Cardinal outlines possible paths to Communion for divorced, remarried

[Geremia]

The question of Charlemagne's concubines isn't faith-shattering dor me, but it's a lot more serious than what's going on in Germany right now. In Chuck's case, he was crowned emperor of the Romans and given Communion by the Pope himself, was bowed to by said pope, is considered a blessed, and currently is the subject of an equestrian statue guarding the doors of Saint Peter's Basilica.

Have you read the section by Dom Gueranger on Charlemagne's feast? What do you make of his defense of Charlemagne? He suggests that there is no concrete evidence that he ever had multiple "wives" simultaneously.

I would say that sounds like wishful thinking, but as a fan of Gueranger, I'd like to read what he had to say about it first. Do you have a link handy?

Charlemagne did have multiple wives, but just one at a time. He was monogamous. It's just that childbirth was dangerous in those days, and the wives died.

[lauermar]

"he allowed for the possibility that in very specific cases the church could tolerate, though not accept, a second union." 

To tolerate is to accept.

This sounds to me like the same words the Anglican Church used in 1930 when it was considering the moral question of whether or not to accept the use of contraception for married couples. "There is the possibility that in very specific cases the church can allow..." After that, everyone thought they could be granted an exception for regular use of contraception.

[Miriam_M]

The modern Church is on a collision course with itself. If Pope Francis approves what Cardinal Kasper is saying, there will be no doubt in my mind that the post conciliar Church has become a completely different religion.

That is, similarly, the first thing I thought of when I saw Friday's headlines about this topic:  a completely different religion.  An example is the quote below.  Consider how the CDF has never said  that contraception, or fornication, or homosexuality is allowable with "a convinced conscience," but that the individual conscience has to be conformed to the mind of the Church.

A possible avenue for finding those proposals, he said, would be to develop "pastoral and spiritual procedures" for helping couples convinced in conscience that their first union was never a valid marriage. The decision cannot be left only to the couple, he said, because marriage has a public character, but that does not mean that a juridical solution -- an annulment granted by a marriage tribunal -- is the only way to handle the case.

As to this, below, someone doesn't know his moral theology very well.  A murderer stops murdering, and an adulterer stops committing adultery, to be included in the category of converts away from evil and toward grace.

"That means that for one who converts, forgiveness is possible. If that's true for a murderer, it is also true for an adulterer."

A firm resolve to Sin No More is essential to the Sacrament of Penance, Your Eminence.  Or didn't they teach you that in seminary?

Cardinal Kasper said it would be up to members of the extraordinary Synod of Bishops on the family in October and the world Synod of Bishops in 2015 to discuss concrete proposals for helping divorced and civilly remarried Catholics participate more fully in the life of the church.

What precisely does that mean, Your Eminence? 

Gag me with a spoon.

[spasiisochrani]

A possible avenue for finding those proposals, he said, would be to develop "pastoral and spiritual procedures" for helping couples convinced in conscience that their first union was never a valid marriage. The decision cannot be left only to the couple, he said, because marriage has a public character, but that does not mean that a juridical solution -- an annulment granted by a marriage tribunal -- is the only way to handle the case.

This seems to be the so-called "internal forum solution"--where a person is morally certain that his first marriage is invalid, but he is unable to produce evidence of nullity that would satisfy a tribunal (e.g. no witnesses will cooperate, or they cannot be located), so a declaration of nullity cannot be obtained.

[The Harlequin King]

The question of Charlemagne's concubines isn't faith-shattering dor me, but it's a lot more serious than what's going on in Germany right now. In Chuck's case, he was crowned emperor of the Romans and given Communion by the Pope himself, was bowed to by said pope, is considered a blessed, and currently is the subject of an equestrian statue guarding the doors of Saint Peter's Basilica.

Have you read the section by Dom Gueranger on Charlemagne's feast? What do you make of his defense of Charlemagne? He suggests that there is no concrete evidence that he ever had multiple "wives" simultaneously.

I would say that sounds like wishful thinking, but as a fan of Gueranger, I'd like to read what he had to say about it first. Do you have a link handy?

Charlemagne did have multiple wives, but just one at a time. He was monogamous. It's just that childbirth was dangerous in those days, and the wives died.

Haha.... no.

[Maximilian]

A possible avenue for finding those proposals, he said, would be to develop "pastoral and spiritual procedures" for helping couples convinced in conscience that their first union was never a valid marriage. The decision cannot be left only to the couple, he said, because marriage has a public character, but that does not mean that a juridical solution -- an annulment granted by a marriage tribunal -- is the only way to handle the case.

