The Church in the service of Agenda 2030
about reading the hymn to an Amazonian paradise, we do not understand why its inhabitants would need the Christian faith. On the contrary, the fact is emerging that the Church should be converted by these natives. Here we are far beyond heresy. Christianity is reduced here to anthropology and ecology. And this is not a surprise, but a direct continuation of Evangelii gaudium and Amoris laetitita. Just as products made in China pretend to be European products, so this product is a plagiarism. He presents himself as Christian, but he is not.
Christianity relegated to pseudobiology
The fact that the announced synod will contain surprises and bring more reasons for schism has been known for a long time. Initially, it seemed that married clergymen would participate. It must be admitted, however, that "Instrumentum Laboris" far exceeded all expectations and wildest imaginations. The document set itself much more demanding ambitions and a more serious goal. It represents the boldest that the Synod Secretariat can dare to do. The document proposes and presents nothing else than the destruction of the very idea of the Church and of the Christian faith from its very foundations.
Dilution of Christianity: Wine turned to water
I say; "Christian" not "Catholic" because the methods and content of this text, full of repetition and now extremely confusing, actually destroy the very foundations of Christianity. Of course, the operation is carried out by a robust system that would otherwise mean: not to deny but to conceal, not to deny but to ridicule. It does so in such a way that the reader can be positively impressed by all the interesting considerations of an ecological, ethnological, hygienic-health, etc. nature that are contained here, and many of them are even correct. But amidst these rigorous and rich empirical analyses, there is nothing new that could not have been expressed in a better, more thorough, and well-documented way by an expert. The person of Christ and His Gospel, however, get lost and literally drown in the exuberance of nature.
To illustrate the relationship between faith and culture, it is necessary to introduce the classical Christology of the first ecumenical councils, which affirm the transcendence of the divine Person of the Word in relation to the human nature it contains and transforms, but not vice versa. However, the "Instrumentum laboris" de facto expresses in its basic logic a completely inverted concept that does not correspond to Christological orthodoxy at all. When we read this hymn in honor of paradise in the Amazon land (imagined as a new Eden of immaculate innocence and harmony both social and cosmic, and not the one brought by Western culture (cf. par. 103)), it is incomprehensible why and how this particular humanity would believe in the Incarnation of the Son of God.
The myth of the great Amazonian river, the source of life, takes its place in the great Christological and Easter image as a river that swells in the temple and, according to the prophet Ezekiel, " heals wherever it flows". Instead of asking how to bring the Gospel message to these peoples and how the living water of Christ can heal the lives of these peoples, it is taken for granted that they already have this life thanks to the tradition of their ancestors in the situation of the new Eden, and now the Church herself must undergo conversion. Indeed, this church must take on an "Amazonian face", as has been said many times, but it is not clear from the document whether the Amazon can take a face and whether it is desirable or not.
The Instrumentum Laboris expresses opinions that some may like, but it is not a Christian document. Let it be said without any doubt. A few biblical terms in the paragraph headings, such as "church", "conversion", "ministry" , are not enough to guarantee the evangelical nature of the text. They resemble security screens, but the word of the living God is not the seed and inspiration on which this document is built. Just look at the example title of Chapter I, Part I, devoted to the subject of life.
The title refers to John 10:10_: "I have come that they may have life, and have it abundantly." It would seem like a good start. But what follows does not say what this life Jesus came with and brought was, nor that John speaks of "eternal life ," and that life itself is a Trinitarian life given by the Holy Spirit. Commenting on this verse of John, the text is content to illustrate the biodiversity of the Amazon with the rich hydrography of the Amazon basin and praise the " good life of the Indians", which - a stunning discovery - signifies the centrality of the relationship between human beings and creation and implies "doing good"_ (paragraph 13) .
Of course, we don't understand whether Christ's cross and resurrection are necessary at all for the kind of "good life" that the model represents. The cross is mentioned twice, but never in relation to Christ and redemption, but to the story of the cross and resurrection, which is the solidarity of the Church with the struggle of the Indian nations in defense of the territory (paragraphs 33-34; 145).
Removal of the fundamental principle - Scripture: this is more apostasy than heresy
Cardinal Brandmüller, in his commentary, which has already been widely circulated, claims uncompromisingly that the document is heretical. It's hard to deny it. Let us note one thing, however, so that we may better understand what heresy is about. Church history teaches us that heresies develop from controversial interpretations of Scripture.
