The Astounding Heresies in Benedict XVI’s 1996 Book Salt of the Earth

By Bro. Peter Dimond, O.S.B.

* This is from my continuing study of Benedict XVI’s books. For those who don’t know, Benedict XVI is Joseph Ratzinger.*

-Salt of the Earth by “Cardinal” Joseph Ratzinger, 1996 (Ignatius Press, 1997)

HERESIES IN SALT OF THE EARTH:

-BENEDICT XVI ADDRESSES OUTSIDE THE CHURCH THERE IS NO SALVATION AND COMPLETELY REJECTS IT

-BENEDICT XVI SAYS THERE IS A NOBLE ISLAM

-BENEDICT XVI TELLS US THAT PAGAN AND IDOLATROUS RELIGIONS ARE HIGH AND PURE

-BENEDICT XVI TEACHES THAT ALL RELIGIONS CAN LEAD TO GOD

- BENEDICT XVI RESPECTS HANS KUNG’S PATH OF DENIAL OF JESUS CHRIST!

-BENEDICT HAS HAD NO DIFFERENCES WITH JOHN PAUL II

- OTHER QUOTES OF INTEREST IN SALT OF THE EARTH

The book Salt of the Earth by Benedict XVI consists of a lengthy interview with Peter Seewald. Seewald asks the questions and Benedict XVI gives the answers. This book is extremely revealing because Benedict XVI is specifically asked about very important matters of the Faith.

BENEDICT XVI ADDRESSES OUTSIDE THE CHURCH THERE IS NO SALVATION AND COMPLETELY REJECTS IT

“Cardinal” Joseph Ratzinger, Salt of the Earth, 1996, p. 24: “Q. But could we not also accept that someone can be saved through a faith other than the Catholic? A. That’s a different question altogether. It is definitely possible for someone to receive from his religion directives that help him become a pure person, which also, if we want to use the word, help him please God and reach salvation. This is not at all excluded by what I said; on the contrary, this undoubtedly happens on a large scale.”

This is a total rejection of the dogma Outside the Church There is No Salvation. Benedict XVI says that there is “undoubtedly” salvation outside the Catholic Faith on a “large scale,” while the Catholic Church infallibly teaches that there is undoubtedly no salvation outside the Church. He also directly contradicts Hebrews 11:6 by telling us that people can please God without the Catholic Faith.

Pope Paul III, Council of Trent, Sess. 5 on Original Sin: “…our Catholic faith, ‘without which it is impossible to please God’ [Heb. 11:6]…” (Denz. 787)

Pope Pius IV, Council of Trent, Iniunctum nobis, Nov. 13, 1565, ex cathedra: “This true Catholic faith, outside of which no one can be saved… I now profess and truly hold…”

Pope Eugene IV, Council of Florence, “Cantate Domino,” 1441, ex cathedra:

“The Holy Roman Church firmly believes, professes and preaches that all those who are outside the Catholic Church, not only pagans but also Jews or heretics and schismatics, cannot share in eternal life and will go into the everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels, unless they are joined to the Church before the end of their lives; that the unity of this ecclesiastical body is of such importance that only those who abide in it do the Church’s sacraments contribute to salvation and do fasts, almsgiving and other works of piety and practices of the Christian militia productive of eternal rewards; and that nobody can be saved, no matter how much he has given away in alms and even if he has shed blood in the name of Christ, unless he has persevered in the bosom and unity of the Catholic Church.”

BENEDICT XVI SAYS THERE IS A NOBLE ISLAM

“Cardinal” Joseph Ratzinger, Salt of the Earth, 1996, p. 244: “And, to prescind from the schism between Sunnites and Shiites, it [Islam] also exists in many varieties. There is a noble Islam, embodied, for example, by the King of Morocco, and there is also the extremist, terrorist Islam, which, again, one must identify with Islam as a whole, which would do it an injustice.”

This is total apostasy. Islam is a false religion which rejects the Divinity of Christ and the Trinity. The Catholic Church officially teaches that Islam is an abomination – an abominable sect of the devil, a false religion comprised of infidels (unbelievers).

Pope Eugene IV, Council of Basel, Session 19, Sept. 7, 1434:

“Moreover, we trust that with God’s help another benefit will accrue to the Christian commonwealth; because from this union, once it is established, there is hope that very many from the abominable sect of Mahomet will be converted to the Catholic faith.”

St. Francis Xavier, May, 1546: “The evil [of Islam] was introduced by some Mahometan caicizes (ministers of religion), who came from Mecca in Arabia, where the accursed body of Mahomet is honored with great superstition.”

