Classics in The Hermeneutic of Continuity 1- Dr. Chad Pecknold on the Abu Dhabi "Document on Human Fraternity"
Case studies in intellectual pusillanimity from our leading theologians and prelates
There´s a curious intellectual disease that´s spread like wildfire through the clergy and worse amongst those who have some or any theological training. I call it privationsim, becuase it empties the good of all good. It thus worships privations of good, i.e. it worships evil. But its a rather subtile creature, difficult to see at first glance. The privationists on the conservative side dont do their dirty work in their own name, but under a rather curious banner. The banner of The Hermeneutic of Continuity, a slogan invented by Pope Benedict the 16th, may he rest in peace. A Hermeneutic is basically a way of understanding texts, and this one, as best as I can discern, involves the project of making uncatholic things appear catholic, when they are taught by the Pope, to save the church from defection. So here´s excursion No. 1 into the world of ecclesiastical privationism.
Meet Chad Pecknold. He´s an accomplished conservative catholic theologian that teaches as an asassociate professor of systematic theology at CUA. He´s well regarded and the few things I´ve read from him seem to betray a genuine piety in his heart. Yet, when the going gets tough he does the right gymnastics to teach us something about privationism.
In February of 2019, Pope Francis traveled to Abu Dhabi to sign an ecumenical document with some Imams. Deus Vult? No matter. He signed off on a piece of paper titled, “Document on Human Fraternity for World Peace and Living Together.” A real thriller that reads like something inspired by the protest songs of Joan Baetz. Fraternity, peace, diversity is beautiful. In any case, this document, among other things states this:
The pluralism and the diversity of religions, colour, sex, race and language are willed by God in His wisdom, through which He created human beings. This divine wisdom is the source from which the right to freedom of belief and the freedom to be different derives. Therefore, the fact that people are forced to adhere to a certain religion or culture must be rejected, as too the imposition of a cultural way of life that others do not accept;
Basically this is textbook religious indifferentism, a heresy which has been repeatedly condemned. A plain reading of this text, also in the context of the document and meeting with Muslims, takes it at its word. The proper response of a theologian is to accuse the Pope of heresy and apostasy and call bishops to remove him, a non-catholic, from the Papal throne. That ”God” wished both for Christianity, which claims Jesus Christ is fully God and fully man, and Islam, which says he was only a prophet, and not the Son of God—its a rediculous proposition. God would here then desire two mutually contradictory religions, and not just those two, all the manifold religions are willed by God with their vastly different and very consequential perspectives on the divinty. And, in fact, had a protestant or someone other than the Pope writen this, a man as sharp as Pecknold would probably have been able to call a spade a spade, but, in the case of the Pope, he cannot, becuase the Pope is supposed to be infallible. And the Catholic take on infallibility, that infallibility means someone, anyone who teaches false things cannot be Pope, is for reasons I cannot understand not a viable option. Thus, the project is to understand texts where the Pope teaches false things as if they were not false. Today we have an army of theologians, Priests, and Prelates schooled in the dark arts of the “Hermeutic of Continuity,” which makes the crooked straight and all the rough places plain.
Enter systematic theologian Chad Pecknold to the scene. The faithful of good will are incensed, afraid, and truly I remember many were at this time, I was: how could the Pope say such a thing, are we bound, then, to believe it? Has the Church defected? Is the Pope really infallible? Is he really Pope? They implore. Calm down my children, do not fear, I got this, he seems to say.
The Privationists always take one horn of a Catholic euthyphro problem: i.e. does the Pope teach something because its true, or is something true because the Pope teaches it? Its perverted by them because the privationists don´t believe in the Truth, and instead substitute the not-false for the truth and always decide for the latter horn of this dilemma. Thus, in practice, the guiding axiom of the Hermeneutic of Continuity reads: something must be not-False because the Pope teaches it. Or else the claims of the Catholic Church are wrong, so they believe. So the dishonesty serves the very existence of the arc of Salvation itself according to the worldview. Of course this isn´t true. Popes have taught error before, and were then declared to be anti-Popes.
So back to the method of the hermeneutic: Step 1: Appeal to the context. Step 2. Generate a dishonest meaning that conforms to catholic teaching. 3. Ignore all actions and clarifying words by the Pope himself that cconfirm the heterodox meaning.