The heretic by vocation, the typical heretic, always offers a more correct interpretation of Scripture, whose authority he does not question. That is why it used to be quotes from the Bible that united and fed everyone. In other words, from Arius to Luther and beyond, the premise that united Catholics and non-Catholics, regardless of orthodoxy or heresy, was always the undeniable authority of Scripture (Gospel passages taken out of context), regarded as the inspired Word, the validity of which was the basis of every doctrine and any theology.
However, there is no trace of this biblical premise in the " Instrumentum laboris" of the Synod of Amazonas. The promoters of the document make no effort to show that what they say is in accordance with Scripture and theology. They say that according to their appearance, the only "theological place" is the "territory" and the "cry of the poor." Here we read: “The territory is the theological place where faith lives and which is also a special source of divine revelation. These spaces are places of epiphany where the source of life and wisdom for the planet is revealed, life and wisdom that speak of God” (par. 19; cf. 144; 126e).
Of course, there is no mention here of any part of Sacred Scripture or liturgy, of the great apostolic and ecclesiastical traditions which, in order of importance, are the first theological places, nor of any other possible minor theological places where their words are to be confirmed, nor is there no mention of primary sources. Dei Verbum and 'Sacrosanctum concilium' are covered with shoots of climbing tropical scab or drowned in shifting sandy swamps.
It is a phenomenon that we cannot avoid, because it is the most important indicator that makes it possible to recognize the true nature of the deviations presented, this " paradigm shift" that the Instrumentum laboris introduces. In the modern era, there have already been important precursors of removing the biblical principle in favor of the primacy of other instances. The so-called liberal theology of the early 19th century in the Protestant sphere was essentially an attempt to "justify Christianity" from the many attacks of modern culture and to confine it "within common reason" or to a special form reduced to a general religious feeling. Faith and the Church have been reduced to their universal intelligibility through a process of rational homology. The basic words and concepts of Christianity remain, but their meaning is secularized. (…)
In the light of these developments, which have not yet been concluded, a phenomenon such as the Instrumentum laboris on the Amazon must also be taken into account. It is dissolving Christianity in anthropology and even ecology to give it the appearance of acceptability and approval from the UN and postmodern anti-Western climate ideology. In this regard, Cardinal Brandmüller's diagnosis is accurate, but I would immediately add that it is an apostasy rather than a heresy.
The removal of biblical principles (i.e. resignation from theology and mission), which replaces the phenomenon of the missionary mission of the Church in the light of the Word of God with a " theological place" contaminated with mythology and the environment, the territory of the poor, is an abandonment of the area of faith that is born for Paul and the Church from the kerygma, not from the ecological return to the territory (a term that is repeated 9 times in the document). The Apostolic Church and the Catholic Church that followed it carried the message of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who died and rose again for our sins in their preaching. Therefore, the Church has always been missionary. But there is no mention of this message in this document. What we have before us, therefore, is not a variant of Christianity, perhaps unorthodox and heretical, but a phenomenon of a total abandonment of biblical faith, of replacing biblical faith with something else that has no legitimate sign for a Christian. It's like a product imported from China and sold on the European market.
I will say more. The great exponents of theological liberalism I have mentioned at least maintained the dignified status of Christianity: for them it remained the highest expression of the human ethos of the religion of mankind. In a way, there was no denying that they were Christians. Something much more radical happens in the new mythical reduction represented in the pre-synodal document: This privileged position is abolished.
It seems that the church (separating itself) now has only one task: to protect as a good what is supposedly already an inseparable element of the Amazonian population. In this way, the vision of Christianity further developed or realized by man is also lost. There is the problem of true religion, which has no right to exist anymore. So also the question of the God that religions worship_: "Behavior that is not open to others, corporate behavior that binds salvation solely to one's own creed is a destructive pro-slavery creed"_ (par. 39). In other words: believe what you want and you will be saved anyway. Something similar was already in the document from Abu Dhabi. So it's not an excuse.
Cultural phenomenon: infantile regression
On reflection, we must state another fact, no less important and of serious importance, which concerns the actual action (we can deal with culture, not Christian culture). It is interesting that the one who is considered privileged in the Instrumentum laboris is no longer the adult logos who explained and translated the "mythos" of the infant age of human culture, including the "Judeo" Christian mythos, as was the case in all liberal theologies. and in all the Enlightenment and Positivist reductions of the Kantian, laissez-faire, Hegelian, Bultmanian, etc. Now the charm of emancipated adulthood has passed, the "age of reason" which became the guide of the Western world has lost its charm .
