- "[T]he [Modernist] Blondelian schema holds that justification for the faith is to be found by turning inwards to the personal experience of the human subject. This turn to the subject is characteristic of modern philosophy, from Descartes right up to the Idealism of Kant and Hegel and beyond, and presented a major challenge to the traditional Catholic apologetics... If it were the case that inner experience justified the faith, if each person was to find the proof of God’s existence within their own life, then what would be the basis for the teaching authority of the Church?" - Neo-Modernist AnthonyCarroll
- "Between [Modernist Maurice] Blondel's philosophy of action and Pope Francis' pastoral action, there are significant coincidence."- Francis's close longtime theological advisor Fr. Juan Carlos Scannone
At the Irving Convention Center in Texas on 2013, Pope Francis's closest adviser and collaborator Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga apparently declared himself a Modernist or at the very least at a Neo-Modernist and appeared to claim that Modernism to some extent was Francis's agenda and the "dreams of 'the next Pope":
"The Second Vatican Council... meant an end to the hostilities between the Church and Modernism... Modernism was, most of the time, a reaction against injustices and abuses that disparaged the dignity and rights of the person."
(Whispers in the Loggia Website, "The Council's 'Unfinished Business,' The Church's 'Return to Jesus"... and Dreams of "The Next Pope" - A Southern Weekend with Francis' 'Discovery Channel,'" October 28, 2013)
Is Francis a Modernist?
Francis's close longtime theological advisor Fr. Juan Carlos Scannone said there is "significant coincidence" or concurrence between Francis's pastoral theology and Modernism:
"Between [Modernist Maurice] Blondel's philosophy of action and Pope Francis' pastoral action, there are significant coincidence."
(La Civilta Catholics, 2015 III)
The greatest theologian of the twentieth century Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange explained the Modernism of Blondel:
"One sees the danger of the new definition of truth, no longer the adequation of intellect and reality but the conformity of mind and life... Maurice Blondel in 1906 proposed this substitution... Truth is no more immutable than man himself inasmuch as it is evolved with him, in him and through him. (Denz. 2058) One understands why Pius X said of modernist: 'they pervert the eternal concept of truth 11 (Denz. 2080)"
(Archive.org, Catholic Family News Reprint Series, Where is the New Theology)
Simply put, Modernism is the denial of objective truth in which the individual's conscience and opinion or sentiment is supreme.
According to Pope John Paul II, the theology of Blondel leads to "the inescapable claims of truth disappear[ing]."
Below is the evidence that Francis is a Modernist heretic:
If Francis is a Modernist it explains why his teachings in Amoris Laetitia as interpreted by his "authentic magisterium" Argentine Letter are exactly the opposite of twenty centuries of Church doctrine and Familiaris Consortio as well as deny the existence of objective truth and objective morality according to Veritatis Splendor.
"Veritatis Splendor, entitled 'Lest the Cross of Christ Be Emptied of Its Power,' warns precisely against the view that the demands of the moral life are too difficult and cannot be lived with the help of God’s grace. Chapter 8 of Amoris Laetitia appears to be exactly what St. John Paul II had in mind in writing Veritatis Splendor."
This means, in practice, that when, for serious reasons, such as for example the children's upbringing, a man and a woman cannot satisfy the obligation to separate, they take on themselves the duty to live in complete continence, that is, by abstinence from the acts proper to married couples."[http://www.catholicworldreport.com/Item/5346/a_malta_laetitia.aspx]
John Paul II's above teachings reject the denial of objective truth and situation ethics or the denial of objective morality, but Veritatis Splendor explicitly says situation ethics by making the "individual conscience... a supreme tribunal of... good and evil" leads or causes "the inescapable claims of truth [to] disappear."
This article will show that Modernism, that is the denial of truth, also, leads to situation ethics or the denial of objective morality.
Francis's Amoris Laetitia goes against the above teachings of John Paul II because of his apparent denial of truth which leads to his promoting "situation ethics" which by name was condemned by Pope Pius XII in 1956. (CatholicCitizens.org, "Pius XII's Condemnation of Situation Ethics: 'Accusations of rigidity first attack the adorable person of Christ,'" 5-30-2017)
Theologian Dr. E. Christian Brugger, writing on AL 305, gives a quick summary of the Pope's situation ethics:
careful not to fall into the temptation of making idols of certain abstract truths. They can be comfortable idols, always within easy reach; they offer a certain prestige and power and are difficult to discern. Because the “truth-idol” imitates, it dresses itself up in the words of the Gospel, but does not let those words touch the heart. Much worse, it distances ordinary people from the healing closeness of the word and of the sacraments of Jesus."
