Francis Appoints Enzo Bianchi to Vatican’s Council for Promoting Christian Unity

Stacking the Deck with more Heretics…

Francis appoints Über-Modernist Enzo Bianchi to Vatican’s Council for Ecumenism

“Pope” Francis is once again causing chaos. On July 22, 2014, “His Holiness” appointed the Modernist layman Enzo Bianchi of the Bose Monastic Community as an advisor to the Vatican’s so-called Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity.

As Vaticanist Giuseppe Nardi reports:

On Tuesday [July 22] Pope Francis appointed new members and consultants to the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity. While no one seriously expected the Argentinian Pope to appoint Tradition-minded Catholics to this important body, nevertheless the Pope’s choice of Enzo Bianchi, the lay prior and founder of the ecumenical monastic community of Bose is still surprising.

Bianchi belongs to that progressive-adogmatic part of the church that interprets the Second Vatican Council and the Popes as he pleases. Msgr. Antonio Livi, who has criticized Bianchi’s theology in sundry articles, does not hesitate to label the prior of Bose a “false prophet.” For Bianchi, a representative of a horizontal, anthropocentric Christianity, the only path to salvation is “replaced by a demagogic search for peace, an illusiory universal harmony and a laicist solidarity”, according to Catholic historian Cristina Siccardi. [This is] A part of the church that was thought to have been overcome under Pope Benedict XVI. Under Pope Francis, on the other hand, Bianchi, a darling of the media and friend of Cardinal Martini’s, was made a consultant for ecumenism.

(Giuseppe Nardi, “Enzo Bianchi the ‘False Prophet’ is new Consultant for Ecumenism”, Katholisches.info, July 23, 2014; our translation.)

Bianchi is on the record endorsing a “reformed papacy”, one which is “no longer feared” and that the Eastern Schismatics could work with (sounds a lot like Joseph Ratzinger ’82). In addition, he adheres to the thoroughly heretical concept of an “ecumenism of blood” — one of Francis’ favorite ideas — according to which Christian unity is realized in a common martyrdom.

In a post on Bianchi and the “ecumenism of blood”, the married-with-kids Novus Ordo priest “Fr.” Dwight Longenecker endorses the concept heartily, mocking the serious and eternally-important theological differences between orthodoxy and heresy, between the Divinely-Established True Religion and a man-made counterfeit, between Catholicism and Protestantism, as “petty quarrels.” This cavalier attitude is actually not surprising, as Longenecker himself is a convert from Anglicanism, and he converted to the Novus Ordo Sect rather than the Catholic Church and so has never learned real Catholicism or joined the True Church.

Let’s face it: Most Novus Ordos don’t believe for a minute that Catholicism alone is the true religion and all others false — rather, the most they believe is that Catholicism is merely the best option among many, or the religion with the “most truth” compared to others, but by no means is it the only, the exclusive way to salvation. This error takes its origin in the false idea that Faith can be possessed in part, in elements, when the truth is that it is an integral whole that can only be possessed in full or not at all. (On this, see our informative post, “Does the Catholic Church merely have the ‘Fullness’ of Truth?”)

So, what’s up with this “Ecumenism of Blood”?

The term is as powerful rhetorically as it is devoid of Catholic theology. Notice in Longenecker’s post linked above, there is no theological substance even being hinted at — it’s all based on emotion: “In prison I don’t suppose people will fuss about whether a brother or sister has worked out every detail of their theology or upheld every line of canon law.” Sounds good, doesn’t it?

Longenecker appeals entirely to our emotions here, but even this he does in an underhanded way, namely, by misrepresenting the issue. What does “upholding every line of canon law” have to do with martyrdom or with the fact that Protestantism is a false religion and Catholicism the only true one? And, just what does he mean by this anyway? Can he give some examples? He is being deliberately vague because the vagueness is what gives the argument its persuasive force. You’re only supposed to feel that he is right, not understand it.

The same goes for “working out every detail of one’s theology” — this is totally vague, and with good reason. But what is Longenecker saying here? There’s no point in speculating because no matter what one comes up with, he can always respond by saying, “That’s not what I meant.”

The absolute impossibility of an ecumenism of blood is definitively enunciated by the Council of Florence in its Decree for the Jacobites, under Pope Eugene IV in 1442:

[This council] firmly believes, professes, and proclaims that those not living within the Catholic Church, not only pagans, but also Jews and heretics and schismatics cannot become participants in eternal life, but will depart “into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels” [Matt. 25:41], unless before the end of life the same have been added to the flock; and that the unity of the ecclesiastical body is so strong that only to those remaining in it are the sacraments of the Church of benefit for salvation, and do fastings, almsgiving, and other functions of piety and exercises of Christian service produce eternal reward, and that no one, whatever almsgiving he has practiced, even if he has shed blood for the name of Christ, can be saved, unless he has remained in the bosom and unity of the Catholic Church.

