Pope Francis: The dynamic word of God cannot be
moth-balled
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(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis on Wednesday evening addressed
participants attending a meeting celebrating the Twenty-fifth Anniversary of
the Promulgation of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, which was sponsored
by the Pontifical
Council for the Promotion of the New Evangelization.
In his prepared remarks to those gathered the Pope
said that, it is in the very nature of the Church to “guard” the deposit of
faith and to “pursue” the Church’s path, so that the truth present in Jesus’
preaching of the Gospel may grow in fullness until the end of time.
Medicine of Mercy
He went on to say that, “with the joy born of Christian
hope, and armed with the “medicine of mercy”, we approach the men and women of
our time to help them discover the inexhaustible richness contained in the
person of Jesus Christ.
The Pope described the Catechism as an
important instrument adding that, it “presents the faithful with the
perennial teaching of the Church so that they can grow in their understanding
of the faith.”
Death Penalty
During his discourse, the Holy Father brought up the subject
of the death penalty saying that it is a “subject that ought to find in
the Catechism of the Catholic Church a more adequate and coherent treatment”…
Pope Francis went on to say that, “it must be clearly stated
that the death penalty is an inhumane measure that, regardless of how it is
carried out, abases human dignity.”
Concluding his remarks the Holy Father said that, “the
word of God cannot be moth-balled like some old blanket in an attempt
to keep insects at bay! No. The word of God is a dynamic and living
reality that develops and grows because it is aimed at a fulfilment that none
can halt”, he said.
Before imparting his Apostolic Blessing on those present,
the Pope underlined that, “doctrine cannot be preserved without allowing
it to develop, nor can it be tied to an interpretation that is rigid and
immutable without demeaning the working of the Holy Spirit.”
Please find the English language translation of
Pope Francis' prepared remarks below:
I offer a
warm greeting to all of you and I thank Archbishop Fisichella for his kind
words of introduction.
The
twenty-fifth anniversary of the Apostolic Constitution Fidei Depositum, by
which Saint John Paul II, thirty years after the opening of the Second Vatican
Ecumenical Council, promulgated the Catechism of the Catholic Church, offers a
significant opportunity for taking stock of the progress made in the meantime.
It was the desire and will of Saint John XXIII to call the Council, not
primarily to condemn error, but so that the Church could have an opportunity at
last to present the beauty of her faith in Jesus Christ in language attuned to
the times. “It is necessary,” the Pope stated in his opening address, “that
the Church should never depart from the sacred patrimony of truth received from
the Fathers. But at the same time she must ever look to the present, to
the new conditions and new forms of life introduced into the modern world which
have opened new avenues to the Catholic apostolate” (11 October 1962).
“It is our duty,” he continued, “not only to guard this precious
treasure, as if we were concerned only with antiquity, but to dedicate
ourselves, with an earnest will and without fear, to that work which our era
demands of us, thus pursuing the path which the Church has followed for twenty
centuries” (ibid.).
It is in
the very nature of the Church to “guard” the deposit of faith and to “pursue”
the Church’s path, so that the truth present in Jesus’ preaching of the Gospel
may grow in fullness until the end of time. This is a grace granted to
the People of God, but it is also a task and a mission for which we are
responsible, that of proclaiming to our contemporaries in a new and fuller way
the perennial Good News. With the joy born of Christian hope, and armed
with the “medicine of mercy” (ibid.), we approach the men and women of our time
to help them discover the inexhaustible richness contained in the person of
Jesus Christ.
In
presenting the Catechism of the Catholic Church, Saint John Paul II stated that
it should “take into account the doctrinal statements which down the centuries
the Holy Spirit has made known to his Church. It should also help
illumine with the light of faith the new situations and problems which had not
yet emerged in the past” (Fidei Depositum, 3). The Catechism is thus an
important instrument. It presents the faithful with the perennial
teaching of the Church so that they can grow in their understanding of the faith.
But it especially seeks to draw our contemporaries – with their new and varied
problems – to the Church, as she seeks to present the faith as the meaningful
answer to human existence at this moment of history. It is not enough to
find a new language in which to articulate our perennial faith; it is also
urgent, in the light of the new challenges and prospects facing humanity, that
the Church be able to express the “new things” of Christ’s Gospel, that, albeit
present in the word of God, have not yet come to light. This is the
treasury of “things old and new” of which Jesus spoke when he invited his
disciples to teach the newness that he had brought, without forsaking the old
(cf. Mt 13:52).
One of the
most beautiful pages in the Gospel of John is his account of the so-called
“priestly prayer” of Jesus. Just before his passion and death, Jesus
speaks to the Father of his obedience in having brought to fulfilment the
mission entrusted to him. His words, a kind of hymn to love, also contain
the request that the disciples be gathered and preserved in unity (cf. Jn
17:12-15). The words, “Now this is eternal life, that they should know
you, the only true God, and the one whom you sent, Jesus Christ” (Jn 17:3),
represent the culmination of Jesus’s mission.