"If the truth could be an idol, then naturally any use of the Scriptures to illustrate that particular truth would be a charade. But the truth of God cannot be an idol because what God has made known to us is our means of entering into His reality – the goal of our existence."
"Francis states that this 'truth-idolatry' in fact 'distances ordinary people from the healing closeness of the word and of the sacraments of Jesus.'”
"Here we have the interpretative key to what I think he is getting at. He is defending his decision in Amoris Laetitia to allow some people who are living in adulterous unions to receive the sacraments of penance and the Holy Eucharistic while intending to continue to engage in adulterous relations."
"... The truth will set you free, it will not enslave you in error and darkness. Those who seek to be healed by coming close to Christ in his sacraments will only realize that goal by knowing and doing what Jesus asks of them. To reject in practice his words about the permanence of marriage and the obligation to avoid adultery, and then assert a right to receive the sacraments risks making an erroneous opinion into an idol." [https://www.thecatholicthing.org/2018/04/21/of-truth-and-idols/]
Francis because of his apparent denial of truth appears to be denying objective morality and intrinsically evil acts. Professor Claudio Pierantoni, a Patristic Scholar of Medieval Philosophy at the University of Chile and Member of JAHLF (John Paul II Academy for Human Life and Family), said that Francis's Gaudete et Exsultate appears to deny "the existence of intrinsically evil acts" and is promoting "situation ethics":
"[T]he document is read within the context of the present controversies in the Church, especially that about Amoris Laetitia and situation ethics, one gets the strong impression that many passages are directly aimed at harshly rebuking all those people (cardinals, scholars, journalists and simple laypeople writing on blogs) that have opposed the papal agenda about giving Communion to the divorced and remarried, Communion to Protestants, permitting contraception in certain cases, too mild opposition or silence in the face of anti-family and anti-life legislation (pro-abortion, pro-birth control pro-euthanasia and pro same-sex marriage). In this sense, the document brings no progress or clarity in any of the most controversial and anti-doctrinal stances of Pope Francis. Quite to the contrary, it seems to represent one more step towards giving a kind of official approval to situation ethics."
"So, the reading of this document should once more to urge us to plead before the Pope for an answer to the dubia, and in particular to dubium no. 2 about the existence of intrinsically evil acts, which are not justifiable in any situation. We should not forget that to deny this doctrine, or sow doubts about it, in any field of ethics, is the principal heresy of our times and the most dangerous enemy of sanctity." [http://m.ncregister.com/blog/edward-pentin/professor-pierantoni-gaudete-et-exsultate-supports-error-of-situational-eth#.WuLDtN9lDqC]
Why does Francis deny truth which has lead to his promoting situation ethics?
"Bergoglio’s fascination with polarities began in the 1960s, when he first began exploring as a Jesuit via Gaston Fessard’s 1956 monumental anti-Hegelian work on the dialectics of grace and freedom in St. Ignatius of Loyola’s Spiritual Exercises. Fessard Francis tells Borghesi, 'gave me so many of the elements that later got mixed in.'”