St. Francis of Assisi (+ c. 1210): [To the Muslims] “We have come to preach faith in Jesus Christ to you, that you will renounce Mohammad, that wicked slave of the devil, and obtain everlasting life like us.”

In fact, the Catholic Church dogmatically teaches that Muslims are infidels, which means unbelievers.

Pope Clement V, Council of Vienne, 1311-1312:

“It is an insult to the holy name and a disgrace to the Christian faith that in certain parts of the world subject to Christian princes where Saracens [i.e., the followers of Islam, also called Muslims] live, sometimes apart, sometimes intermingled with Christians, the Saracen priests, commonly called Zabazala, in their temples or mosques, in which the Saracens meet to adore the infidel Mahomet, loudly invoke and extol his name each day at certain hours from a high place… This brings disrepute on our faith and gives great scandal to the faithful. These practices cannot be tolerated without displeasing the divine majesty. We therefore, with the sacred council’s approval, strictly forbid such practices henceforth in Christian lands. We enjoin on Catholic princes, one and all.. They are to forbid expressly the public invocation of the sacrilegious name of Mahomet… Those who presume to act otherwise are to be so chastised by the princes for their irreverence, that others may be deterred from such boldness.”

BENEDICT XVI TELLS US THAT PAGAN AND IDOLATROUS RELIGIONS ARE HIGH AND PURE

“Cardinal” Joseph Ratzinger, Salt of the Earth, 1996, p. 23: “And so we can also see that in the Indian religious cosmos (‘Hinduism’ is a rather misleading designation for a multiplicity of religions) there are very different forms: very high and pure ones that are marked by the idea of love, but also wholly gruesome ones that include ritual murder.”

St. Paul teaches us that the gods of the heathen are devils (1 Cor. 10:20). The same is taught in Psalm 95:5. Hinduism is a heathen religion which worships false gods (devils). That is the teaching of the Catholic Church. But Benedict XVI teaches that this idolatrous, pagan and false religion can be “very high and pure.” This is heresy and apostasy.

BENEDICT XVI TEACHES THAT ALL RELIGIONS CAN LEAD TO GOD

“Cardinal” Joseph Ratzinger, Salt of the Earth, 1996, p. 29: “Q. How is a good Catholic different from other people? A. … Among Catholics there is every degree of good and evil – just as, conversely, in all religions there are men of interior purity who through their myths somehow touch the great mystery and find the right way of being human.”

He says that in “all religions” – which includes idolatrous, pagan religions and even satanic religions, such as voodoo – there are men of interior purity who “touch the great mystery and find the right way of being human.” This is total apostasy.

BENEDICT XVI RESPECTS HANS KUNG’S PATH OF DENIAL OF JESUS CHRIST!

For those who don’t know, Hans Kung denies, among other things, Papal Infallibility and the Divinity of Our Lord Jesus Christ. Hans Kung can correctly be described as an Arian; he denies that Our Lord is of the same substance as the Father. In the quotation below we see that Benedict XVI acknowledges that Kung denies Papal Infallibility, the Trinity and the Divinity of Our Lord. Here is what he says:

“Cardinal” Joseph Ratzinger, Salt of the Earth, 1996, pp. 95-96: “Q. And about Hans Kung’s path? I mean, he now hopes for a rehabilitation. A… he [Hans Kung] has taken back nothing of his contestation of the papal office; indeed, he has further radicalized his positions. In Christology and in trinitarian theology he has further distanced himself from the faith of the Church. I respect his path, which he takes in accord with his conscience, but he should not then demand the Church’s seal of approval but should admit that in essential questions he has come to different, very personal decisions of his own.”

If Benedict XVI had said that he respects Hans Kung himself, that would be horrible and heretical enough. But he doesn’t say that he merely respects Kung; he says that he respects “his path”! Benedict XVI respects the path of Arianism. This is total apostasy.

BENEDICT XVI HAS HAD NO DIFFERENCES WITH JOHN PAUL II

“Cardinal” Joseph Ratzinger, Salt of the Earth, 1996, p. 106: “Q. Have there been differences between the Pope [John Paul II] and his chief guardian of the faith? Have you ever contradicted the Pope or even refused him something? A. There have never been differences in the strict sense of the word.”

OTHER QUOTES OF INTEREST IN SALT OF THE EARTH

“Cardinal” Joseph Ratzinger, Salt of the Earth, 1996, pp. 99-100: “Q. In the Middle Ages there were public brothels that were even in part run by the local church. A. There’s a passage in Saint Augustine where he asks what one should do about this problem. And he answers that, given man’s makeup, it’s better for the order of the commonwealth when prostitution exists in an ordered form.”