In its place has returned the despised mythos - the world of primitives, the childhood age of humanity, the good savage with his heritage of animistic ancestors (whom homo technologicus envies, but does not really know) . After criticizing and proclaiming myth, even biblical, as a remnant of infantile humanity, desecrating even the ritual practices of the Church ( accused of superstitious mentality) **, he now seeks to replace his emptied product and resorts to the myths and shamanic rituals of the Amazonian Indians, to the pre-Christian repertoire, because it has become the new paradigm where the wine of Christ's uniqueness is diluted in water.**
There is no doubt that from the point of view of cultural psychology, this is a classic phenomenon of infantile postmodern regression, typical of the Western world, which no longer aspires to the age of adulthood, enlightenment and positivist memory. Being an adult is too demanding and too boring. Pure absolute reason is simpler, the effort to create concepts is over. Better to be instinctive. This is no longer the age of reason, but the age of dreams and fun.
Sin camouflages this infantile aspiration: behind the charming innocence of the 'puer' lies a deep nihilism. Just think of the Nitzschean superman who flirted with the end of the logos and had just the figure of a child, innocent in his games, far from good and evil, with a merry-go-round of eternal return: " Dionysus against the Crucified"! Pagan myth in place of the Christian God. The infantile captivates today because it embodies an instinctive innocence and irresponsibility that an adult cannot afford.
This diagnosis should not be considered an exaggeration. (…) The mythization of the unadulterated neo-pagan naturalism of the Indians is a regression of the entire West and of postmodernism. Where to look for help for hypertechnologization, which has become uncontrollable due to urbanization. How to heal the wounds of mutual relations, which are becoming more and more fragmented. After the temptations of the " flower children" , here is a proposal for a model of worship that is more ecological and less neurotic: life transferred to its origins, to the bow and arrow, to shamanic healing rituals.
A new beginning! Does everyone want a new beginning… Like all regressions, this one is not self-aware, otherwise it would be ashamed of itself. On the contrary, she shows herself in her impressive genius as a prophetess, only out of date, while all the boring pages of the Instrumentum laboris are a cocktail of overpriced goods just right for (possessed) children or toothless old men who just gibberish (...). Telling about the wonders of the Amazon territory, the documentary plunges into endless naivety. The Amazon described in the documentary is a construction of an imaginary West looking for tailor-made replacement myths after it has destroyed its own. The authors should have at least read a page of Leopardi's "The Nature of the Mace" to avoid being so banally seduced by Rousseau's mermaids. (In conclusion, the author returns to his earlier critique of Evangelii Gaudium, noting how the authors have drawn conclusions for their latest work.)
about reading the hymn to an Amazonian paradise, we do not understand why its inhabitants would need the Christian faith. On the contrary, the fact is emerging that the Church should be converted by these natives. Here we are far beyond heresy. Christianity is reduced here to anthropology and ecology. And this is not a surprise, but a direct continuation of Evangelii gaudium and Amoris laetitita. Just as products made in China pretend to be European products, so this product is a plagiarism. He presents himself as Christian, but he is not.
Christianity relegated to pseudobiology
The fact that the announced synod will contain surprises and bring more reasons for schism has been known for a long time. Initially, it seemed that married clergymen would participate. It must be admitted, however, that "Instrumentum Laboris" far exceeded all expectations and wildest imaginations. The document set itself much more demanding ambitions and a more serious goal. It represents the boldest that the Synod Secretariat can dare to do. The document proposes and presents nothing else than the destruction of the very idea of the Church and of the Christian faith from its very foundations.
Dilution of Christianity: Wine turned to water
I say; "Christian" not "Catholic" because the methods and content of this text, full of repetition and now extremely confusing, actually destroy the very foundations of Christianity. Of course, the operation is carried out by a robust system that would otherwise mean: not to deny but to conceal, not to deny but to ridicule. It does so in such a way that the reader can be positively impressed by all the interesting considerations of an ecological, ethnological, hygienic-health, etc. nature that are contained here, and many of them are even correct. But amidst these rigorous and rich empirical analyses, there is nothing new that could not have been expressed in a better, more thorough, and well-documented way by an expert. The person of Christ and His Gospel, however, get lost and literally drown in the exuberance of nature.
To illustrate the relationship between faith and culture, it is necessary to introduce the classical Christology of the first ecumenical councils, which affirm the transcendence of the divine Person of the Word in relation to the human nature it contains and transforms, but not vice versa. However, the "Instrumentum laboris" de facto expresses in its basic logic a completely inverted concept that does not correspond to Christological orthodoxy at all. When we read this hymn in honor of paradise in the Amazon land (imagined as a new Eden of immaculate innocence and harmony both social and cosmic, and not the one brought by Western culture (cf. par. 103)), it is incomprehensible why and how this particular humanity would believe in the Incarnation of the Son of God.
