Christian is a Philosopher that comes from Belgium. What identifies him the most and above all is simplicity, for everything is better with “vanilla ice cream.” Perhaps, for this reason, his intellectual passion is criticism and irony, in the sense of trying to reveal what “hides behind the mask,” and give birth to the true. For him, ignorance and knowledge never “cross paths.” What he likes the most in his leisure time, is to go for a walk with his wife.
Scott Douglas Jacobsen: We talked about Leonardo Da Vinci and the Roman Catholic Church, so both laity and hierarchs with a specific focus on the hierarchs and theology. On Leonardo, the biographer Giorgio Vasari wrote, “[Leonardo’s] cast of mind was so heretical that he did not adhere to any religion, thinking perhaps that it was better to be a philosopher than a Christian.” In a time of the absolute authority of the Roman Catholic Church, especially in Europe, in Italy in particular, to be a philosopher disconnected from being “a Christian” was, indeed, “heretical,” much independence of thought, even genius, went undiscovered and, if discovered, crushed with threats of punishment, actual torture, even murder, by the Roman Catholic authorities of the time. In the modern period, this may become overwhelmingly, over decades now, overshadowed by the continuous scandals of the rape of children by hierarchs, as for example with priests, and then cover-up by hierarchs from someone who even became a Pope down to a local priest. A shuffling of the geographic priest deck so as to cover the tracks while keeping the crimes hidden because, as can be surmised, the crime of the rape of children becomes more of an issue as a media and public relations disaster, for decades, for the Roman Catholic Church than dealing with its internal crimes as an organization devoted to its public image and representation of authority, i.e., than to its dealing with human crimes committed against children. As you noted, Da Vinci valued reason above all, not below faith. In this manner, Da Vinci, clearly, rejected faith-based ‘understanding’ for a preference of primarily experience while organized thought and direct sensory experience through reason. Some might posit him as someone with a high regard for analogical perceptions as a means to come to the better approximations of the elusive truth of reality, such as it is, compared to the literature of the ancients, as he clearly, probably as a first since the ancients, questioned the handed-down assertions of the ancients – namely, the ancient Greeks – and put them to the test, showing several of them as outright fallacious. What does this further show about Da Vinci in the times of the absolute authority of the Roman Catholic Church and the Vicar of Christ on Earth?
Dr. Christian Sorensen: I think that time has not changed, since I consider that the Roman Catholic Church and the Vicar of Christ on earth, continue to have absolute authority, from the point of view, of what their factual power represents, nevertheless, time has varied, because from the perspective, of what Da Vinci was able to demonstrate, it could be said, that if he was to reason, as the absolute authority was to the Roman Catholic Church, that equation, currently, is not proportionally equivalent, due to the fact, that absolute authority is to the Roman Catholic Church, but reason is to no one, since contextually speaking, Da Vinci, indeed, questioned through reason and science, the earthly divine authority, however today, there is nobody, doing something analogous to what Da Vinci did. Therefore, it could even be stated, that the questioning that is being made, in ourdays, by utilizing the same framework of Da Vinci, is basic and rudimentary, because beyond to denounce Church’s crimes and aberrations, they have not managed to go further, in the sense of dismantling their authority, argumentatively, through facing the potholes and incongruities of their Christological farce, which invariably throughout time, has been the only cosmogony that they have had on hand, in order to steal, through the intimidation, what causes within some consciences, the sacred, as well as all the wealth, that has been accumulated by them over centuries, since through these, they have found the perfect combination, not only with Da Vinci, to spin through a russian roulette of death, their campaign of terror, which actually inverts its cross, in order to place it, next to a sword.
Jacobsen: What were other ‘crimes’ of other geniuses in the eyes of the Roman Catholic Church through time?
Sorensen: Almost all geniuses, in one way or another, have been persecuted and criminalized, by the Roman Catholic Church, just for having thought differently, nevertheless, there is one of them, that comes to mind particularly, since every day, when I went to the Palazzo di Sant’Apollinare in Rome, I had to pass forcibly, during my way, by the street del Sant’Ufficio, and the place that remembers, where Giordano Bruno had been burned at the stake.
