At the peculiarly appellated Eponymous Flower there is (in addition to a poll on the sidebar about Amoris laetitia) a piece gleaned from Katholisches.info about a presser held by the honchos of the Spanish Bishops Conference on, yes, Familiaris divortio … ooops … the aforementioned Amoris laetitia.
A couple points:
All participants of the press conference stressed that the Church’s teaching “does not change”. Pope Francis had proposed to the bishops, however, “a new form of application” of this doctrine. The papal letter “recommends,” said Father Julio Martinez, Rector of the Pontifical University of Comillas and the second Jesuit at the conference table, not to divide the world into “Pure and Impure” and not in “good and bad”.
“The full recognition of the Magisterium is not inconsistent with an internal Church debate. We are facing a new style of Magisterium. It is about the harmonious coexistence between salvation and morality [does that mean “sin”? I think he means “sin”.] in order not to fall into a religious rigor.”
With this the Spanish Episcopal Conference seems to acknowledge the softening of the indissolubility of marriage. Because with the aforementioned “universal and equal criteria” that should be given to the priests in guiding, implicitly recognizing that there are situations in which the indissoluble marriage is still dissoluble. At the same time, the Episcopal Conference is trying to prevent anarchic situation that according to Amoris Laetitia, every priest could decide at their own discretion. The Episcopal Conference is expected to draw the question of “general and identical criteria” for the clergy itself. [So… the Conference is going to draw up criteria by which priests will judge individual cases… hmmm…]
And… something pretty scary.
Pope Francis has burst the door open so that every Episcopal Conference and every diocesan bishop may adopt criteria to allow divorced and remarried to communion. The traditional doctrine must now be confirmed individually by each Episcopal Conference and every diocesan bishop. [AL doesn’t say that, but is that what is going to happen? Frankly, wouldn’t each parish priest be the Bishops Conference of his own parish?] The probability that there will be at least only one Episcopal Conference or a bishop who softens the indissolubility of sacramental marriage is based on approximately 130 global Episcopal Conferences and Synods of Bishops and nearly 3,000 dioceses is quite likely. In any case, a question valid for the unity of the entire world Church is a question to be answered a hundred times.
Is the “lío” that Pope Francis called for? I honestly don’t know.
One of my interlocutors quipped:
