Friday, September 11, 2009

A Holy-See-dependent charity sponsoring the Russian schism

Last Sunday’s edition of the Sydney Catholic Weekly featured the annual Catholic charities guide. That issue’s back page (p. 48, September 6, 2009) was a full-page advertisement for Aid to the Church in Need (A.C.N.), which (the advertisement, that is) described A.C.N. as “A Catholic charity under the guidance of the Holy Father”, and which contained the following startling passage:

In 1992, Fr Werenfried [van Straaten, A.C.N.’s founder] extended Aid to the Church in Need’s work to supporting the Orthodox Church in Russia: for as Pope John Paul II said in Ut Unum Sint, it is “an imperative of charity” to help our Orthodox brethren.
Now A.C.N. is not a charity like the St. Vincent de Paul Society or Caritas; it does things like funding the formation of seminarians and distributing Bibles and catechisms rather than providing social services like those which secular government or non-government organisations provide, so naturally I reacted with consternation to the thought of donations for the support of the Catholic religion going to fund the religious activities of formal schismatics. But could it be that I had misconstrued the advertisement, and that A.C.N funds are just going towards innocent social-services-type activities rather than fomenting schism and disseminating error? (Mind you, even if that were the case, it would still seem to be a misuse of donations, since A.C.N. is supposed to focus on assistance for the support of the Faith as such rather than for non-religious humanitarian activity.) Alas, no:

Before the end of the Gorbachev years, many bishops began to make plans for the daunting task of rebuilding seminary life. The strides they have made over the past ten years have been impressive. A useful benchmark is the remarkable ecumenical venture by the Roman Catholic agency, Aid to the Church in Need. In 1992 its founder, the Dutch Norbertine monk Werenfried van Straaten, already 79 years old, had a vision which challenged him to support the Russian Orthodox Church. His advisers settled on helping Russian Orthodox theological education as the most effective focus for this new outreach. Of the 46 theological academies, seminaries and schools in Russia, Aid to the Church in Need is now
[as at April 4, 2001] helping 26 financially.
[my square-bracketed interpolation,
http://www.religion-online.org/showarticle.asp?title=2099]
And at A.C.N.’s own official Australian website we find the following things:

He [A.C.N. international president Father Joaquín Alliende] also underlined the charity’s commitment to continue supporting the Russian Orthodox – as well as the Catholic Church in Russia – and developing east-west relations.
and

Last year, ACN gave over $4 million to support Church communities in Russia, prioritising help for the Catholic Church but also some giving help to the Russian Orthodox Church as well as ecumenical projects.
[my square-bracketed interpolation,
both quotations from
http://members4.boardhost.com/acnaus/msg/1227482615.html]

Furthermore, a Google search using the keywords “Aid to the Church in Need”, “Orthodox Church” and “Russia” led me to an article by the respected Traditional Catholic lawyer and journalist Mr. Christopher A. Ferrara, who had the following things, among others, to say:

Meanwhile, as Aid to the Church in Russia seeks funds to build a headquarters for the Archbishop at Moscow, another Catholic charity, Aid to the Church in Need, is giving millions of dollars to the Orthodox Church for its continued functioning in Russia - a fact recited by the Vatican itself as justification for its creation of the Catholic pseudo-dioceses: "Navarro-Valls also reminded reporters that in the past decade Catholic groups such as Aid to the Church in Need have provided more than $17 million in direct aid to the Russian Orthodox Church." (CWNews.com, Feb. 11, 2002) The website for Aid to the Church in Need proclaims: "Following a 1984 decree of the Vatican Congregation for the Clergy, Aid to the Church in Need was recognized by the Catholic Church as a universal public association of faithful." [http://www.kirche-in-not.org/e_home.htm]

So, one Catholic charity combats the agenda of another in Russia! The faithful are asked, on the one hand, to help build up the Catholic Church in Russia, and, on the other hand, to give money to an organization that helps build up its hateful opponent, the Russian Orthodox church, already fattened by the spoils that Stalin robbed from the Catholic Church at gunpoint in the 1940s.

