Card. Müller: The reason for Papacy is to strengthen faith. Doctrine is not an open question

– The deepest foundation of the existence of the ministry of Peter or Papacy... is the unification of all bishops and believers in the confession which Simon, the first of the apostles, gave to Jesus on the basis of the revelation of the heavenly Father, "You are Christ, the boy of the surviving God." said the cardinal. Gerhard Müller. The retired Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith, a associate in the upcoming conclave, gave an interview to the Italian paper “Il Giornale”. As he emphasized, Catholic doctrine is not an open substance which the Holy Father may change, but contains God’s truth.

– Massive compassion for his death worldwide, even from non-Christian communities and organizations critical of the Church, showed how Pope Francis was able to bring moral authority to the Papacy for the peace and awareness of the unity of the full household of nations – spoke in a conversation with the Italian spiritual medium.

The erstwhile Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of religion stated that we must not forget that Christ founded the Church as a sacrament of salvation for the planet (Vatican II, Lumen Gentium 1:48), that all men should be saved and come to know the fact by the only mediator between God and men: the man Christ Jesus (1 Tim. 2:4f). He is the Word that has become the body. He is the boy (in the Trinitarian Life of God) who rests in the Father's heart and brings us cognition (Jn 1:14-18), manifesting himself in the individual (hypostatic) union of his divine and human nature and humanity: "I am the way and fact and life" (Jn 14:6).

The cardinal recalled that the deepest foundation of the existence of Peter's ministry, or Papacy, without worldly claims to power, which are not part of his nature, is the unification of all bishops and believers in the confession which Simon, the first of the apostles, gave to Jesus on the basis of the revelation of the heavenly Father, "You are Christ (Messiah), the boy of the surviving God" (Mt 16:16).

Commenting on many of the issues in which the pontificate of Francis introduced confusion – from divorce and remarriage to openness to homosexuals and relations with another religions, especially Islam – cardinal. Müller pointed out that: “More precisely, these issues are not open questions. They are defined and settled by God's Revelation, which is expressed in the clear and unchanging teaching of the Church, added the erstwhile Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith.

The cardinal stressed that dialog with existing religions, their teachings and organizations must not be based on relativisation of the fact or lead to it. – religion is simply a moral virtue (Tomasz of Aquinas, Summa theologiae II-II q. 81), which comprehensively directs everyone as a spiritual and moral creature towards God. As Christians, we are convinced that God has met all the people who search Him full at the time erstwhile the boy of God became man until his death on the cross, and that he has opened the door to eternal life for all through his resurrection (Acts 17:22-34). The Risen Christ sent his apostles and their successors (bishops and priests) into the planet to proclaim this gospel of universal salvation to all men and to pass it on specifically through the sacraments of the Church – explained the German hierarch.

When asked if there is simply a hazard of fragmentation in the Church, the cardinal recalled that schism is simply a large historical event, but like interior emigration, there is besides interior schism, interior emigration or silent protest.

– The Magisterium aims to strengthen the faithful in the revealed faith, which is bindingly defined by the Church. The ideological substitutes for the authentic teaching of the Gospel in Scripture and Apostolic Tradition should be avoided—under the pretext of reinterpretation, which in fact is simply a modernist forgery of faith. – the cardinal warned.

KAI/work. FA