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PREVIOUS BULLETIN POSTS THAT ARE NOT OUTDATED

“Hijacked”? Or is he the hijacker?

More proof that Francis’ pontificate has been ‘hijacked’ by the ‘Gay Lobby’

LifeSiteNews | January 12, 2018 – The revelations of homoerotic, blasphemous art in the Cathedral of Terni, commissioned in 2006 by Archbishop Paglia, now the head of the dicastery that oversees the St. John Paul II Institute for Studies in Marriage and Family worldwide, had already raised several vital issues that needed to be urgently addressed.

The exposition of homoerotic art in Archbishop Paglia’s Cathedral from 2006 left the world asking the important question of how he could ever have been chosen to lead the Pontifical Council for the Family and later the Pontifical Academy for Life and the John Paul II Institute for Studies in Marriage and Family, when he clearly opposes the Church’s teaching on sexual morality.

This question in itself requires an inquiry as to the intentions and criteria used within the Vatican for appointments under Pope Francis.

Archbishop Paglia’s use of homoerotic art reinforced the earlier views presented to the Vatican by several Catholic mental health professionals, that Archbishop Paglia should be suspended from his responsibilities at the Vatican and be required to undergo a mental health evaluation.

This evaluation would correspond to the Dallas charter concerning Sexual Abuse and further required because of his role in the development of the grossly erotic Meeting Point online sex education program when he led the Pontifical Council for the Family. That damaging program for youth is now under review and, hopefully, reform.

But Paglia was promoted.

Already Public concern about the policies placing Catholic youth at risk of abuse had been intensified by Pope Francis’ restoring to priestly ministry an Italian priest who was laicized by Pope Benedict for homosexually abusing adolescent males. This priest relapsed, homosexually abusing a youth, and was arrested.

The rumors of the Vatican being in the clutches of a ‘gay lobby’ seem each day to be further confirmed. Parents will increasingly retire their children from religious-run schools and parochial activities. A sad result of what is billed as ‘compassion’ and ‘mercy.’

The protection of Catholic marriages, families and youth depend upon a correct resolution of these scandals.

Even more alarming, however, is the teaching coming out of a series of conferences being held at the Gregorian University on Humanae Vitae.

Added to the deviant suggestions made and over-ruled at the Synods on the Family, the same subtle, but insistent, approval for homosexuality is making its way again toward what would seem intended to be acceptance of what was expressed by one speaker, French Jesuit Father Alain Thomasset, as “homosexual relationship[s] lived in stability and fidelity can be a path of holiness”

One need not be an expert to see the incremental presentation by Vatican ‘authorities’ of homosexuality as a legitimate use of sexuality, even by priests and religious. Priests recently “come out” are praised by their bishops, further splitting the Church in matters of Christian morality.

New evidence of the collusion of privileged prelates and special friends in the priesthood toward the destruction of Catholic moral teaching surfaced in the Gregorian University conference on Humanae Vitae.

A certain Father Maurizio Chiodi was allowed to present the entirely heretical theory that objectively evil acts do not exist; that all is subject to the judgment of the individual.

On that basis, he went on to declare that “contraception can be a good and even a duty.” It is obvious that, if uncorrected, this is a sign of two important things:

1) A clever strategy to demolish the 2000 years of Catholic morality assembled in Humanae Vitae and Veritatis Splendor, and thereby permit all deviant sexual practices, and

2) Apparent proof that Chapter 8 of Amoris Laetitia does, in fact, contain heretical teaching. Chiodi bases his entire argument in favor of relativism, situation ethics and contraception upon this chapter. There is no other authoritative teaching that would allow him to do this.

There is concern worldwide that the Pontificate of Francis has been hijacked by the ‘Gay Lobby’ so discussed of late and that he is manipulated by homosexual prelates.

It is time that Pope Francis take a firm stand in favor of Catholic Moral Doctrine, distancing himself from those who favor homosexuality as an alternate form of ‘love’ and from the notion that ‘anything goes, if you feel good about it.’

FOR NOTHING DEFILED CAN ENTER HEAVEN. APOCOLYPSE 21:27

Study asks: Why are young Catholics going, going, gone?

Parish People | Julie Bourbon | Jan 22, 2018

Baltimore — A new report on young adults who no longer identify as Catholic is attempting to understand why so many have “disaffiliated” from the faith they were born into. It comes at a time when more young people than ever before are leaving the church, even as those losses are being offset by Hispanic immigration to the U.S.

Whether it's feelings of being judged by religious leaders who don't know or understand them, or being forced by their parents to attend church, or witnessing the sexual abuse scandal and the hypocrisy of church hierarchy, young people are expressing a desire both to break free from organized religion and to be part of a community.

“Going, Going, Gon: The Dynamics of Disaffiliation in Young Catholics” looked at a sample of former Catholics, aged 15 to 25. This group is often characterized as “nones” because they claim no particular religious affiliation. The "Going, Going, Gone" report notes 2015 Pew Research on all Americans that puts the number of disaffiliated young millennials (ages 18-24) at 36 percent and disaffiliated older millennials (25-33) at 34 percent.

Highlights from the new survey, which was conducted by St. Mary’s Press in collaboration with the Center for Applied Research in Apostolate at Georgetown University, include:

· Approximately 12.8 percent of young adults in the U.S. between 18 and 25 are former Catholics.

· Approximately 6.8 percent of U.S. teenagers between 15 and 17 are former Catholics.

· Seventy-four percent said they stopped identifying as Catholic between ages 10 and 20, with a median age of 13.

· About one-third (35 percent) are "done" with religious affiliation but still believe in something bigger, perhaps even God.

· About 14 percent say religious affiliation and faith are "nonsensical."

· Nearly half (46 percent) are looking for another faith expression or practice that better aligns with their sense of spirituality. […..]

Traditional Catholic Faithful - ‘Rebels without a Pause’

Another vindictive sermon by Pope Francis in which he again maligns those Catholics who know “Absolute Truth” who are faithful to dogmatic truth and necessary ecclesiastical traditions as “idolaters,” committing the sin of “divination,” and “obstinate rebels”! The charges again are gratuitously offered without evidence which is, by definition, the sin of calumny. Whatever spirit possesses Francis cannot be from God!

Pope Francis: obstinate Christians are rebels and idolaters

Vatican Radio | Homilies | January 16, 2015

Christians who say “it’s always been done that way,” and stop there have hearts closed to the surprises of the Holy Spirit. They are idolaters and rebels will never arrive at the fullness of the truth. That was the message of Pope Francis at Mass on Monday morning at the chapel in the Casa Santa Marta.

In the first reading, Saul was rejected by God as King of Israel because he disobeyed, preferring to listen to the people rather than the will of God. The people, after a victory in battle, wanted to offer a sacrifice of the best animals to God, because, he said, “it’s always been done that way.” But God, this time, did not want that. The prophet Samuel rebuked Saul: “Does the Lord so delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as in obedience to the command of the Lord?” Jesus teaches us the same thing in the Gospel, the Pope explained. When the doctors of the law criticized Him because His disciples did not fast “as had always been done,” Jesus responded with these examples from daily life: “No one sews a piece of unshrunken cloth on an old cloak. If he does, its fullness pulls away, the new from the old, and the tear gets worse. Likewise, no one pours new wine into old wineskins. Otherwise, the wine will burst the skins, and both the wine and the skins are ruined. Rather, new wine is poured into fresh wineskins.”

“What does this mean? That He changes the law? No! That the law is at the service of man, who is at the service of God – and so man ought to have an open heart. ‘It’s always been done this way’ is a closed heart, and Jesus tells us, ‘I will send you the Holy Spirit and He will lead you into the fullness of truth.’ If you have a heart closed to the newness of the Spirit, you will never reach the full truth. And your Christian life will be a half-and-half life, a patched life, mended with new things, but on a structure that is not open to the voice of the Lord—a closed heart, so that you are not able to change the wineskins.”

This, the Pope emphasized, was the sin of Saul, for which he was rejected by God. “It is the sin of so many Christians who cling to what has always been done and who do not change the wineskins. And they end up with half a life, [a life that is] patched, mended, meaningless.” The sin, he said, “is a closed heart,” that “does not hear the voice of the Lord, that is not open to the newness of the Lord, to the Spirit that always surprises us.” This rebellion, says Samuel, is “the sin of divination,” and obstinacy is the sin of idolatry:

“Christians who obstinately maintain ‘it’s always been done this way,' this is the path, this is the street—they sin: the sin of divination. It’s as if they went about by guessing: ‘What has been said and what doesn’t change is what’s important; what I hear—from myself and my closed heart—more than the Word of the Lord.’ Obstinacy is also the sin of idolatry: the Christian who is obstinate sins! The sin of idolatry. ‘And what is the way, Father?’ Open the heart to the Holy Spirit, discern what is the will of God.”

Pope Francis noted that in Jesus’ time, good Israelites were in the habit of fasting. “But there is another reality,” he said. “There is the Holy Spirit who leads us into the full truth. And for this reason he needs an open heart, a heart that will not stubbornly remain in the sin of idolatry of oneself,” imagining that my own opinion is more important than the surprise of the Holy Spirit.

“This is the message the Church gives us today. This is what Jesus says so forcefully: ‘New wine in new wineskins.’ Habits must be renewed in the newness of the Spirit, in the surprises of God. May the Lord grant us the grace of an open heart, of a heart open to the voice of the Spirit, which knows how to discern what should not change, because it is fundamental, from what should change in order to be able to receive the newness of the Spirit.”

Pope Francis has denied the faith and the duty of his office. Dialogue without Proselytism cannot dissolve the essential difference between heretics and Catholics. Ultimately, that essential difference will result, as our Father Abraham said in a permanent separation: "And besides all this, between us and you, there is fixed a great chaos: so that they who would pass from hence to you, cannot, nor from thence come hither." Luke 16:26

Question from a young girl: Eighty percent of locals do not belong to any Christian denomination. Should I convince these friends, who are good and happy people, of my faith?

Pope Francis Reply: It's not licit to convince someone of your faith. Proselytism is the strongest venom against the path of ecumenism. The Apostle Paul tells us that, by virtue of our baptism, we all form the one Body of Christ. The different members, in fact, are one body. This is why we belong to each other and when one suffers, all suffer, when one rejoices, all rejoice. Let us continue with confidence on our ecumenical journey, because we know that, beyond the many open questions that still separate us, we are already united. What unites us is much more than what divides us.

Pope Francis, October 13, 2016, to a group of Lutherans in Rome

There is a fitting irony that it was on the 500^th anniversary of the Luther’s revolt that Pope Francis should embrace divorce and adultery when he publically proclaimed his personal belief in the heretical doctrines of Martin Luther!

By his teaching on the impossibility of continency either in celibacy or In marriage, he paves the way to the sanction of a bigamic marriage, at least In the case of the Landgrave Philip von Hessen. In union with Melanchton and Bucer, Luther acts the spiritual adviser, with counsel pertinent to the matter in hand. On account of the sensation caused by the bigamic marriage, the Landgrave Is recommended to deny it, but secretly he may keep the trull—”Metze”—as a “conjugal concubine.” In principle, Luther had already enunciated these tenets after his interior apostasy from the Church. They only prove his bent and readiness with regard to lying, cunning, and deception.

Rev. Heinrich Denifle, O.P., Luther and Lutherdom

Pope Benedict XVI and the Prayer Meeting at Assisi

Although it clearly follows from the circumstances that the Pope can err at times, and command things which must not be done, that we are not to be simply obedient to him in all things, that does not show that he must not be obeyed by all when his commands are good. To know in what cases he is to be obeyed and in what not, it is said in the Acts of the Apostles: “One ought to obey God rather than man,”; therefore, were the Pope to command anything against Holy Scripture, or the articles of faith, or the truth of the sacraments, or the commands of the natural or divine law; he ought not to be obeyed, but in such commands, to be passed over.

Juan cardinal de Torquemada, O. P., Summa de Ecclesia, quoting St. Robert Bellarmine

Dogmas are not Precepts – They are Divinely Revealed Truths

The dogmas of the Faith are to be held only according to their practical sense; that is to say, as preceptive norms of conduct and not as norms of believing, Condemned Proposition. St. Pius X, Lamentabili Sane

Pope Francis Awards Architect of Safe-Abortion Fund with Pontifical Honor

Global Abortion Advocate Lilianne Ploumen Claims Papal Award is “Confirmation” of Her Work

Steve Skojec | OnePeterFive | January 15, 2018

Michael Hichborn and Maike Hickson contributed to this report.

On January 12, OnePeterFive and The Lepanto Institute reported that Liliane Ploumen, a Dutch politician and international abortion activist, received the Order of St. Gregory award from the Vatican in 2017 — a pontifical award given for “meritorious service to the Church”. Multiple diplomatic sources around the Vatican have now confirmed to OnePeterFive that the award was given to Ploumen last year when she took part in an official state visit of King Willem-Alexander and Queen Máxima of the Netherlands to the Vatican in June of 2017.

Ploumen, who formerly served as the Minister of Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation for the Dutch government, started a progressive global initiative in 2017 called “She Decides.” Self-described as “a global movement”, SheDecides is designed to

support the fundamental rights of girls and women to decide freely and for themselves about their sexual lives, including whether, when, with whom and how many children they have. This includes having access to modern contraception, to sexual and relationship literacy and safe abortion.

The SheDecides initiative came in response to the funding gap for “family planning” facilities around the world created after US President Donald Trump re-instated the Mexico City Policy, which blocks American federal funding for NGOs providing abortion services. Within six months, SheDecides — which has the support of 60 countries — had received pledges totaling $300 million (USD).

There is little official information available online about the Order of St. Gregory award, but one website detailing its history indicates that it is “typically made on the recommendation of Diocesan Bishops or Archbishops or Nuncios for special merit or service.” It is perhaps for this reason that today, Cardinal Willem Eijk of Utrecht, has issued a statement indicating that he had no knowledge of or involvement in the bestowal of Ploumen’s award:

In response to many questions from both The Netherlands and abroad, Cardinal Eijk says that he was not involved in the application for the title Commander in the Pontifical Equestrian Order of St. Gregory the Great, which former minister L. Ploumen received last year. Cardinal Eijk was also unaware of the fact that this papal award was requested for her.

Sources say that a routine exchange of decorations was made between officials from the Vatican and from the Dutch delegation, and that the only reason Ploumen received the award was because she received it as part of that group.

Nevertheless, in a video posted to YouTube, Ploumen was seen discussing the award, which she held as she spoke with an interviewer, saying that she received it “despite” the fact that she is pro-abortion.

A longer interview on BRN Newsradio in the Netherlands reveals additional assertions from Ploumen, in which she implies that the Vatican gave her the award as a personal “prize”, rather than as a pro-forma honor bestowed upon her entire delegation. She tells the interviewer that this was done even though she believes the Vatican was aware of her work for SheDecides, and that she sees it as confirmation of her work. […..]

“Sustainability” is a UN term that calls for a world population of 500 million. That means 5.5 billion people have got to go!

‘Sustainability’ key in Pope's visit to Chile

Father Felipe Herrera, Head of the Communication Department of the National Commission for the Apostolic Visit explains that the whole visit has been planned in the name of "sustainability" in line with 'Laudato Sì' and with Pope Francis' own choices.

Vatican News | Linda Bordoni | January 15, 2018

Papal visit organizers in Santiago, the capital of Chile where Pope Francis kicks off his 22nd apostolic visit abroad say everything is on track as the nation prepares to welcome the Pope.

Despite the complex challenges faced by the country and its Church today, a high number of people are expected to participate in the event, with an estimated over 1 million 200,000 due to arrive from throughout the country and from Argentina, Bolivia and Brazil.

Organizers have been working full steam and counting on the cooperation of thousands of volunteers.

Heading the Communication Department of the National Commission for the Apostolic Visit is Father Felipe Herrera. He spoke to Vatican News correspondent Stefan von Kempis of the huge challenges posed by contemporary lifestyle and the sheer quantity of information each one of us is offered 24 hours per day on social media. […..]

One aspect Herrera was keen to highlight is that organizers have prepared this visit in a sustainable way.

“We have prepared a series of documents that aim to inspire sustainability: environmental sustainability, economic and social sustainability” he said.

He said that many of the people helping out are not believers, “but we gave each of them a copy of ‘Laudato Sì’ and every single one of them loved it!”

“From the environmental point of view we are trying to have no emissions of CO2; we are aiming to make sure that the venues where the Pope will hold his events remain cleaner than they were before; we are making sure the disabled have front-row seats and that there are translations for the hearing impaired; and in the economic area we are working on absolute transparency” he said.

He also said the national commission for the apostolic visit has published the budget: “something that is very unusual! And when the visit is over we will publish which were the incomes and expenditures: we want to be absolutely transparent and act in the same way as the Pope dealing with the IOR and other economic realities”.

“For there will rise up false Christs and false prophets, and they shall shew signs and wonders, to seduce (if it were possible) even the elect.” Mark 13:22

Apparently, They Think We are Fools, By Christopher A. Ferrara

Beware of “moral theologians” in pastel blue...

As Pope Francis continues his five-year-long tirade against the imaginary Catholic Pharisees who defend the Church’s teaching on the indissolubility of marriage and the integrally related Eucharistic discipline—(on January 9)— he and his collaborators are busily engineering neo-Pharisaical escape hatches from the negative precepts of the divine and natural law emanating from the Sixth Commandment.

Determined to quell any Catholic opposition to his moral subversion, Francis has slapped the label Authentic Magisterium® on his outrageous opinion that in “complex circumstances” wherein it is not “feasible” to live as brother and sister, two people who are not married can be admitted to Holy Communion without ceasing extra-marital sexual relations so long as they engage in an ill-defined “process of discernment.” As Father Brian Harrison has so trenchantly observed, this means that people embroiled in adultery can receive Holy Communion while they “discern” that they should not be receiving Holy Communion because they are embroiled in adultery.

Do they think we are fools?

Then there is the endlessly double-talking Cardinal Müller. In a recent interview concerning Rocco Buttiglione’s verbal contortions aimed at demonstrating that the administration of Holy Communion to public adulterers is consistent with the Church’s bi-millennial prohibition of precisely that, Müller proposed this preposterous “solution” to a “problem” that does not exist:

It is possible that the penitent may be convinced in conscience, and with good reasons, of the invalidity of the first marriage even though they cannot offer canonical proof. In this case the marriage valid before God would be the second one and the pastor could grant the sacrament, certainly with the appropriate precautions as not to scandalize the community of the faithful and not to weaken the conviction of marriage indissolubility.

The Cardinal knows this is moral and canonical nonsense. No Catholic, whether or not he consults a priest, can declare for himself that his marriage in the Church was invalid, especially when—indeed because—he lacks canonical proof of invalidity. Moreover, absent an annulment granted by the competent Church tribunal, a purported “second marriage” can only be an invalid civil ceremony and thus a thinly disguised form of continuous public adultery. Cardinal Burke, whom Francis sacked as head of the Church’s highest tribunal because he was a major impediment to the conspiracy culminating in Amoris Laetitia (AL), has observed the obvious in this regard:

Such cases do not exist. No priest has the authority to declare a marriage null in the internal forum. Marriage is a public state in the Church, and the judgment regarding an accusation of nullity of marriage must be made in accord with the long practice of the Church. If a college of judges in a matrimonial tribunal is not able to arrive at moral certitude regarding the nullity of a marriage after a careful and thorough examination of the petition of nullity, how can an individual priest be capable of making such a judgment having to do with the eternal salvation of the soul in question?

The only case in which a priest could admit a person living in an irregular matrimonial union to receive the Sacraments of Penance and Holy Eucharist is the case of a couple who agree to live “as brother and sister”, that is to respect the marriage to which they are bound by not living in a marital way with another person. Even then, the priest would have to insist that the couple living in continence receive the Sacraments in a place in which they are not well known, lest other faithful be led to believe that persons living in an irregular matrimonial union may receive the Sacraments.

Does Cardinal Müller think we are fools? Some of us apparently are, or at least are willing to serve as knowing dupes by defending neo-Pharisaical sophistry that would produce “a discipline alien to the entire Tradition of the Catholic and Apostolic faith.”