Jacobsen: The scholastics parroted the works of others century after century. This has been the premise of theology since its inception with little in the manner of internal change while only happening from external pressures. Da Vinci didn’t state this once, or as a one-off. He kept saying it, “When the followers and reciters of the works of others are compared to those who are inventors and interpreters between Nature and man, it is as though they are non-existent mirror images of some original. Given that it is only by chance that we are invested with the human form, I might think of them as being a herd of animals.” When he was charged with sodomy, after the verdict came out as “not guilty,” he said, “When I made God a cherub, you put me in prison. Now, if I make him a grown man, you will do me even worse.” Da Vinci probably resented the Roman Catholic Church, where, one manner to make a point most succinctly and past one’s lifetime including attempted jailers, is to use the symbols, iconography, and language of the Oppressors Supreme themselves in artistic works and make this point several times in writings. His rejection of the scholastics; his questioning of the authority of the Roman Catholic Church, punctuated by a claim of sodomy about him. All these show a lack of endearment to the religious absolutes and the Roman Catholic hierarchs of the time. What would prevent even polymaths from more fully enacting their freedom of spirit in their works, their life, their words?
Sorensen: I think that what prevents polymaths, from being able to fully express their freedom of spirit, ultimately is fear, which from my point of view, always refers to the fear of losing something, which can be from running out of life, to losing what for me, is one’s vital space, that refers in the case of the last, to the projected image of oneself on others, which if it is negative, can leads as a consequence of punishment, to individual isolation, generally motivated, by some type of social rejection, that seeks to take refuge, in pseudo reasonable justifications, by alluding to commonwealth assumptions, that at the same time, intend to correlate, with what the Roman Catholic Church, denominates as good judgment and well-formed conscience, which is nothing more, than the obverse of a repressive morality, which sees in individual self-affirmation, the greatest onanistic sin, even though that as such, I believe, it can only be reserved for the clergy, especially, when they want to use some altar, for discharging their autoerotic pleasure.
Jacobsen: Da Vinci further stated, “Of what use are those who try to restrict what we know to only those things that are easy to comprehend, often because they themselves are not inclined to learn more about a particular subject, like the subject of the human body.” Noting, he did anatomical dissections when this was illegal, so had to do this surreptitiously and without showing anyone his findings. Other times, he could be scathing, “…they want to comprehend the mind of God, talking about it as though they had already dissected it into parts. Still, they remain unaware of their own bodies, of the realities of their surroundings, and even unaware of their own stupidity.” All these reflect his fundamental skepticism of the dogma of the time, which remain the dogma of today. Why would discovery and science be made so difficult for society under the auspices of the Roman Catholic Church?
Sorensen: Just as Da Vinci says, that they intend to understand the mind of God and speak of it, as if they had dissected it into parts, in the same manner, I also state, that they intend to understand the soul, and speak of it, as if someone had found it, when he was dissecting a body. Science and any kind of discovery, are difficult to be perfomed in a society, under the pressure of the Roman Catholic Church, because scientific discoveries, mean, a loss of power for them, since additionally, implies that society, places faith in reason, and not in theology, which it’s the opposite, of what the authority of the Roman Catholic Church has always intended to achieve, when by placing science below theology, subdues it, because in that way, under the auspices of their authority, which gives totalizing responses regarding everything, since according to the bible, there’s nothing left to create, which is in my opinion a good history book, although I think it’s less good, when there are those, who childishly believe in it, as if it was the story of something real, society is ultimately pushed to believe, that reason should become, the slave of faith.
