuous and good. True pastoral charity would also lead, guide, and encourage in what is truly virtuous and good. In order to lead, guide, and encourage someone to what is good, one must necessarily be prepared to disapprove of, discourage, and lead that person away from what is bad.
Indeed, since God’s love is everywhere, it must even be in Hell. Hell is not the absence of experiencing God’s love (although there is much hatred in Hell); rather, Hell is the experience of God’s love as Divine disapproval, Divine discouragement, Divine censure. Why? Because God’s love is in its very essence the strongest possible disapproval of sin; the experience of God’s love is the strongest possible discouragement against sin. Those who are in Hell, those who have given themselves over to sin forever and completely, can only experience God’s love as disapproval and discouragement, since there is nothing Godly in them to countenance or encourage. The letter ends this way: “The Father loves us, and the only thing that remains for us is the joy of blessing him, and the joy of thanking him, and of learning from him […] to bless.” Again, notice that the love of the Father is invoked to justify a pastorally permissive attitude—an attitude that not only has no preconditions for the sinner, not even that he stop sinning, not even that he be encouraged to stop sinning; but an attitude which fails to offer admonishment or instruction to the sinner (both spiritual works of mercy, by the way). In understanding the true nature of God’s love, we can begin to understand how perverse Pope Francis’ letter truly is, how it depicts pastoral charity as permissive, as a force of neither approval nor disapproval, but as a merely passive force, not countenancing that which is good, not discouraging that which is bad, not guiding the sinner in the doctrine and truth of the Church.
Before finishing, I would like to address the fact that this Declaration specifically approves the blessing of same-sex couples as couples, not merely as individuals. In speaking of blessing same-sex couples, the letter says the following: “In such cases, a blessing may be imparted that not only has an ascending value but also involves the invocation of a blessing that descends from God upon those who—recognizing themselves to be destitute and in need of his help—do not claim a legitimation of their own status, but who beg that all that is true, good, and humanly valid in their lives and their relationships be enriched, healed, and elevated by the presence of the Holy Spirit.” This statement may actually have some sort of meaning in the context of coming to the Church as a sinful individual, but in the context of coming to the Church as a same-sex couple, this statement becomes completely meaningless.
The Word of God and the Church are clear: homosexuality is a unique abomination, a complete and total perversion of God’s intention regarding sexuality, and a rejection of God’s original gift to man in his loneliness, which was woman. There is nothing good, nothing valid, and nothing beautiful in a homosexual union. Along with murder, defrauding laborers of their wages, and oppression of the poor, it is the only sin mentioned in the Bible as crying out to God for vengeance. To come before God as a same-sex couple is to mock Him and His intentions. It is to come to Him, beseeching Him to bless you in your identity of sin, in the very identity which calls out to Him for vengeance. In establishing blessings without any preconditions, in encouraging pastoral charity to be permissive, thereby separating it entirely from Divine Charity, and in creating a divide between Catholic Doctrine and Praxis, Francis opens up the tradition of blessings to every abomination imaginable: under the conditions established in this Declaration, I could conceivably open a whore-house, and then ask my local parish priest to conduct a blessing of the space, “not, of course, in any way as a sanctioning of what goes on there, oh no, not that, of course. But simply in asking that God bless all that is legitimate, and true, and humanly valid about prostitution, and in asking that God give strength to all those poor sinners whom I will service to one day do better.” Sufficient unto this day, is the evil thereof. . . .
Moreover, in addressing in particular the horrific and terrifying statement that “The Church. . . must shy away from resting its pastoral praxis on the fixed nature of certain doctrinal or disciplinary schemes”, Metropolitan Archbishop Tomash Peta and Auxiliary Bishop Athanasius Schneider correctly assert that “With such blessings, the Catholic Church becomes, if not in theory, then in practice, a propagandist of the globalist and ungodly “gender ideology”’ (Statement of the Archdiocese of St. Mary in Astana). In allowing this letter to be issued from his Vatican, Pope Francis has forsaken the thousands of individuals, faithful stewards of Catholicism, who struggle with same-sex attraction, but have trusted that in their existential struggles with sin, the Church and its supreme leader would always have their backs. This, they can no longer believe.
Additionally, Pope Francis has further jeopardized the status of the Church as moral leader of the world, exposing the papacy to its enemies’ attacks, and exposing the Church to the ridicule of those who hate her. Ironically, the letter warns against “allowing any type of liturgical rite or blessing similar to a liturgical rite that can create confusion”. Apparently, the prohibition does not extend to penning Papal Declarations and encouraging pastoral practices which will create confusion and scandal.
The Charity of God is the very essence of God’s being. It follows that in their war against Him, the enemies of God would mount their final and most spectacular assault on this all-important Divine attribute. But we will not let them take the love of our God away from us, nor will we let them corrupt It with their pathetic human caricatures, for we know, with the assurance that God offers all His children, that we will experience the fullness of God’s love, the fullness of his Divine approval and empowerment, only in Heaven, when we have been “made perfect, as our Heavenly Father is perfect.”
Well said.
I would go so far as to say that such a ‘blessing’ is void, ineffective, meaningless; an empty form. A priest has no power to bless what is un-natural, un-Godly.