Apparently, they think they can fool us in the next phase of the program of moral subversion that this incredible Pope seriously expects us to believe is an imperative of “mercy”: the justification of contraception in “complex cases” to which “discernment” must be applied. Consider the recent declaration by one of Francis' new appointments to the Pontifical Academy for Life, whose entire membership he sacked and whose constitution he ordered rewritten to neutralize it. In a lecture at the Gregorian, one Father Maurizio Chiodi, a “moral theologian” of the post-Vatican II variety, proposed that “an artificial method for the regulation of births could be recognized as an act of responsibility that is carried out, not in order to radically reject the gift of a child, but because in those situations responsibility calls the couple and the family to other forms of welcome and hospitality.”

That is, Francis’ man at the reconstituted Pontifical Academy declares openly that there is a duty to contracept! Chiodi’s sole “authority” for this lie from the pit of hell is nothing more than Chapter 8 of AL, the only document of its kind in the entire history of the Church. AL will doubtless be providing cover for a whole new line of Authentic Magisterium® products, all of which will be utter fakes, including some form of “pastoral integration” of homosexual unions.

Evidently, they do think we are fools or willing to play the fool in exchange for the benefits of respectable conformity in the midst of an unparalleled debacle for the Church. (Consider the example of Catholic Answers, which “defends the Faith” while refusing to recognize that it is under ferocious attack from the very vertices of the Church. Silence at best is the price it must pay for remaining in good standing with the pro-homosexual bishop Francis has installed in San Diego.)

But we are not fools. And God will not be mocked. Francis and all his designs will ultimately come to nothing. Meanwhile, ours is but to keep the Faith and protest before God and man the blows now raining down against the Church, even when they come from a wayward Roman Pontiff at her summit. Indeed, especially then.

The word, “discern” and its cognates, appears 40 time in the document, Amoris Laetitia. So if we want to know what Pope Francis means by “discernment”, here is a an example of “careful discernment” during a brief encounter over the skies of Chile. Was there discovery of any impediments to the sacrament?, Did the couple go to Confession?, In their parish chuch damaged by an earthquake eight years ago, has there been no sacramental life for any parishioners?, Or, has this couple never been back in the last eight years to find out?, etc., etc.

Pope Francis just performed a historic wedding aboard the papal plane

Washington Post | Lindsey Bever | January 18, 2018

Pope Francis just performed a wedding aboard the papal plane, a historic and unplanned moment near the end of his trip to Chile.

The midair ceremony Thursday for the two LATAM Airlines flight attendants came on the way from Santiago to the northern city of Iquique, according to the Italian news service ANSA.

The pair, identified by the Associated Press as Carlos Ciuffardi and Paola Podest, had told Francis during the flight that they’d had a civil ceremony but that their religious ceremony was put on hold because a 2010 earthquake in Chile had destroyed their church, according to ANSA.

It was then that Francis decided to perform the wedding. The Vatican told ANSA that the in-flight ceremony was “unexpected.”

Pope Francis Has Defended a Chilean Bishop Accused of Covering Up Sex Crimes

Time | Nicole Winfield / AP | January 19, 2018

(SANTIAGO, Chile) — Pope Francis accused victims of Chile’s most notorious pedophile of slander Thursday, an astonishing end to a visit meant to help heal the wounds of a sex abuse scandal that has cost the Catholic Church its credibility in the country.

Francis said that until he sees proof that Bishop Juan Barros was complicit in covering up the sex crimes of the Rev. Fernando Karadima, such accusations against Barros are “all calumny.”

The pope’s remarks drew shock from Chileans and immediate rebuke from victims and their advocates. They noted the accusers were deemed credible enough by the Vatican that it sentenced Karadima to a lifetime of “penance and prayer” for his crimes in 2011. A Chilean judge also found the victims to be credible, saying that while she had to drop criminal charges against Karadima because too much time had passed, proof of his crimes wasn’t lacking.

“As if I could have taken a selfie or a photo while Karadima abused me and others and Juan Barros stood by watching it all,” tweeted Barros’ most vocal accuser, Juan Carlos Cruz. “These people are truly crazy, and the pontiff talks about atonement to the victims. Nothing has changed, and his plea for forgiveness is empty.”

The Karadima scandal dominated Francis’ visit to Chile and the overall issue of sex abuse and church cover-up was likely to factor into his three-day trip to Peru that began late Thursday.

Karadima’s victims reported to church authorities as early as 2002 that he would kiss and fondle them in the swank Santiago parish he ran, but officials refused to believe them. Only when the victims went public with their accusations in 2010 did the Vatican launch an investigation that led to Karadima being removed from ministry.

The emeritus archbishop of Santiago subsequently apologized for having refused to believe the victims from the start.

Francis reopened the wounds of the scandal in 2015 when he named Barros, a protege of Karadima, as bishop of the southern diocese of Osorno. Karadima’s victims say Barros knew of the abuse, having seen it, but did nothing. Barros has denied the allegations.

His appointment outraged Chileans, badly divided the Osorno diocese and further undermined the church’s already shaky credibility in the country.

Francis had sought to heal the wounds by meeting this week with abuse victims and begging forgiveness for the crimes of church pastors. But on Thursday, he struck a defiant tone when asked by a Chilean journalist about Barros.

“The day they bring me proof against Bishop Barros, I’ll speak,” Francis said. “There is not one shred of proof against him. It’s all calumny. Is that clear?”

Francis had defended the appointment before, calling the Osorno controversy “stupid” and the result of a campaign mounted by leftists. But The Associated Press reported last week that the Vatican was so worried about the fallout from the Karadima affair that it was prepared in 2014 to ask Barros and two other Karadima-trained bishops to resign and go on a yearlong sabbatical.

According to a Jan. 31, 2015, letter obtained by AP from Francis to the executive committee of the Chilean bishops’ conference, the plan fell apart and Barros was sent to Osorno.

Juan Carlos Claret, spokesman for a group of Osorno lay Catholics who have mounted a three-year campaign against Barros, questioned why Francis was now accusing the victims of slandering Barros when the Vatican was so convinced of their claims that it planned to remove him in 2014.

“Isn’t the pastoral problem that we’re living (in Osorno) enough to get rid of him?” Claret asked.

The reference was to the fact that — guilty or not — Barros has been unable to do his job because so many Osorno Catholics and priests don’t recognize him as their bishop. They staged an unprecedented protest during his 2015 installation ceremony and have protested his presence ever since.

Anne Barrett Doyle, of the online database BishopAccountability.org, said it was “sad and wrong” for the pope to discredit the victims since “the burden of proof here rests with the church, not the victims — and especially not with victims whose veracity has already been affirmed.”

“He has just turned back the clock to the darkest days of this crisis,” she said in a statement. “Who knows how many victims now will decide to stay hidden, for fear they will not be believed?”

Indeed, Catholic officials for years accused victims of slandering and attacking the church with their claims. But up until Francis’ words Thursday, many in the church and Vatican had come to reluctantly acknowledge that victims usually told the truth and that the church for decades had wrongly sought to protect its own.

German Silva, a political scientist at Santiago’s Universidad Mayor, said the pope’s comments were a “tremendous error” that will reverberate in Chile and beyond.

Patricio Navia, political science professor at Diego Portales University in Santiago, said Francis had gone much further than Chilean bishops in acknowledging the sexual abuse scandal, which many Chileans appreciated.

“Then right before leaving, Francis turns around and says: ‘By the way, I don’t think Barros is guilty. Show me some proof,'” Navia said, adding that the comment will probably erase any good will the pope had won over the issue.

Navia said the Karadima scandal had radically changed how Chileans view the church.

“In the typical Chilean family, parents (now) think twice before sending their kids to Catholic school because you never know what is going to happen,” Navia said.

Worth Repeating: The SCHISM is already HERE! If you do not choose, the choice will be made for you! No one saves their soul by default.

COMMENT: This book in the article below provides an interpretation of Chapter 8 of Amoria Laetitia. It is addressed to bishops with a “merciful heart” and offers an interpretation that is consistent with the interpretation approved in the private letter sent by Pope Francis to the bishops of Argentina as well as with the interpretation of Cardinal Schornborn who Pope Francis has publically identified as its ‘official interpretor.’ These bishops say that the proper understanding and application is that any Catholic living in public adultery based upon their own private judgment in the internal forum can declare themselves worthy to receive Holy Communion and absolution in the sacrament of Penance and therefore cannot be denied these sacraments. It is given semi-official approval by its publication in L’Osservatore Romano.

Now in the Novus Ordo which may nothing more than a memorial meal as initially defined by Pope Paul VI, perhaps giving the Novus Ordo communion wafer to a person in objective mortal sin is not a real problem. But what is certainly a grave sin it that these persons can expect to be absolved by a confessor in the sacrament of Penance without confessing or repentance of mortal sin. Pope Francis and his CDF puppet, Cardinal Muller, will not be answering the Dubia in any official capacity. This does not represent a change in the Church’s teaching. It represents the active effort of a Francis and his minions to destroy the Catholic doctrine and morality. As we announced during the synod, the schism has long been present. It is more evident each passing day and every Catholic will have to pick sides. God cannot let an open attack upon the sacrament of marriage go unpunished. Their hypocrisy is oozing from every pore. Imagine if a Catholic with “humility, discretion and love for the Church and her teaching, in a sincere search for God’s will and a desire to make a more perfect response to it” arrives at traditional Catholicism, what kind of response can be expect from the local bishop and Rome? If you want to know read our OPEN LETTERS!

If, as a result of the process of discernment, undertaken with “humility, discretion and love for the Church and her teaching, in a sincere search for God’s will and a desire to make a more perfect response to it” (Amoris Laetitia 300). a separated or divorced person who is living in a new relationship manages, with an informed and enlightened conscience, to acknowledge and believe that he or she are at peace with God, he or she cannot be precluded from participating in the sacraments of Reconciliation and the Eucharist (see AL, notes 336 and 351).

Bishops Charles J Scicluna and Mario Grech, Guide for the Interpretation of Chapter 8 of Amoris Laetitia: An Invitatiion to the Bishops of Merciful Hearts. This received semi-official approbation by being featured in the publication, L’Osservatore Romano, 1-2017

Nothing will come of this until conservative Catholics realize that John Paul II's Prayer Meeting at Assisi was just as blasphemous as this Italian priest's public apostasy! But it is a beginning.

De Mattei: Minimalism: the present-day sickness of Catholicism

Roberto de Mattei | Corrispondenza Romana | January 17, 2018

In Italy recently, two videos have been circulating online which give pause for thought. The first replicates the words of Don Fredo Olivero, Rector of the Church of San Rocco in Turin, uttered during Midnight Mass. “Do you know why I’m not going to say the Creed? Because I don’t believe it!” Amidst the laughter of the faithful, the priest continues: “As if anyone understands it – but as for myself after many years I’ve realized that it was something I didn’t understand and couldn’t accept. Let’s sing something else that presents the essential things of the faith.” The priest then substituted the Creed with the song “Dolce Sentire” from the film “Brother Sun, Sister Moon”.

The Creed sums up the articles of the Catholic Faith. To deny merely one of these articles constitutes heresy. To deny the Creed, in block, constitutes an act of public apostasy. Further, to deny it during Holy Mass, constitutes an intolerable scandal. The removal, suspension a divinis and excommunication of the priest should have been immediate. Yet none of this occurred.

While the media was spreading this incredible news, the lone voice of ecclesiastical reaction came from the other end of Italy, in Sicily, where Don Salvatore Priola, parish-priest and rector of the Marian Sanctuary of Altavilla Milicia, expressed his indignation in a homily against the priest from Piedmont, urging his faithful, and every baptized person, to react publically in the face of such a scandal. A video reports his impassioned words: “Brothers and sisters – he said – when you hear a priest saying things that are against the Catholic Faith, you must have the courage to stand up and tell the priest - even during the Mass: this is not allowed! It’s time to stand up when you hear things that are against our Creed. Even if a bishop says them even if a priest says them. Stand up and say: Father, Your Grace, this is not allowed. Because we have the Gospel: Because we are all under the Gospel, from the Pope down. We are all under the Gospel.

The two opposing homilies call for some reflections. If a priest goes as far as repudiating the Catholic Creed, without incurring sanctions by the ecclesiastical authorities, we find ourselves indeed faced with a situation of crisis in the Church of unparalleled gravity. Even more since the case of Don Frido Olivero is not isolated. Thousands of priests in the world think the same way and act accordingly.

What appears to be something out of the ordinary though, and which consequently merits the total appreciation of true Catholics, is the Sicilian priest’s invitation to stand up in Church and admonish a priest publically, even a bishop, who is giving scandal. This public correction is not only legitimate, but at times a duty.

This is a point that ought to be emphasized. The true cause of the present crisis is not so much in the arrogance of those who have lost the faith, but in the weakness of those, who, conserving it, choose to be silent, rather than defend it publically. This minimalism constitutes our present-day spiritual and moral sickness. For many Catholics, we should not oppose errors, as it is enough “to behave well”, or resistance should be limited to the defense of the negative, moral absolutes, that is to those norms that prohibit always and in every case, specific behaviors against the Divine and moral law. This is sacrosanct, but we must remember that there are not only negative precepts which tell us what we can never do, there are also positive precepts which tell us what we must do; what works and attitudes that are pleasing to God and through which we are able to love our neighbor.

While the negative precepts (thou shalt not kill, steal or commit impure acts) are formulated in concrete terms seeing as they prohibit a specific action always and everywhere, without exceptions, the positive precepts (prayer, sacrifice, love of the Cross) are not specific, as they cannot establish what we must do in every circumstance, yet they are also obligatory, according to the situation. The modernists are improperly spreading “situation ethics” from the positive precepts to the negative ones, in the name of God’s love, forgetting that loving means observing the moral law, as Jesus said: “He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them; he it is that loveth me”. (John 14, 21).

The conservatives for their part, often attest positions of minimalistic morality, forgetting that a Catholic must love God with all their heart, mind, soul and strength (Mark. 12, 28-30). For this St. Thomas Aquinas explains that we are all bound not only to the good, but to the greater good, not at the level of action, but in that of love (Mat. 19, 12). The first moral truth is love. Man must love God above all creatures, and love creatures according to the order established by God. There are negative acts that can never be carried out, under any circumstance. Yet there are positive acts, which, in determinate circumstances are mandatory to carry out. This moral duty does not have its foundation in a negative precept, but in the love of God.

Precepts then have a lower limit: what one cannot do, but they do not have a higher limit since loving God and neighbor have no boundaries and we are perfect in the measure of our love. John Paul II explains it in no. 52 of Veritatis Splendor. “The fact that only the negative commandments oblige always and under all circumstances does not mean that in the moral life prohibitions are more important than the obligation to do good indicated by the positive commandments. The reason is this: the commandment of love of God and neighbour does not have in its dynamic any higher limit, but it does have a lower limit, beneath which the commandment is broken. Furthermore, what must be done in any given situation depends on the circumstances, not all of which can be foreseen.”

We must oppose the theory of the “lesser evil” with that of the “greater good”. At the level of action, the good cannot be determined a priori, since the actions we might carry out are many, uncertain and indeterminate. However, if the greater good presents itself as clear in our conscience, well defined and as such that we can act upon it hic et nunc, negligence is culpable: we have the moral obligation to act on it.

The precept of fraternal correction is among the positive moral precepts. One is not always obliged to do it, and one cannot demand it a duty from others, but each one of us must feel bound to react, faced with public negations of the Catholic Truth. Those who truly love God have to follow the example of Eusebius, the layman, subsequently made a bishop, who, in 423, rose up in public against Nestorius who had denied the Divine Maternity.

Don Salvatore Priola’s exhortation to stand up when we hear things said against the Catholic Faith, is an invitation to manifest our maximalism in loving God and not hide our light under a bushel, but put it in a lamp-stand, [in this way] illuminating the darkness of our times with our example.

“Through the deceit of evil men….. (who are) most certainly going to perish forever…”

Now we come to another very fertile cause of the evils by which, we are sorry to see, the contemporary Church being afflicted. This is indifferentism, or that wicked opinion which has grown up on all sides through the deceit of evil men. According to this opinion, the eternal salvation of the soul can be attained by any kind of profession of faith, as long as a man’s morals are in line with the standard of justice and honesty. You must drive out from the people entrusted to your care this most deplorable error on a matter so obviously important and so completely clear. For, since the Apostle has warned that there is one God, one faith, one baptism, those who pretend that the way to [eternal] beatitude starts from any religion at all should be afraid and should seriously think over the fact that, according to the testimony of the Savior Himself, they are against Christ because they are not for Christ; and that they are miserably scattering because they are not gathering with Him; and that consequently, they are most certainly going to perish forever, unless they hold the Catholic faith and keep it whole and inviolate.

Pope Gregory XVI, Mirari Vos

Catholic Dogma: Only the sacrament of Baptism received by those who hold the true faith can make men “children of God” and members of His Church!

In this crowd, in this range of religious, there is only one certainty we have for all: we are all children of God. I hope you will spread my prayer request for this month: That sincere dialogue among men and women of different faiths may produce the fruits of peace and justice. I have confidence in your prayers.

Pope Francis the Indifferent, Prayer intention for January 2016

Dogmas “are to give light, not to receive light from human reason”!

I answer: The obligation to believe what God says is a natural duty, it is a natural law, dictated by the common sense of reason which the Creator has deposited in every human soul. The Church only enforces this law, which existed before she herself existed, because from all eternity it was a truth that the creature is bound to believe the word of the Creator. If the Church allows no denial, no doubt, no alteration or misconstruction of any of her dogmas, it is because the veracity of the Son of God, who has revealed these truths, is attacked when any of His doctrines are denied or doubted. These dogmas are so many fixed stars in the firmament of holy Church. They cannot be reached by the perversity and frivolity of man. He may close his eyes against them and deny their existence; he may misrepresent them and look at them through glasses stained the color of every prejudice; but he cannot do away with them altogether, nor change in any way their natural brightness and brilliancy. Like the stars that deck the vault of heaven, they are to give light, not to receive light from human reason. They are the word of God, and what God says is truth, that cannot be made untruth. The mind that receives truth is enlightened thereby; the mind that denies or misrepresents it is darkened and corrupted.

Besides, every dogma of faith is to the Catholic cultivated mind not only a new increase of knowledge, but also an incontrovertible principle from which it is able to draw conclusions and derive other truths. They present an endless field for investigation so that the beloved Apostle St. John could write at the end of his Gospel, without fear of exaggeration: “But there are also many other things which Jesus did: which if they were written every one, the world itself, I think, world not be able to contain the books that should be written.”

Rev. Joseph Prachensky, S.J., The Church of the Parables and True Spouse of the Suffering Savior

Novena to SS. Peter and Paul

O glorious SS. Peter and Paul, filled with compassion for those who invoke you, with love for those who suffer, heavily laden with the weight of my troubles, I kneel at your feet and humbly beg you to take my present need under your special protection (mention intention). As disciples of Christ and the first pastors of the early Church you both knew disappointment and suffering. Lead me out of my troubles as you have so many to Christ our Lord. Cease not to intercede for me until my request is granted. Above all, obtain for me the grace to one day meet God face to face, and with you and Mary and all the angels and saints praise Him through all eternity.

O most powerful SS. Peter and Paul, do not let me lose my soul, but obtain for me the grace of winning my way to heaven.

O holy Apostles, Peter and Paul, I choose you this day and forever to be my special patrons and advocates; thee, Saint Peter, Prince of the Apostles, because thou art the Rock, upon which Almighty God hath built His Church; thee, Saint Paul, because thou wast fore-chosen by God as the Vessel of election and the Preacher of truth in the whole world. Obtain for me, I pray you, lively faith, firm hope and burning love; unshakable confidence in the merciful providence of God, complete detachment from myself, contempt of the world, patience in adversity, humility in prosperity, attention in prayer, purity of heart, a right intention in all my works, diligence in fulfilling the duties of my state of life, constancy in my resolutions, resignation to the will of God and perseverance in the grace of God even unto death; that so, by means of your intercession and your glorious merits, I may be able to overcome the temptations of the world, the flesh and the devil, and may be made worthy to appear before the chief and eternal Shepherd of souls, Jesus Christ, who with the Father and the Holy Ghost liveth and reigneth for endless ages, to enjoy His presence and love Him forever. AMEN

Our Father, Hail Mary, Glory be

§ V. Thou shalt make them princes over all the earth,

§ R. They shall be mindful of Thy name, O Lord.

