ROME, December 23, 2016 (LifeSiteNews) — The cardinal who gave his name to the ‘Kasper Proposal’ that would allow Catholics living in adulterous relationships to receive Holy Communion has criticized the four cardinals for asking the pope questions that he considers to be already answered.
“Of course, anyone can ask the pope questions and questions – any cardinal can do that. Whether it was a good idea to make them public is a completely different question. I doubt it was. In my opinion, the Apostolic Letter [Amoris Laetitia] is clear,” Cardinal Walter Kasper told Vatican Radio in a December 22 interview.
Cardinal Burke, along with Cardinals Walter Brandmüller, Carlo Caffarra and Joachim Meisner, submitted the dubia in September seeking clarity from Pope Francis on whether his Exhortation conforms to Catholic moral teaching on marriage, reception of Holy Communion, and the role of conscience. When the pope did not issue a response after two months, the cardinals released the questions publicly.
IMPORTANT: To respectfully express your support for the 4 cardinals' letter to Pope Francis asking for clarity on Amoris Laetitia, sign the petition. Click here.
Kasper said the pope has made himself clear on how to interpret the controversial Exhortation released in April with his September letter to the Argentine bishops where he stated that there was “no other interpretation” of Amoris than allowing communion for the divorced and remarried, in certain cases.
“There are also statements by the pope himself, such as his letter to the Argentine bishops, or explanations by the Cardinal Vicar of Rome. There it is clarified what the pope means and how he understands it. Others have shown that there is no contradiction [in Amoris] to the testimony of John Paul II, but a homogeneous development. This is my position, so I see it this way. In this respect, for me, these dubia, these doubts do not exist,” the cardinal said.
Despite Kasper’s heterodox position, many consider him to be one of the pope’s closest allies and a knowledgeable source about the pope’s agenda for the Catholic Church.
It was just days after his election that Pope Francis praised the cardinal as a “talented theologian, a good theologian—on mercy,” saying that the Cardinal’s book “did me such good, so much good.” In 2014 Kasper was given the honor of giving the opening speech to the Consistory of Cardinals where he promoted his path for allowing Catholics living in adulterous relationships to receive Holy Communion. Pope Francis praised Kasper a day after this speech, calling him someone who engages in “profound theology, and even serene thinking in theology.”
The Cardinal has recently expressed his hope that Pope Francis will open the way for “shared Eucharistic communion in special cases” with Lutherans after the pope’s visit to Lund, Sweden in October where he commemorated the anniversary of Martin Luther’s Reformation.
RELATED: Who are the four Cardinals who wrote the dubia to the Pope?