9. april 2015
Phyllis Zagano, National Catholic Reporter, skriver bl.a.:
Killing Christianity
Killing Christians is the goal of various extremist groups that call themselves Muslim, but killing Christianity is the real danger.
In the Middle East and Africa, the Taliban, ISIS (the so-called Islamic State), Boko Haram, and al-Shabab use large and small weaponry to eradicate Christians and all evidence of Christian culture. Each incorporates a peculiar hatred in the name of Islam -- the word means "submission to the will of God."
In Rome, while Francis charms the world, the Curia burns. Lately, Cardinal Gerhard Müller has announced the pope is no theologian. Müller, editor of the opera Ratzinger, has been telling just about anyone who will listen that as head of the old Holy Office, he must "theologically structure" the papacy. Translation: Only Müller can speak about faith and morals.
That's what it boils down to.
It is about divorce and remarriage. Against a backdrop of dueling German cardinals, with Cardinal Walter Kasper at one end and Müller at the other, Francis wages Christianity and points to the Gospel. Müller is armed with canon law against Kasper, whose pastoral theology seems more in tune with how Francis thinks Jesus would approach the questions.
Most telling is Müller's perspective. Speaking about second marriages to the French Catholic newspaper La Croix, Müller declared: "Il est impossible d'avoir deux femmes!" ("It is impossible to have two women!")
Note to Cardinal Müller: Women are no longer chattel in the developed world. Women are independent human beings made in the image and likeness of God. To "have two women" speaks to the older traditions that terrorists want to preserve in Christian lands: Women are property; women are to be controlled. Remember female genital mutilation? Remember honor killings?
Such is the attitude toward women Jesus' teachings counter. The whole crowd of marauding men in the Middle East and in Africa wants to preserve that belittling attitude and that distorted view. They believe it is a man's world and no one has any business saying otherwise. Women are for breeding, for cooking, for cleaning. Barefoot and pregnant is their preferred state.
Church teachings can be thus misunderstood. So when a Christian woman finds herself disastrously married to Joe Six-Pack, who comes home drunk every night and beats her before raping her, she's stuck. So when a man finds his wife has moved on to another romance, he's stuck, too.
Francis and Kasper are not so sure, but Müller wants to hold the line. So the clerics who work for Müller look for where Francis and Kasper have made mistakes. There's got to be a law in there somewhere, and if not, we'll write a decree or something.
Hele artiklen er <her>
Wikipedia Phyllis Zagano
Wikipedia: Cardinal Gerhard Ludwig Müller