Let us pray

O God, whose right hand raised up blessed Peter, when he walked upon the water and began to sink, and thrice delivered his fellow-Apostle Paul from the depths of the sea, when he suffered shipwreck: graciously hear us and grant, by the merits of them both, that we also may attain unto everlasting glory: Who livest and reignest world without end.

AMEN

VP of German Bishops Conference wants to bless homosexual couples

LifeSiteNews | GERMANY, January 10, 2018 – Bishop Franz-Josef Bode, the Vice President of the German Bishops' Conference, has called for a discussion about the possibility of blessing homosexual relationships. He believes there to be “much [that is] positive” in such relationships.

The new statement from Bishop Bode comes in the wake of a recent interview given to the German journal Herder Korrespondenz by Cardinal Reinhard Marx – President of the German Bishops' Conference and papal adviser – in which he proposed that the Catholic Church rethink her teaching on sexual morality in which he argued against “blind rigorism.” For him, it is “difficult to say from the outside whether someone is in the state of mortal sin.” Marx applied this statement not only to men and women in 'irregular situations,' but also to those in a homosexual relationship.

There has to be “a respect for a decision made in freedom” and for one's “conscience,” claimed Marx. He said that one has to take into account the “concrete circumstances,” while still remembering “one's own responsibility in light of the Gospels.” Of course, added Marx, one also has “to listen to the voice of the Church.” [.....]

Official Simony: Sacraments for Sale

German bishops raked in $7.1 billion last year from taxpayers

LifeSiteNews | GERMANY, January 4, 2018 — The German Bishops’ Conference received the equivalent of $7.1 billion US from German Catholic taxpayers in 2017.

This is the highest amount of tax revenue the German Catholic Church has received since the church tax was introduced to the constitution of the Weimar Republic in 1919. The clause concerning the tax was included in the new German Constitution after the Second World War.

The church tax, or Kirchensteuer, is levied upon Roman Catholics, “Old Catholics,” Lutherans, two other Protestant communions, and Jews. The revenue was once kept by the German government for the upkeep of religious buildings and payment of ministers’ salaries, but it is now given directly to the governing bodies of these religious communities. Muslim places of worship are self-supporting or receive funds from abroad.

The Kirchensteuer represents 8 percent-9 percent of an individual’s annual income, depending on where in Germany they live. The monthly deduction appears as “KS” on payslips, much to the consternation of foreign employees who do not consider themselves members of these religious communities but are taxed all the same. According to Handelsblatt, the German business magazine that broke the story of the German Church’s record haul, officials will go so far as to request the baptismal records of foreign nationals.

Germans and foreign residents can opt out of the church tax by going to a government office or courthouse, signing documents stating that they are no longer members of their religion, and paying a fee. German Christians began doing this in large numbers in the 1990s when taxes were significantly increased to rebuild post-reunification East Germany. In some cases, Christians signed the forms and continued participating in their faith communities.

However, the German Catholic bishops shut the door on this option for Catholics in 2012 when they decreed that Catholics who opted out of the Church tax would be socially and spiritually penalized.

Catholics who opt out of the church tax will not be employed by the German Catholic Church or its establishments, including schools and hospitals. They are not allowed to join such Catholic groups as church choirs. They may not be godparents. They are denied the sacraments and a Catholic funeral. [.....]

Cardinal: Those who practice homosexuality, contraception, adultery cannot receive Communion

LifeSiteNews| January 9, 2018 – Cardinal Juan Sandoval Íñiguez, Archbishop Emeritus of Guadalajara, Mexico, rejected the possibility of giving Holy Communion to people who commit the sins of homosexuality, contraception, and adultery, in an exclusive interview with LifeSiteNews.

He also called homosexuality a “psychological illness” that leads to the self-destruction of its practitioners. He accused the elite financial class of the Anglo-Saxon countries of seeking to impose gender ideology on developing countries.

Asked about proposals to give practicing homosexuals Holy Communion if they are in “good conscience” about their behavior, Sandoval responded, “They can't be in good conscience. Chastity is a universal precept. All of us must maintain chastity.”

The cardinal added that chastity is not something required exclusively of those who suffer from homosexual impulses, but of everyone according to his particular situation.

“So just as those who have normal tendencies, and aren't married, have to abstain, so those who have abnormal tendencies must also abstain,” said Sandoval, adding, “Even more so, knowing that homosexuality is a psychological illness which can be cured. Let them seek a cure, because homosexuality is never permitted.”

“That's what Genesis is about. Gomorrah . . . what happened with Sodom and Gomorrah? What happened? They gave vent to their desires and were destroyed in that way,” said the Cardinal.

“There are many people who have the misfortune of being homosexual but who live chastely,” said Sandoval. “Those, yes, are going to enter into the kingdom of God. But those who practice it will not enter the kingdom of God. St. Paul says that. And homosexuality is condemned, totally condemned, in the Old Testament, in Genesis, and by St. Paul in the New Testament.”

Sandoval also rejected proposals to give Holy Communion to Catholics who use artificial birth control, noting that “contraception is decisively condemned, totally condemned, in Blessed Paul VI's Humanae vitae. It's totally condemned because it runs counter to human nature and against the plan of God. All forms of contraception.” [......]

Excerpts from Letter Written by Catholic Converts from Islam to Pope Francis the Destroyer

You do not like to beat around the bush, and neither do we, so allow us to say frankly that we do not understand your teaching about Islam, as we read in paragraphs 252 and 253 of Evangelii Gaudium, because it does not account for the fact that Islam came AFTER Christ, and so is, and can only be, an Antichrist (see 1 Jn 2.22), and one of the most dangerous because it presents itself as the fulfillment of Revelation (of which Jesus would have been only a prophet). If Islam is a good religion in itself, as you seem to teach, why did we become Catholic? Do not your words question the soundness of the choice we made at the risk of our lives? Islam prescribes death for apostates (Quran 4.89, 8.7-11), do you know? How is it possible to compare Islamic violence with so-called Christian violence? “What is the relationship between Christ and Satan? What union is there between light and darkness? What association between the faithful and the unfaithful?” (2 Cor 6: 14-17)In accordance with His teaching (Lk 14:26), we preferred Him, the Christ, to our own life. Are we not in a good position to talk to you about Islam?[.....]

In fact, as long as Islam wants us to be its enemy, we are, and all our protestations of friendship cannot change anything. As a proper Antichrist, Islam exists only as an enemy of all: “Between us and you there is enmity and hatred forever, until you believe in Allah alone!” (Qur’an 60.4) For the Qur’an, Christians “are only impurity” (Quran 9.28),” “the worst of Creation” (Qur’an 98.6), all condemned to Hell (Qur’an 4.48), so Allah must exterminate them (Quran 9.30). We must not be deceived by the Quranic verses deemed tolerant, because they have all been repealed by the verse of the Sword (Quran 9.5). Where the Gospel proclaims the good news of Jesus’ death and resurrection for the salvation of all, and the fulfillment of the Covenant initiated with the Hebrews, Allah has nothing to offer but war and murder of the “infidels” in exchange for his paradise: “They fight on the way of Allah, they kill and are killed.” (Quran 9:11) We do not confuse Islam with Muslims, but if for you “dialogue” means the voice of peace, for Islam it’s only another way to make war. Also, as it was in the face of Nazism and communism, naiveté in the face of Islam is suicidal and very dangerous. How can you speak of peace and endorse Islam, as you seem to do: “To wring from our hearts the disease that plagues our lives (...) Let those who are Christians do it with the Bible and those who are A Muslims do it with the Quran. “(Rome, January 20, 2014)? That the Pope seems to propose the Quran as a way of salvation, is that not cause for worry? Should we return to Islam? [.....]

the welcoming of migrants regardless of the fact that they are Muslims, something forbidden by Apostolic command: “If anyone comes to you but refuses this Gospel, do not receive him among you nor greet him. Whoever greets him participates in his evil works.” (2 John 1.10-11); “If anyone preaches to you a different Gospel, let him be accursed!” (Galatians 1.8-9) [.....]

The pro-Islam speech of Your Holiness leads us to deplore the fact that Muslims are not invited to leave Islam, and that many ex-Muslims, such as Magdi Allam, are even leaving the Church, disgusted by her cowardice, wounded by equivocal gestures, confused by the lack of evangelization, scandalized by the praise given to Islam … Thus ignorant souls are misled… [....]

not preparing for a confrontation with Islam, to which St. John Paul II has called them (Ecclesia in Europa, No. 57). We are under the impression that you do not take your brother Bishop Nona Amel, Chaldean-Catholic Archbishop of Mosul in exile, seriously, when he tells us: “Our present sufferings are the prelude to those that you, Europeans and Western Christians, will suffer in the near future. I have lost my diocese. The headquarters of my archdiocese and my apostolate have been occupied by radical Islamists who want us to convert or die. (…) You are welcoming into your country an ever increasing number of Muslims. You are in danger as well. You must make strong and courageous decisions (…). You think that all men are equal, but Islam does not say that all men are equal. (…) If you do not understand this very quickly, you will become the victims of the enemy that you have invited into your home.” (August 9, 2014) “This is a matter of life and death, and any complacency towards Islam is treasonous. We do not wish the West to continue with Islamization, nor that your actions contribute to it. Where then would we go to seek refuge? [.....]

Signed by over 2600 Catholic Converts, Posted on Rorate Caeli

For all the gods of the Gentiles are devils; but the Lord made the heavens. Ps. 44

Pope Francis denigrates traditional Catholics as schismatics and regards those who keep the immemorial ecclesiastical customs of our Faith as “neo-Pelegians.” If the members of Ss. Peter & Paul were really “schismatics,” we would then have their “respect” for us, and “respect (for our) religion, its teachings, its symbols, its values.... (for our) religious leaders and places of worship.”

    ....Turning to mutual respect in interreligious relations, especially between Christians and Muslims, we are called to respect the religion of the other, its teachings, its symbols, its values. Particular respect is due to religious leaders and to places of worship. How painful are attacks on one or other of these!
   It is clear that, when we show respect for the religion of our neighbours or when we offer them our good wishes on the occasion of a religious celebration, we simply seek to share their joy, without making reference to the content of their religious convictions.
    Regarding the education of Muslim and Christian youth, we have to bring up our young people to think and speak respectfully of other religions and their followers, and to avoid ridiculing or denigrating their convictions and practices.
    We all know that mutual respect is fundamental in any human relationship, especially among people who profess religious belief. In this way, sincere and lasting friendship can grow.....

Pope Francis, greeting to Mohammedans at the end of Ramadan

Tell Novus Ordo Saint JP II the “Great” – if he indeed made it to Purgatory - to turn out the lights and lock the place up when he is the last to leave.

John Paul II was a pope under whose reign we had the most horrific scandal in the Church’s 2000-year history. Thousands of children were molested by priests and bishops he ordained. By the end of his pontificate, lawsuits were bankrupting Catholic Churches all over the world; and between one third and one half of the clergy (sources available upon request) were admittedly homosexual, with a significant percentage being pederasts whom the pope didn’t even admit existed when he was told of their crimes, much less did anything to stop them, even when stark evidence was brought before him, as in the case of Legionnaires leader Marciel Maciel. At the same time he hid other clerics from prosecution, as in the case of Cardinal Bernard Law of Boston.

This was the pope who allowed the Vatican Bank’s corruption that started under Paul VI to continue with little or no reform; and who protected its chief perpetrator, Bishop Paul Marcinkus, from prosecution. He did nothing to investigate the suspected murder of John Paul I, the very pope who made it known in the first days of his reign that he was going to clean up the financial misdealings of his curia. This was the pope who took 250 million dollars of the Vatican’s money and gave it to Solidarity in Poland, thereby making the Church a political institution instead of a spiritual one. By the same token he condemned Liberation theology because if its tendency to get involved in politics.

This was the pope who went to the hut of an African witch doctor in 1985 and afterward wrote, “the prayer meeting in the sanctuary at Lake Togo was particularly striking. There I prayed for the first time with animists.” In December 1984 he sent a Vatican representative to the laying of the foundation of the largest mosque in Europe. In September 1989 he wrote to Muslim leaders and said: “In the name of the same God we adore,” without any qualifications whatsoever. In May 1999 he kissed the Koran in a public ceremony; and in 2000 asked John the Baptist “to protect Islam.” In February 1986 he received the red dust of the Hindu religion on his forehead in honor of the goddess Shiva. In March 1986 in New Delhi he stated that “collaboration between all religions is necessary for the good of mankind... as Hindus, Buddhists, Jainists, and Christians, we unite to proclaim the truth about man.”

This was the pope who invited all the world’s non-Christian and pagan religions to pray for world peace at Assisi in 1986 and Assisi in 2002 (with five additional Assisi-like gatherings in the 1990s in various countries) and never once in those 16 years did he preach the Gospel to them about conversion to Christ for salvation. Instead he sent them all back to their countries encouraging them to continue to pray to their false gods, the very opposite that St. Paul did in Acts 17. He paid no attention to any of his high-placed clerical advisors who told him these acts were abominations.

This was the pope who, against two millennia of Catholic tradition, told husbands to be mutually submissive to women; dispensed with head coverings for women; and allowed women and girls to be communion ministers, altar girls, and directors of chanceries, thereby increasing the feminization of the Church amidst an already feminized clergy who were by this time at least a third homosexual, while another significant portion were receiving paternity suits.

This was the pope who profusely apologized for the ecclesiastical policies of previous popes; who had his Vatican envoy sign the 1998 Lutheran/Catholic Joint declaration which, in direct contradiction to the Council of Trent, said “man is justified by faith alone.” This was the pope who told the Lutherans they had a “profound religiousness and spiritual heritage” and that Martin Luther was driven by a “burning passion of the question of eternal salvation,” and who told the Lutheran bishops that Rome’s excommunication of Luther had expired, and that “There is a need for a new evaluation of the questions raised by Luther and his teaching.” This was the pope who implied or taught universal salvation and that hell may not be applicable to any human being. This was the pope who at the very beginning of his pontificate in the 1979 encyclical Redemptor Hominis used the word “church” 150 times but never once mentioned the word “Catholic.” This was the pope who continually sided with liberals like Karl Rahner, Urs von Balthasar and Raymond Brown but who would hardly give an ear to those, such as Archbishop Lefebvre, who wanted to preserve the tradition and who decried the anti-Catholic innovations being foisted on the Catholic populace. (Fortunately, Pope Benedict XVI saw John Paul II’s mistake and reversed the decision against Lefebvre). This was the pope who was criticized by his own admirers for failing to discipline wayward clerics, both in their doctrinal aberrations and moral laxity (Charles Curran, Edward Schillebeeckx, Hans Kung, et al). Ironically, the only cleric that was excommunicated was Lefebvre, yet he was one of the most doctrinally sound and morally upright clerics the Church had ever known.

This was the pope who in 1981, contrary to tradition, implied or taught that the Jewish Old Covenant is not revoked and that Jews have a special relationship with God, as does Paragraph 121 of his papally-signed 1994 Catechism. He continued to propagate confusing and doctrinally fallacious teaching about the Jews and Judaism through his cardinals who taught that the Jews did not need to convert to Christianity to be saved since they have their own covenant with God (Kasper, Keeler, Willebrands, George, Ratzinger, et al). This was the first pope in history to visit Israel and who then placed himself under Judaism by praying at the Jerusalem’s Wailing Wall. This was the pope who, for the first time in the history of the papacy, visited and prayed in Jewish synagogues - the religion that denies more than any other that Jesus Christ is God.

Last but not least, this was the pope who changed the Church’s criterion for sainthood, which now allows him and all his fellow 20th century popes to be easily canonized in the face of the fact that there have been only three popes canonized since 1294 (Pius X, d. 1914; Pius V, d. 1572; Celestine V, d. 1294). As such, the very popes who lived and reigned during the Church’s worst corruptions and scandals are now being exonerated and place in heaven.

Robert Sungenis, Ph.D., Letter to Editor, Culture Wars Magazine

COMMENT: He forgot to mention that it was JP II who left Bishop Zanic and, then Bishop Peric, former ordinaries of Medjugorge, who had condemned the false apparitions as the work of the devil, hanging in the wind by his silence on the matter. More than 20 million Catholics have made the pilgrimage the “shrine” and helped spread the doctrinal errors worldwide.

The “Miracle of the Red Thread”- The Talmud Confirms the Sacrifice of Christ on the Cross

by Giuseppe Nardi, posted on Eponymous Flower Blog

Talmud and Zohar report that the Jewish high priest offered animal sacrifices only once a year, on Yom Kippur, the

“Day of Atonement,” entering the Holy of Holies of the Temple (see also Heb 9: 6-7). He asked for forgiveness for the sins of the Jews, who were once called Israelites. The Zohar is the most important font of Kabbalah, a Jewish secret doctrine. Both scriptures mention “the miracle of the red thread.”

The Zohar is included in the commentary to Vayikra, as the Book of Leviticus or Third Book of Moses in Hebrew reads:

“On this day, all sins will be forgiven [...] the impurities of the souls and bodies [...] all of them, on that day [...] God forgives Israel and freed it from all sins. On this day, the priest prays for himself, his house, the priests, and for all and for the sanctuary for forgiveness [...] they would know whether the priest had success by the red thread. “(Vayikra, 3).

If the thread discolored to white from red, there was rejoicing among all the people. If it remained red, there was general dejection, because it was the sign that the sacrifice of the High Priest and his prayers were not heard by God.

The priests and people knew that God had not forgiven the sins.

The emergence of the Zohar is now dated by the research in the 13th century and its authorship is attributed to Mosche de León. It is not Orthodox Judaism, that affirms Shimon ben Jochais, a Talmudic Rabbi of the 2nd century AD.

The prophet Isaiah alluded to this “thread”, without expressly describing it. That was for the Jews not even necessary. They knew how to interpret the words:

“Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow. Though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool “(Isaiah 1:18).

For 40 years the miracle ceased

The Talmud reports that this great miracle of divine confirmation of the acceptance of the priestly sacrifice and therefore the forgiveness of sins, had already ceased for forty years before the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem.

“Originally they fastened the thread at the gate of the outer [temple] Court. Were it white, the people rejoiced, when it was not, they were troubled. [...] For forty years before the destruction of the Temple the red thread was no longer white, but remained red.”(Babylonian Talmud, Rosh Hashanah 31b). The same is reported in the Jerusalem Talmud (yYom 6,3,43c).

The Talmud is the central font of Judaism after the denial and execution of Christ. The quoted passage is goes back to the time of the Pharisee Rabbi Gamaliel II, who died in the year 114 AD. Gamaliel was responsible for the final expulsion of the Jewish Christians from the synagogue and cursing them as heretics.

The temple was destroyed in 70 AD by the Romans under the high command of Titus, the son of Emperor Vespasian, who himself was later emperor. The “miracle of the red thread” therefore, had no longer occurred since the year 30 AD. This is exactly the time when Jesus was crucified at Calvary. The New Testament, which was written by Jews who saw Christ and followed him, teaches that the sacrifice of the Cross of Christ replaced the animal sacrifices of the Old Covenant. The old temple had lost its meaning and the animal sacrifice their effectiveness. In place of the old covenant, a new covenant was entered.

Every persecution that Catholics suffer under can be attributed, not to the strength of our enemies, but to the tepidity and coldness of Catholics to the graces offered by our Lord!

In 1681 the Turks threatened to overrun Europe. Pope Innocent XI. had recourse to prayer, and so as to secure the intercession of all the Faithful, he published a Jubilee, giving special privileges to all who prayed that the power of the Turks might be checked. The Holy Father was not deceived in his hope. The Ottoman army was completely overthrown before the walls of Vienna. John Sobieski gained a magnificent victory and gladly referred his success to the prayers that had been offered. Whilst the Te Deum was being sung in the Cathedral of Vienna, he lay prostrate on the ground, in thanksgiving for the marvelous victory.

