But will the 'Pope of Mercy' excommunicate anyone (unless of course it's a believing Catholic, as one of his minions did to a faithful Priest)?
From LifeSiteNews
By Maike Hickson
September 30, 2019 (LifeSiteNews) – Father Gero P. Weishaupt, a German priest with a doctorate in canon law, just wrote a commentary in light of the recent fall assembly of the German bishops. At this assembly, they decided
to start a “synodal path” questioning the Church's teaching on
celibacy, the all-male priesthood, and homosexuality, among others.
Two German prelates – Cardinal Rainer Woelki and Bishop Rudolf Voderholzer – strongly oppose
this controversial choice of topics for the “synodal path,” and
Voderholzer announced already that he might at some point leave this
event.
Dr. Weishaupt entitled his own commentary on the problem of the “synodal path” To Take Seriously the Penal Law, which already indicates the theme of his text.
Weishaupt received his doctorate from the Gregoriana in Rome and
since then has served as judge at diocesan tribunals, as a curial
secretary in Rome, as a Latin expert for Radio Vatikan (the German
section of Vatican Radio), as a professor at the Benedict XVI University
Heiligenkreuz (Austria), and as the editor of the Catholic website
Kathnews.
Right at the beginning of his article, Weishaupt makes it clear that
the discussion about the possibility of “ordaining” female “priests” is a
“questioning of a definitive, infallible and unchangeable doctrine of
the Church.” The “unending” discussion in Germany on this matter is
therefore “a criminal offense.”
“The Apostolic See would now have to admonish the majority of the
German Bishops’ Conference and the members of the Central Committee of
German Catholics [ZdK, a lay organization that takes a leading role in
the ‘synodal path’] and, should there be no revocation, then to sanction
them with a penalty.”
Weishaupt makes it clear that, “he who wishes to discuss a topic,
puts the object of the discussion into question, otherwise, a discussion
would be superfluous.”
After some detailed explanations of a 1998 document
by Pope John Paul II as to the nature of different infallible doctrines
(those that are part of the deposit of the faith as revealed by God and
those which are infallible without the Church saying that they “have
been revealed by God”), Dr. Weishaupt explains that Pope John Paul II,
for the “protection of these definitive doctrines of the faith which are
most intimately connected with the revealed deposit of the faith, in a
historical and logical manner,” had also established penal norms.
Those Catholics who reject a doctrine and don’t recant that rejection
should be punished. (can. 1371 § 1) Accordingly, can. 750 § 2 explains
that everything has to be held “that has been presented by the
Magisterium of the Church concerning faith and morals as being
definitive.” He who rejects these teachings finds himself in “resistance
to the teaching of the Catholic Church.”
Dr. Weishaupt then presents to his readers Pope John Paul II's 1994 document Ordinatio Sacerdotalis,
in which the Pope writes, “I declare that the Church has no authority
whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women and that this judgment
is to be definitively held by all the Church's faithful.”
Since the German bishops and some members of the ZdK have already
declared that they wish to discuss the matter of female “priests,”
Weishaupt continues, this decision is “an act of disobedience toward the
Pope and the Church's Magisterium,” to include a “rejection of an
infallible, definite doctrine.”
“Therefore,” he explains, “the criminal offense according to can. 1371 § 1 is fulfilled.”
“It would now be the duty of the Apostolic See first to admonish
those bishops of the German Bishops' Conference who wish to discuss this
doctrine, as well as the members of the Zdk, according to the precepts
of can. 1371 § 1,” Weishaupt states.
“If, on the part of the majority of the German bishops and of the
ZdK, there does not follow a recantation,” the canon lawyer continues,
“there should be imposed upon them a ‘just penalty,’ which does not
exclude the excommunication of the concerned bishops and of the members
of the ZdK, as well as, in reference to bishops, the removal from the
episcopal office as the highest form and ultima ratio of ecclesial penalties.”
Weishaupt explains that, since the outbreak of the sex abuse crisis
in the Church, the Church's penal law has been “rediscovered,” “after it
had been gravely neglected in the wake of the Second Vatican Council.”
“The abuse crisis,” the canon law expert continues, “led to a deepened insight that penalties are necessary.”
He also draws a connection to the German “synodal path” and its
questioning of dogmatic teachings of the Catholic Church, saying that
such questioning also “damages the Church.”
“It will be seen,” Dr. Weishaupt concludes, “whether the Church will
apply in a resolute manner the penal law with regard to the ‘synodal’
discussion of the definitively settled doctrine that the priestly
ordination can only be conferred on men.”
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