RCC Bishop: If supermarkets are open, then temples must also be open

Catholic Bishop Athanasius Schneider. Photo:skgnews.com

Catholic Bishop Athanasius Schneider believes that during the coronavirus epidemic, closing churches against the backdrop of open supermarkets looks wrong. He spoke about this in his interview with Remnat Newspaper.

Schneider believes that most Catholic bishops reacted "precipitously and out of panic in prohibiting all public Masses", while the decision to close the churches was "even more incomprehensible."

“As long as supermarkets are open and accessible, and as long as people have access to public transportation, one cannot see a plausible reason for banning people from assisting at Holy Mass in a church,” Bishop Schneider said. “One can guarantee the same and even better hygienic protective measures in churches.”

He said the Church’s handling of the coronavirus epidemic has revealed a “loss of supernatural vision” particularly among the hierarchy — some of whom, he noted, despite their vigilance to combat COVID-19, have “tranquilly allowed the poison virus of heretical teachings and practices to spread among their flock.”

Against the backdrop of the coronavirus pandemic, he said that priests should "observe all necessary precautions", but at the same time "be extremely creative in finding ways to celebrate Holy Mass and perform the sacraments, even for a small group of the faithful."

In his opinion, “such was the pastoral behavior of all confessor and martyr priests in the time of persecution.”

Moreover, in some cases, he said, the care of souls might necessitate a priest disobeying the unjust order of his bishop. “If a priest is prohibited by an ecclesial authority from going to visit the sick and dying, he cannot obey. Such a prohibition is an abuse of power. Christ did not give a bishop the power to forbid visiting the sick and dying.”

He also admitted the coronavirus might have to do with the divine retribution for the Pachamama events held inside the Vatican during the October 2019 Amazon Synod: "This is surely a great sin of infidelity to the First Commandment of the Decalogue, it was an abomination."

At the same time, according to Bishop Schneider, “such acts of idolatry were the culmination of a series of other acts of infidelity to the safeguarding of the divine deposit of Faith by many high-ranking members of the Church’s hierarchy in past decades.”

He is convinced that “Christ would repeat the same words to Pope Francis and to the other bishops” who allowed the veneration of the Pachamama in the Vatican and who “implicitly approved sexual relationships outside a valid marriage” by allowing “divorced and remarried” Catholics who are sexually active to receive Holy Communion.

Bishop Schneider noted that the uniqueness and severity of the ban on public Masses and sacramental Communion beckons Catholics to consider its ‘deeper meaning’.”  

According to his observations, “for more than fifty years, he observed, the Eucharistic presence of Jesus Christ has been “trivialized” and even “desecrated” through the practice of Communion in the hand (when the cache is not put into the lips of the laity but is given in the palm of their hand – Ed.) and the introduction of “protestantizing elements” in the Roman liturgy.

“Now the Lord has intervened and deprived almost all the faithful of assisting at Holy Mass and sacramentally receiving Holy Communion. The innocent and the guilty are enduring this tribulation together, since in the mystery of the Church all are mutually united as members,” said the hierarch.

The Catholic bishop is convinced that "the pope and the bishops urgently need to conduct a public act to redress the damage in Rome for sins against the Holy Eucharist, as soon as the coronavirus pandemic is taken under control."

He also said that the Pope and bishops ought urgently to carry out a public act of reparation in Rome “for sins against the Holy Eucharist” once the coronavirus pandemic is brought under control.

He also said the Pope should issue concrete norms inviting the entire Church to “turn toward the Lord” in the liturgy and “forbid the practice of Communion in the hand.”

Earlier, the UOJ wrote that Catholic Bishop Athanasius Schneider believes that the measures taken to combat the coronavirus are political dictatorship, and even the Third Reich did not close the churches.

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