Sister Margaret Mary prayed most fervently during this Jubilee, and Our Lord taught her the spirit in which she should plead for the great object put before all Catholics by the Pope. He appeared to her as a Judge, and told her that His justice was irritated, not so much on account of the Infidels, but because of His chosen people, who had revolted against Him and made use of their easy access to Him to persecute Him. “If they do not amend”, He said, “I will make them feel the weight of My avenging justice.” Just at this moment the bell rang for Matins, Sister Margaret Mary rose to go, but the vision did not cease, and Jesus continued to speak to her. “Weep and sigh continually that My Blood should be shed unprofitably for so many souls, who abuse it greatly in these Indulgences. They are satisfied with cutting down the bad weeds that grow in their hearts without ever trying to root them up. But woe to those souls who remain uncleansed and insensible in the midst of these living waters; they will never be either washed from their stains or find their thirst quenched.” Sister Margaret Mary knew that Our Lord was Himself thirsting for these souls; she therefore addressed herself to His Sacred Heart: “Place all these souls herein, my Lord, so that they may be sanctified and glorify Thee eternally. “Yes,” replied Our Lord, “I will do so, if thou wilt answer for their perfect amendment.” “Thou knowest well, O my God,” she rejoined, “that this is not in my power unless Thou Thyself enable me by the efficacious merit of Thy Passion.”

Then Our Lord taught her to ask for three things specially in time of Jubilee. First, to offer to the Eternal Father the superabundant satisfaction He had made to the Divine Justice for sinners upon the cross, and to beg of Him to apply the merits of His Precious Blood to all souls in mortal sin, that they might be raised to a life of grace, and glorify God eternally. Secondly, to offer to Him the burning love of His Sacred Heart in satisfaction for the tepidity and cowardice of His chosen people, and to beg of Him, by the ardent love which made Him suffer death, to rekindle the fire of His love in those tepid hearts, so that they might love and glorify Him eternally. Thirdly, to offer the submission of His Will to His Eternal Father, and to beg of Him, through the merits of His Son, that He would complete and perfect His graces and consummate the accomplishment of His Will.

Sister Mary Philip, Visitation nun of the Bar Convent, York, Life of Blessed Margaret Mary Alacoque

Queers Always Hang Together

“Sodomy Is a Gift from God…. Those who oppose sodomy should be debarred from church seminaries.”

Rev. Timothy Radcliffe, O.P., Pope Francis’ appointment to the Pontifical Council of Justice

Hermeneutics of Continuity/Discontinuity

Pope Francis Teaches:

If someone comes to you and feels something must be removed from him, but perhaps he is unable to say it, but you understand … it’s all right, he says it this way, with the gesture of coming. First condition. Second, he is repentant. If someone comes to you it is because he doesn’t want to fall into these situations, but he doesn’t dare say it, he is afraid to say it and then not be able to do it. But if he cannot do it, ad impossibila nemo tenetur. And the Lord understands these things, the language of gestures. Have open arms, to understand what is inside that heart that cannot be said or said this way … somewhat because of shame … you understand me. You must receive everyone with the language with which they can speak. Pope Francis the Faithless

Catholic Church Teaches:

If any one denieth, that, for the entire and perfect remission of sins, there are required three acts in the penitent, which are as it were the matter of the sacrament of Penance, to wit, contrition, confession, and satisfaction, which are called the three parts of penance; or saith that there are two parts only of penance, to wit, the terrors with which the conscience is smitten upon being convinced of sin, and the faith, generated (a) by the gospel, or by the absolution, whereby one believes that his sins are forgiven him through Christ; let him be anathema. Council of Trent, Canon IV on the sacrament of Penance

The hermeneutic of continuity between Liberation Theology and the Gaia Cult of Earth Worship demonstrates that they are of one and the same provenance! Is any faithful Catholic really surprised? Should anyone be surprised that Pope Francis finds in Boff a kindred spirit?

Liberation Theologian Boff: “Francis is One of Us”

OnePeterFive | Maike Hickson | December 26, 2016

On 25 December 2016 the Brazilian Leonardo Boff, one of the most prominent theorists and operatives of Latin American Liberation Theology, gave a candidly revealing and manifoldly informative interview to the German regional newspaper Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger. Due to his confident, if not presumptuous, openness, the 78-year-old Boff (b. 14 December 1938) speaks about several matters of moment which we otherwise would not so easily hear about.

For example, he reveals the following:

1. How and why Pope Francis did not meet Boff in Rome, as planned, on the day before the second Synod on the Family in 2015 – because the pope was angry at the Thirteen Cardinals’ Letter and was trying to quiet the situation (and himself?) ahead of the Synod;

2. How Cardinal Walter Kasper recently told Boff that Pope Francis has some “big surprises” planned;

3. How Pope Francis intends to allow the Catholic Church in Brazil to permit married priests, as his friend Cardinal Claudio Hummes has been requesting now for some time;

4. How Pope Francis had requested from Boff material for the writing of his own encyclical Laudato Si and how the pope thanked him afterwards;

5. How Boff considers Pope Francis to be “one of us,” meaning one of the supportive sympathizers with liberation theology.

In the following, therefore, I shall translate parts of this important interview. The words of Leonardo Boff will speak for themselves. Important to note in this context, however, is that Boff himself was publicly criticized and silenced in 1985 by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger – then the Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) – for his unorthodox writings that boldly go quite far against Church doctrine. Thus, in 1992, he both formally left the Franciscan Order to which he had belonged and he also then publicly left the Catholic priesthood.

QUESTION: Liberation Theology of Latin America – one of whose most prominent representatives you certainly are – has now received new honors [and encouraging support] from and through Pope Francis. [Is there now to be] A rehabilitation also for you personally, after your years-long struggles with Pope John Paul II himself and with his highest defender of Doctrine, Joseph Ratzinger, who later became Pope Benedict XVI?

Francis is one of us. He has turned Liberation Theology into a common property of the Church. And he has widened it. Whoever speaks today of the poor, also has to speak of the earth, because it, too, is now being plundered and abused. “To hear the cry of the poor,” that means to hear the cry of the animals, the forests, of the whole tortured creation. The whole earth cries. Also, says the pope – and he thus quotes one of the titles of one of my books – we have to hear simultaneously the cry of the poor and the cry of the earth. And, for sure, both need to be liberated. I myself have dealt in the recent past with this widening of the Liberation Theology. And that [this environmental dimension] is also the fundamentally new aspect in Laudato Si.

QUESTION: ….which is now in the “ecological encyclical” of the pope promulgated in the year 2015. How much Leonardo Boff is in Jorge Mario Bergoglio?

The encyclical belongs to the pope. But he has consulted with many experts.

QUESTION: Has he read your books?

More than that. He asked me for material for the sake of Laudato Si. I have given him my counsel and sent to him some of what I have written. Which he has also used. Some people told me they were thinking while reading: “Wait, that is Boff!” By the way, Pope Francis directly told me: “Boff, don’t send the papers directly to me.”

QUESTION: Why not?

He said: “Otherwise, the Sottosegretari (the employees of the Vatican administration, editors [of the Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger]) will intercept them and I will not receive them. Rather, send the things right to the Argentine Ambassador [at the Holy See] with whom I have a good connection, then they will safely land into my hands.” For that, one needs to know that the current Ambassador at the Holy See is an old friend of the pope from his time in Buenos Aires. They have often drunk together mate [a special drink from Argentina, a sort of tea]. Then, one day before the publication of the encyclical, the pope had someone call me in order to thank me for my help.

QUESTION: A personal meeting with the pope is still outstanding?

He [Pope Francis] has sought a reconciliation with the most important representatives of the Liberation Theology: with Gustavo Gutierrez, Jon Sobrino, and likewise with me. I have said to him with respect to Pope Benedict – respectively Joseph Ratzinger – “But that other is still alive, after all!” He did not accept this. “No,” he said, “Il Papa sono io” – “The pope, that is me!” We were welcomed to come. That is where you see his courage and his decisiveness.

QUESTION: Why then has your visit not yet worked out?

I had received an invitation and I even had already landed in Rome. But just that day, immediately before the beginning of the [second] Synod on the Family in 2015, 13 cardinals – among them the German Cardinal Gerhard Müller – rehearsed a rebellion against the pope with a letter addressed to him which then, o surprise!, was published in a newspaper. The pope was angry and he told me: “Boff, I have no time. I have to establish calm before the synod begins. We will see each other another time.”

QUESTION: But also with the hoped-for calm, that did not really work out, either, did it?

The pope feels the sharpness of the headwind from his own ranks, especially coming from the U.S. This Cardinal Burke, Leo Burke, who now – together with your retired Cardinal Meisner from Cologne – has already written another letter [to the pope]; he is is the Donald Trump of the Catholic Church (laughs). But, unlike Trump, Burke has now been neutralized within the Curia. Thanks be to God. These people really believe that it is up to them to correct the pope. As if they are above the pope. Something like this is unusual [sic!], if not unprecedented in the history of the Church. One may criticize the pope, one may have discussions with him. That is what I have often done. But, that cardinals publicly accuse the pope of the spreading of theological mistakes or even heresies, that is – I think – too much. That is an affront with which a pope cannot put up. The pope cannot be judged, that is the teaching of the Church.

QUESTION: With all your enthusiasm for the pope – what is it with these Church reforms which so many Catholics have expected from Francis; but where, in fact, not so much has yet happened?

You know, as far as I understand, the center of his interest is not any more the Church – and certainly not the internal operation of the Church – but, rather, the survival of humanity, the future of the earth. […] I believe that there is a hierarchy of problems for him. When the earth perishes, all the other problems have also been taken care of. But, with regard to the questions within and about the Church: wait and see! Only recently, Cardinal Walter Kasper, a close confidant of the pope, told me that soon there will be some great surprises.

QUESTION: What do you expect?

Who knows? Perhaps a diaconate for women, after all. Or the possibility that married priests may be again engaged in pastoral care. That is an explicit request from the Brazilian bishops to the pope, especially from his friend, the retired Brazilian Curial Cardinal Claudio Hummes. I have heard that the pope wants to meet this request – for now and for a certain experimental period in Brazil. This country with its 140 million Catholics should at least have 100,000 priests. But, there are only 18,000. Institutionally, this is a catastrophe. No wonder that the faithful now go in droves to the Evangelicals and the Pentecostals, who fill this personal vacuum. If now all these thousands of already married priests might again exercise their office, this would be a first step toward an improvement of the situation – and, at the same time, it would be an impulse [and a sign] that the Catholic Church now loosens the fetters of obligatory celibacy. [my emphasis]

QUESTION: If the pope were to make a decision in this sense and direction – would you yourself, as a former Franciscan priest, also again undertake priestly duties?

I personally do not need such a decision. It would not change anything for myself because I still do what I have always done: I baptize, I give Christian burials, and if I happen to come into a parish without a priest, then I also celebrate Mass together with the people.

QUESTION: Is it very “German” to ask whether you are permitted to do that?

Up to now, no bishop whom I know has ever either criticized it or forbidden it. The bishops, on the contrary, are happy and tell me: “the people have a right [sic] to the Eucharist. Just keep doing it!” My theological teacher, Cardinal Paulo Evaristo Arns – who just died a few days ago – was, for example, of a very great openness. He went so far that, when he saw married priests sitting in the pew during Mass, he had them come to the altar and he then concelebrated the Eucharist with them. He did it often and said: “You are, after all, still priests – and you will remain so!”

Comment by Maike Hickson:

In the context of this blunt interview – and with Boff’s apparently newly discovered “orthodox” criticisms of those people who now even dare to criticize a pope – it might be worth recalling and reading what Leonardo Boff had earlier said, back in 2001.

For, in that 2001 interview with the Internet site Communità Italiana, he also spoke bluntly concerning both Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger himself – then Head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith under Pope John Paul II – and Ratzinger’s own putatively provocative defense of certain traditional positions and doctrines of the Catholic Church:

“What I can say is that the dominant tendency in the Vatican under this pontificate [of John Paul II] is highly fundamentalist. A Cardinal like J. Ratzinger who publishes an official [Vatican] document in which he says that the only true Church is the Catholic Church and that the rest are not even churches, that the only legitimate religion is the Catholic religion and that the others have no faith (they are only convictions and beliefs) – he commits religious terrorism [sic] and is in grave theological error, as well.” [my emphasis]

The poignancy – and irony – of these Boff comments increases when one considers that, in 1970 in Munich, it was Cardinal Ratzinger himself who was one of the committee of select professorial guides of Leonardo Boff’s own doctoral dissertation de Ecclesia: concerning “the Church as Sacrament” in light of some of the world’s purported experiences. The main title of Boff’s dissertation, in German, was: Die Kirche als Sakrament im Horizont der Welterfahrung.

In the larger context of this recent 25 December 2016 interview with Leonardo Boff, we also would like to remind our readers of the work of the Vatican specialist, Dr. Sandro Magister, who has repeatedly pointed to the possibility, even the probability, that Pope Francis himself will grant Brazil the permission to allow for married priests. We also remember that we ourselves earlier reported how – right after the publication of the 13 Cardinals Letter by way of Dr. Magister himself – there also came trustworthy reports about Pope Francis’ own outburst of anger over that polite, but firmly orthodox, initiative of the cardinals. Thus in his confident bluntness, Leonardo Boff now unexpectedly confirms the earlier work of journalists, both of Dr. Magister himself and, in a small way, of mine own.

Hermeneutics of Continuity/Discontinuity - the difference between preaching and dialogue!

The “Traditional Evangelization” – Conversion to the True Faith in the Catholic Church

· “Go ye into the whole world, and preach the gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is baptized, shall be saved: but he that believeth not shall be condemned.”

Jesus Christ, Mark 16, 15-16

· “There is but one universal Church of the faithful, outside which no one at all is saved.”

Pope Innocent III, Fourth Lateran Council 1215

· “We declare, say, define, and pronounce that it is absolutely necessary for the salvation of every human creature to be subject to the Roman Pontiff.”

Pope Boniface VIII, Unam Sanctam, 1302

· “The most Holy Roman Church firmly believes, professes and preaches that none of those existing outside the Catholic Church, not only pagans, but also Jews and heretics and schismatics, can have a share in life eternal; but that they will go into the eternal fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels, unless before death they are joined with Her; and that so important is the unity of this ecclesiastical body that only those remaining within this unity can profit by the sacraments of the Church unto salvation, and they alone can receive an eternal recompense for their fasts, their almsgivings, their other works of Christian piety and the duties of a Christian soldier. No one, let his almsgiving be as great as it may, no one, even if he pour out his blood for the Name of Christ, can be saved, unless he remain within the bosom and the unity of the Catholic Church.”

Pope Eugene IV, Cantate Dominio, 1441

The “Old-New Evangelization” of Vatican II – Ecumenical Convergence replaced Conversion

[According to Lumen Gentium] the Catholic Church has no right to absorb the other Churches... [A] basic unity — of Churches that remain Churches, yet become one Church — must replace the idea of conversion, even though conversion retains its meaningfulness for those in conscience motivated to seek it.

Fr. Josef Ratzinger, Theological Highlights of Vatican II

Heretics and schismatics place an obstacle to God’s grace by their sins of infidelity and schism in which they actually persevere.

St. Robert Bellarmine

Heresy as an act of the “Authentic Magisterium” only makes the pope a heretic!

[…..] The “hermeneutic of continuity,” or the attempt to interpret erroneous or ambiguous documents in the light of the Tradition of the Church, did not work well even when it was promoted by a Pope like Benedict XVI. Is it not an illusion to pretend to keep using it when it is now the Pope himself who proposes the hermeneutic of discontinuity? Is it not simpler and more logical to remember that there can be errors contained in non-infallible acts of the ordinary Magisterium? “Authentic Magisterium” does not in fact mean “dogmatic,” and if the believer observes, in a reasonably evident manner, a precise opposition between a text of this Magisterium and the divine law of the Church, after accurately studying the matter, he may licitly suspend or negate his assent to the papal document. This doctrine is found in the writings of the most authoritative theologians, such as Fr. Hugo von Hurter (1832-1914), who affirms:

“If in the mind of the believer there are grave and solid reasons, above all theological, against decisions of the authentic Magisterium (= non-infallible), whether episcopal or pontifical, it will be lawful for him to reject the error, assent conditionally, or finally also to suspend assent” (Theologiae Dogmaticae Compendium, Wagneriana-Bloud et Barral, Innsbruck-Parigi, 1883, vol. I, p. 492).

Recalling the words of Saint Paul: “But even if we ourselves or an angel from heaven should preach to you a Gospel other than the one that we preached to you, let him be anathema” (Galatians 1:8), St. Vincent of Lerins comments:

“But why does he say ‘even if we ourselves’ and not ‘even if I myself’? Because he means that also if Peter or Andrew or John or the entire college of the apostles preaches to you a Gospel other than the one that we preached to you, let him be anathema. What tremendous rigor! In order to affirm his fidelity to the primitive faith he spared neither himself nor the other apostles” (Commonitorium, cap. VIII, 2).

The possibility of infidelity to the Tradition of an assembly of bishops, and of Peter himself, however rare, is not excluded. To close one’s eyes to reality means to put oneself in a dead end. Both reason and the sensus fidei demand resistance, including public resistance, to a Pope who promotes, encourages, and favors errors and heresies within the Church. ....

Roberto De Mattei, excerpt from A Response to Edward Peters on the Buenos Aires Letter & Authentic Magisterium, December 12, 2017

Pope Francis credited with helping euthanasia law pass in Italy

LifeSiteNews | ROME | December 19, 2017– Euthanasia has come to Italy, and both jubilant right-to-die activists and heartbroken Catholics are giving Pope Francis part of the credit. Moreover, the law does not provide doctors the right to refuse participation via conscientious objection.

Last Thursday the Italian government passed a law allowing adults to determine their end-of-life care, including the circumstances in which they can refuse treatment. Italians will now be able to write “living wills” in which they can refuse not only medical treatment, but also hydration and nutrition.

According to Catholic doctrine, the withdrawal of nutrition and hydration is passive euthanasia.

The Italian end-of-life bill was first introduced thirty years ago, but was vigorously opposed at that time by pro-life politicians who blocked its passage by suggesting over three thousand amendments. However, on Wednesday the amendments were voted down, 180 to 71, with 6 abstentions.

The new legislation will be entered in the official record on the 40th anniversary of the passing of the Italian law allowing abortion.

Critics say the resistance of Catholic politicians to the bill was weakened after Pope Francis’ November speech to the Pontifical Academy for Life, in which he indicated that people may refuse life-prolonging medical treatment but failed to note that administration of nutrition and hydration are basic humanitarian care rather than medical treatment. According to Italy’s La Repubblica, and The New York Time, many of the bill’s supporters, and many Catholics, saw Francis’s speech as a “green light” to the new law.

“The words of Pope Francis on the end of life, on November 16 at the Pontifical Academy for Life, were interpreted by all as an ‘open door’ to the form of euthanasia that is the living will,” wrote Roberto di Mattei, Catholic historian and head of Italy’s Lepanto Foundation.

The Pope's words on the topic were necessary, wrote Corrado Augias in La Repubblica, “to overthrow the last resistance of some Catholics and--probably--to convince at least a group of them to give their consent to [the pro-euthanasia law].”

Right-to-die advocate Marco Cappato, a member of Italy’s far-left “Radical Party” praised Francis immediately after his Academy for Life address for placing the wishes of the sick person at the center of the controversy about medical care for the terminally ill. Francis, he thought, was on the side of the bill.

“That we lack a law giving the least respect to the rights of the sick person has been questioned now by the Pope, too,” he wrote at that time. “Who knows if the ‘more Catholic than the Pope’ clericalists in Parliament will ever take a moment to rethink their obstructionism ...regarding the living will.” […..]

Those who choose to be faithful to God must move toward God and away from sin. Those who do nothing, who try not to choose at all will have the choice made for them. They will by default be turned away.