Jacobsen: Other times, Da Vinci was outright direct, “Along with the scholars, they despise the mathematical sciences, which are the only true sources of information about those things which they claim to know so much about. Instead, they talk about miracles and write about things that nobody could ever know, things that cannot be proven by any evidence in nature.” Someone skeptical of the miracles, or the miraculous claims of others, as in “cannot be proven by any evidence in nature.” Indeed, he continued, “Wherever there is no true science and no certainty of knowledge, there will be conflicting speculations and quarrels. However, whenever things are proven by scientific demonstration and known for certain, then all quarreling will cease. And if controversy should ever arise again, then our first conclusions must have been questionable.” Over the most fundamental claims of the Roman Catholic faith, whether the Resurrection of Christ or the Immaculate Conception, there exists millennia-long innumerable “speculations and quarrels.” Indeed, even the soul and God, he lay explicit skeptical claims about it:
It seems to me that all studies are vain and full of errors unless they are based on experience and can be tested by experiment, in other words, they can be demonstrated to our senses. For if we are doubtful of what our senses perceive then how much more doubtful should we be of things that our senses cannot perceive, like the nature of God and the soul and other such things over which there are endless disputes and controversies.
Thusly, when Da Vinci spoke of the concept of a god, as in “God,” he wasn’t using the Roman Catholic Church’s God vis-à-vis “miracles,” the “soul,” or even “God,” or that which “cannot be proven by any evidence of nature,” and probably meant both Nature and the Necessity upon which nature is built. Because, otherwise, these meant endless “speculations and quarrels,” those which enact a dog’s indefinite tail-chase. What does this further imply about the unprovables asserted as absolutes in the mind of Da Vinci, of you?
Sorensen: I will follow a different logic than Da Vinci, since from my point of view, what is improbable, because it has no basis in empirical experience, but is assumed as an absolute, is something, that does not admits any speculation or discussion, due to the cause, that evidently, empirical experience, must be born from the perception of senses, therefore, it is not possible to discuss, discursively speaking, about something, that regardless of whether it is truth or not, does not have the properties of knowledge, that is to say, if discursiveness needs of knowledge, in order to exist as a discussion, then it is possible to affirm, that discursiveness in face of the improbable, is in front of nothingness, which wouldn’t allow any discussion, to exist as such, in consequence the last, enables in turn to conclude, that everything which is not knowledge, because it is improbable, but that’s assumed to be an absolute, should always be considered as a dogma, and then, as something that’s not speculable, therefore, from there onwards, nothing linked to the breadth of the understandable, will be able to arise at that point.
Jacobsen: Similarly, as you note, a man leaving a reality within reality, i.e., his works and life and so life-work, with infinite interpretation; an infinity of possible perspective-taking and parsing, and combining, so as to reject the fundamental bases of the Roman Catholic Church as omni-absolute or that which contains the Truth, for that which is claimed as “the way and the truth and the life.” A religion whose Theity garners the title, Lord of Lords, King of Kings, Father, Son, Son of God, Son of Man, and the like. A religion with a divine patriarch, in short. Yet, as someone who claims sense as primary and not the patriarchs or the works of dead theologians, who considers “art… the queen of all sciences,” and, indeed, claims “those who study the ancients and not the words of Nature are stepsons and not sons of Nature, the mother of all good authors,” thus sees Nature as mother, so nature as primary, because sense is primary. He may have used the word “God,” but he was a naturalist and a logician through and through, therefore not a Catholic and not a Christian through skepticism of “miracles,” the “soul,” and “God.” His ultimate undermining of the Roman Catholic Church, in such a manner, comes from the life representative of infinitude of interpretation, marked by the dint of the mother, Nature, or the source of all good authors, and reflective of the infinite asymptotic discovery process of science while exhibited most thoroughly through art as the queen of the sciences, harkening back to the “primordial pagan goddesses” of old, as in a feminine principle represented in Mary Magdalena while with origin beyond the opacity of pre-recorded human history when the feminine principle reigned supreme, thus “Nature,” the “queen,” so sense, which, if you think about it, makes a lot more sense than theological non-sense. What does infinity of interpretation in Nature mean for institutions grounded on absolutes?