[bracketed content in the original,
http://www.fatimaperspectives.com/cr/perspective208.asp]
(I encourage you to read the whole article.) Now I seem to recall a recent controversy over funds from a Canadian Catholic charity going towards a Latin American organisation which supported abortion, which would and should have generated outrage. But how much more outraged should we be at Church sponsorship (by an “international Catholic charity dependent on the Holy See”, no less) of schism—abortion kills the body, but schism kills the soul. Of course, God only permits an evil in order to avert a greater evil or procure a greater good, and perhaps the indifferentists behind this scandalous funding—ecumenism at its worst—are contributing unwittingly towards, if not what one Angelqueen reader called the ‘material preparation for the conversion of Russia’, then at least, in some inscrutable way, the material preparation for the Consecration of Russia to Our Lady’s Immaculate Heart.

Reginaldvs Cantvar
Feast of Sts. Protus and Hyacinth, Martyrs, A.D. 2009

20 comments:

Cardinal Pole said...

I've also published this at angelqueen.org/forum:

http://angelqueen.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=27864

Schütz said...

Deary me, your Eminence, get down off your high horse for a little bit and understand what is happening here.

You know the facts:

The Russian Orthodox Church is the largest non-Roman Christian communion in the world.

The ROC is a true Church in the proper sense, despite its lack of communion with the Catholic Church.

These two facts alone mean that if we are serious about the unity of the Church, we must be at least as serious about the ROC as we are about the Ecumenical Patriarchate in Constantinople. St Paul exhorts us (Gal 6:10) "as we have opportunity, let us do good to all men, and especially to those who are of the household of faith." According to Catholic ecclesiology, the Russian Orthodox belong to "the household of faith", even if they are not in full communion with us. Christian Charity (Christian love, not "charity" in the secular sense) demands that we give them aid in their greatest need.

Now add a few more facts:

The ROC has recently emerged from the most turbulent period in its history, in which the Communists almost succeeded in eradicating not only parish life, but the life and spiritual tradition of the monasteries as well.

The ROC is desparately in need of theological resources to enable it to carry out the mission of the Gospel in Russia.

There has been a period of acrimonious relationship between the Vatican and Moscow. There are signs of this relationship entering a more healthy phase - and part of this improvement in relations will be the demonstration of our good faith that we are not in competition with them, but that we share with them the burden of the promotion of the Gospel and ecclesial life in Russia.

For these and many other reasons, I applaud Kirche in Not, and support them financially. They are doing good work with the full support of the Catholic Church. They may be "schismatics" as you call them, but they are also our brothers and sisters in the faith, and by showing love to the members of "the household of God", we work towards the healing of the schism which exists between us.

Cardinal Pole said...

Mr. Schütz, I have responded in full at your blog:

http://scecclesia.wordpress.com/2009/09/11/why-aid-to-the-church-in-need-supports-the-russian-orthodox-church/#comments

Michael Webb said...

It isn't furthering schims but rather being charitable to those Russians who are already Russian Orthodox.
The Holy Father is obviously OK with thie prudential strategy that if not in place might mean that ACN and our missionaries might get a harder time from the Russian church and even the Russian Government.

Let's count our blessings. There is no schism being encouraged. The schism which is there is, through these kinds of initiatives being weakened.

Cardinal Pole said...

Mr. Webb,

You wrote that

"It isn't furthering schims ..."

What the ... That is just what this is!!! How can people deny this? Do people see the words "dependent on the Holy See" and go into crimestop* mode?

"... but rather being charitable to those Russians who are already Russian Orthodox."

Swap the word "Russians" for "Muslims" and the words "Russian Orthodox" for "Islamic" and it becomes clear that such an arrangement is the very antithesis of true Charity.

"The Holy Father is obviously OK with thie prudential strategy ..."

Obviously. But the fact that it is, as you acknowledge, prudential means that it could be, and here certainly is, open to legitimate criticism.

"... that if not in place might mean that ACN and our missionaries might get a harder time from the Russian church and even the Russian Government."

Perpetuating a schism is doing evil. One may never do evil in order that good may come of it.

"There is no schism being encouraged."

?????????????????? (I'm simply speechless. How can you possibly assert this?)