The myth of the great Amazonian river, the source of life, takes its place in the great Christological and Easter image as a river that swells in the temple and, according to the prophet Ezekiel, " heals wherever it flows". Instead of asking how to bring the Gospel message to these peoples and how the living water of Christ can heal the lives of these peoples, it is taken for granted that they already have this life thanks to the tradition of their ancestors in the situation of the new Eden, and now the Church herself must undergo conversion. Indeed, this church must take on an "Amazonian face", as has been said many times, but it is not clear from the document whether the Amazon can take a face and whether it is desirable or not.
The Instrumentum Laboris expresses opinions that some may like, but it is not a Christian document. Let it be said without any doubt. A few biblical terms in the paragraph headings, such as "church", "conversion", "ministry" , are not enough to guarantee the evangelical nature of the text. They resemble security screens, but the word of the living God is not the seed and inspiration on which this document is built. Just look at the example title of Chapter I, Part I, devoted to the subject of life.
The title refers to John 10:10_: "I have come that they may have life, and have it abundantly." It would seem like a good start. But what follows does not say what this life Jesus came with and brought was, nor that John speaks of "eternal life ," and that life itself is a Trinitarian life given by the Holy Spirit. Commenting on this verse of John, the text is content to illustrate the biodiversity of the Amazon with the rich hydrography of the Amazon basin and praise the " good life of the Indians", which - a stunning discovery - signifies the centrality of the relationship between human beings and creation and implies "doing good"_ (paragraph 13) .
Of course, we don't understand whether Christ's cross and resurrection are necessary at all for the kind of "good life" that the model represents. The cross is mentioned twice, but never in relation to Christ and redemption, but to the story of the cross and resurrection, which is the solidarity of the Church with the struggle of the Indian nations in defense of the territory (paragraphs 33-34; 145).
Removal of the fundamental principle - Scripture: this is more apostasy than heresy
Cardinal Brandmüller, in his commentary, which has already been widely circulated, claims uncompromisingly that the document is heretical. It's hard to deny it. Let us note one thing, however, so that we may better understand what heresy is about. Church history teaches us that heresies develop from controversial interpretations of Scripture.
The heretic by vocation, the typical heretic, always offers a more correct interpretation of Scripture, whose authority he does not question. That is why it used to be quotes from the Bible that united and fed everyone. In other words, from Arius to Luther and beyond, the premise that united Catholics and non-Catholics, regardless of orthodoxy or heresy, was always the undeniable authority of Scripture (Gospel passages taken out of context), regarded as the inspired Word, the validity of which was the basis of every doctrine and any theology.
However, there is no trace of this biblical premise in the " Instrumentum laboris" of the Synod of Amazonas. The promoters of the document make no effort to show that what they say is in accordance with Scripture and theology. They say that according to their appearance, the only "theological place" is the "territory" and the "cry of the poor." Here we read: “The territory is the theological place where faith lives and which is also a special source of divine revelation. These spaces are places of epiphany where the source of life and wisdom for the planet is revealed, life and wisdom that speak of God” (par. 19; cf. 144; 126e).
Of course, there is no mention here of any part of Sacred Scripture or liturgy, of the great apostolic and ecclesiastical traditions which, in order of importance, are the first theological places, nor of any other possible minor theological places where their words are to be confirmed, nor is there no mention of primary sources. Dei Verbum and 'Sacrosanctum concilium' are covered with shoots of climbing tropical scab or drowned in shifting sandy swamps.
It is a phenomenon that we cannot avoid, because it is the most important indicator that makes it possible to recognize the true nature of the deviations presented, this " paradigm shift" that the Instrumentum laboris introduces. In the modern era, there have already been important precursors of removing the biblical principle in favor of the primacy of other instances. The so-called liberal theology of the early 19th century in the Protestant sphere was essentially an attempt to "justify Christianity" from the many attacks of modern culture and to confine it "within common reason" or to a special form reduced to a general religious feeling. Faith and the Church have been reduced to their universal intelligibility through a process of rational homology. The basic words and concepts of Christianity remain, but their meaning is secularized. (…)
In the light of these developments, which have not yet been concluded, a phenomenon such as the Instrumentum laboris on the Amazon must also be taken into account. It is dissolving Christianity in anthropology and even ecology to give it the appearance of acceptability and approval from the UN and postmodern anti-Western climate ideology. In this regard, Cardinal Brandmüller's diagnosis is accurate, but I would immediately add that it is an apostasy rather than a heresy.