“Cardinal” Joseph Ratzinger, Salt of the Earth, 1996, p. 263: “The dialogue with other religions is under way. We are, I think, all convinced that we can learn something, for example, from the mysticism of Asia and that precisely the great mystical traditions also open possibilities of encounter that are not so clearly present in positive theology.”

Benedict XVI tells us that Catholics can learn something from the mysticism of false religions of the devil (see 1 Cor. 10:20; Psalm 95:5) which lead people to damnation. This is like saying that we can learn something about fidelity to human dignity from the “great” pro-abortion doctors of our day.

“Cardinal” Joseph Ratzinger, Salt of the Earth, 1996, p. 31: “The theme you have just mentioned – Darwin, creation, the theory of evolution – is the subject of a dialogue that is not yet finished and, with our present means, is probably also impossible to settle at the moment.”

This seems to indicate that he is not convinced that Darwinism is wrong.

“Cardinal” Joseph Ratzinger, Salt of the Earth, 1996, p. 106: “Also the urgent ecumenical impulse that moves him [John Paul II] is something rooted very deeply in his own soul, in his own personality – ‘rooted’ is perhaps too undynamic an expression for the force that works and operates in him.”

Benedict XVI seems to be admitting here in cryptic fashion that John Paul II was possessed.

“Cardinal” Joseph Ratzinger, Salt of the Earth, 1996, p. 177: “Here we ought to learn not just from the Eastern Church but from all the religions of the world, which know that liturgy is something other than the invention of texts and rites, that it lives precisely from what is beyond manipulation.”

I think that it is important to note that this book was endorsed by the “conservative” Novus Ordo Bishops “Cardinal” George of Chicago and “Archbishop” Chaput of Denver. So the most “conservative” Bishops of the Vatican II/Novus Ordo hierarchy are in line with the apostasy of this book.

A HERETIC CANNOT BE A VALID POPE

It is a proven fact that Ratzinger (now Benedict XVI) is a non-Catholic heretic. The Catholic Church teaches that a heretic cannot be validly elected Pope, since a heretic is not a member of the Catholic Church. Ratzinger, who is now Benedict XVI, is a non-Catholic Antipope whose election was utterly null and void.

Pope Paul IV, Bull Cum ex Apostolatus Officio, Feb. 15, 1559: “6. In addition, [by this Our Constitution, which is to remain valid in perpetuity We enact, determine, decree and define:-] that if ever at any time it shall appear that any Bishop, even if he be acting as an Archbishop, Patriarch or Primate; or any Cardinal of the aforesaid Roman Church, or, as has already been mentioned, any legate, or even the Roman Pontiff, prior to his promotion or his elevation as Cardinal or Roman Pontiff, has deviated from the Catholic Faith or fallen into some heresy:

(i) the promotion or elevation, even if it shall have been uncontested and by the unanimous assent of all the Cardinals, shall be null, void and worthless;
(ii) it shall not be possible for it to acquire validity (nor for it to be said that it has thus acquired validity) through the acceptance of the office, of consecration, of subsequent authority, nor through possession of administration, nor through the putative enthronement of a Roman Pontiff, or Veneration, or obedience accorded to such by all, nor through the lapse of any period of time in the foregoing situation;
(iii) it shall not be held as partially legitimate in any way…

(vi) those thus promoted or elevated shall be deprived automatically, and without need for any further declaration, of all dignity, position, honour, title, authority, office and power….

10. No one at all, therefore, may infringe this document of our approbation, re-introduction, sanction, statute and derogation of wills and decrees, or by rash presumption contradict it. If anyone, however, should presume to attempt this, let him know that he is destined to incur the wrath of Almighty God and of the blessed Apostles, Peter and Paul.

Given in Rome at Saint Peter's in the year of the Incarnation of the Lord 1559, 15th February, in the fourth year of our Pontificate.

+ I, Paul, Bishop of the Catholic Church…”

St. Robert Bellarmine: “A pope who is a manifest heretic automatically (per se) ceases to be pope and head, just as he ceases automatically to be a Christian and a member of the Church. Wherefore, he can be judged and punished by the Church. This is the teaching of all the ancient Fathers who teach that manifest heretics immediately lose all jurisdiction.” (De Romano Pontifice, II, 30)

The Catholic Encyclopedia, “Papal Elections,” 1914, Vol. 11, p. 456: "Of course, the election of a heretic, schismatic, or female [as Pope] would be null and void."

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