News Item: : In Answering Some Questions, Archbishop Ganswein Raises Some More
(Category: Torch of The Faith News)
Posted by admin
Saturday 08 April 2017 - 12:23:28

Archbishop Ganswein adjusts the cloak around Pope Benedict XVI.

I imagine that it would be better for my reputation to simply leave this subject well alone. Nevertheless, I cannot help but think that Archbishop Georg Ganswein's latest interview raises as many questions as it purports to answer.

La Stampa has published details of an interview, which the late-night TV-show Matrix recently conducted with Archbishop Ganswein in Italy. The focus of the La Stampa report deals with Ganswein's responses to the persistent rumours which continue to surround Pope Benedict XVI's abdication.

No doubt, this primarily involves the bombshell claim made by Pope Benedict's friend, Archbishop Negri, that he resigned his papacy under tremendous pressure.

Whilst contesting the various rumours and claims, Archbishop Ganswein states that Pope Benedict's renunciation of the papacy was free, well thought-out and prayed for.

He adds: ''Pope Benedict is not a person who gives in to pressure. Quite the contrary. When there were challenges, when both the doctrine and people of God had to be defended, he was the one who behaved in an exemplary way: he did not flee in front of the wolf, but he resisted, and this would never have been a reason to leave the pontificate and renounce.''

Further on, Ganswein concludes: ''It is clear: Pope Francis is the successor of Peter. Pope Benedict was the Pope, he renounced and now he has retired to pray.''

At the very end of the La Stampa piece, we read Ganswein's suggestion that: ''I don't think the gay lobby is a power lobby - he said - there was an attempt to put things right and to give the necessary response.''

Taken at face value, this could all be understood in a way which would finally lay to rest all the rumours and claims about Benedict.

Then again, the questions that this latest interview raises for us fall into three categories:-

1. Defence of Doctrine and the People of God.

Archbishop Ganswein acknowledges that Pope Benedict resisted whenever the doctrine and the people of God needed to be defended. On many occasions, this was certainly true.

The questions thus raised are:-

Who needed to be resisted and why?

Where are they now?

When Pope Francis and many of those around him are so obviously subverting Catholic doctrinal and moral teachings, why does Pope Benedict no longer resist or defend the people of God from their errors?

If Benedict feels that he cannot publicly resist because he has retired to pray, then why does he return to give such public blessings to radical dissenters, when they receive the red hats of the Cardinalate from Francis?

Why is it OK to leave him in prayerful retirement when doctrine needs defending; but not when Francis' actions seem to need Benedict's public affirmation?

Also, if Benedict is under no pressure, then why did he give such an unusual address during his 65th-anniversary of priesthood; in which he described Pope Francis' ''goodness'' as ''the place where he feels protected''?

From whom, or what, does he need protection? Is that the kind of thing that someone who feels no pressure needs to say? If Benedict feels the need for protection, should the rest of us?

Having admitted in his address at the Pontifical Gregorian University last May, that the election of Pope Benedict was the outcome of a ''battle'' betwen the St. Gallen group and the Ratzingerians, why is Ganswein so happy to serve both Ratzinger and the St. Gallen mafia's favoured son Francis, without ever raising his voice to defend the faith or the faithful from that latter group's depradations?

If Archbishop Ganswein is concerned about the defence of the faith and the people of God, then why does he also front up to smilingly take part in videos showing Benedict blessing the new cardinals, inter-religious prayer events or the reception of Luther's heretical theses? 

2. Pope Benedict Renounced the Papacy - It is clear that Francis is the Pope.

Well, fair enough Archbishop. However, it was actually you that confused so many people by positing some kind of diarchy model for the papacy last May in the Pontifical Gregorian University!

Does this latest TV interview, described this week by La Stampa, now lay to rest your own seeming diarchy proposition for the papacy?

If so, have you also renounced your heretical-sounding claims that Pope Benedict had ''profoundly and lastingly transformed'' the papacy; and had even constructed an almost communal papal ministry with contemplative and active members?

Has Archbishop Ganswein now moved beyond his relativistic-sounding complacency in summarizing the several views of the ''transformed'' papacy; which included notions that the papacy had been made more humane and less sacred, more collegial and synodal, and had even been ''demythologized''?

In short, is Archbishop Ganswein now convinced that the seeming conception of a diarchy must be invalid, if Pope Francis is the Pope?

3. The Gay Lobby

Given that, to name just one infamous example, such public promoters of homosexuality as Archbishop Paglia - the scandalous prelate who adorned his cathedral wall with a vast, blasphemous and pro-homosexualist mural, which even narcissistically featured himself and one of his since deceased buddies in the priesthood - are now holding key leadership positions and doing grave damage to the Church, Holy Matrimony, education in chastity and the pro-life apostolate; how can Ganswein suggest that the ''gay lobby is not a power lobby''?

And why has he nothing to say about any of that?

Concluding Question

If everything is as hunky-dory as Archbishop Ganswein wants us to accept, then why does it seem that more questions are raised than answered whenever this matter is discussed?

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This news item is from Torch of The Faith
( http://www.torchofthefaith.com/news.php?extend.1605 )