Sorensen: For institutions based on absolutes, such as happens, with the Roman Catholic Church, that presumption would constitute anathema, since it violates, what I will denominate the theological creationist principle, because if God, created everything that exists in six days, then, the fact of admitting an infinity of interpretations in nature, would be equivalent, to accept evolution, and therefore, to assume, that the creative process, is not only ad aeternum, but also, that it only takes place in nature itself, which implies, the denial of the most primal theological truth, because rejects, the idea of a creation already completed, and refuses the belief, in the existence of a creator God.
Jacobsen: As the Roman Catholic Church continues to add wood to a burning ship, what words happen to be on the side of the ship, its title or signage?
Sorensen: The Roman Catholic Church, is not adding wood to a burning ship, but is adding wood, to its own burning ship, that doesn’t mean the same. On its side, it would be written as title, if from dust you came, then to dust you will return, because to fire, you have always belonged.
Jacobsen: What do you make of modern efforts by the Roman Catholic Church and its efforts to combat anti-Semitism? There are calls for Christians and Jewish peoples to work together. When is this sincere and historical? When is this sincere and ahistorical? When is this simply insincere?
Sorensen: I think that the Roman Catholic Church, has invariably always been anti-Semitic, in this sense, the only thing that has variably changed throughout history, until our days, is the cynicism, with which they have wrapped it, in order to make it look, like a gift. From my point of view, it constitutes a historical reality, the fact, that they have always blamed the Jewish people, for the death of Jesus, as well that, for nobody is anything new, that they perceive Judaism, as an archaic religion, which was surpassed by their New Testament, nor that the Church believes, that the end of time will come, after the Jews converted to Catholicism. In other terms, if not only, they accuse the Jewish people of murder, but also, they consider Judaism, not as a truth religion, and they are convinced, that some day, the Jews will repent and do penance, for all their sins, and therefore, they will surrender, at the feet of Roman Catholic Church’s authority, then I think, that the anti-Semitism of the Roman Catholic Church, is a fact of evidence, that since ever, has cried to them.
Jacobsen: You have Freemasonic family history. Any important points of contact for this particular interview?
Sorensen: What I internalize the most from them, is the value of social justice, that in the context of this interview, leads me to raise my voice, for the silence of all those innocents, who have paraded, in front of Roman Catholic Church’s, perfidious and dispiteous, impassive gaze.
Jacobsen: Why has the Roman Catholic Church been such a strong opponent of the Freemasons who number only a few million worldwide?
Sorensen: The Roman Catholic Church, has always fought the Freemasons, not from a numerical issue, but rather since a matter of principles and consequences, derivated from these, which leads in synthesis, to the fact, that this religious sect, sees them as a threat, and therefore, rejects from their guts, what Freemasons, defend as supreme value, in terms of equality, fraternity and freedom, at the same time that fight, with outrage, any trace of dogmatism. Therefore, if there is something that identifies Freemasons, above all things, is tolerance, and in consequence a principle, that I am going to denominate, as the intolerance of intolerance, which in front of the Roman Catholic Church, is exactly the opposite, since respect to them, it’s possible to translate that maximum, as the intolerance of tolerance, through which, it can be inferred, and easily respond, respectively, the question and the reason of why, this Church, has always wanted, to make Freemasonry, disappear from the face of world.
Jacobsen: The Congregation on the Doctrine of the Faith in Declaration on Masonic Associations stated in full:
It has been asked whether there has been any change in the Church’s decision in regard to Masonic associations since the new Code of Canon Law does not mention them expressly, unlike the previous Code.
This Sacred Congregation is in a position to reply that this circumstance in due to an editorial criterion which was followed also in the case of other associations likewise unmentioned inasmuch as they are contained in wider categories.
Therefore the Church’s negative judgment in regard to Masonic association remains unchanged since their principles have always been considered irreconcilable with the doctrine of the Church and therefore membership in them remains forbidden. The faithful who enrol in Masonic associations are in a state of grave sin and may not receive Holy Communion.