Lets look at Step 1, i.e. exclude non-elite critics or inquirers through a gesture to the complexity of the context. Its true: things need to be read in context, but here its context ad infinitum—in the context of tradition, of the historical context, of the current geo-political context of the middle east, and the context can always be expanded to claim someone is not qualified to comment. The “Hermeneutic of Continuity” simply expands the context until you aren´t qualified to claim to know that the obvious non-catholic meaning is in fact the true meaning of the text. As reported by a CNA interview on this document, Dr Pecknold said at the outset, “This statement must be read in the proper context and perspective…. In sensitive inter-religious contexts, it is fitting for the Holy See to acknowledge that despite serious theological disagreements, Catholics and Muslims have much in common, such as a common belief that human beings are 'willed by God in his wisdom,'" See what he did there! He did a little trick! The text says rather simply that God willed all the religions, But Pecknold instead says the text means each believes God willed human beings, which would be a Catholic but entirely trivial thing to say. Why fly to Abu Dhabi to say that? So now you see Step 2, render an entirely disingenuous interpretation of the text that squares with catholic doctrine.
Pecknold continues with another wave of the dark magic in this interview. He says,
"The idea that God wills the diversity of color, sex, race and language is easily understood, but some may find it puzzling to hear the Vicar of Christ talk about God willing the diversity of religions… It is puzzling, and potentially problematic, but in the context of the document, the Holy Father is clearly referring not to the evil of many false religions, but positively refers to the diversity of religions only in the sense that they are evidence of our natural desire to know God."
Here we see the two steps again clearly performed if not exactly in sequential order. Step 1, gesture to context to exclude potential objectors. Pecknold seems to warn: For anyone who simply read a news article with the juicy heresy-quote I cited earlier, shut your trap! To understand that you need to read the whole document! Few have time or care to, and its in truth totally unnecessary as the meaning is clear from the sentence alone. But if they did actually read the document and say its still heresy, then the Hermeneutic of Continuity will take it a step further, oh, you need to understand the (historical, theological, political, etc) context of the contex of the document, ad infinitum. Its a foil. And then Pecknold moves onto Step 2: generate an entirely fictitious meaning that´s in line with the catholic teaching. Again, he has the temerity to say, “Holy Father is clearly referring not to the evil of many false religions, but positively refers to the diversity of religions only in the sense that they are evidence of our natural desire to know God." Is he clearly saying that? No one thinks that is the meaning. The part of the text he is referring to says “This divine wisdom is the source from which the right to freedom of belief and the freedom to be different derives.” The text speaks in no wise about desire at all. Pecknold doesn´t care, the natural desire for God all humans posses must be the meaning. Operating from the axiom—that something taught by the Pope must not be false—he claims this basically untenable meaning is “clearly” what is intended.
Pecknold, as if dissatisfied with his first attempts to butcher the meaning of this text, as if he hasn´t extinguished entirely his sense for the truth, then returns to take a third stab at the Document. He says in closing,
"God wills that all men come to know Him through the free choice of their will, and so it follows that a diversity of religions can be spoken about as permissively willed by God without denying the supernatural good of one true religion."
Its a truly bizarre and remarkable feat. Pecknold returns this third time to fiddle with the meaning of the notion of God willing something. The first two attempts he tries to make something evil—i.e. the plurality of religions--good. Because the sentence says God wills in His Wisdom! Almost realizing no one will buy this, he turns to the notion of will itself, to twist it to its opposite meaning, so that he can return to a plain reading of the plurality of all religions. You see, God positively wills all good things that happen, and passively wills all evil things. So if you get a haircut that is stunning and I say Deus vult! then I gave you a compliment. If I say God permitted this haircut in his passive will, then I am insulting your haircut. Its bad, but not so bad that God scrapped his creation entirely rather than have you get this haircut. So if we speak of the Coming of Christ or that people come to faith in Him, God wills these things positively, because they are good. But if we speak of the fire bombing of Dresden or Holocaust, God permits these evils to occur. Knowing that the catholic tradition teaches that false religions are evil, Pecknold gets a crazy idea in his head, what if we could make this heretical sentence, saying all religions are good, into an orthodox one if we just assume the meaning is God´s passive will. Brilliant! So Pope Francis meant God wills all religions passively, according to Pecknold, in the sense he allows them to have developed. Just like God willed the Gulag in Russia and the Cultural Revolution in China, so too, did God will the plurality of religions. Did Pope Francis really travel to Abu Dhabi to sign off on an insult to the faith of the Imams he was meeting with in fraternity? Of course not.
