Another Assault on Holy Orders

Cardinal Marx(ist) is at it again, and Fr Zed points out the evil intent of his idea.

From Fr Z's Blog

At Lifesite I read that in the caput malorum omnium, Card. Marx, Archbishop of Freising-Munich has proposed that lay men and (of course) women should preach at Mass.

Given the general state of things in Germany… they probably couldn’t do any worse.

But that isn’t the point.

It is really quite an assault on the priesthood.

These comments come shortly after a private and unannounced pre-Amazon Synod meeting took place near Rome, at which several German prelates and theologians participated, among them Cardinal Walter Kasper and Bishop Franz-Josef Overbeck. An official summary of that meeting called for the introduction of female deacons.

It is an assault on Holy Orders.

Since “talents are different,” the German prelate raised the question of lay preachers. “Do we not want to say: he who has a talent, he shall speak?” he asked. “May only the priest preach?” In general, Cardinal Marx hopes for “a greater diversity of that which is the homily.”

What this is is a reduction of orders simply to functions.  Hence, the ordained are simply functionaries, who do things, then why not pick the people who are good at those things.  That’s a Protestant view of “minister”, not a Catholic view of “orders”.

But, hey!, maybe this sort of talk slowed for a few minutes the number of people leaving the Church in Germany and, therefore, the decrease in the Kirchensteuer.