To know God, as we are well aware, is not in the first place
an abstract exercise of human reason, but an irrepressible desire present in
the heart of every person. This knowledge comes from love, for we have
encountered the Son of God on our journey (cf. Lumen Fidei, 28). Jesus of
Nazareth walks at our side and introduces us, by his words and the signs he
performs, to the great mystery of the Father’s love. This knowledge is
strengthened daily by faith’s certainty that we are loved and, for this reason,
part of a meaningful plan. Those who love long to know better the
beloved, and therein to discover the hidden richness that appears each day as
something completely new.
For this
reason, our Catechism unfolds in the light of love, as an experience of
knowledge, trust, and abandonment to the mystery. In explaining its structure,
the Catechism of the Catholic Church borrows a phrase from the Roman Catechism
and proposes it as the key to its reading and application: “The whole concern
of doctrine and its teaching must be directed to the love that never ends.
Whether something is proposed for belief, for hope or for action, the
love of our Lord must always be made accessible, so that anyone can see that
all the works of perfect Christian virtue spring from love and have no other
objective than to arrive at love” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 25).
Along these
same lines, I would like now to bring up a subject that ought to find in the
Catechism of the Catholic Church a more adequate and coherent treatment in the
light of these expressed aims. I am speaking of the death penalty.
This issue cannot be reduced to a mere résumé of traditional teaching
without taking into account not only the doctrine as it has developed in the
teaching of recent Popes, but also the change in the awareness of the Christian
people which rejects an attitude of complacency before a punishment deeply
injurious of human dignity. It must be clearly stated that the death
penalty is an inhumane measure that, regardless of how it is carried out,
abases human dignity. It is per se contrary to the Gospel, because it
entails the willful suppression of a human life that never ceases to be sacred
in the eyes of its Creator and of which – ultimately – only God is the true
judge and guarantor. No man, “not even a murderer, loses his personal
dignity” (Letter to the President of the International Commission against the
Death Penalty, 20 March 2015), because God is a Father who always awaits the
return of his children who, knowing that they have made mistakes, ask for
forgiveness and begin a new life. No one ought to be deprived not only of
life, but also of the chance for a moral and existential redemption that in
turn can benefit the community.
In past
centuries, when means of defence were scarce and society had yet to develop and
mature as it has, recourse to the death penalty appeared to be the logical
consequence of the correct application of justice. Sadly, even in the
Papal States recourse was had to this extreme and inhumane remedy that ignored
the primacy of mercy over justice. Let us take responsibility for the past and
recognize that the imposition of the death penalty was dictated by a mentality
more legalistic than Christian. Concern for preserving power and material
wealth led to an over-estimation of the value of the law and prevented a deeper
understanding of the Gospel. Nowadays, however, were we to remain neutral
before the new demands of upholding personal dignity, we would be even more
guilty.
Here we are
not in any way contradicting past teaching, for the defence of the dignity of
human life from the first moment of conception to natural death has been taught
by the Church consistently and authoritatively. Yet the harmonious development
of doctrine demands that we cease to defend arguments that now appear clearly
contrary to the new understanding of Christian truth. Indeed, as Saint
Vincent of Lérins pointed out, “Some may say: Shall there be no progress of
religion in Christ’s Church? Certainly; all possible progress. For
who is there, so envious of men, so full of hatred to God, who would seek to
forbid it?” (Commonitorium, 23.1; PL 50). It is necessary, therefore, to
reaffirm that no matter how serious the crime that has been committed, the
death penalty is inadmissible because it is an attack on the inviolability and
the dignity of the person.
“The
Church, in her teaching, life and worship, perpetuates and hands on to all
generations all that she herself is, all that she believes” (Dei Verbum, 8).
The Council Fathers could not have found a finer and more synthetic way
of expressing the nature and mission of the Church. Not only in
“teaching”, but also in “life” and “worship”, are the faithful able to be God’s
People. Through a series of verbs the Dogmatic Constitution on Divine
Revelation expresses the dynamic nature of this process: “This Tradition
develops […] grows […] and constantly moves forward toward the fullness of
divine truth, until the words of God reach their complete fulfillment in her”
(ibid.)
Tradition
is a living reality and only a partial vision regards the “deposit of faith” as
something static. The word of God cannot be moth-balled like some old
blanket in an attempt to keep insects at bay! No. The word of God
is a dynamic and living reality that develops and grows because it is aimed at
a fulfilment that none can halt. This law of progress, in the happy
formulation of Saint Vincent of Lérins, “consolidated by years, enlarged by
time, refined by age” (Commonitorium, 23.9: PL 50), is a distinguishing mark of
revealed truth as it is handed down by the Church, and in no way represents a
change in doctrine.
Doctrine
cannot be preserved without allowing it to develop, nor can it be tied to an
interpretation that is rigid and immutable without demeaning the working of the
Holy Spirit. “God, who in many and various ways spoke of old to our
fathers” (Heb 1:1), “uninterruptedly converses with the bride of his beloved
Son” (Dei Verbum, 8). We are called to make this voice our own by
“reverently hearing the word of God” (ibid., 1), so that our life as a Church
may progress with the same enthusiasm as in the beginning, towards those new
horizons to which the Lord wishes to guide us.
I thank you
for this meeting and for your work, and to all of you I cordially impart my
blessing.
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