Fatima Perspectives #1283
In his Joint Declaration with the “Grand Imam of Al-Azhar,” Ahmed el-Tayeb last month in Abu Dhabi, Pope Francis and the “Grand Imam” together declared: “The pluralism and the diversity of religions, colour, sex, race and language are willed by God in His wisdom, through which He created human beings. This divine wisdom is the source from which the right to freedom of belief and the freedom to be different derives.”
The meaning is beyond reasonable dispute: the diversity of religions, which God does not will but merely tolerates as an evil, is classed with differences of race, sex and language, which God does indeed will. The existence of religions replete with damnable errors against divine revelation is thus unambiguously presented as a positive good — indeed, “the freedom to be different.” It can hardly be the case that el-Tayeb agreed with a statement that could in any way be read to mean that his man-made religion of Islam is merely a tolerated evil.
As Life Site News reports, during an ad limina visit to Rome, “the bishops of Kazakhstan and Central Asia raised a number of concerns which have been widely shared in the Church over the last several years, concerning perceived ambiguities in the magisterium of Pope Francis.”
In particular, Bishop Athanasius Schneider, Auxiliary Bishop of Astana, politely pressed Francis on his facially heretical claim that God wills the diversity of religions just as He wills the diversity of races. Interviewed by Life Site, Bishop Schneider recounted that Francis “told us: you can say this, too, that the diversity of religions is the permissive will of God.”
So, Francis now says privately that other people can say that he meant only that the diversity of religions is merely tolerated by God. But as for him, his public, signed declaration manifestly to the contrary will stand without any public correction.
Understandably dissatisfied, Bishop Schneider recounts that:
“I tried to go more deeply into the question, at least by quoting the sentence as it reads in the document. The sentence says that as God wills the diversity of sexes, color, race and language, so God wills the diversity of religions. There is an evident comparison between the diversity of religions and the diversity of sexes.
“I mentioned this point to the Holy Father, and he acknowledged that, with this direct comparison, the sentence can be understood erroneously. I stressed in my response to him that the diversity of sexes is not the permissive will of God but is positively willed by God. And the Holy Father acknowledged this and agreed with me that the diversity of the sexes is not a matter of God’s permissive will.
“But when we mention both of these phrases in the same sentence, then the diversity of religions is interpreted as positively willed by God, like the diversity of sexes.
“The sentence therefore leads to doubt and erroneous interpretations, and so it was my desire, and my request that the Holy Father rectify this. But he said to us bishops: you can say that the phrase in question on the diversity of religions means the permissive will of God.”
In short, Francis issued a public declaration expressing a blatant heresy. Confronted with his error and the scandal it has caused, and even admitting his error, he informs Bishop Schneider that the Bishop can rectify it if he wishes, whereas he will say nothing publicly to correct his own publicly promulgated heresy.
In other words, Francis told el-Tayeb what he wanted to hear, and then told Bishop Schneider what he wanted to hear. He thus created space for plausible deniability for both parties. This is behavior befitting a politician, not the Vicar of Christ, charged with confirming his brethren in the Faith. But after six years of this sort of thing, can we expect anything else?
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