The Dicastery for the Faith has published the reply sent to the bishops of the following countries Philippines concerned about the increase of Freemasonry members in the country. The Philippine episcopate asked the Vatican for suggestions on how to deal pastorally with the situation.
Many faithful in the dioceses of the country are enrolled in Masonic lodges and consider that there is no opposition between Catholic doctrine and membership in Freemasonry. The Vatican Dicastery wants to cooperate with the Philippine Bishops' Conference to initiate a pastoral and doctrinal strategy to put an end to the confusion.
In the brief response from the Vatican, the first thing they mention is the document published by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in 1983. In the statement, signed by the then Cardinal Ratzinger, it was recalled that membership in Masonic lodges is forbidden by the Catholic Church. In addition, the document pointed out that "the faithful who belong to Masonic associations are in a state of grave sin and cannot approach Holy Communion".
On the other hand, the Dicastery for the Faith encourages the Philippine Bishops' Conference to develop a catechesis in all parishes in the country to explain that membership in Masonic lodges is irreconcilable with the Catholic faith.
Incompatibility between Freemasonry and the Catholic Faith
Now, why are one and the other incompatible? In 1985, "L'Osservatore Romano" published an article in clarification on this subject. One of the points expressed by the Church at that time is that "it is not possible for a Christian to live his relationship with God in a double modality, that is, diversifying it into a humanitarian-supraconfessional form and an internal-Christian one".
The great number of symbols that fill the Masonic ideology, such as the "Great Architect", the "masons" or the "profane", distances the Catholic from the Christian fraternity. On the other hand, "the relativizing force" contained in the ideology of the Masons can lead to confusion with the concept of Truth expressed by the Catholic Church.
The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith further warned of the danger of all this. The "distortion of the fundamental structure of the act of faith is usually carried out smoothly and without one being aware of it". As a result, adherence to the Catholic faith "becomes mere membership of an institution considered as a particular expressive form, alongside other expressive forms, more or less possible and also valid, of man's orientation towards the eternal".
For all these reasons, the Catholic Church strongly condemns membership in Freemasonry and considers it "her duty to make known the authentic thought of the Church in this regard and to warn against a membership that is incompatible with the Catholic faith".