This seems to be the so-called "internal forum solution"--where a person is morally certain that his first marriage is invalid, but he is unable to produce evidence of nullity that would satisfy a tribunal (e.g. no witnesses will cooperate, or they cannot be located), so a declaration of nullity cannot be obtained.

Yes, I think that you have nailed it.

Step 1, I believe, is to get the rest of the world to adopt the US practice of tens of thousands of annulments. This would be considered an improvement by bishops in other countries where these people instead of filing for annulments simply cease the practice of the faith.

Step 2, then, is to extend that even further by expanding the use of the "internal forum," as you point out.

When these two steps are combined, one has reached a solution to the problem of "Catholic divorce."

1. Everyone gets an annulment.
2. If for any reason you can't use option 1, then you use the "internal forum."

The desired result is then reached that the exterior adhesion to the teaching of Christ remains intact, while Catholics divorce just as much or more than anyone else.

It will be just like the farce we have today where NFP acts as a facade while Catholics use contraception just as much or more than any members of any other religion.

[Geremia]

The question of Charlemagne's concubines isn't faith-shattering dor me, but it's a lot more serious than what's going on in Germany right now. In Chuck's case, he was crowned emperor of the Romans and given Communion by the Pope himself, was bowed to by said pope, is considered a blessed, and currently is the subject of an equestrian statue guarding the doors of Saint Peter's Basilica.

Have you read the section by Dom Gueranger on Charlemagne's feast? What do you make of his defense of Charlemagne? He suggests that there is no concrete evidence that he ever had multiple "wives" simultaneously.

I would say that sounds like wishful thinking, but as a fan of Gueranger, I'd like to read what he had to say about it first. Do you have a link handy?

Charlemagne did have multiple wives, but just one at a time. He was monogamous. It's just that childbirth was dangerous in those days, and the wives died.

Haha.... no.

Proof?

[dust]

The modernists are throwing wide the gates. They feel that they have won. 50 years of destruction of traditional Faith,  destruction of the Mass, heretical catechesis, now is the time to unveil the full apostasy.  I feel that the slight awakening of the True Faith was a tipping point for the destroyers.  They had to act before a reawakening occurred. The shades have been opened to reveal them for what they are.  May God have Mercy on us.

[Miriam_M]

The modernists are throwing wide the gates. They feel that they have won. 50 years of destruction of traditional Faith,  destruction of the Mass, heretical catechesis, now is the time to unveil the full apostasy.  I feel that the slight awakening of the True Faith was a tipping point for the destroyers.  They had to act before a reawakening occurred. The shades have been opened to reveal them for what they are.  May God have Mercy on us.

My assessment, too.  They have chosen larger, less pure Church, increasingly indistinguishable from the soft pablum of emotionally based evangelical protestantism, where Truth is an endangered species and rejected as Lack of Charity, and where raw membership numbers is the goal.  It's not only modernism, as evident in the topic of this thread -- as if that weren't bad enough on its own.  it's an overt attempt to reshape Catholicism as nothing radically different from any other religion. 

I'm sick of it.  It's nauseating on many levels.

Resist.

[Michael Wilson]

I found this article on Charlamagne in Wikipedia;  Charlamange had four legitimate wives; they indeed did die before he remarried; He also had several "girl-friends".  So even though Charlamagne was not the model of Christian virtue in his personal life, he did much to help the Church and support the Papacy, and that would be a reason to have a statue to him erected.   


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlemagne
Start date   Marriages and heirs   Concubinages and illegitimate children
ca.768   His first relationship was with Himiltrude. The nature of this relationship is variously described as concubinage, a legal marriage, or a Friedelehe.[90] (Charlemagne put her aside when he married Desiderata.) The union with Himiltrude produced two children:
•   Amaudru, a daughter[91]
•   Pippin the Hunchback (ca. 769–811)

ca. 770   After her, his first wife was Desiderata, daughter of Desiderius, king of the Lombards; married in 770, annulled in 771.   
ca. 771   His second wife was Hildegard of Vinzgouw (757 or 758–783), married 771, died 783. By her he had nine children:
•   Charles the Younger (ca. 772–4 December 811), Duke of Maine, and crowned King of the Franks on December 25, 800
•   Carloman, renamed Pippin (April 777–8 July 810), King of Italy
•   Adalhaid (774), who was born whilst her parents were on campaign in Italy. She was sent back to Francia, but died before reaching Lyons
•   Rotrude (or Hruodrud) (775–6 June 810)
•   Louis (778–20 June 840), twin of Lothair, King of Aquitaine since 781, crowned King of the Franks/co-emperor in 813, senior Emperor from 814
•   Lothair (778–6 February 779/780), twin of Louis, he died in infancy[92]
•   Bertha (779–826)
•   Gisela (781–808)
•   Hildegarde (782–783)   
ca. 773      His first known concubine was Gersuinda. By her he had:
•   Adaltrude (b.774)
ca. 774      His second known concubine was Madelgard. By her he had:
•   Ruodhaid (775–810), abbess of Faremoutiers

