masonry alliance impossible
Freemasons and Catholics, alliance impossible
Dan Brown lost in the Creed often alludes to the enemies of Freemasonry as pathological characters, fundamentalist Christians are victims of absurd "conspiracy theories". One could argue that the sermon is a strange pulpit, as some of the most bizarre conspiracy theories were made public with great enthusiasm just by Brown in Angels and Demons and Da Vinci Code. But in truth the anti-Masonic came long before the Protestant fundamentalism of the religious right or the U.S. so little sympathetic to Brown.
Even before the modern Freemasonry is founded in 1717, reactions already occurring anti-Masonic. In 1698, for example, a certain M. Winter (of which I find more biographical information) is disseminating a leaflet addressed "To all God-fearing people in the city of London" which warns against the "evil perpetrated in the face of God by so-called Freemasons ':' They are the Antichrist that is to remove the men from the fear of God Why some men should meet in secret places and secret signs, making sure that nobody sees them, if it were to do the work of God? These are not the ways of the workers of iniquity?. Do not mingle with these people corrupt - should the wheel - not to find them when it is the consummation of the world. " As you can see, the anti-Masonic least as old as Freemasonry. However, as is more appropriate to speak of Masonry, in the plural, so there are different types of anti-Masonic. It should at least distinguish between an anti-Masonic 'political' often claim that anti-Masonic and civil interdiction for the Masons, and an anti-Masonic-type doctrine "which criticizes the masonry on the philosophical and cultural.
The anti-Masonic "political" derives his arguments from the specific results of the Masonic method in this or that country, in this or that historical period, arguing that they are harmful or dangerous to society. The anti-Masonic "doctrine" instead focuses his criticism on the Masonic method as a constant in the history of Freemasonry, apart from the specific results of the method are derived from time to time. Of course, the anti-Masonic 'political' el'antimassonismo "doctrine" is, to use a sociological term, "ideal types" or "ideal types" that the interpreter can reconstruct but rarely encountered in pure form. Often you are faced with hybrid forms of anti-Masonic, which have elements of both the ideal type. However, it is important to emphasize two important aspects of the history of anti-Masonic. First, the anti-Masonic "political" does not necessarily require the anti-Masonic "doctrinal." For example, the forces of Marxist may claim legal measures against Freemasonry Believing that, in a specific historical situation, globally and harmful at the same time expressing appreciation for the Masonic method and the role of "progressive", in other times, he has had. Secondly, the anti-Masonic "doctrine" can maintain its strong criticism of the concrete masonry regardless of the positions that the individual Masonic Lodges take up this or that problem. Exclude the teaching in the Catholic world, you can always say, the "dual membership" of the faithful with the Catholic Church and the Freemasons: and does so on the basis of a rigorous critique of doctrinal Masonic method, which always remains incompatible with Catholic faith, what are the results as the application of the method in each door.
The current position and force of the Catholic Church is expressed in the Declaration on the masonry of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, 1983, signed by its prefect Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, but then also signed by Pope John Paul II, so that must be teaching considered binding on all the faithful. According to this document, although the new Code of Canon Law of 1983 no longer spoke of "excommunication" for the Masons, in fact 'remains unchanged [...] the negative opinion of the Church in regard to Masonic associations, since their principles have always been considered irreconcilable with the doctrine of the Church and therefore membership in them remains forbidden. The faithful who enroll in Masonic associations are in a state of grave sin and may not receive Holy Communion. " When some Mason argues that the fact that in the new Code does not use the word excommunication as can be seen that Catholics today could easily become Masons, therefore, expresses the position of Freemasonry, not that of the Catholic Church. And what behavior should keep clearly led the Catholic Church in binding, not the Freemasons. Freemasonry is free to think that the Freemasons are Catholics.
But the Church teaches with absolute clarity that Catholics can not be Masons. Although missing the word "excommunication" is the substance: the Catholics who are Masons' can not receive Holy Communion. " And the document also states that individual bishops can not change a decision that was taken in a formal way and by the Holy See. Importantly, in the same lines, a text published by L'Osservatore Romano February 23, 1985, unsigned but which is commonly considered the author, the then Cardinal Ratzinger. The text is as it were the "motivation" of the "ruling" of 1983. According to this text, even if - to be tested for obedience obedience, case by case, country by country - where there are no specific results were hostile to the Church, "the incompatibility of the principles" remains steady, because - whatever its results - is always the Masonic method to be incompatible with Catholic faith. Someone points out the note of 1985, could argue that it is improper to speak of 'incompatibility of principles "because" of Freemasonry would be precisely the essential fact of not imposing any "principle". "
But this aspect of 'essential' is incompatible with the Christian faith in terms of methodology, "Even if it is asserted that relativism is not assumed as dogma" - precisely because there are no doctrines or dogmas - "but it is proposed that a symbolic concept of relativity and thus relativizing the value of such a moral community, ritual, far from being eliminated, it is crucial to the contrary. In this context, the different religious communities, which belong to the individual members of the lodges, can not be considered only as mere institutionalization of a broader and elusive truth. " Thus, "even when [...] there were no explicit obligation to profess the doctrine of relativism, however, the relativizing force of such a brotherhood, for its own intrinsic logic, has in itself the capacity to transform the structure of 'act of faith so radically as to be acceptable to a Christian, "which is dear to his faith." The initiation rite of the Masonic lodge affiliated with a second incision of the eighteenth century
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