Its even more astounding, when we look to the context of this very sentence and see that this meaning would then render a difference of gender or race evil as well. If this were true we must assume the first fruits were good, so then God permitted in his passive will the creation of Eve, that dumb treacherous broad and all deformed female kind in her decieving likeness, and also the damned poles and hispanics and other mutant races that were permitted! This would be the most sexist and racist text ever to be signed by a Roman Pontiff if the implied meaning is permissive and not active will of God. It´s an absolutely insane reading. But its what the Hermeneutic of Continuity demands of him, and he followed through belieing a total shamelessness in his willingness to defend falsity in the most crucial case of the Pope. With permissive will, at least the text isn´t false, as these other implications are so out there they have not yet been condemned. Hopefully the next Pope will condemn the idea that Eve was created in God´s permissive will! Which is now according to Pecknold part of Papal Magesterium.
Despite the Scandal this caused, Pope Francis in his interview returning from Abu Dhabi did not retract or clarify the text according to the lines of Pecknold. This is another key part of the hermeneutic of Continuity, Step 3, Ignore counterveiling evidence from the Pope that supports the non-catholic meaning of the non-catholic text. Important here is how the Pope situates this document in the context of Church dogmatics. Pope Francis says,
“But I want to say one thing. This I emphasize clearly. From the Catholic point of view, the document does not pull away one millimeter from Vatican II, which is even cited a few times. The document was made in the spirit of Vatican II…If anyone feels bad, I understand it, it is not an everyday thing... not a step back. It is a step forward. But, step forward that comes after 50 years, from the Council, that must be developed. The historians say that a council takes 100 years to take root in the Church. We are halfway. Also in the Islamic world there are different opinions, there are some more radical than others.”
Of course he´s right, he is doing the work of the council by saying God, in his Wisdom, willed the diversity of religions including Islam. We need not get into what this Council said about each religion. Let the text from Lumen Gentium on Islam suffice,
#16 But the plan of salvation also includes those who acknowledge the Creator. In the first place amongst these there are the Muslims, who, professing to hold the faith of Abraham, along with us adore the one and merciful God, who on the last day will judge mankind.
Conservative catholics have for six decades used the Hermeneutic of Continuity to twist the meaning of Lumen Gentium to say its refering to the fact Muslims think they worship a merciful God that will judge mankind, but do not in fact do so. Its equally disingenuous as the sentence in question says, in the latin, nobiscum, so “along or together with us.” So we are worshiping God together, but two different one, merciful Gods, why are we worshiping together if they are different? In any case, this more recent trip of Pope Francis is one of many instances that confirm the plain and heretical reading of Lumen Gentium #16. Pope Francis says this text is in line and an outgrowth of the meaning of Vatican Two. So now the task of the Hermeneutic of Continuity is to say, that the plain reading of Lumen Gentium, also the plain reading of the Document on Human fraternity, also Pope Francis´s own clarification of this texts are all false, only they know the true and hidden meaning of the text.
Its like Straussianism but way less interesting and insightful. There is an esoteric reading of every conciliar text, and only the conservatives theologians, like Chad Pecknold, can generate the meaning. When he did this, I had heard enough about him I truly was surprised, “How does he sleep at night, doing something like this? This helps no one, not the Pope, not the faithful, God doesn´t like dishonesty either, it makes no sense.“ Here is a brilliant man, probably knows 5 or 6 languages, has mastered latin, greek all for deeply studying the Catholic tradition. And you ask him to speak on any normal theological topic and he will probably impress you with his intellect and insight, but turn him to these most crucial points for the health of the church at this time and he´s starts playing the Papal Stasi game.
What good is all his training, if it cannot tell the truth here? If he and all the good guys tell the faithful a red line has been crossed, then there is a schism, and he likely loses his job and career temporarily, but then the Church can be renewed and healed in the Truth. And I call this privationism because Pecknold himself would never sign a document worded like this, he knows its misleading at best, but metaphysically speaking he´s lowered the bar, its not that if the Pope teaches something it must be the Truth, its that it must simply not be false. And its easy to twist any statement not false if you are imaginative and trained in philosophy.
But the truth is convertible with the good, and what he knows in his heart of hearts is that this document is not good. What he doesn´t seem to realize is that his defense of it is probably worse than the document itself, because he knows the truth and is convinced of it. He knows other religions are evil, Pope Francis truly does not seem to. All theologians, priests, and Bishops should tell the truth, should have no tolerance for error, let alone heresy. This is the only way to love the Pope and the Papacy, is to hold it to a high standard. The Pope claims to be The Vicar of Christ, we should hold him to a high standard. We make a mockery of our faith by only saying the things he says and writes in his ordinary magesterium must merely be not-false. The not-false, in contrast, to the truth, can be non-sense, it can be useless or misleading. Unlike the Truth, the not-false is often evil. And even here, to make this text not-false requires mental gymnastics and out right dishonesty that people of more noble times could not achieve.