If we consider certain things that Kierkegaard has to say about faith, about the fundamental religious attitude, and if we then turn to a number of articles by Catholic priests and laymen published in recent years, we cannot escape the impression that these writers not only have lost their Catholic faith, but also no longer understand the very nature of religion based on divine revelation.
Indeed, we are tempted to ask if these "progressive" Catholics ever had a true religious experience, if they ever experienced the elementary confrontation with the absolute Lord: the fear and trembling before the infinitely holy God and the blissful encounter with Christ, the Epiphany of God. Are they capable of understanding the words of Pascal's memorial:
GOD OF ABRAHAM GOF OF ISAAC GOD OF JACOB NOT THE GOD OF
PHILOSOPHERS AND LEARNED MEN
GOD OF JESUS CHRIST
HE IS ONLY TO BE FOUND THROUGH THE GOSPEL
GREATNESS OF THE HUMAN SOUL
JOY JOY JOY TEARS OF JOY
JESUS CHRIST
JESUS CHRIST
I HAVE SEPARATED FROM HIM I HAVE RUN AWAY FROM HIM
I HAVE DENIED HIM CRUCIFIED HIM
TOTAL AND SWEET RENUNCIATION ETERNALLY JOYFUL FOR ONE
SINGLE DAY OF RENUNCIATION ON EARTH
This book is adressed to all those who are still aware of the metaphysical situation of man, to those who have resisted brainwashing by secular slogans, who still possess the longing for God and are still conscious of a need for redemption. It is adressed to those who have not yet become deaf to the voice of Christ amid the noisy huckstering of cheap and shallow formulas, to those whose minds are not spellbound by the alleged coming of age of modern man, to those not caught in the turmoil of the contemporary puberty crisis. This book seeks to appeal to those in whom a sense of real depth, of grandeur, is to be found; to those who can still see the abyss that separates Plato from a Russell, a Shakespeare from a Brecht, a Newman from a Robinson.
We are convinced that the great majority of Catholics have not yet been confused by slogans, that they are not yet swimming in the typical pride that rests on the immature illusion that man has come of age. We are furthermore convinced that many outside the Church hold to the true realism concerning man's metaphysical situation - a realism that can also be found in Plato's Phaedo and Phaedrus. We mean the consciousness of the mysterious rupture in man's nature, of his being simultaneously "but a reed, the weakest of nature" (Pascal), and the lord of creation. This is a realism that does not overlook the inner conflict in man, but senses that man is in need of redemption.
Against this background we shall try to shed light on the confusions, apostasies, disclosures of loss of faith that are to be found among those who trumpet forth the claim that they are the true interpreters of the Council. Against the background of true realism, of the very core of religion, of the good tidings of the Gospel, we shall try to examine all the horrible errors that are being propagated now by the so-called "progressives".
May God grant us grace so that our minds may again be enlightened by Christ, the divine truth, and our hearts inebriated by the ineffable holiness of the God-man. May God grant Catholics the grace to experience again what is written in the Preface of Christmas: By the mystery of the Word made flesh, from thy brightness a new light hath risen to shine on the eyes of our soul in order that God becoming visible to us, we may be borne upward to the love of things invisible.
If this book contributes in a modest way to dispelling the choking fog of secularization and to opening the eyes of souls to the glory of Christ and the true "sentire cum ecclesia," I would consider it the greatest unmerited gift of God:
Despite not thy people, O almighty God,
When they cry out in their affliction, but graciously
Succor them in their tribulation for the glory of
Thy name through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Dietrich von Hildebrand - Trojan Horse in the City of God (Introduction)
Luís
P.S.: O puro prazer intelectual (e espiritual) de estar com acesso à maior biblioteca teológica do mundo é indescritível mas senti-me na obrigação de o partilhar convosco desta forma. Acho que nunca li tão avidamente na minha vida. O Concílio a que von Hildebrand se refere é o Vaticano II claro, e a data de publicação do livro, pasme-se, é de 1967.
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Fico feliz com essa tua felicidade.
Como é hábito não vejo um boi desse tipo que estás a ler.
Mas espero que o cavalo de Tróia não se refira especificamente ao Vaticano II (o ser de 67 parece-me pecar por muito cedo, não?).
Penso que a Fé não mudou na essencia. A substancia da Fé é independente das questões da razão, de acordo.
Mas a formulação dessa substancia é que depende das questões de cada época, sob pena de se afastar do homem "moderno", em vez de se aproximar.
A formulação do Vaticano II pode ter sido mal interpretada e essa má-interpretação pode ser uma ameaça (um cavalo de Tróia) à raíz esssencial da Fé Cristã.
Mas por outro lado, se tudo tivesse ficado como estava antes (por exemplo a missa em latim) seria certamente dificil que o cristão comum, emerso no século materialista e positivista, não sentisse o Evangelho como um penedo impenetrável.
Não vejo de facto que a perda tenha sido maior do que se não tivesse havido o aggiornamento e a abertura ao mundo moderno. Melhor vejo até a possibilidade que se abriu de retorquir ao materialismo no seu próprio domínio, sem se perder o essencial - claro que há sempre derivas, mas isso também antes houve.
abraço pós-natalício (e desde o C.S.Lewis até ao Hildebrand, nem sei por onde começar, lol)