The removal of biblical principles (i.e. resignation from theology and mission), which replaces the phenomenon of the missionary mission of the Church in the light of the Word of God with a " theological place" contaminated with mythology and the environment, the territory of the poor, is an abandonment of the area of faith that is born for Paul and the Church from the kerygma, not from the ecological return to the territory (a term that is repeated 9 times in the document). The Apostolic Church and the Catholic Church that followed it carried the message of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who died and rose again for our sins in their preaching. Therefore, the Church has always been missionary. But there is no mention of this message in this document. What we have before us, therefore, is not a variant of Christianity, perhaps unorthodox and heretical, but a phenomenon of a total abandonment of biblical faith, of replacing biblical faith with something else that has no legitimate sign for a Christian. It's like a product imported from China and sold on the European market.
I will say more. The great exponents of theological liberalism I have mentioned at least maintained the dignified status of Christianity: for them it remained the highest expression of the human ethos of the religion of mankind. In a way, there was no denying that they were Christians. Something much more radical happens in the new mythical reduction represented in the pre-synodal document: This privileged position is abolished.
It seems that the church (separating itself) now has only one task: to protect as a good what is supposedly already an inseparable element of the Amazonian population. In this way, the vision of Christianity further developed or realized by man is also lost. There is the problem of true religion, which has no right to exist anymore. So also the question of the God that religions worship_: "Behavior that is not open to others, corporate behavior that binds salvation solely to one's own creed is a destructive pro-slavery creed"_ (par. 39). In other words: believe what you want and you will be saved anyway. Something similar was already in the document from Abu Dhabi. So it's not an excuse.
Cultural phenomenon: infantile regression
On reflection, we must state another fact, no less important and of serious importance, which concerns the actual action (we can deal with culture, not Christian culture). It is interesting that the one who is considered privileged in the Instrumentum laboris is no longer the adult logos who explained and translated the "mythos" of the infant age of human culture, including the "Judeo" Christian mythos, as was the case in all liberal theologies. and in all the Enlightenment and Positivist reductions of the Kantian, laissez-faire, Hegelian, Bultmanian, etc. Now the charm of emancipated adulthood has passed, the "age of reason" which became the guide of the Western world has lost its charm .
In its place has returned the despised mythos - the world of primitives, the childhood age of humanity, the good savage with his heritage of animistic ancestors (whom homo technologicus envies, but does not really know) . After criticizing and proclaiming myth, even biblical, as a remnant of infantile humanity, desecrating even the ritual practices of the Church ( accused of superstitious mentality) **, he now seeks to replace his emptied product and resorts to the myths and shamanic rituals of the Amazonian Indians, to the pre-Christian repertoire, because it has become the new paradigm where the wine of Christ's uniqueness is diluted in water.**
There is no doubt that from the point of view of cultural psychology, this is a classic phenomenon of infantile postmodern regression, typical of the Western world, which no longer aspires to the age of adulthood, enlightenment and positivist memory. Being an adult is too demanding and too boring. Pure absolute reason is simpler, the effort to create concepts is over. Better to be instinctive. This is no longer the age of reason, but the age of dreams and fun.
Sin camouflages this infantile aspiration: behind the charming innocence of the 'puer' lies a deep nihilism. Just think of the Nitzschean superman who flirted with the end of the logos and had just the figure of a child, innocent in his games, far from good and evil, with a merry-go-round of eternal return: " Dionysus against the Crucified"! Pagan myth in place of the Christian God. The infantile captivates today because it embodies an instinctive innocence and irresponsibility that an adult cannot afford.
This diagnosis should not be considered an exaggeration. (…) The mythization of the unadulterated neo-pagan naturalism of the Indians is a regression of the entire West and of postmodernism. Where to look for help for hypertechnologization, which has become uncontrollable due to urbanization. How to heal the wounds of mutual relations, which are becoming more and more fragmented. After the temptations of the " flower children" , here is a proposal for a model of worship that is more ecological and less neurotic: life transferred to its origins, to the bow and arrow, to shamanic healing rituals.
A new beginning! Does everyone want a new beginning… Like all regressions, this one is not self-aware, otherwise it would be ashamed of itself. On the contrary, she shows herself in her impressive genius as a prophetess, only out of date, while all the boring pages of the Instrumentum laboris are a cocktail of overpriced goods just right for (possessed) children or toothless old men who just gibberish (...). Telling about the wonders of the Amazon territory, the documentary plunges into endless naivety. The Amazon described in the documentary is a construction of an imaginary West looking for tailor-made replacement myths after it has destroyed its own. The authors should have at least read a page of Leopardi's "The Nature of the Mace" to avoid being so banally seduced by Rousseau's mermaids. (In conclusion, the author returns to his earlier critique of Evangelii Gaudium, noting how the authors have drawn conclusions for their latest work.)
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