There are moments in our life and in the history of the Church in which one is obligated to choose between two sides, without ambiguity and compromise. The Spiritual Exercises of Saint Ignatius and theology of history of Saint Augustine in The City of God do nothing other than emphasize the Gospel maxim according to which “no one can serve two masters; either he will hate the one and love the other or love the one and hate the other” (Matthew 6:24). Seen in this light, the recent publication in AAS of the letter of Pope Francis to the bishops of Buenos Aires reduces the matter to two diametrically opposed positions. The line of thinking of those cardinals, bishops, and theologians who maintain that it is possible to interpret Amoris Laetitia in continuity with Familiaris Consortio 84 and other documents of the Magisterium has been reduced to dust. Amoris Laetitia is a document which serves as a litmus test: it must be either accepted or rejected in toto. There is not a third position, and the insertion of Pope Francis’ letter to the Argentine bishops [into AAS] has the merit of making this clear.

Professor Roberto de Mattei

St. Thomas Aquinas was not an “Aristotelian,” and the neo-Modernists are not saints

When, in the 13th century, Aristotelian thought entered into contact with Medieval Christianity, formed by the Platonic tradition, and when faith and reason were at risk of entering into an irreconcilable opposition, it was Saint Thomas Aquinas who played the role of mediator in the new encounter between faith and philosophy, thus placing faith in a positive relation with the form of reason dominant in his epoch. […] With Vatican Council II the moment when a new reflection of this type was necessary arrived. […] Let us read it and welcome it, guided by a just hermeneutic.

Benedict XVI, speech of December 22, 2005

The simple fact is that those who have dubbed Thomas with the epithet “Aristotelian” have not hit the mark. This is the reason why the first modern efforts to open up the world of St. Thomas, which date from about 1890, failed. Yet they established an image of Thomas which prevailed for a long time, an image which has in fact prevailed to the present day..... From a purely historical point of view, it is a misinterpretation of what really happened to imagine that young Thomas turned to Aristotelianism because it had become modish and that he thus became an “Aristotelian.” This notion literally obstructed any real understanding of Thomas for decades until in recent years it was energetically pointed out that Plato too, Augustine too, the Neo-Platonists Dionysius Areopagita too, are very much very much present and effective in the work of St. Thomas, and that Thomas himself was not unaware of their presence. Thomas frequently defends Plato against Aristotle; he points out that Aristotle, in his polemics, often did not consider the substance of what Plato said, the veritas occulta, but only the superficial phrasing, the sonus verborum. The doctrine of Ideas, the conception of the Creation as following prototypes living within the divine Logos, this central Platonic concept was something that Thomas never abandoned. And a tally of the works of St. Thomas has turned up almost seventeen hundred quotations from Dionysius Areopagita. This will astonish only those who regard intellectual history as a succession of “isms” that replace one another.... For St. Thomas was anything but a participant in the “excessive cult of Aristotle” which had become a fad in his time.

Josef Pieper, Guide to Thomas Aquinas

Salvation a Difficult Work - Man’s Unwillingness

IT is manifest that there is in man’s nature a deep and settled unwillingness, which is the first and greatest barrier to his salvation an unwillingness not simply to be saved, that is, to be made everlastingly blessed—this, as a mere end of their desires, all men long after—but an unwillingness to be saved in the way of salvation which God has ordained. They would fain enter into the strait gate, if they could do it without repenting, or denying self, or crossing their own will, or changing their way of life. If they might live on the very threshold of His kingdom with an unchastened heart, and then, without struggle, shed off the unmortified body of sin and death, and enter new-born into His joy; if, after a life of self-indulgence, they could inherit eternal bliss, and so draw out the indolent, self-pleasing luxury of earth into the perfect blessedness of heaven,—then, indeed, there would be no unwillingness; then the way of life should be broad enough, and many should go in thereat; and the way of destruction narrow, and few should there be that find it. But because the carnal mind is enmity against God, it is the severe holiness of salvation from which they shrink. They know that salvation is, the being saved from sin, from its guilt and from its soil, from the power with which it rules over us, from the love with which we cling to it;—in a word, it is the healing of the soul; the cleansing of its deadly sickness; the making of the sinful creature a holy being. From this men shrink by the recoil of their natural will. They too clearly see that it is from themselves that they must be saved; from what they love and pamper with perpetual license; that they must renounce what they are, and become what they are not; that they must absolutely submit their will to be changed and subdued to His will;—and they are not prepared to put so great a yoke upon themselves. And, besides this, the thought of God’s awful and searching presence, all pure, all holy, is insufferable. They feel the awful contrast of their own sullied spirits with His spotless sanctity; and they can neither endure to forsake the sins they doat on, nor dare to draw nigh Him without repentance.

Cardinal Henry Manning, sermon

Vatican now calls upon the heretical and immoral Orthodox, who permit divorce and remarriage three times, to come to the defense of Francis the Lutheran!

Over the last months, there have been many commentaries and evaluations on this significant document. People have wondered how specific doctrine has been developed or defended, whether pastoral questions have been reformed or resolved, and if particular rules have been either reinforced or mitigated. However, in light of the imminent feast of the Lord’s Incarnation -- a time when we commemorate and celebrate that the “divine word assumed human flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1.14) -- it is important to observe that Amoris Laetitia recalls first and foremost the mercy and compassion of God, rather than solely the moral rules and canonical regulations of men.

What has undoubtedly smothered and hampered people in the past is the fear that a “heavenly father” somehow dictates human conduct and prescribes human custom. The truth is quite the opposite, and religious leaders are called themselves to remember and in turn to remind that God is life and love and light. Indeed, these are the terms repeatedly emphasized by Pope Francis in his encyclical, which discerns the experience and challenges of contemporary society in order to discern a spirituality of marriage and family for today’s world.

Bartholomew of Constantinople, the Orthodox Patriarch, endorsing Amoris Laetitia which was published in L’Osservatore Romano

OBEDIENCE is only a virtue when it is properly regulated by the virtue of RELIGION which is the FIRST DUTY of every one of the FAITHFUL under the virtue of JUSTICE!

“When a law is enacted contrary to reason, or to the eternal law, or to some ordinance of God, obedience is unlawful, lest while obeying man, we become disobedient to God.”

Leo XIII

“There is a time when those who obey, obey to their own condemnation.”

St. Catherine of Siena

“The devil has the Bible but he is in Hell. It is Tradition what will bring you to Heaven.”

St. Maximilian Kolbe to Fr. Victor Mrosz, who was “excommunicated” for being faithful to Tradition

The Barbarian hopes — and that is the mark of him, that he can have his cake and eat it too. He will consume what civilization has slowly produced after generations of selection and effort, but he will not be at pains to replace such goods, nor indeed has he a comprehension of the virtue that has brought them into being. Discipline seems to him irrational, on which account he is ever marvelling that civilization, should have offended him with priests and soldiers.... In a word, the Barbarian is discoverable everywhere in this, that he cannot make: that he can befog and destroy but that he cannot sustain; and of every Barbarian in the decline or peril of every civilization exactly that has been true. We sit by and watch the barbarian. We tolerate him in the long stretches of peace, we are not afraid. We are tickled by his irreverence; his comic inversion of our old certitudes and our fixed creed refreshes us; we laugh. But as we laugh we are watched by large and awful faces from beyond, and on these faces there are no smiles.

Hilaire Belloc

Our refuge in temptation

LET us take two very simple practical rules. One is: when we are tempted by any approach of evil, to fix our eyes inwardly upon Him hanging upon the Cross. Let us then call to mind His five wounds, and His crown of thorns. This will abate our pride, break our will, and cast out our evil thoughts. If the temptation be strong and abiding, keep your eyes upon him until you are delivered. Look upon Him, as upon the true Serpent of brass, till the fever and the poison of your sin be healed. Go, if you can, into some secret place, and kneel down in His sight; and, there, stay upon your knees till the sting of sin is allayed, and the temptation passed away.

The other rule is: to pray, day by day, that our will may be crucified with Him. This prayer, if we persevere, will, by His grace, slay the enmity that is in us, and make us, not enemies, but lovers of His Cross. St. Paul says, “They that are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts;” (Gal. v. 24.) and again, he says still more, “I am crucified with Christ;” (Gal. ii. 20.) This shall be even our state at last. Happy and blessed are they who are dead to themselves, alive to Him alone. Let us, therefore, pray Him so to unite us to the spirit of His crucifixion, that we may die to sin, to the world, to our own will; to all that flatters, fosters, strengthens the love of ourselves. As in Baptism we were signed with His life-giving sign, and charged to fight manfully under His banner, so let us pray, that in life and in death we may be under the shadow of His Cross. Howsoever He may fulfil this prayer, be not afraid. It may be He will send you sickness, or sorrow, or contradiction of sinners, or suffering of some kind. For your prayer is an appeal to His Passion. He may suffer you to receive the stigmas which the world printed on Him. Be it so. Let come what may, if only we have upon us the mark of our crucified Master at that day when the sign of the Son of Man shall appear, and the angels “shall gather His elect from the four winds of heaven.”

Cardinal Henry Manning, sermon

“As regards the bishops, very few of them possess genuine zeal for souls … So we have to pray to Jesus Christ that he would give us as head of the Church one possessed of more spirit and zeal for the glory of God than of learning and human prudence. He should be free of all party attachments and devoid of human respect. If, by chance, for our great misfortune, we should get a Pope that does not have the glory of God as his sole purpose, the Lord will not help him greatly and things from their present condition will go from bad to worse.”

St. Alphonsus Marie Liguori, excerpt from letter commenting on the Papal Conclave, October 24, 1774

Bergoglio in the Ratzinger Mold: On the perpetual evolution of Dogma!

My fundamental impulse, precisely from the Council, has always been to free the very heart of the faith from under any ossified strata, and to give this heart strength and dynamism. This impulse is the constant in my life.

Benedict XVI/Ratzinger

Revolutionary France: Civil Constitution of the Clergy, Title II, Article XXI

Things began to change quickly in 1789. On August 4, the newly assembled National Assembly drafted the ‘Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen,’ and over the next year completely dismantled French society and rebuilt it from the ground up. Part of this included nationalizing all Church lands and transferring ownership to the state. By June 1790 the Assembly had officially abolished the nobility, and on July 12 passed the Civil Constitution of the Clergy.[.....]

The most contentions aspects of the constitution, however, involved how new bishops would be appointed to office and the duties required of them. The Church was now essentially completely incorporated as a branch of government, and bishops were to be elected by popular vote. This was received with outrage by many clergy, as it not only completely up-ended the top-down appointment system of the Church, but would then allow Protestants, Jews, and atheists to directly influence Church matters. What would cause the greatest problems though, was Article XXI of Title II. This required bishops to take an oath before municipal officials asserting their loyalty to the nation of France before all other things, or their office would be declared vacant.[.....]

The oath of loyalty created a massive schism within the clergy. Many lower clergy had supported revolutionary calls for reform, even reform within the Church, but this was beyond the pale. Thousands of priests, monks, and nuns now had to choose between refusing the oath and risking arrest and punishment, or taking the oath and risking their salvation. In March 1791, the Pope forced the issue by issuing a papal bull officially condemning the Revolution's actions towards the Church and leveling excommunication upon any clergy who took the oath.

The clergy was then split into juring priests (those who took the oath) and non-juring or refractory priests (those who refused). ....

Wikipedia

COMMENT: The situation in revolutionary France is analogous to the revolutionary Church that is known as the “Church of the New Advent.” Article XXI of Title II required of every Catholic priest as a necessary condition to function as a priest that he take an oath placing the authority of man above the authority of God. Today, the Church of the New Advent imposes the 1989 Profession of Faith and Oath of Fidelity upon every priest in the Church as a necessary condition to exercise any authority. This Profession includes an unconditional oath of submission of the mind and will, or as Lumen Gentium say, submission of the soul, to the authentic magisterium of the pope. The “authentic magisterium” is a term that only identifies the person who occupies the office of the papacy. The Profession of Faith and Oath of Fidelity demand an unconditional submission of the mind and will to a man as man. Unconditional submission of the mind and will can only be given to God,.... to God alone. It is time that those priests in the Church of the New Advent be referred known as “juring” priests as it will become more and more evident with the passage of time when they will be required to go along with Pope Francis' overturning all Catholic morality.

“Give not that which is holy to dogs; neither cast ye your pearls before swine...”

I reproached a woman some months ago in a parish because she was pregnant with her eighth child, after having had seven C-sections. But does she want to leave the seven as orphans? This is to tempt God. I speak of responsible paternity. This is the way, a responsible paternity. [......] Therefore, the key word, to give you an answer, and the one the Church uses all the time, and I do too, is responsible parenthood. How do we do this? With dialogue. Each person with his pastor seeks how to do carry out a responsible parenthood. That example I mentioned shortly before about that woman who was expecting her eighth child and already had seven who were born with caesareans. That is an irresponsibility. That woman might say ‘no, I trust in God.’ But, look, God gives you means to be responsible. Some think that – excuse the language – that in order to be good Catholics, we have to be like rabbits. No. Responsible parenthood.

Pope Francis, remarks from his “authentic magisterium” during return flight from the Philippines, January 19, 2015

Pope Francis the Lutheran wants to show the world that he can be just as foul-mouthed as Luther by displaying his “tendency” toward, and “morbid fascination” with, homosexual proclivities! He may go down in history as Francis the Scatologian! “Fake News” is the next liberal agenda and Francis has jumped on board the effort to silence his critics. Francis, the master of ‘fake views’!

Pope warns media over ‘sin’ of spreading fake news, smearing politicians

By Philip Pullella | December 7, 2016

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - Media that focus on scandals and spread fake news to smear politicians risk becoming like people who have a morbid fascination with excrement, Pope Francis said in an interview published on Wednesday.

Francis told the Belgian Catholic weekly “Tertio” that spreading disinformation was “probably the greatest damage that the media can do” and using communications for this rather than to educate the public amounted to a sin.

Using precise psychological terms, he said scandal-mongering media risked falling prey to coprophilia, or arousal from excrement, and consumers of these media risked coprophagia, or eating excrement.

The Argentine-born pontiff excused himself for using such terms in order to get his point across while answering a question about the correct use of the media.

“I think the media have to be very clear, very transparent, and not fall into - no offence intended - the sickness of coprophilia, that is, always wanting to cover scandals, covering nasty things, even if they are true,” he said.

“And since people have a tendency towards the sickness of coprophagia, a lot of damage can be done.”

That section of the interview, all of which was distributed to reporters in an Italian translation of the interview in the pope’s native Spanish, contained some of the most blunt language the pontiff has ever used about the media.

He also spoke of the danger of using the media to slander political rivals.

“The means of communication have their own temptations, they can be tempted by slander, and therefore used to slander people, to smear them, this above all in the world of politics,” he said. “They can be used as means of defamation...”

“No-one has a right to do this. It is a sin and it is hurtful,” he said.

He described disinformation as the greatest harm the media can do because “it directs opinion in only one direction and omits the other part of the truth,” he said.

The pope’s comments on disinformation followed widespread debate in the United States over whether fake news on the internet might have swayed voters toward Republican candidate Donald Trump.

Official Heresy – to which every bishop of the “Church of the New Advent” has unconditionally sworn to obey!

The fact that the pope requested that his letter and the interpretations of the Buenos Aires bishops be published in the Acta Apostolicae Sedis (AAS) means that His Holiness has given these documents a particular qualification that elevates them to the level of being official teachings of the church. While the content of the pope’s letter itself does not contain teachings on faith and morals, it does point toward the interpretations of the Argentine bishops and confirms them authentically reflecting his own mind. Thus together the two documents became the Holy Father’s authentic magisterium for the whole church.

Archbishop Francesco Coccopalmerio, Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts

The work of the devil will creep even into the Church in such a way that cardinals will be opposed to other cardinals, and bishops against bishops. The priests who venerate me, will be despised and hindered by their brethren… the Church will be full of those who accept compromises.

Blessed Virgin Mary, Our Lady of Akita

So! What’s New?

Cardinal Kasper Refuses to Listen to Arguments

En.News | December 11, 2017- Cardinal Walter Kasper has brazenly claimed that Communion for adulterers is rooted in the Council of Trent, Vatican II, St. Thomas Aquinas and the whole Catholic tradition.
Writing for German Radio Vatikan (December 7), he also pretended that there is no contradiction between John Paul II, Benedict XVI and Francis although John Paul II unambiguously and categorically excluded Communion for adulterers.
Kasper speaks in contradictions. He seems to agree that there are commandments which apply “without exception” but adds at the same time that objective guilt is not necessarily subjective because of the personal circumstances. John Paul II condemns this position as situation ethics.
The Modernist cardinal accuses critics of Amoris Laetitia unjustly of undervaluing the significance of the personal conscience while he himself uses "personal conscience" as a free ticket for sinning.

Pope Francis and his “subtle” sins against the Catholic Faith

Many men sin against Faith in an even more subtle way through the sins against the Holy Ghost, namely, the sins of despair, presumption, impenitence, obstinacy, resisting the known truth and envy of someone else's spiritual good. The sins against the Holy Ghost are not sins of weakness or ignorance. They are sins of certain malice. By despair a man rejects God's goodness and mercy. By presumption he rejects God's justice. By impenitence he refuses to turn from sin to God. By obstinacy a man hardens his will in sin. A man sins in resisting the known truth because he does so in order to sin more freely. Lastly a man sins by envying someone else's spiritual good because he hates the increase of God's grace in the world. In all these sins there is great danger for man because these sins mean that man is deliberately refusing to consider those truths and motives which would keep him from sin and enable him to turn to God. It is for this reason that the sins against the Holy Ghost are said to be unforgivable. It is not that God is unwilling to forgive any sins. It is rather that in these sins a man shows that he does not wish forgiveness.

Fr. Walter Farrell, O.P., S.T.M., My Way of Life, Pocket edition of St. Thomas

Claimed by Modernists as the “Father of Modernism”: Cardinal John Henry Newman

It has always been incomprehensible to me why Manning’s hostility to Newman should be imputed to him as a sin, while Newman’s hostility to Manning is held to be a virtue. [.....] Yet at the present hour, when the Modernists have claimed Newman as their precursor, supporting their contention with many a passage from his writings, it would seem that Manning, as the exponent of orthodox doctrine, was justified in his appreciation of Newman’s teaching.[....] Manning had everything to lose by becoming a Catholic, Newman had everything to gain. [....]This is shown by the willingness with which (Manning) threw aside ambition, comfort, and prosperity, when as the high road to the foremost and pleasantest preferments in the Church of England, to enter upon the tedious life of a Roman Catholic mission priest. His new durance called forth from him no moaning such as Newman poured out when he was sent to work in Ireland. [.... ] Manning’s religion was free from all pious affectation. Yet in close contact with him one felt that he was always living in the presence of an unseen Power, not as a pompous agent, but as its simple and humble messenger. It has been my lot to witness some of the most imposing religious ceremonies of modern Christendom; but nothing so impressive, so faith-inspiring has ever met my eyes as the sight of the noble old Englishman in his threadbare cassock kneeling alone before the altar of his bare chapel.”

[......] “I became a Catholic off my own bat” (Manning) exclaimed to indicate the lack of conviction in the Oxford converts. Afterwards the conversation moved to theological ground, and Manning’s tone changed. “From an observation you made”, he said, “I gather that you are under the impression that Doctor Newman is a good Catholic.” I replied that such was my vague belief. He retorted: “Either you are ignorant of the Catholic doctrine, or of the works of Doctor Newman” - he always said ‘Doctor Newman’ in Oxford fashion, and never gave him the title of Cardinal. After asking me which of Newman’s books I had read, he proceeded to tick off on his tapering fingers, in his usual way, ten distinct heresies to be found in the most widely-read works of Dr. Newman.” [.....] To Msgr. Talbot Manning wrote, “. . . an English Catholicism, of which Newman is the highest type. It is the old Anglican, patristic, literary, Oxford tone transplanted into the Church... In one word, it is a worldly Catholicism, and it will have the worldly on its side, and will deceive many. [....] He is the most dangerous man in England.”

Richard Sartino, Another Look at Cardinal Newman, quoting J. E. C. Bodley, a Protestant and Mason, on Cardinal Newman and Cardinal Manning

“Every one therefore that shall confess me before men, I will also confess him before my Father who is in heaven. But he that shall deny me before men, I will also deny him before my Father who is in heaven.”

Matthew 10:32-33

Hermeneutics of Continuity/Discontinuity – Even JPII did not deny this dogma!

