"No Mercy Without Truth" -- Cardinal Müller on the Holy Year and the Synod of Bishops

Prefect Müller:  There are no secret pathways or shortcuts to
holiness.

(Rome) The proclaimed by Pope Francis extraordinary Holy Year of Charity begins next December 8 Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception Virgin Mary. "The Holy Year is to serve the people to remember that mercy can not be without the truth," said Cardinal Gerhard Müller, Prefect of the Congregation. Man and the Church "are often tempted to separate one from the other," the cardinal said.

The love of God is closely bound up with the truth. The same applies to the so-called broken families, those who are in an irregular situation. They need  the attention of the Church,  not in new pastoral ways, but by the truth.  Cardinal Müller led a discussion with the Italian news agency ANSA about the upcoming Holy Year. Cardinal Müller belonged to the most ardent defenders at the Extraordinary Synod of Bishops last October, of the Catholic teaching on marriage. In preparation for the Ordinary Synod of Bishops on the family next October,  he  always returns to take a position on the world stage for the sacrament of marriage as it has been taught by the Church of Christ and how this is why the Church has taught it  for almost 2000 years.

God does not intervene to "keep everything as it is"

In an interview with ANSA, said the cardinal,  the extraordinary Holy Year must "include all." God loves, "as he intervenes in history through His grace." But this is not just a "favor" as the cardinal used the Latin expression. So this is not just a favor- or proof of sympathy, a privilege or an acknowledgment. God does not grab one, "to let everything be as it is", but that the people "experience a renewal, a conversion, so we ever renew our hearts and truly change our lives. Therefore, we must remember also in the Holy Year, that we can not speak of mercy without truth," said Cardinal Prefect Müller.

In view of the Synod of Bishops in October, the German cardinal added that this also applies to the family. "We must accept  all,  especially sinners, because we are all sinners, but according to the instructions of God and not by human considerations. Because sometimes people see things a little differently as God sees them."

"We can not preach the resurrection without the cross"

It was important to show that there "is still sacramental marriage" and that the lifelong, indissoluble marriage between a man and a woman is not only possible, it will be a boon for both spouses and their offspring. "The mercy of God accepts us as we are, but it will not leave us as it finds us," said Cardinal Müller.

Always with a view to the forthcoming Synod of Bishops, in the interest particularly to the question of communion being valid for the divorced and remarried, the cardinal said that the goal of any intervention of divine grace is "salvation", and the  path to repentance. "We can not preach the resurrection without the cross. There is no second or third way," said the Prefect of the Roman Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, who made it to be understood so that there can be no short cuts on these topics or abbreviations.

Text: Giuseppe Nardi
image: Radiosanmartin

Trans: Tancred vekron99@hotmail.com

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