There are indications that Pope Francis may be entertaining ideas to slough off some papal authority to local bishops' conferences. Under the proposal, these conferences would be empowered to deal with moral matters such as homsexuality and divorce as well as some doctrinal matters. Voice of the Family has a fairly extensive analysis of the problem.
Both Cardinals Muller and Burke rightly condemn this idea as a violation of the very notion of a universal Church and an admittance of moral relativism. Ladies and gentlemen, the Catholic Church is custodian of the Teachings of Jesus Christ. These teachings are as immutable and eternal as the God who promulgated them. They don't change from place to place, era to era. What this crackpot idea would do is to create situations where the Church in one place would falsely teach that homosexuality is morally acceptable while another would hold onto Christ's teachings. It would in fact formalize schisms (yes, that's plural) within the Church.
Readers of this blog are well aware of the many problems caused by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. I needn't rehash them here; just put the name in the search box at the top left. Now can you just imagine the unmitigated disasters that would be spewing forth from that cabal if they were granted doctrinal authority? The Church in the United States would be crippled beyond recognition.
Let us pray that the Church survives the remaining days of this sin-nod.
I heard about this, too. It is terrible. We need to pray and fast to Our Lady of Akita (and I believe the Church to be in the thick of Her prophecies; recall She said "bishops will be against bishops") that this does not happen. It is like this, I learned, in the Baptist church, with different ministers teaching different things according to their understanding of the Bible. Well, we are not the Baptist church; we are the One, Holy, Catholic, Apostolic Church, and our churchmen needn't fool with what Christ has given us. Cardinal Burke is spot on!
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