Heresy and other grave doctrinal errors are found in Bishop Athanasius Schneider’s catechism, which is titled “Credo: Compendium of the Catholic Faith”. The Latin word “Credo” means “I believe”.

“Credo” – Errors on Man as the image and likeness of God

First, let’s review true Catholic doctrine:

[Genesis]
{1:26} And he said: “Let us make Man to our image and likeness. And let him rule over the fish of the sea, and the flying creatures of the air, and the wild beasts, and the entire earth, and every animal that moves on the earth.”
{1:27} And God created man to his own image; to the image of God he created him; male and female, he created them.

Human persons, male and female, were created in the image and likeness of God. God created human persons according to His own image. This is the explicit teaching of Sacred Scripture, and has always been the teaching of the Church.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches the following:

“Every human life, from the moment of conception until death, is sacred because the human person has been willed for its own sake [GS 24] in the image and likeness of the living and holy God.” [CCC 2319]

On the implications of faith in one God:
“It means knowing the unity and true dignity of all men: everyone is made in the image and likeness of God.” [CCC 225]

CDF Instruction Dignitas Personae, n. 16, inner quote from Pope Benedict XVI:
“it needs to be repeated that ‘God’s love does not differentiate between the newly conceived infant still in his or her mother’s womb and the child or young person, or the adult and the elderly person. God does not distinguish between them because he sees an impression of his own image and likeness (Gen 1:26) in each one…. Therefore, the Magisterium of the Church has constantly proclaimed the sacred and inviolable character of every human life from its conception until its natural end’. [31]”

Pope Saint John Paul II, Mulieris Dignitatem:

“This image and likeness of God, which is essential for the human being, is passed on by the man and woman, as spouses and parents, to their descendants: “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it” (Gen 1: 28).” [MD 6]

“What makes man like God is the fact that – unlike the whole world of other living creatures, including those endowed with senses (animalia) – man is also a rational being (animal rationale).” [MD 6]

“These words [i.e. Genesis 3] are confirmed generation after generation. They do not mean that the image and the likeness of God in the human being, whether woman or man, has been destroyed by sin; they mean rather that it has been “obscured”[30] and in a sense “diminished”. Sin in fact “diminishes” man, as the Second Vatican Council also recalls.[31] If man is the image and likeness of God by his very nature as a person, then his greatness and his dignity are achieved in the covenant with God, in union with him….” [MD 9]

Every human person, whether Christian or not, whether a great Saint or a great sinner, is created in the image and likeness of God. Now sin does diminish the human persons, somewhat obscuring this image and likeness of God. However, the Magisterium rejects the claim that his image and likeness of God has been destroyed by sin; it is only obscured, not destroyed or lost.

And now let’s review the errors of “Credo”

Bishop Athanasius Schneider in Credo rejects and contradicts the above teaching of the Church:

Credo: “224. Is the dignity of the human person rooted in his creation in God’s image and likeness? This was true for Adam, but with original sin the human person lost this resemblance and dignity in the eyes of God. He recovers this dignity through baptism, and keeps it as long as he does not sin mortally.” [p. 90]

False! The image and likeness of God is not destroyed or lost, but only partially obscured, as Pope Saint John Paul II teaches in Mulieris Dignitatem. What Schneider has done is to pervert the teaching of the Church and of Sacred Scripture on the image and likeness of God, so as to claim that only baptized Christians in the state of grace have that image and likeness, and that dignity of the human persons which it confers. But recall that Schneider also refuses to call baptized non-Catholics as “Christians”, and denies them salvation (apart from exceptional cases).

Therefore, the image and likeness of God and the fundamental dignity that the Church teaches is possessed by all human persons is denied by Bishop Athanasius Schneider to all but Catholics in the state of grace. This grave error is contrary to the teaching of Sacred Scripture that Man (mankind; humanity) is created to be in the image and likeness of God by the very nature of each human person. Here again is the teaching of the Catechism of the Catholic Church:

“Every human life, from the moment of conception until death, is sacred because the human person has been willed for its own sake [GS 24] in the image and likeness of the living and holy God.” [CCC 2319]

On the implications of faith in one God:
“It means knowing the unity and true dignity of all men: everyone is made in the image and likeness of God.” [CCC 225]

But in “Credo”, Bishop Athanasius Schneider makes a point of repeatedly quoting or referencing the Catechism of the Catholic Church and the teaching of Vatican II, so as to reject those teachings.

Schneider, in Credo, goes on to commit formal heresy by rejecting an infallible teaching of the Council of Trent, as so:

Credo: “226. Isn’t every human person a ‘son or daughter of the One who wants to be called “our Father” ‘? [52]
“No. One becomes a child of God only through explicit faith in Jesus Christ, the Incarnate Word and Son of God, being reborn of God (see Jn 1:12–13) through the sacrament of baptism (see Jn 3:5; and 1 Pt 1:3–23).” [p. 90]

The footnote [52] above is from Credo, and it states: “A regrettable affirmation of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2212.” This type of reference to a teaching of the Church that is explicitly rejected by Bishop Athanasius Schneider and his heretical catechism “Credo” occurs repeatedly in the book.

And the heresy that contradicts the infallible teaching of the Council of Trent is the claim that no one is “a child of God” except those who have “explicit faith in Jesus” and who has received the Sacrament of Baptism. This is directly contrary to the following teaching of Trent, that those also are children of God who receive the state of grace by a baptism of desire, i.e. NOT by the Sacrament of Baptism itself. In saying that the Sacrament of Baptism is required to be a child of God, Schneider explicitly and directly contradicts this dogma of the Council of Trent.

Furthermore, the Magisterium has always taught that this baptism of desire can be implicit, meaning that the person who enters the state of grace and becomes a child of God does not have “explicit faith in Jesus”. And this, too, means that Bishop Athanasius Schneider is teaching heresy in his book “Credo”. That book is not a true Catechism of the Catholic Church, but is only a collection of personal beliefs, grave errors, and heresies held by its authority, Bishop Athanasius Schneider.

In Credo 227, Schneider repeats this error, claiming that “It is the sacrament of baptism that establishes basic human fraternity….” But Trent taught that the sacrament of baptism with water “or its desire” makes human persons children of God by spiritual adoption. The claim by Schneider that “basic human fraternity” is denied to those children of God who are in the state of grace by a baptism of desire as well as being denied to all other human persons is heresy.

Ronald L Conte Jr