"The schism which is there is, through these kinds of initiatives being weakened."

Again, that is evil is being done (the evil of perpetuating a schism) in the (vain) hope that good (the weakening of the same schism) might come of it.

*
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crimestop

Cardinal Pole said...

Correction: delete the second "is" from "that is evil is being done" in the previous comment.

Michael Webb said...

Not sure that your comparison between Orthodoxy and Islam helps the point you are trying to make with me.

The Pope and not us decide on modes of charity and how we interact with the Orthodox.
Isn't that good enough?

Cardinal Pole said...

Mr. Webb,

You said that

"Not sure that your comparison between Orthodoxy and Islam helps the point you are trying to make with me."

The rationale behind the A.C.N. initiative seems to be that if we perpetuate the schism in the short term then it will be easier to convert the Russian-schismatics in the long-term than if the Russians had lapsed altogether into outright apostasy and secularism. But that is doing evil in order to procure good, and is clearly analogous to saying something like that, since Muslims are theists and it's easier to convert theists to Catholicism than it is to convert complete atheists, then if Islam were faced with the prospect of dying out in some part of the world then we should fund Islamic theological colleges there in order to perpetuate Islam until, eventually, (we hope) that they convert.

"The Pope and not us decide on modes of charity and how we interact with the Orthodox."

I refuse to co-operate in evil unless purely materially, remotely and with a grievous proportionate cause. To do otherwise would be to sin, and in this case, to sin very gravely indeed. I, for one, will not be bank-rolling the Russian schism. I will not do evil in order that good may come of it; I will not behave like a consequentialist.

Michael Webb said...

Withholding funds from the Orthodox
is not going to lessen the schism. The Catholic Church through the current and past Pope I think are doing the right thing. They have distinguished between the original schism and the now centuries old schism in which the original protaganists are long in the grave.
The Orthodox are deeply inculturated in their Eastern Orthodox Liturgy and devotions. Full communion/conversion back to us in the Catholic Church will happen longer term through collaboration in practical day to day assistance and co-operation. They do not interfere in our Liturgy and doctrine yet we can remain open to them because the closer we get in charity to them the more they will look more closely at re-union and the few historical and theological/doctrinal differences.

Cardinal Pole said...

Mr. Webb, you said that

"Withholding funds from the Orthodox
is not going to lessen the schism."

But I haven't said that it would lessen the schism, and that is not relevant here anyway.

"The Catholic Church through the current and past Pope I think are doing the right thing."

But you and others who support this initiative have failed to justify yourselves. You say that

"They [the current and past Pope] have distinguished between the original schism and the now centuries old schism in which the original protaganists are long in the grave."

But a schism is a schism, and a schism is an evil, and the perpetuation of a schism is an evil too. It might well be a lesser evil, but the doctrine of lesser evil means that one may only permit--never actively do--an evil if it is the lesser of a range of evil alternatives, with no feasible good alternative available. And co-operating in evil is also doing evil, unless all of the necessary conditions are present (which they aren't here).

"Full communion/conversion back to us in the Catholic Church will happen longer term through collaboration in practical day to day assistance and co-operation."

But we aren't just talking about collaboration in non-controversial matters such as humanitarian or anti-secularist activity, we are talking about the funding of Russian-schismatic theological colleges--the propagation of error and the perpetuation of schism. There is no justification for this.

Michael Webb said...

I take your point about their theological colleges. That is a bridge too far for me too, upon reflection.

Cardinal Pole said...

"I take your point about their theological colleges."

And that is the core of the problem here--if it were just a matter of co-operating with the Russians in (non-theological) charitable work or in presenting a united front against secularism then that would not necessarily pose a problem, but funding the means by which the schism is perpetuated is unacceptable.

And although A.C.N. appears to do some good work and so, in deciding whether to donate to A.C.N., a person might appeal to the principle of double effect (since donation will have bad effects--perpetuating the Russian schism--but also good effects), such reasoning would not be valid, since one of the requirements for legitimately invoking double effect is that there be no other ways to achieve the good effects. But obviously here there are other ways--one could simply donate directly to a Traditional seminary in a mission land, for instance.

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