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Bishop Athanasius Schneider on the Meaning of “Discernment” in Amoris Laetitia

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Interview Organization: PCh24TV · Polonia Christiana
Date: August 26, 2017
Bishop Schneider warns that discernment must align with God’s will and cannot justify sin. He cites the serpent’s dialogue with Eve as the first failed discernment, leading to original sin. Allowing adulterers to persist in sin, even through confessional discernment, is spiritually dangerous and a grave responsibility for clergy and the Pope.
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Transcript:

You know where the first discernment started. It was the dialogue of the serpent with Eve, a discernment to obey God or not to obey God.

Eve said, “God said to us not to eat from this fruit.” And then the devil said, “Oh, let us start a discernment. Is it true that God said this or not? What did God say?” And Eve said, “He said, ‘When we will eat, we will die.'”The devil replied, “Oh, no, this is not true. Let us discern. You will know what is good.” And so they made a process of discernment, the first one, and we know the result of this discernment: a catastrophe for all humanity.

So we are now bearing in our souls, in our bodies, the consequences of the original sin, of this bad discernment.

Discernment can only be for the good. Discernment can only be to fulfill the will of God. But to continue to practice adultery is not fulfilling the will of God; it is offending God. So it is anti-discernment, an absurd discernment, which will confirm the soul in sin and lead it even to the danger of losing its soul for all eternity.

And so we cannot play with our eternity, as the proverb says, “We cannot play with fire.” We cannot play with eternity. It is clearly the will of God that sexual acts are only permitted and willed by God inside a valid matrimony. This is the clear will of God. There is no other exception, no, as there is no exception.

So, for someone who likes to lie, but says, “Let us make a discernment so that they can continue to lie,” or someone who likes to steal, “Okay, I’m so existentially linked with stealing with my family and so on. Maybe I’m a mafioso, and I say, ‘Let us make a discernment that I can make a little bit.'” It is the same as a discernment, even in the confessional, to allow adulterers to continue in adultery. It is a contradiction and a very great danger for the souls, and a grave responsibility, more on the priest who allows this, and more on the Pope who seems to allow this. It seems to me, as I see, that he does not do anything to prevent this. And I think it seems that Amoris Laetitia goes in this direction.

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