It is not within the competence of local ecclesiastical authorities to give a judgment on the nature of Masonic associations which would imply a derogation from what has been decided above, and this in line with the Declaration of this Sacred Congregation issued on 17 February 1981 (cf. AAS 73 1981 pp. 240-241; English language edition of L’Osservatore Romano, 9 March 1981).
In an audience granted to the undersigned Cardinal Prefect, the Supreme Pontiff John Paul II approved and ordered the publication of this Declaration which had been decided in an ordinary meeting of this Sacred Congregation.
Rome, from the Office of the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, 26 November 1983.
Joseph Card.
RATZINGER
Prefect
+ Fr. Jerome
Hamer, O.P.
Titular Archbishop of Lorium
Secretary
What does this exhibit to you?
Sorensen: I think this statement, it’s a serious and plausible threat, that as such, demonstrates the way, in which the Roman Catholic Church, communicates with Catholics and exercises its authority over them, at the same time that exhibits, how the Lamb of god, and the Vicar of Christ, who represents it on earth, actually have little or no innocence. Likewise, it is deductible the kind of conflict, that the Roman Catholic Church put’s over the table, not only with the Freemasons, but also with anything that embodies reason, and therefore, that facilitates and promotes, the right for thinking freely. From the perspective of this sick logic, a threat of this nature, undoubtedly, must be mitigated through intimidation, that is to say, by the exercise of communicational means, that search to achieve control with the manipulation of fear, which implies, a sort of development proposal towards human beings, that’s supported, by messages implicitly loaded of superstitious images, that ultimately will be directly proportional, to what I will name as despotic and patriarchal authoritarianism, that instead of developing a spirit of service, among their faithful and the community, what explicitly does, is to restrict freedom, by confusing their parishioners to believe, that meekness, is equivalent to having a spirit of servitude.
Jacobsen: How does this reflect the centuries of reactionary history of the Roman Catholic Church to the Freemasons?
Sorensen: This is reflected, in the demonization, that the Roman Catholic Church has made of the Freemasons, over the centuries, and in the Christian charity, with which the Church, has always treated them, in such a manner, and so tangibly, that it’s possible to verify these, through such ordinary deeds, as are the signs, founded in the entrances of some European churches, where it’s possible to read, that dogs and Freemasons, are prohibited from entering that place of prayer, or as are the declarations of the popes, like Francis I, the current pontiff, who treats Freemasonry, as the black beast.
Jacobsen: What real threat, renewed in 1983, do the Freemasons, or others associated or of like mind, pose to the Roman Catholic Church? Why was this warning ‘resurrected’?
Sorensen: This warning arose, because it coincides, with the time when the Roman Catholic Church, through a communicational strategy, that had its origin in John Paul II, who tried to show itself, as an intellectual, by removing the ghost of Karol Wojtyla, wanted to demonstrate, a compatibility and harmonic relationship, between reason and faith, for which, in order to be convincing with their pseudo sincere intention, they decided to reconcile with science, by baptizing symbolically, some paradigmatic scientists, as Darwin and Galileo, who were condemned with their work as heretics, and were hidden in the Index of the Sant’Ufficio, as forbidden reading for the Catholics. In this context, it was naively believed, that the Roman Catholic Church, was exhibing with that gesture, a greater openness towards Freemasons and to other similiar associations, nevertheless, regarding these, the Church did the opposite, since they ratified their historical position, due to the fact, that they believe, that Freemasons, seek to destroy the Roman Catholic Church, question that I partially share, not since Freemasonry intends to do so, but because they postulate, that man, through the utilization of reason and the development of science, transforms in the only architect of himself, and of a better humanity, cause for which, from my point of view, there is no other possibility for the Roman Catholic Church, other than to collapse, since sooner rather than later, Catholics will become aware, of the deception, of which they have been victims.
Jacobsen: Thank you for the opportunity and your time, Dr. Sorensen.
Sorensen: My pleasure, Mr. Jacobsen.