ca. 784   His third wife was Fastrada, married 784, died 794. By her he had:
•   Theodrada (b.784), abbess of Argenteuil
•   Hiltrude (b.787)   
ca. 794   His fourth wife was Luitgard, married 794, died childless.   His third known concubine was Amaltrud of Vienne. By her he had:
•   Alpaida (b.794)
ca. 800      His fourth known concubine was Regina. By her he had:
•   Drogo (801–855), Bishop of Metz from 823 and abbot of Luxeuil Abbey
•   Hugh (802–844), archchancellor of the Empire
ca. 804      His fifth known concubine was Ethelind. By her he had:
•   Richbod (805–844), Abbott of Saint-Riquier
•   Theodoric (b. 807

[Petrie]

And as this all plays out I thought this was interesting:

http://www.novusordowatch.org/wire/index.htm#.UxN5XiyYbCk

The so-called "conservative", "traditional" Benedict considered exceptions for divorced and remarried as well. 

[Geremia]

Here's Sandro Magister's report: http://chiesa.espresso.repubblica.it/articolo/1350729?eng=y

[VeraeFidei]

For HK, on Charlemagne, typed straight out of Dom Gueranger's The Liturgical Year, Volume III (Loreto Publicans Jubilee 2000 edition), from page 433b-433d:

And firstly, we affirm, with the great Bossuet that the morals of Charlemagne were without reproach, and that the contrary opinion, which is based on certain vague and contradictory expressions of a few writers of the Middle-Ages, has only gained ground by Protestant influence. Dom Mabillon - after having given the history of the Emperor's repudiation of Hermengarde, and his return to Himiltrude, his first wife - concludes his account of Charlemagne, in his Benedictine Annals, by acknowledging that this Prince's plurality of wives has never been proved to have been simultaneous (emphasis author's). Natalis Alexander and le Cointe - authors who cannot be taxed with partiality, and who have gone into all the intricacies of the question - prove most clearly, that the only reproach to be laid to Charlemagne's charge, on the subject of his wives, is his having repudiated Himiltrude, out of complaisance to the mother of Hermengarde, a fault which he repaired the following year, in compliance with the remonstrances of Pope Stephen the Fourth.

We grant, that after the death of Luitgarde, the last of his wives who was treated as Queen, Charlemagne married several others, whom Eginhard calls concubine, because they did not wear the crown, and their children were not considered as princes of the blood; but we say, with Mabillon, that Charlemagne may have had these wives successively, and that it is difficult to believe the contrary, regarding so religious a Prince, and one who had singular respect for the laws of the Church.

But, independently of the opinion of the grave authors whom we have cited, there is an incontestable proof of Charlemagne's innocence on the score of the simultaneous plurality of wives, at least from the time of his separation from Hermengarde. The Prince was then in his twenty-eighth year. The severity of the Roman Pontiffs relative to the marriages of sovereigns is too well known to require proof. The history of the Middle-Ages abounds with the struggles they had, on this essential point of christian morals, with the most powerful monarchs, some of whom were most devoted to the Church. How, then, we would ask, would it be possible, that St. Adrian the First, who governed the Church from 772 to 795, and whom Charlemagne treated as a father, asking his advice in everything he undertook - how, we repeat, would this holy Pontiff allow Charlemagne to indulge in the most scandalous crimes, without remonstrating, whilst Stephen the Fourth, who only sat three years, and had not the same influence on this Prince, could induce him to dismiss Hermengarde? Or again, would St. Leo the Third - who reigned as Supreme Pontiff from 795 till after Charlemagne's death, and who recompensed his virtuous conduct by crowning him Emperor - would he have made no effort to induce him to abandon the concubinage in which some writers would make us believe he lived after the death of his last Queeen Luitgarde? Now, we find not the shadow of any such remonstrances made by these two Popes, who governed the Church for more than forty years, and have been placed on her altars. The honour of the Church herself is at stake in this question, and it is the duty of every Catholic to suspect the imputations cast on the name of Charlemagne as calumnies.

[The Harlequin King]

VF: thanks. Will get back to you after carefully reading.

[Greg]

The rumble of Russian tanks might put the kibosh on this, don't you think?