(Council of Florence, Decree Cantate Domino; Denz. 714; underlining added.)

This absolutely, definitively, and infallibly excludes any possibility of an “ecumenism of blood.” No one dying for the name of Jesus Christ can attain to eternal life unless he is joined to the Catholic Church, either as a formal member, or, if invincible ignorance should obtain, through the genuine virtues of Faith, hope, and charity, the latter of which, to be true charity, must animate the sincere desire to enter the Catholic Church, even if this desire be only implicit. The great anti-Modernist Mgr. Joseph Clifford Fenton explains:

…the forgiveness of sin and the infusion of the life of grace is available by the power of Christ only “within” His kingdom, His Mystical Body, which, in this period of the New Testament [i.e., as opposed to the time of the Old Covenant —NOW], is the visible Catholic Church.

…Now, while it is possible to have a desire to be within the Church, and, indeed even to be a member of the Church, without having the love of charity for God, it is quite impossible to have charity without being within the true Church, at least by an implicit desire to dwell in it. The love of charity is, by its very nature, a sovereign affection.

…The love of charity is essentially something in the line of intention rather than of mere velleity. The man who loves God with the true affection of charity actually intends, insofar as it is possible for him to do so, to do the will of God. It is definitely the will of God that all men should enter and live within the Mystical Body of Jesus Christ. It is impossible for a man who really loves God with the affection of divine charity not to be within the Church as a member or at least to desire with a sincere and effective, even though perhaps only an implicit, intention to enter this company.

Hence, if a man is not “within” the Church at least by a sincere desire or affection, he has not the genuine love of charity for God.

(Mgr. Joseph C. Fenton, The Catholic Church and Salvation [Westminster: The Newman Press, 1958], pp. 38-40).

This scenario, under which someone who objectively professes heresy but is subjectively not guilty of the sin of heresy and instead possesses the love of charity and genuinely seeks to believe all that God has revealed, is killed for professing Christ, is known as the Baptism of Blood. (The term ‘baptism’ here is to be understood loosely, as it merely produces the grace of regeneration, not the sacramental character [indelible mark], and many who profess heresy but are not subjectively guilty of the sin of heresy already received a valid sacramental baptism in their own church. Cf. Pietro Parente, Dictionary of Dogmatic Theology, s.v. “Baptism”.)

This Baptism of Blood is infinitely far removed from the heretical notion of an “ecumenism of blood”, which claims that Catholics and heretics are spiritually and/or theologically united by being killed for professing allegiance to Christ. If this were so, then it would mean that the motive of the killer can cause religious unity between Catholics and Protestants, two religions that are exclusive of each other because their claims are mutually exclusive and per seirreconcilable.

Whereas in a baptism of blood, the martyr dies within the Catholic Church of our Lord, and any adherence to heresy is entirely accidental and not intended (i.e. not pertinacious), in the proposed “ecumenism of blood” anyone who professes allegiance to Christ is per se considered united to the Church, regardless of any attachment to heresy or a false religion. This is clearly condemned by the decree of the Council of Florence, quoted above.

To put it succinctly: In the baptism of blood, being united to the Catholic Church is a necessary precondition for one’s martyrdom to lead to salvation; whereas in the ecumenism of blood, unity with the Catholic Church is, at best, the inevitable consequence of the martyrdom. This would then make any and all martyrs ipso facto into Catholics, and one might as well include Muslims then, too, for there is no theologically satisfactory reason why if a Protestant who dies for his faith goes to Heaven, this couldn’t also be affirmed of a Muslim dying for his religion. The inevitable result of this is indifferentism, the idea that it ultimately doesn’t matter what religion you profess.

And thus we see that an “Ecumenism of Blood” is an absurdity, simply the latest in Modernist-indifferentist hogwash dressed up as Catholic theology and foisted upon an unsuspecting populace by the enemies of the true Catholic Faith. Beware of the Modernists, who cleverly seek to eliminate all distinction between true religion and false religion.

True Catholic Teaching on Ecumenism and Christian Unity:

• Pope Pius IX, Apostolic Letter Iam Vos Omnes on the Return of Protestants to the Church (1868)
• Pope Pius IX, Instruction to Puseyite Anglicans on True Religious Unity (1865)
• Pope Leo XIII, Encyclical Praeclara Gratulationis Publicae on the Reunion of Christendom (1894)
• Pope Leo XIII, Encyclical Satis Cognitum on the Unity of the Church (1896)
• Pope St. Pius X, Apostolic Letter Our Apostolic Mandate on Society and Interreligious Cooperation (1910)
• Pope Pius XI, Encyclical Mortalium Animos on Ecumenism and Interreligious Dialogue (1928)
• Pope Pius XII, Canonical Warning on Attending Ecumenical Gatherings (1948)
• Pope Pius XII, Instruction on the Ecumenical Movement (1949)

Image source: Wikimedia Commons (Niccolò Caranti)
License: CC BY-SA 3.0