"Fessard was one of a 1950s group of Lyons-based jésuites blondéliens - that is, Jesuits inspired by Maurice Blondel - that included Henri de Lubac, Gaston Fessard and Michel de Certeau." [https://cruxnow.com/book-review/2017/11/18/new-book-looks-intellectual-history-francis-pope-polarity/]
Francis theological advisor Fr. Juan Carlos Scannone connects the final dots of the close connection of Francis's thinking with Blondel's teachings which explains why the Pope does not believe in truth and promotes situation ethics:
"Between Blondel’s philosophy of action and Pope Francis’ pastoral action, there are significant coincidences, probably because they both draw from the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola. However, indirect links between the two should not be excluded, for example, through the relationship between Gaston Fessard (strongly influenced by Blondel) and Miguel Ángel Fiorito, much appreciated by Bergoglio. This article focuses first on the convergences regarding action; then it compares the coincidences between the two authors regarding the overcoming of social and existential conflicts. Finally, it studies the parallelism between the «logic of love», nominated and applied by the Pope, and the «logic of a moral life» by Blondel, focused on charity. ( La Civiltà Cattolica 2015 III / www.laciviltaca
Scannone connecting the Pope's thinking to Blondel is very important because he is one of "Francis’ closest theological advisors" according to an expert on Latin America and Francis's theology, Claudio Remeseira:
"In the almost fifty years since its appearance, the Theology of the People has become the Argentine theological school by default. The generation of its founders was followed by a second generation of disseminators, the most prolific of whom is father Scannone... Scannone, Galli, and Fernández are among Francis’ closest theological advisors. ["https://medium.com/@hispanicnewyork/pope-francis-per%C3%B3n-and-god-s-people-the-political-religion-of-jorge-mario-bergoglio-2a85787e7abe ]
Theologian John Lamont explains what Blondel taught:
"The neomodernists, due to their historical perspectivism, did not think that the theology and dogma of previous epochs could satisfy this understanding, but they did not want to dismiss them as false. They accordingly held that dogma was true, but that its truth could not be understood in Aristotle's sense. Garrigou-Lagrange saw them as reviving the philosopher Maurice Blondel's rejection of the traditional definition of truth as bringing the mind into conformity with reality ('adaequatio rei et intellectus') in favour of an account of truth as bringing thought into line with life ('adaequatio realis mentis et vitae'). While this definition of truth was not explicitly stated by the neomodernists, the importance of Blondel for their thought makes this interpretation a plausible one; Bouillard, for example, wrote extensively and approvingly on Blondel.12 What they did explicitly assert was that the truth of past dogmatic pronouncements does not consist in their being an accurate description of reality, and that a theology that was not relevant to the present day ('actuel') was untrue." [https://rorate-caeli.blogspot.com/2015/01/a-christmastide-gift-for-our-readers.html?m=1]
"Conscious of the challenge to the traditional Thomist theory of knowledge that had been ushered in by modern philosophy, Blondel, for example, sought to identify the practical level of human action as the place where one might find a new apologetic for the Christian faith. In his L’Action (1893), he analyses the dynamics of human action and argues that the distance between what we desire and what we actually realise in our actions indicates that what we truly desire lies always beyond the particular object that we are momentarily fixed upon. This transcendental horizon of desire draws the mind and heart towards God as the only One who can satisfy truly our infinite longings. For Blondel, it is this Augustinian unrest that leaves a trace of the divine in our human experience. Such a turn to the interiority of human experience as grounds for the proof of God’s existence is what is meant by immanentism in Pascendi."
"Rather than pointing towards the historical existence of Jesus, the factual occurrence of miracles and the fulfilment of earlier prophecies for proof of God’s existence, the Blondelian schema holds that justification for the faith is to be found by turning inwards to the personal experience of the human subject. This turn to the subject is characteristic of modern philosophy, from Descartes right up to the Idealism of Kant and Hegel and beyond, and presented a major challenge to the traditional Catholic apologetics of the time, which had been constructed on the basis that external revelation could be taken for granted. With this turn to the interior experience of the human subject, more than simply philosophical questions were raised. If it were the case that inner experience justified the faith, if each person was to find the proof of God’s existence within their own life, then what would be the basis for the teaching authority of the Church?" [https://www.thinkingfaith.org/articles/20090724_1.htm]
Finally, the great theologian and teacher of Pope John Paul II, Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P., wrote about Blondel and why anyone who was influenced by his teachings, directly or indirectly, would deny truth, as apparently Francis is influenced according one of his closest advisor's Scannone:
"One sees the danger of the new definition of
truth, no longer the adequation of intellect and reality
but the conformity of mind and life.™ When Maurice
Blondel in 1906 proposed this substitution, he did not
foresee all of the consequences for the faith. Would he
himself not be terrified, or at least very troubled?
What life" is meant in this definition of: "conformity
of mind and life"? It means human life. And so then,
how can one avoid the modernist definition: "Truth is
no more immutable than man himself inasmuch as it
is evolved with him, in him and through him. (Denz.
2058) One understands why Pius X said of the
modernists: "they pervert the eternal concept of truth. 11
an Our Father now for the restoration of the Church.
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