Pope Francis Teaches:

We hold the Jewish people in special regard because their covenant with God has never been revoked, for “the gifts and the call of God are irrevocable” (Rom.11:29). The Church, which shares with Jews an important part of the Sacred Scriptures, looks upon the people of the covenant and their faith as one of the sacred roots of her own Christian identity (cf. Rom. 11:16-18). As Christians, we cannot consider Judaism as a foreign religion; nor do we include the Jews among those called to turn from idols and to serve the true God (cf. 1 Thes. 1:9). With them, we believe in the one God who acts in history, and with them we accept his revealed word. Pope Francis, Evangelii Gaudium

The Church officially recognizes that the People of Israel continue to be the Chosen People. Nowhere does it say: “You lost the game, now it is our turn.” It is a recognition of the People of Israel. Pope Francis, On Heaven and Earth

The Catholic Church Teaches:

Hebrews 7:18: “On the one hand, a former commandment is annulled because of its weakness and uselessness…”;

Hebrews 10:9: “Then he says, ‘Behold, I come to do your will.’ He takes away the first [covenant] to establish the second [covenant]…”;

2 Corinthians 3:14: “For to this day when they [the Jews] read the Old Covenant, that same veil remains unlifted, because only through Christ is it taken away”;

Hebrews 8:7: “For if there had been nothing wrong with that first covenant, no place would have been sought for another”;

Colossians 2:14: “Having canceled the written code, with its decrees, that was against us and stood opposed to us; He took it away nailing it to the cross”;

Pope Pius XII, Mystici Corporis, para. 29: “…the New Testament took the place of the Old Law which had been abolished…but on the gibbet of His death Jesus made void the Law with its decrees fastened the handwriting of the Old Testament to the Cross”;

The Catechism of the Council of Trent: “…the people, aware of the abrogation of the Mosaic Law…”;

Council of Florence: [This council] firmly believes, professes, and teaches that the matter pertaining to the law of the Old Testament, of the Mosiac law, which are divided into ceremonies, sacred rites, sacrifices, and sacraments, because they were established to signify something in the future, although they were suited to the divine worship at that time, after our Lord’s coming had been signified by them, ceased, and the sacraments of the New Testament began; and that whoever, even after the passion, placed hope in these matters of the law and submitted himself to them as necessary for salvation, as if faith in Christ could not save without them, sinned mortally. Yet it does not deny that after the passion of Christ up to the promulgation of the Gospel they could have been observed until they were believed to be in no way necessary for salvation; but after the promulgation of the Gospel it asserts that they cannot be observed without the loss of eternal salvation. All, therefore, who after that time observe circumcision and the Sabbath and the other requirements of the law, it declares alien to the Christian faith and not in the least fit to participate in eternal salvation, unless someday they recover from these errors. Pope Eugene IV, Council of Florence, Cantate Domino

Council of Trent: “but not even the Jews by the very letter of the law of Moses were able to be liberated or to rise therefrom”;

Cardinal Ratzinger: “Thus the Sinai [Mosaic] Covenant is indeed superseded” (Many Religions – One Covenant, p. 70).

St. John Chrysostom: “Yet surely Paul’s object everywhere is to annul this Law….And with much reason; for it was through a fear and a horror of this that the Jews obstinately opposed grace” (Homily on Romans, 6:12); “And so while no one annuls a man’s covenant, the covenant of God after four hundred and thirty years is annulled; for if not that covenant but another instead of it bestows what is promised, then is it set aside, which is most unreasonable” (Homily on Galatians, Ch 3);

St. Augustine: “Instead of the grace of the law which has passed away, we have received the grace of the gospel which is abiding; and instead of the shadows and types of the old dispensation, the truth has come by Jesus Christ. Jeremiah also prophesied thus in God’s name: ‘Behold, the days come, says the Lord, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah…’ Observe what the prophet says, not to Gentiles, who had not been partakers in any former covenant, but to the Jewish nation. He who has given them the law by Moses, promises in place of it the New Covenant of the gospel, that they might no longer live in the oldness of the letter, but in the newness of the spirit” (Letters, 74, 4);

Justin Martyr: “Now, law placed against law has abrogated that which is before it, and a covenant which comes after in like manner has put an end to the previous one; and an eternal and final law – namely, Christ – has been given to us, and the covenant is trustworthy…Have you not read…by Jeremiah, concerning this same new covenant, He thus speaks: ‘Behold, the days come,’ says the Lord, ‘that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah…’” (Dialogue with Trypho, Ch 11).

John Paul II: “Christ fulfills the divine promise and supersedes the old law.” (Redemptoris Mater)

Taken from Robert Sungenis, The Old Covenent: Revoked or Not Revoked?

Nothing is more evident than this –

Pope Francis knows nothing of the Mother of God, he knows nothing of the spiritual life!

The Gospel does not tell us anything: if she spoke a word or not... She was silent, but in her heart, how many things told the Lord! “You, that day, this and the other that we read, you had told me that he would be great, you had told me that you would have given him the throne of David, his forefather, that he would have reigned forever and now I seen him there!” Our Lady was human! And perhaps she even had the desire to say: “Lies! I was deceived!”

Pope Francis, sermon December 20, 2013, published by Vatican News Service

His friends just call him “Bergoglio”!

We were close for a few days, the three daily meals and have shared other moments both public and private. We talked about everything: about dialogue, but also about the journey that we will do together to Israel [.....] Together we have celebrated the beginning of Shabbat, he was by my side when I recited the Kiddush and has broken challah, which Zion Evrony, the Israeli Ambassador, brought to the Holy See. They were unforgettable days and I think that they have a value that goes beyond the affection and confidence that has always connected us [.....] “Important signal”: “I see great value in Bergoglio’s comments against proselytism. It is a point on which he insists with a special emphasis and gets even more weight when we think of the evangelizing framework within which these statements were made...... But now, the Pope speaks of it (of evangelization) only to introduce Catholics to the faith.

Rabbi Abraham Skorka from Argentina, interview for the Jewish monthly Pagine Ebraiche, which was reproduced in Osservatore Romano November 25, about his visit to the Community of Sant’Egidio in Rome as a “personal guest of Bergolio in Santa Maria.”

COMMENT: The moral value of an act is determined by its ends. The “end” of evangelization, established by Jesus Christ, is to “make disciples of all nations.” A true disciple must necessarily undergo a conversion. False disciples, like Judas Iscariot, either never really convert in the first place or fall away betray the faith and turn away from their conversion. A proselyte is by definition a convert. The term is used in scripture to describe the true disciple “Nicolas, a proselyte of Antioch” (Acts 6:5) who with St. Stephen Martyr was one of the first deacons. When the end of evangelization is not conversion it ceases to be evangelization at all. It is vain dialogue devoid of charity and a betrayal of Jesus Christ!

Castro was not reconciled to the Church, only to his fellow revolutionary, Pope Francis!

Pope Francis grieves, prays for atheist revolutionary Castro

VATICAN CITY | Reuters | November 26, 2016 - Pope Francis said the death of Cuba’s revolutionary leader Fidel Castro was “sad news” and that he was grieving and praying for his repose.

Francis expressed his condolences in a Spanish-language message to Fidel’s brother, President Raul Castro on Saturday.

The pope, who met Fidel Castro when he visited Cuba last year, said he had received the “sad news” and added: “I express to you my sentiments of grief.”

Fidel Castro, who was a professed atheist, was baptized as a Catholic and educated in schools run by the Jesuits, the religious order of which the pope is a member.

Fr. Walter Farrell, O.P., S.T.M., My Way of Life, Pocket edition of St. Thomas

This is the expected fruit from the blasphemous 1989 Profession of Faith which demands a vow of unconditional obedience to man on his own authority. Unconditional obedience can only be given to God!

Pope Francis Promulgates Buenos Aires Guidelines Allowing Communion for Some Adulterers in AAS as his “Authentic Magisterium”

This week, the Vatican's organ for promulgating the Official Acts of the Apostolic See, Acta Apostolicae Sedis (AAS), has published its October 2016 issue, containing Pope Francis' infamous Letter to the Buenos Aires Bishops. AAS not only published this letter, declaring that there are "no other interpretations" ("No hay otras interpretaciones") of Amoris Laetitia other than those of the Buenos Aires bishops, but it also published the full Buenos Aires guidelines themselves, which permit Holy Communion in some cases for couples in a state of permanent and public adultery who are not committed to living in complete continence.

Rorate Caeli

Two Years! And the hard work of collecting evidence was done for them!

BREAKING: U.S. Department of Justice investigating Planned Parenthood for selling baby parts

LifeSiteNews | Claire Chretien | WASHINGTON, D.C. | December 7, 2017– The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) is officially investigating Planned Parenthood for selling baby body parts, more than two years after the release of the Center for Medical Progress (CMP) videos.

“It is time for public officials to finally hold Planned Parenthood and their criminal abortion enterprise accountable under the law,” said David Daleiden of CMP.

Fox News broke the story Thursday evening, reporting that they had obtained a letter from Justice Department Assistant Attorney General for Legislative Affairs Stephen Boyd to the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee. This letter asked for unredacted documents from that committee, which had been investigating Planned Parenthood.

“This is long-awaited, good news,” said Abby Johnson, a former abortion advocate and Planned Parenthood director who is now a pro-life activist.

“Planned Parenthood has actively participated in illegal activity, selling the body parts of aborted babies in exchange for profit,” said Johnson. “They’ve lied to the very women they purport to fight for. I saw it first-hand when I worked for the abortion giant and yet, they still manage to obtain over half a billion dollars a year in our tax dollars.” [.....]

Prophecy of St. Francis of Assisi

Act bravely, my brethren; take courage and trust in the Lord. The time is fast approaching in which there will be great trials and afflictions; perplexities and dissensions, both spiritual and temporal, will abound; the charity of many will grow cold, and the malice of the wicked will increase. The devils will have unusual power; the immaculate purity of our Order, and of others, will be so much obscured that there will be very few Christians who obey the true Supreme Pontiff and the Roman Church with loyal hearts and perfect charity.

At the time of this tribulation a man, not canonically elected, will be raised to the Pontificate, who, by his cunning, will endeavour to draw many into error and death. Then scandals will be multiplied, our Order will be divided, and many others will be entirely destroyed, because they will consent to error instead of opposing it.

There will be such diversity of opinions and schisms among the people, the religious and the clergy, that, except those days were shortened, according to the words of the Gospel, even the elect would be led into error, were they not specially guided, amid such great confusion, by the immense mercy of God….

Those who preserve their fervor and adhere to virtue with love and zeal for the truth, will suffer injuries and persecutions as rebels and schismatics; for their persecutors, urged on by the evil spirits, will say they are rendering a great service to God by destroying such pestilent men from the face of the earth…

Some preachers will keep silent about the truth, and others will trample it under foot and deny it. Sanctity of life will be held in derision even by those who outwardly profess it, for in those days Our Lord Jesus Christ will send them, not a true Pastor, but a destroyer.

St. Francis of Assisi, shortly before his death addressed to his faithful followers, Works of the Seraphic Father, St. Francis of Assisi, pp. 248-250

“From Priest’s Whore to Pastor’s Wife”

On 13 June 1525, after weeks of speculation, Martin Luther secretly married Katharina von Bora, a former nun, in a private ceremony officiated by city preacher Johann Bugenhagen and attended by jurist Johann Apel, professor Justus Jonas, and artist Lucas Cranach and his wife. Over the last centuries, scholars, writers, artists, Wittenberg citizens—in their popular, annual Lutherhochzeit [Luther’s wedding] festival—and even a recent filmmaker have characterized this event as one of the iconic episodes of the Lutheran Reformation. Yet Luther’s marriage neither legalized nor heralded an immediate acceptance of priestly marriage even in reformed territories. Luther certainly was not the first cleric to marry. Three of the witnesses at his wedding—Apel, Bugenhagen, and Jonas—were former Catholic clergy who had all married by mid-1523, a full two years before this event. Only a few weeks prior to this event, Luther expressed hesitation about marriage even for political reasons, suggesting perhaps he would agree to a chaste marriage, a Josephehe, to support married clergy. Luther’s marriage does illustrate many aspects of the ongoing reform process. His mixed feelings about marrying, the atmosphere that led him to a decision, the subsequent outcry about marriage, and the personal trials that faced him and his wife in their married life had much in common with the many clergy who married before and after him in the first decades of the German Reformation.

Marjorie Elizabeth Plummer, Ph.D., From Priest’s Whore to Pastor’s Wife: Clerical Marriage and the Process of Reform in the Early German Reformation

Revolutionary France: Civil Constitution of the Clergy, Title II, Article XXI

The clergy was then split into juring priests (those who took the oath) and non-juring or refractory priests (those who refused). ....

Wikipedia

COMMENT: The situation in revolutionary France is analogous to the revolutionary Church that is known as the “Church of the New Advent.” Article XXI of Title II required of every Catholic priest as a necessary condition to function as a priest that he take an oath placing the authority of man above the authority of God. Today, the Church of the New Advent imposes the 1989 Profession of Faith and Oath of Fidelity upon every priest in the Church as a necessary condition to exercise any authority. This Profession includes an unconditional oath of submission of the mind and will, or as Lumen Gentium say, submission of the soul, to the authentic magisterium of the pope. The “authentic magisterium” is a term that only identifies the person who occupies the office of the papacy. The Profession of Faith and Oath of Fidelity demand an unconditional submission of the mind and will to a man as man. Unconditional submission of the mind and will can only be given to God and to God alone. It is time that those priests in the Church of the New Advent be referred known as “juring” priests as it will become more and more evident with the passage of time when they will be required to go along with Pope Francis' overturning all Catholic morality.

There wholly escapes you the character of the Catholic Church .... You are like one examining the windows of Chartres from within by candle-light but we have the sun shining through . . . . For what is the Catholic Church? It is that which replies, co-ordinates, establishes. It is that within which is right order; outside the puerilities and the despairs. It is the possession of perspective in the survey of the world .... Here alone is promise, and here alone is foundation. Those of us who boast so stable an endowment make no claim thereby to personal peace; we are not saved thereby alone .... But we are of so glorious a company that we receive support, and have communion. The Mother of God is also our own. Our dead are with us. Even in these our earthly miseries we always hear the distant something of an eternal music, and smell a native air. There is a standard set for us whereto our whole selves respond, which is that of an inherited and endless life, quite full, in our own country. You may say, “all that is rhetoric.” You would be wrong, for it is rather vision, recognition, and testimony. But take it for rhetoric. Have you any such? Be it but rhetoric, whence does that stream flow? Or what reserve is that which can fill even such a man as myself with fire? Can your opinion (or doubt or gymnastics) do the same? I think not! One thing in this world is different from all others. It has a personality and a force. It is recognized and (when recognized) most violently hated or loved. It is the Catholic Church. Within that household the human spirit has roof and hearth. Outside it is the night.

In haec urbe lux, sollennis, Ver aeternum, pax perennis, Et aeterna gaudia.

Hilaire Belloc, Defender of the Faith

The Fall of Simon the Magician and his “lying wonders”

For there shall arise false Christs, etc. Signs, wrought by art magic, by the power of the devil, whom many heresiarchs have had as a familiar spirit, as I have shown in I Tim. 4:1. Such was their great prince Simon Magus (Simon the Magician), who deluded Nero and the Romans, so that they erected a statue to him at Rome; but at length he himself, flying through the air by the aid of the devil, was dashed down to the earth by the prayers of St. Peter, and falling upon a stone, broke his knees “so that he who had attempted to fly was not able to walk; and he who had taken wings, lost his legs,” as S. Maximus says (Hom. 5, de SS. Petro et Paulo).

Cornelius a Lapide, The Great Commentary, Matt 24:24

One big cowardly Begging of the Question! Since the objections are given in “bad faith” they need not be answered!

As for opinions of others, we always have to distinguish the spirit in which they are given. When not given in bad faith, they help with the way forward. Other times you see right away that the critics pick bits from here and there to justify a pre-existing viewpoint; they are not honest, they are acting in bad faith to foment divisions. You see right away that a certain ‘rigorism’ is born out of a lack of something, from a desire to hide inside the armor of one’s own sad dissatisfaction.

Pope Francis, his reply to the four cardinals critical of Amoris Laetitia, published in Avvenire, the official newspaper of the Italian hierarchy

funny.pho.to_clown_face_in_hole.jpg Another Creepy Clown sighting!

“He was born a female, a girl, and he suffered greatly because he felt that he was a boy but physically was a girl. He told his mother, when he was in his twenties, at 22, that he wanted to have an operation and so forth. His mother asked him not to do so as long as she was alive. She was elderly, and died soon after. He had the operation. He is a municipal employee in a town in Spain. He went to the bishop. The bishop helped him a great deal, he is a good bishop and he “wasted” time to accompany this man. Then he got married. He changed his civil identity, he got married and he wrote me a letter saying that it would bring comfort to him to come see and me with his bride: he, who had been she, but is he. I received them.”

Pope Francis the Weird, comment during in flight press conference from Azerbaijan, October 2, 2016

New book on Pope Francis the Humbler than Thou

Father (Peter Hans) Kolvenbach (superior general of the Jesuits from 1983 to 2008) accused Bergoglio of a series of defects, ranging from habitual use of vulgar language to deviousness, disobedience concealed under a mask of humility, and lack of psychological balance; with a view to his suitability as a future bishop, the report pointed out that he had been a divisive figure as Provincial of his own order. It is not surprising that, on being elected Pope, Francis made efforts to get his hands on the existing copies of the document, and the original filed in the official Jesuit archives in Rome has disappeared.

Marcantonio Colonna, The Dictator Pope

A true Catholic is he who loves the truth revealed by God, who loves the Church, the Body of Christ, who esteems religion, the Catholic faith, higher than any human authority, talents, eloquence, and philosophy; all this he holds in contempt, and remains firm and unshaken in the faith which, he knows, has always from the beginning been held by the Catholic Church; and if he notices that anyone, no matter who he may be, interprets a dogma in a manner different from that of the Fathers of the Church, he understands that God permits such an interpretation to be made, not for the good of religion, but as a temptation, according to the words of St. Paul: “For there must be also heresies; that they also, who are reproved, may be made manifest among you” (I Cor. xi. 19). And indeed, no sooner are novel opinions proclaimed, than it becomes manifest what kind of a Catholic a man is.

St. Vincent of Lerins, Commonit.

Pope Francis’ friends and confidants tell him half the world’s population must go!

Speaker tells Vatican conference: Reducing population is best solution to climate ‘crisis’

LifeSiteNews | VATICAN | November 16, 2017— One of the main concerns about the Vatican’s frequent conferences on climate change in recent years has been that many of the invited speakers favor population control as a means to protecting the planet.

This became patently clear at a Pontifical Academy of Sciences seminar last week when a key speaker said “it’s a little ambitious” to think we can cut the population in half by 2050, but it is “smarter” to cull the number of people first, thereby making the move to renewable energy easier.

The November 2-4 conference, hosted at the prestigious Casina Pio IV in the Vatican Gardens, was entitled: Health of People, Health of Planet, and our responsibility: Climate change, air pollution and health.

Answering a question from the academy’s chancellor, Bishop Marcelo Sanchez Sorondo, on whether there should be a “hierarchy” of solutions to address the “crisis” of climate change and global warming, Taiwanese professor Dr. Yuan-Tseh Lee welcomed the fact that the number of children entering elementary school in his native land has dropped from 400,000 to 200,000 since 1994, calling it “amazing.”

Bishop Sorondo had said in his question that he thought renewable energy came first in Lee’s hierarchy of solutions, but in his answer Lee said halving the population by 2050 would be his priority as it would significantly reduce consumption. “Then we [can] talk about renewable energy,” he said, which can be “easily” achieved. […..]

