(LifeSiteNews) — Cardinal Gerhard Müller appeared to acknowledge that Pope Francis committed material heresies during his pontificate, in a recent interview with La Nacion.

Cardinal Müller said during the interview that Francis “has sometimes created confusion” and that “order” must now be re-established, adding that “the relationship between doctrine and pastoral care must be very clear.”

“When Francis, for example, speaks on board an airplane, what he said was not a presentation of the Church’s magisterium, they were just some private opinions,” continued the prelate.

When La Nacion pointed out that Francis has been accused of being a heretic, Cardinal Müller noted that “a distinction must be made between formal heresy and material heresy.” 

“A pope can say something that is not very clear, but it is only a heresy when he intentionally contradicts the revealed truth, not when it has not been expressed well or has been misunderstood.”

Asked if Francis had “sometimes incurred material heresies,” Cardinal Müller replied, “When, for example, a boy asked Francis if his father, an atheist, had gone to hell after dying, the pope generated confusion by telling him that his father was in heaven.”

This statement by Francis contradicts the Catholic Church teaching that all souls must “belong” to the Church to be saved: “All are obliged to belong to the Catholic Church in order to be saved.” (Baltimore Catechism, Q 166.)

Francis had declared in 2021 that charges that he acts against “Catholic doctrine” and is a step away from “heresy” are a “risk” he’s willing to take to move forward on the path toward “human fraternity.”

Join Bishop Strickland’s novena for a holy pope:

“You know that there are some criticisms: that the pope is not courageous, he is a reckless person who is taking steps against Catholic doctrine, that he is one step away from heresy, there are risks. But these decisions are always made in prayer, in dialogue, in asking for advice, in reflection,” Francis said at the time.

Cardinal Müller has recently acknowledged the possibility of a heretical pope. Following the death of Francis, he warned of the danger of a new pope who would be “a heretic” basing his values on the “mass media.”

A pope “must be orthodox – neither a liberal nor a conservative,” he told The Times.

Continuing, Cardinal Müller commented that “the question is not between conservatives and liberals but between orthodoxy and heresy.” He added:

I am praying that the Holy Spirit will illuminate the cardinals, because a heretic pope who changes every day depending on what the mass media is saying would be catastrophic.