COMMENT: The new morality of Pope Francis and his defenders is set to overturn all Catholic morality. The argument offered below is flawed. It claims that mortal sin is impossible without full knowledge and full consent of the will which is not true with respect to intrinsically evil acts, such as blasphemy, sodomy, etc. He then argues therefore, after a period of priestly directed discernment and penance, a couple living in adultery may be given sacramental absolution and receive Holy Communion while continuing in their adulterous union. He does not explain how it is possible to undergo a period of discernment under the direction of a priest without arriving at full knowledge of the sin and full consent in an adulterous union. The argument indirectly denies the existence of intrinsically disordered acts whereby mortal sin is always imputable. St. Paul says, under in the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, that adulterers among others will not inherit the Kingdom of Heaven. Why? How can he make this categorical judgment? Because the acts themselves do not admit the possibility of mitigating circumstances that excuse from mortal sin. Therefore, St. Paul says to St. Timothy, “Some men's sins are manifest, going before to judgment: and some men they follow after” (1 Tim 5:24). Adultery is a “manifest sin going before to judgment,” therefore St. Paul can declare that such sinners cannot inherit the Kingdom of Heaven. Pope Francis denies this Catholic truth.

“Here is the deviation in which Amoris Laetitia’s critics fall”

Philosopher Buttiglione continues his “friendly” discussion with those who attack the Pope, “The exhortation is traditional doctrine, there are cases in which remarried divorcees can be admitted to sacraments”

andrea tornielli | vatican city | 20/11/2017

“There are some cases in which the remarried divorcees can be considered in God’s grace. It seems a shocking novelty but it is a rock-hard traditional doctrine. The critics have given rise to a new deviation in Amoris Laetitia: ethical objectivism”. Philosopher Rocco Buttiglione, friend of John Paul II and author of the book in defense of Francis’ exhortation on marriage and family that includes the preface of Cardinal Gerhard Luwig Müller, continues from the pages of Vatican Insider his “friendly” discussion with those who criticize the current Pontiff. By highlighting the “deviation” in which many of Amoris Laetitia’s opponents risk falling.

tornielli: Cardinal Müller’s preface to your book was greeted with embarrassment by the the Pope’s most vivid critics, who after a few days tried to diminish what the cardinal had written - through for example, stilted titles such as “Never spoke of exceptions on communion with the remarried” - Yet, as the text shows - Müller had given examples of possibilities for admission. How do you comment?

Buttiglione: “I believe that, thanks to my book and Cardinal Müller’s preface, for the first-time critics have been forced to respond and cannot deny one point: there are mitigating circumstances in which a mortal sin (a sin that would otherwise be mortal) becomes a lighter sin, a venial sin. There are therefore some cases in which remarried divorcees can (through their confessor and after an adequate spiritual discernment) be considered in God’s grace and therefore deserving of receiving the sacraments. It seems a shocking novelty, but it is a doctrine entirely - I dare say hard-rock - traditional”. […..]

tornielli: You continue to argue that Amoris Laetitia represents a development of Familiaris consortio and not a break with the exhortation of John Paul II. Why?

Buttiglione: There is a common theological basis: the acceptance of the distinction between mortal sin and venial sin, the acknowledgment that, for there to be a mortal sin, it is necessary full knowledge and deliberate consent; the acknowledgment that the social situations in which a person lives can powerfully hinder the full recognition of truth and lead to do evil without fully realizing it or, it might even limit and compress the freedom to do good... All these things are found in Familiaris Consortio (and in Reconciliatio et paenitentia) before being in Amoris Laetitia. On this common basis, there are two different disciplinary choices. St. John Paul II, in order to defend the conscience of the faithful people and especially that of the little ones, the conscience of the indissolubility of marriage forbids that remarried divorcees may receive communion, unless they separate or commit themselves to renouncing to sexual intercourse. He does not say that in their case there can be no subjective mitigating factors, he does not deny that in some cases they may be in God’s grace. He simply says that the objective scandal they are giving is too great for them to be admitted to the sacraments. Pope Francis instead says that they must be admitted to penance like all other sinners. Let them go to the confessor, confess their sins, expose their mitigating circumstances, if they have them, and the confessor will give them acquittal, if there are the conditions to give it. Pope Francis probably believes that, at least in some societies, the consciousness of the indissolubility of marriage has already been lost in the popular conscience and that it is now useless to “close the stable because the oxen have already escaped”. Now it’s time to go and look for them, there where they have lost themselves and take them back to the house of the Lord. The same theology, two different disciplinary choices but, in reality, a single pastoral line”.

tornielli: Did different contexts in which the two documents were written play a role?

Buttiglione: The critics of Pope Francis do not remember what the context in which Familiaris Consortio is set. Before Familiaris Consortio, the remarried divorcees were practically excommunicated. They were excluded from participation in the life of the Church, objects of criticism and condemnation only. Familiaris consortio (and the new Code of Canon Law) rules out the excommunication, invites them to attend Sunday mass, to baptize their children and give them a Christian education, and to participate in the life of the community. The famous paragraph 84 of Familiaris Consortio (the one that contains the prohibition of communion) sets a limit on this path. Amoris Laetitia continues the process of reintegration of the remarried divorcees into the life of the Church. For this reason, we say that, despite the disciplinary diversity, there is a profound pastoral line unity between Saint John Paul II and Francis. Does this mean that remarried divorcees are no longer sinners and that adultery is no longer a sin? No, simply now divorcees who have remarried are no longer “extraordinary” sinners, excluded from confession. They are “ordinary” sinners who can go to confession, say their mitigating circumstances (if they have them) and, “in some cases” (few or many, we don’t know), receive absolution”.

tornielli: Why do you think that the most debated question, that of the possibility, in some cases, after a penitential path and discernment, of administering the sacraments to remarried divorcees, has been relegated only to a note in the document of Francis?

Buttiglione: I believe that the reason is that the Pope did not intend to dictate a general rule. There are so many different contexts and situations in the world today that it is not possible to dictate a disciplinary rule that applies uniformly to everyone. The Pope wanted, in my opinion, only to invite the episcopates and individual bishops to assume their responsibilities. In contexts of solid Christianity, it would probably make sense to maintain a rigid attitude, which may seem without mercy but originates from the mercy for the little ones, the needy, the defenseless who could be misled. In “liquid” contexts in which the banks of the old structures are now broken, a rigid defense does not make sense, it is necessary to go and look for the people where they are, within their existential condition. To baptized who have not been evangelized it will first be necessary to propose the love of Christ. The time will then come to clarify and untangle their marriage situations. Here, the risk of scandal will be minimal because the sensitivity to this value has been lost and must be re-formed.

tornielli: Why is Amoris Laetitia accused of approaching the situation from an ethical point of view?

Buttiglione: “The ethics of the situation says that no behavior is totally good or bad. Ethically speaking, all behaviors are good or bad according to the circumstances; the conscience of the subject and their intention determine the moral value of the act.

St. John Paul II, taking up a long tradition that dates back at least to St. Thomas Aquinas, said that there are acts that are intrinsically evil, regardless the intention of the subject agent. There is an intention which is necessarily immanent to the act and which is distinct from the intention of the subject agent. In conclusion: subjective intention does not make a bad act good.

Neither Saint Thomas nor Saint John Paul II, however, have ever intended to deny that the subjective side of the action - the knowledge and freedom that converge in the subject’s intention - enter to determine the level of responsibility of the subject for their action. A great friend of John Paul II (and of mine) Tadeusz Styczeń used to say “innocens sed nocens”: one can be subjectively innocent but objectively do the wrong thing and thus do harm to themselves and others. For this reason, Don Giussani used to say: do not be afraid to judge actions and say what is good and what is bad; never dare to judge people because only God knows the heart of people and can measure their level of responsibility (God and, tentatively, the subjects themselves and the confessor to whom they entrust themselves)”.

The most vivid critics of the current Pontiff accuse him of favoring subjectivism...

“It seems to me that the critics of Amoris Laetitia have given rise to a new deviation emerges, parallel and opposite to the ethics of the situation and to subjectivism in ethics. This new deviation is ethical objectivism. Just as subjectivism (the ethics of the situation) sees only the subjective side of action, that is, the intention of the subject, so objectivism sees only the objective side of action, that is, the more or less grave matter. Catholic ethics is realistic. Realism sees both the subjective and the objective side of the action, and therefore assesses both the grave matter and the full knowledge and deliberate consent. As Dante Alighieri teaches, the opposite of an error is not the truth, but the opposite error. Truth is the narrow path between two errors of the opposite sign”.

University grills grad student over ‘transphobic’ thought crimes

Opposing transgender pronouns is comparable to Hitler, according to Wilfrid Laurier University officials.

LifeSiteNews | WATERLOO, Ontario | November 20, 2017 – Communications student Lindsay Shepherd has committed a thought crime: she presented students with opposed points of view in an evenhanded fashion.

Shepherd, 22, is an MA student at Waterloo’s Wilfrid Laurier University. She is teaching assistant for a class called “Canadian Communication in Context.” A few weeks ago, as part of a lecture on gendered language, Shepherd showed a 5 minute clip of a debate between Nicholas Matte, a professor of Transgender Studies, and University of Toronto psychology professor Jordan Peterson.

For this Shepherd was called into a meeting with Adria Joel, the university’s acting manager of its “Gendered Violence Prevention and Support” office, program coordinator Herbert Pimlott and an assistant professor named Nathan Rambukkana. Joel and Rambukkana accused Shepherd of violating the Canadian Human Rights Code and the university’s Gendered and Sexual Violence policy. Joel told Shepherd that she had caused “harm and violence” to “trans folk” by presenting Peterson’s position that the government should not force Canadians to use recently coined pronouns to describe transgender people.

It is legal in Ontario for someone to record a conversation without the knowledge of all parties if the recorder is one of them. Shepherd recorded her meeting with Joel, Pimlott and Rambukkana. Excerpts from the alleged recording were made available to the to the public by Canada’s Global News.[…..]

Pope Francis betraying Chinese Catholics into the power of the Communist State

Mass for a deceased underground priest. Card. Zen asks for God’s grace to save the Church in China and the Holy See from the ‘precipice’

Fr. Wei Heping, 41, died in mysterious circumstances, his body dumped in a river in Taiyuan (Shanxi). For the police claim he committed suicide. Family members are not allowed to even see the autopsy report. For Card. Zen the Holy See (which “is not necessarily the Pope”) seeks a compromise at all costs with the Chinese government, risking “to sell out the faithful Church”. Justice and Peace publish a booklet about Fr. Wei, not to forget.

Li Yuan | 11-11-2017 | AsiaNewsIT | Hong Kong - Card. Joseph Zen, Emeritus Bishop of Hong Kong, has asked God to save the Holy See “from the brink of the precipice and not sell out the faithful Church [to the Chinese government]”. The cardinal expressed his concerns in his homily recalling Fr. Wei Heping (alias Yu Heping), who died two years ago in mysterious and suspicious circumstances.

The Mass was held last night in the Church of St. Jude, organized by the Diocesan Commission for Justice and Peace. Pointing out that “the Holy See is not necessarily the Pope,” the cardinal remarked that in recent years, in which an initial dialogue between Beijing and the Vatican is taking place, the Holy See has often remained silent about the grave events of the Chinese Church such as death of Fr. Wei, the captivity of Msgr. Giacomo Su Zhimin, the destruction of crosses and churches in Zhejiang.

“Dialogue - said Card. Zen - is important and necessary. However, it [the Holy See] is too optimistic about the communist regime. It has depended on its diplomacy instead of faith. It does not have a bottom line to reach an agreement.”

He continued “The Holy See is ceaselessly compromising and has even arrived at the point of selling itself out to appease. This is by no means what God expects of the Church and by no means faithful to the mission that Christ gave the Apostles.”

These comments seem to have been provoked by some news the Cardinal has recently received and which is “very shocking”. Previously, Card. Zen had thought the negotiations were stalled, that “the Pope was more cautious” perhaps because “Beijing had expressed other demands on which he could not agree.”

Without mentioning the diocese, the emeritus bishop of Hong Kong said that “they are pushing for an evil plan: to ask faithful bishops to resign in order to leave room for illicit and excommunicated bishops. This is a bolt out of the blue! And it is the approach of a huge disaster for the Church.”

“Someone - he added - might think I'm using the Mass to complain. No, I think Fr. Wei is using my mouth to communicate. These words serve to let us know what kind of grace we are asking for today.”

The body of Fr. Wei, an active 41-year-old priest of the underground community, was found in suspicious circumstances in the Ren River, near Taiyuan City (Shanxi) on November 8, 2015. He had been expected to return the day before from a trip to Liaoning Province.

According to ecclesial sources, who closely followed his case, the autopsy revealed a wide hemorrhagic area in the right part of the brain, but there were no visible wounds on the skin. The police concluded that he had committed suicide and archived the case.

To the family of Fr. Wei was not allowed to have a copy of the autopsy report and they asked to reopen the investigation but the police refused.

A faithful in the underground community thanked Card. Zen for remembering Fr. Wei and the Church's difficulties in China, and said she was saddened after reading the Cardinal's homily, posted today on his blog: “After reading this, my heart bleeds. As the cardinal said, maybe we should retreat to a cave and weep. But my heart does not give me peace.” [……]

Church of England tells schools to let children 'explore gender identity'

'Pupils need to be able to play with the many cloaks of identity and to explore the possibility of who they might be' say guidelines likely to fuel debate
The Independent | Rachael Roberts | 11-12-2017

Children should be able to try out “the many cloaks of identity” without being labelled or bullied, the Church of England has said in new advice issued to its 5,000 schools.

The Church said youngsters should be free to “explore the possibilities of who they might be” – including gender identity - and says that Christian teaching should not be used to make children feel ashamed of who they are.

Nursery and primary school is a time of intense “creative exploration”, the fresh guidelines say, and children should be able to choose the tutu, tiara and heels, as well as or instead of the helmet, tool belt and superhero cloak “without expectation or comment”.

Guidance for Church of England schools on homophobic bullying was first published three years ago, and has now being updated to cover "transphobic and biphobic bullying" – which means bullying people who consider themselves to be either transgender or gender fluid.

The guidelines warn that schools must take action to stamp out bullying based on perceived or actual sexual orientation or gender identity, because of the psychological damage it can cause.

The guidelines say that schools which “promote dignity for all” enable pupils to “accept difference of all varieties and be supported to accept their own gender identity or sexual orientation and that of others.”

The advice goes on to say: “In the early years context and throughout primary school, play should be a hallmark of creative exploration.

“Pupils need to be able to play with the many cloaks of identity (sometimes quite literally with the dressing up box). Children should be at liberty to explore the possibilities of who they might be without judgement or derision.

“For example, a child may choose the tutu, princess's tiara and heels and/or the fireman's helmet, tool belt and superhero cloak, without expectation or comment.”

It adds: “Children should be afforded freedom from the expectation of permanence. They are in a 'trying on' stage of life, and not yet adult and so no labels need to be fixed.

“This should inform the language teachers use when they comment, praise or give instructions.

“It may be best to avoid labels and assumptions which deem children's behaviour irregular, abnormal or problematic just because it does not conform to gender stereotypes or today's play preferences.”

In a foreword to the advice, the Archbishop of Canterbury says: “All bullying, including homophobic, biphobic and transphobic bullying causes profound damage, leading to higher levels of mental health disorders, self-harm, depression and suicide.

“Central to Christian theology is the truth that every single one of us is made in the image of God. Every one of us is loved unconditionally by God. We must avoid, at all costs, diminishing the dignity of any individual to a stereotype or a problem.”

The Most Rev Justin Welby adds: “This guidance helps schools to offer the Christian message of love, joy and the celebration of our humanity without exception or exclusion.”

The guidance acknowledges a wide range of views among Christians and people of all beliefs about same-sex marriage, sexual orientation and gender identity.

The new guidelines are likely to reignite the debate around the idea of children being allowed to “self identify”, with critics asking whether there is a sudden “trend” towards gender fluidity and gender neutral.

Campaign groups including Christian Concern have raised concerns that any dissenting voices in the debate around gender identity are being silenced or labeled as bigoted.

A Christian Maths teacher from Oxfordshire is due to appear before a disciplinary hearing to answer allegations that he referred to a pupil born female as a “girl”.

Joshua Sutcliffe claims not to have been given any instructions on how to refer to the pupil, and said he did not mean to cause any offence.

According to Christian Concern: “Since the pupil started at the school, Joshua has tried to balance his sincerely held Christian belief that biological sex is God-given and defined at birth, with the need to treat sensitively the pupil. He avoided the use of gender-specific pronouns, and instead referred to the pupil by the pupil’s chosen name. Joshua admits saying ‘Well done girls’ when he addressed a group of students including the pupil in question. The pupil became irate at this and Joshua sought to diffuse the situation and apologised”

Responding to the proceeding against him, Mr. Sutcliffe said: “I have been shocked and saddened by the actions of the school, which, in my opinion, reflect an increasing trend of seeing Christians, people like me, being marginalised in the public square, and our beliefs punished and silenced.

“While the suggestion that gender is fluid conflicts sharply with my Christian beliefs, I recognise my responsibility as a teacher and Christian to treat each of my pupils with respect and dignity.”

“I have balanced these factors by calling the pupil by the chosen name and although I did not intentionally refer to the pupil as a ‘girl’, I do not believe it is unreasonable to call someone a girl if they were born a girl.

“The aggressive way in which transgender ideology is being imposed is undermining my freedom of belief and conscience, as well as the conscience of many people throughout our nation who believe that gender is assigned at birth.”

Pope Francis proselytizing for his Gaia Cult Earth Worship!

The Pope says anyone who denies climate change is 'perverse'

· Pope Francis has hit out at climate change deniers calling them 'perverse'

· Called global warming 'the most worrisome phenomena humanity is facing'

· Pontiff spoke during a message to climate change meeting in Bonn, Germany

· Urged negotiators to take action 'free of political or economic pressures'

Associated Press | November 16, 2017

Pope Francis has rebuked those who deny the science behind global warming, warning world leaders against listening to such 'perverse attitudes'. Francis issued a message to the climate change meeting in Bonn, Germany, and called climate change 'one of the most worrisome phenomena that humanity is facing.' He urged negotiators to take action free of political or economic pressures, and to accelerate efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions. [....]

I confess that I cannot forbid a person to marry several wives, for it is not contradicted in Scripture. I myself could not and would not abstain from impurity.

Martin Luther, Heresiarch, Table Talks

Müller, Buttiglione and the “confusion” of those criticizing the Pope

After the articles of the philosopher and the preface of the cardinal to his book, now everyone admits that there are cases in which the way to the sacraments is open for remarried divorcees. Demonstrating in this way the absurdity of the accusation of “heresy” addressed to the Pontiff, but also how the dubia need to be radically reformulated

andrea tornielli | vatican city | 07/11/2017

Professor Rocco Buttiglione’s new book “Friendly answers to Amoris laetitia’s critics and above all the introductory essay written by Cardinal Gerhard Ludwig Müller seem to have sown a certain confusion among the liveliest critics of Pope Francis. To realize this, we only need to start from the latest article published on Sandro Magister’s blog, which in the title warns us that “the dubia are more alive than ever”. And that “Müller adds one of his own”. Actually, it is hard to understand in the text exactly what Müller’s new doubt would be. It is well understood, instead, that the cardinal demolishes the first doubt of the cardinals (and consequently all the others).

According to Magister “the cardinal proposes - explicitly - a single case of possible access to communion by a Catholic who has passed to a new union and with their first spouse still alive. It’s the case when the first marriage, though celebrated in church, is to be considered invalid due to the absence of faith or other essential requirements at the time of the celebration, but such invalidity “cannot be canonically proven”. Let’s leave aside the fact that Cardinal Müller also considers other cases of diminished responsibility – one just need to read the preface to Buttiglione’s book. Let us therefore limit ourselves to this only case recognized by Magister. Not only does the author of the blog “Settimo cielo” recognize that the cardinal considers this case as acceptable, but it seems that he too considers it acceptable. And he even says that this thesis had already been proposed by Joseph Ratzinger.

We then have at least one case in which it is legitimate to give communion to remarried divorcees. It’s a “completely traditional” case, Magister tells us. This is not entirely true, as traditionally, a disciplinary prohibition existed on this issue. But one can be excused from the disciplinary prohibition, which can be eventually diminished or removed. At this point, however, the first and fundamental doubt of the four cardinals (Carlo Caffarra, Raymond Leo Burke, Walter Brandmüller and Joachim Meisner) has been clearly overcome. For the sake of completeness, we shall recall the text of dubia number 1: “It is asked whether, following the affirmations of Amoris Laetitia (300-305), it has now become possible to grant absolution in the sacrament of penance and thus to admit to holy Communion a person who, while bound by a valid marital bond, lives together with a different person more uxorio without fulfilling the conditions provided for by Familiaris Consortio, 84, and subsequently reaffirmed by Reconciliatio et Paenitentia, 34, and Sacramentum Caritatis, 29. Can the expression “in certain cases” found in Note 351 (305) of the exhortation Amoris Laetitia be applied to divorced persons who are in a new union and who continue to live more uxorio?” The answer, according to Müller (and at this point, we must consider for Magister as well) is, yes: there is at least one case in which this can be lawful.

If there is at least one case in which this is legitimate, then the accusation of heresy made against the Pope by the signatories of the “Correctio filialis” is false, and those who have signed it have slandered the Successor of Peter. [….]

COMMENT: Andrea Tornielli is not a reporter. He is a Vatican shill who publishes prepared scripts. He demonstrates with every published article that he is not his own man. His faith is based upon the person of the pope and not the revealed truths of the Catholic religion. Reason is at the service of his ideology. Cardinal Müller is no better. In his tenure as head of the CDF, he defended nothing. He was the dog who would not bark. A Catholic marriage is presumed to be valid unless proven otherwise and the proof must be necessarily compelling to declare the Catholic sacrament invalid. If a nullity of marriage cannot be proven it must necessarily be assumed to be valid. This argument proposes that if a married person believes that their marriage is invalid, but the invalidity cannot be canonically proven, then they may marry again outside the Catholic Church without grave sin of adultery being imputable based upon their subjective conviction. Then what is knowable as objectively true becomes entirely dependent upon subjective speculations. This in fact if carried to its logical conclusion will not just call every marriage into question, but will destroy all Catholic morality. Pope Francis’ moral system can excuse any and every intrinsically evil act. St. Paul wrote to St. Timothy, “Some men's sins are manifest, going before to judgment: and some men they follow after. In like manner also good deeds are manifest: and they that are otherwise, cannot be hid” (I Tim 5:24-25). What are “manifest” sins? St. Paul said, “Know you not that the unjust shall not possess the kingdom of God? Do not err: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor the effeminate, nor liers with mankind (sodomites), nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor railers, nor extortioners, shall possess the kingdom of God” (I Cor. 6:9-10). St. Paul could say this because such acts cannot be committed without imputable sin because they are intrinsically evil violations of the natural law written on the heart of every man and cannot admit a good intention. They are “manifest sins” and to recognize them as such is not entering into unjust judgment. Those that do not recognize “manifest sins” for what they are will invariably “give that which is holy to dogs… and cast pearls before swine” (Matt 7:6).

The moral system of Pope Francis is nothing more than situation ethics that places the subjective actor as the primary determinate of the morality of any action. And why should it be limited to the subjective speculation of just one of the married parties? Suppose one spouse does not share in the others subjective speculation? Then if they both marry again, does only one commit adultery? Now with the novel grounds of “lack of faith” used to establish invalidity, anyone is free to speculate on validity of anyone’s Catholics marriage because one of the “married” parties doesn’t have the “right” Catholic faith. Pope Francis calls into question the validity of every Novus Ordo Catholic marriage! Every heretic eventually attacks the sacrament of Matrimony because marriage is the metaphor God uses to describe His relationship with His Church and each individual faithful. Heretics cannot abide the integrity of the metaphor.

De Mattei: Pope Francis and his “Lutheran turning point”

Roberto de Mattei | Corrispondenza Romana | November 8, 2017

On October 31st 2016, Pope Francis inaugurated the year of Luther by meeting with representatives of Lutheranism from all over the world in the Swedish Cathedral of Lund. Since then, meetings and “ecumenical” celebrations ad abundantiam have followed one after the other in the Catholic Church.

A year exactly from that date, the “”Lutheran turning point ”was sealed by a symbolic act the gravity of which very few have noticed. The Vatican Post Office issued a stamp which celebrates the birth of Protestantism on October 31^st 1517, the date Luther hung his 95 theses on the door of Wittenberg Cathedral.

“V Centenary of the Protestant Reformation”can be read at the top of the stamp, presented on October 31st of this year by the Vatican Philatelic Office. The official communiqué describes the stamp: “It depicts Jesus Crucified in the foreground on a gold, timeless background showing Wittenberg city. In an attitude of penance, on their knees respectively on the left and the right of the the Cross, Martin Luther holds a Bible, source and point of his doctrine, while Philip Melanchthon, theologian and a friend of Martin Luther’s, one of the most important protagonists of the Reformation, holds in his hand the Augsburg Confession, Confessio Augustuana, the first official exposition of the principles of Protestantism drawn up by him.”

The substitution of Our Lady and St. John at the foot of the Cross with the two heresiarchs, Luther and Melanchthon is a blasphemous offense that no Catholic cardinal or bishop has, to date, openly condemned. The significance of this image is explained by the joint declaration of the World Lutheran Federation and the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of Christian Unity, published the same day as the stamp. The note refers to the positive outcome of the dialogue between Catholics and Lutherans, endorsing the “new understanding of those XVI century events which lead to our separation” and affirms how both sides are “very grateful for the theological and spiritual gifts received through the Reformation”.

As if that weren’t enough, around the same time, La Civiltà Cattolica, the Pope’s “unofficial” voice, celebrated Luther with an article by Father Giancarlo Pani (Martin Luther, Five Hundred Years Later, in La Civiltà Cattolica , of October 21st – November 4th 2017, pp. 119-130)

Father Pani is the same priest who said in 2014 that the Fathers of the Council of Trent had admitted the possibility of divorce and remarriage in the case of adultery, according to the custom established in the schismatic Greek Church. Now he is sustaining that Martin Luther was in no way a heretic, but an authentic “reformer”. In fact, “ the theses of Wittenberg are not a challenge, nor a rebellion against authority, but the proposal to renew the proclamation of the Gospel, in the sincere desire for a “reform” in the Church”. (p.128). Despite the claim “ by the Church of Rome and Luther of incarnating the truth in toto and being dispensers of it ” “ the role Luther had as a witness to the faith cannot be denied: He is “the reformer”; he was able to initiate a process of “reform” where the results of it have also benefited the Catholic Church.”

If this is the case then he has been unjustly persecuted and defamed by the Catholic Church for 500 years. The time has come to rehabilitate him. And in order to rehabilitate him we cannot limit ourselves to presenting only his prophetic side, but must make the Church accept and put into practice his demands of reform. And the Post-Synod Exhortation Amoris Laetitia represents a decisive stage on this path. They are not wrong then the authors of the Correctio filialis (to Pope Francis) when they underlined “the affinity between Luther’s ideas on the law, justification and matrimony and those taught or favored by Pope Francis in Amoris laetitia and elsewhere.”

At this point it should be remembered that Pope Francis, like Father Pani, belongs to the Company of Jesus, whose Founder, St. Ignatius of Loyola, was the champion of the Faith that Divine Providence raised up in the XVI century against Lutheranism. In Germany, apostles like St. Peter Canisio and Blessed Peter Fabro, fought every inch of the way against the heretics and on the terrain of anti-Protestant controversy no-one can surpass St. Robert Bellarmino.

La Civiltà Cattolica was founded in 1850, with the support of Pius IX, and had a role of doctrinal defense against the errors of the time for a very long time. From its very first edition, on April 6^th 1850, it dedicated an extensive anonymous essay (by Father Matteo Liberatore) on The Political Rationalism of the Italian Revolution, in which he saw Protestantism as the cause of all modern errors. These theses were developed, among others, by two famous Jesuit theologians: Fathers Giovanni Perrone (Protestantism and the Rule of the Faith, La Civiltà Cattolica, Rome 1853, 2 voll.), and Hartmann Grisar (Luther, Herder, Freiburg im Breisgau, 1911/1912, 3 voll.).

But the commemoration of the Lutheran revolt made by the Jesuit journal in October 1917, the fourth centenary marking the 95 theses in Wittenberg, takes on a special meaning. (Luther and Lutheranism, in La Civiltà Cattolica, IV (1917), pp. 207-233; 421-430). The theologian of La Civiltà Cattolica explained that “The essence of the Lutheran spirit, or rather Lutheranism, is rebellion in all of its extension and in all the force of its word. Rebellion, therefore, which is personified in Luther, was varied and profound, complex and very vast; which apparently appeared but was in fact violent, angry, trivial, obscene and diabolic; deep down it was studied, and directed according to the circumstances, focused on opportunistic ends and interests, intended and wanted with measured, resolute determination.” (pp.208-309).

Luther, La Civiltà Cattolica continues, “initiated that contemptible parody, with which the rebel monk attributed to God, his ideas, blasphemies and the abominations of his perverted mind: he outraged the Pope in an unspeakable way in the name of Christ, he cursed Caesar in the name of Christ, he blasphemed against the Church, against bishops, against monks with absolute infernal impetuosity, in the name of Christ; he threw his religious habit onto the tree of Judas, in the name of Christ and in the name of Christ he was married sacrilegiously” (p.209). “With the very convenient pretext of following Scripture, as that which alone contains the word of God, he conducted a war on scholastic theology, tradition, canon law, all the institutions and precepts of the Church and councils: in place of these august and venerated things, he, Martin Luther, perjured monk and self-proclaimed doctor, put himself and his authority! Popes, doctors and Holy Fathers were no longer of any worth; the word of Marin Luther was worth more than all of them! (p.212). The Lutheran theory of justification, in the end, “was born of Luther’s imagination, not by the Gospel or any other word of God revealed to the writers of the New Testament: for us, every Lutheran novelty finds its origins in the concupiscence he stimulated, and in his development of the falsification of Scripture or in formal lying” (p.214

Father Pani cannot deny that the opinion he gives of Luther is a 360 degree turnaround from the one his confreres gave in the same journal, a century ago. In 1917, he was censured as an apostate, a rebel, a blasphemer; today he is being praised as a reformer, a prophet, [even] holy. No Hegelian dialectic can harmonize yesterday’s judgment with today’s. Luther was either a heretic who denied some basic dogmas of Christianity, or he was a “witness to faith” who initiated the Reformation of the Church, brought to completion by the Second Vatican Council and Pope Francis.

In short, every Catholic is called upon to choose whether to side with Pope Francis and the Jesuits of today, or be alongside the Jesuits of yesterday and the Popes of all time.

It is time for choices and to mediate precisely on St. Ignatius’ two standards (Spiritual Exercises, n. 137)* which will help us make them in these difficult times.

A clear explanation of the essential problem: What is for faithful Catholic the "Rule of Faith"? Is it Dogma or the Pope? Those who believe it is the Pope will follow Pope Francis even if he takes them to Hell!

Maike Hickson: Where does Prof. Rocco Buttiglione (who defends the new morality of Pope Francis and Amoris Laetitia), in your eyes, leave the solid foundation of the Catholic moral teaching, perhaps in order to maintain loyalty toward Pope Francis?

Professor Josef Seifert: I think (1) with respect to his “two principles” that separate us, they do not correspond to sound Catholic teaching because it is Catholic teaching (and the basis for all condemnation of heresies in the history of the Church) that a) truth has priority over unity and b) that no Catholic has an absolute duty to accept everything a Pope or Council are saying if it is not dogmatic and de fide, and if he has good reason to believe that it is contrary to natural or revealed truth or to both (to claim otherwise would be papolatry). Besides, (2) I believe that Professor Buttiglione’ s concrete and brilliant but unsuccessful efforts to reconcile the novelties of Amoris Laetitia with Familiaris Consortio, Veritatis Splendor, Evangelium Vitae, Humanae Vitae, and the Tradition of the Church all fail and put him at the risk of using overcomplicated and sophistical reasons and of contradicting dogmas of the Church such as (a) that God never commands things which we cannot obey, with the help of grace (a Lutheran heresy denied this and was condemned in the Council of Trent), or (b) that extramoral evils (such that the partner of a second “marriage” will leave me) can never be greater evils than a sin and the intention to prevent them can never justify committing a sin (VS and Trent affirmed this and condemned its negation as heretical), or (c) that weighing good versus bad effects of any action can never justify committing one of the many intrinsically evil acts (Veritatis Splendor made this very solemnly clear).

What is the difference between this example of Jewish “truth” and Novus Ordo theology and praxis?

Lying is now a “heightened version of reality” because it may be “true in a higher metaphysical sense”!?
. . . . What anti-Semites keep insisting are “fake Holocaust stories” need to be seen in a more positive light as “the truth of imagination,” to quote the famous phrase of the poet John Keats. If something is perceived as true by the mind, though strictly speaking it may not have happened, and if that event is subsequently seen as a living truth in the minds of millions of other good people who have been exposed to that same heightened version of reality, then it must on no account be dismissed as a “lie” ( . . . ) All such stories are true in a higher metaphysical sense, and to deny them is a sacrilege ( . . . ) We have a sacred obligation to the six million who died under the tyranny of the evil Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler to remember the dead and dismiss with contempt all attempts to deny the Holocaust by referring to “fake Holocaust stories.” I repeat: there is no such thing as a fake Holocaust story. Every Holocaust story is true, 100 per cent true, whether it happened or not. ( . . . ) In the sublime words of Elie Wiesel: “In literature, certain things are true though they didn’t happen, while others are not true, even if they did happen.”

Seymour Zak, defending “fake Holocaust stories” after Herman Rosenblat’s holocaust story, An Angel at the Fence, was publically exposed as a pure fabrication. Hollywood was unmoved. The film production based upon the book will proceed as planned.

Dogma is the proximate Rule of Faith. Deny this Catholic truth and this is what follows. So now we have an infallibly infallible magisterium and a infallibly non-infallible magisterium.

This false accusation railed against Pope Francis, claiming that he is teaching or prompting heresy in part of his Ordinary Magisterium is in effect a denial of the one of the essential truths behind the teaching authority of the Roman Pontiff, who is granted Divine assistance which prevents him from erring in matters of faith and morals, even when teaching non-infallibly.

So while there may be certain deficiencies present in the Ordinary Magisterium, the faithful are still required to submit their will and intellect to its higher prudential judgment by giving religious assent, and such deficiencies can never fall into error in matters of faith and morals through the promise of Divine assistance accorded to even these non-infallible pronouncements.

Emmett O'Regan, published by Vatican Insider

At last, admission by Pope Francis that the purpose of ecumenical dialogue is to make Catholics Lutherans!

Many members of our communities yearn to receive the Eucharist at one table, as the concrete expression of full unity. We experience the pain of those who share their whole lives, but cannot share God’s redeeming presence at the Eucharistic table. We acknowledge our joint pastoral responsibility to respond to the spiritual thirst and hunger of our people to be one in Christ. We long for this wound in the Body of Christ to be healed. This is the goal of our ecumenical endeavours, which we wish to advance, also by renewing our commitment to theological dialogue.

Pope Francis and “Bishop” Munib A Younan, President of the Lutheran World Federation, joint statement, Oct 31, 2017

Pope Francis the Lutheran

[.....] Moreover, because the preceding errors and many others are contained in the books or writings of Martin Luther, we likewise condemn, reprobate, and reject completely the books and all the writings and sermons of the said Martin, whether in Latin or any other language, containing the said errors or any one of them; and we wish them to be regarded as utterly condemned, reprobated, and rejected. We forbid each and every one of the faithful of either sex, in virtue of holy obedience and under the above penalties to be incurred automatically, to read, assert, preach, praise, print, publish, or defend them. They will incur these penalties if they presume to uphold them in any way, personally or through another or others, directly or indirectly, tacitly or explicitly, publicly or occultly, either in their own homes or in other public or private places. Indeed immediately after the publication of this letter these works, wherever they may be, shall be sought out carefully by the ordinaries and others [ecclesiastics and regulars], and under each and every one of the above penalties shall be burned publicly and solemnly in the presence of the clerics and people. As far as Martin himself is concerned, O good God, what have we overlooked or not done? What fatherly charity have we omitted that we might call him back from such errors? [.....]

Pope Leo X, Exsurge Domine, condemnation of Martin Luther and all those who embrace his heresy.

This is the goal of those secret sects which have come forth from the darkness to destroy and desolate both the sacred and civil commonwealth. [.....] “It is an act of great piety to expose the concealments of the impious and to defeat there the devil himself whose slaves they are” (Pope Leo the Great). Therefore we entreat you to use every means of revealing to your faithful people the many kinds of plots, pretense, errors, deceit and contrivance which are enemies use.[....] Also exhort them unceasingly to flee from the sects and societies of the impious as from the presence of the Serpent earnestly avoiding everything which is at variance with the wholeness of the faith, religion and morality.

Blessed Pius IX, Qui Pluribus, (Against the Secret Societies)

The world is governed by very different personages to what is imagined by those who are not behind the scenes.... That mighty revolution which is at the moment preparing in Germany, and which will be, in fact, a second and greater Reformation, and of which so little is yet known in England, is developing entirely under the auspices of the Jews. [.....]

One can trace Jewish influence in the last revolutionary explosions in Europe (1848). An insurrection has taken place against traditions, religion and property, the destruction of the semitic principle, the extirpation of the Jewish religion, either under its Mosaic or Christian form, the natural equality of men and the annulment of property are proclaimed by the secret societies which form the provisional government, and men of Jewish race are found at the head of each of them. The People of God cooperate with atheists, the most ardent accumulators of property link themselves with communists. The select and chosen race walks hand in hand with the scum of the lower castes of Europe. And all this because they wish to destroy this Christianity which owes them its very name and whose tyranny they can no longer bear.

Benjamin Disraeli, Jewish Prime Minister of Great Britain, taken from Vicomte Leon De Poncins, The Secret Powers behind Revolution, Freemasonry and Judaism, 1929

Therefore the sacred partnership of true marriage is constituted both by the will of God and the will of man. From God comes the very institution of marriage, the ends for which it was instituted, the laws that govern it, the blessings that flow from it; while man, through generous surrender of his own person made to another for the whole span of life, becomes, with the help and cooperation of God, the author of each particular marriage, with the duties and blessings annexed thereto from divine institution. Now when We come to explain, Venerable Brethren, what are the blessings that God has attached to true matrimony, and how great they are, there occur to Us the words of that illustrious Doctor of the Church whom We commemorated recently in Our Encyclical Ad salutem on the occasion of the fifteenth centenary of his death: “These,” says St. Augustine, “are all the blessings of matrimony on account of which matrimony itself is a blessing; offspring, conjugal faith and the sacrament.” And how under these three heads is contained a splendid summary of the whole doctrine of Christian marriage, the holy Doctor himself expressly declares when he said: “By conjugal faith it is provided that there should be no carnal intercourse outside the marriage bond with another man or woman; with regard to offspring, that children should be begotten of love, tenderly cared for and educated in a religious atmosphere; finally, in its sacramental aspect that the marriage bond should not be broken and that a husband or wife, if separated, should not be joined to another even for the sake of offspring. This we regard as the law of marriage by which the fruitfulness of nature is adorned and the evil of incontinence is restrained.

Pope Pius XI, Casti Connubii, On Christian Marriage

Do you need to convince the other to become Catholic? No, no, no! Go out and meet him, he is your brother. This is enough. Go out and help him and Jesus will do the rest.

Pope Francis the Neo-Evangelist

Europe will return to the faith or…. perish.

Hilaire Belloc

Homosexuals have gifts and qualities to offer.... Are our communities capable of .... accepting and valuing their sexual orientation, without compromising Catholic doctrine?

Synod of the Family, First Relatio written by Pope Francis’ Hand Picked Clerics

“Revelation manifests itself more and more each day… it’s always moving.”

It is a dogma of divine and Catholic faith that Revelation was completed at the death of the last Apostle!

Ideologies are bewitching; and so Paul says: “Oh foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you?” Those who preach with ideologies: everything’s right! They are bewitching: it’s all clear! But look, God’s revelation isn’t clear eh? God’s revelation manifests itself more and more each day; it is always moving. Is it clear? Crystal clear! It is Him, but we have to find it along the way. Those who think they possess the whole truth are not just ignorant, Paul goes as far as to call them ‘foolish’ for letting themselves be bewitched.

Pope Francis, sermon, October 6, 2016

COMMENT:

O senseless Galatians, who hath bewitched you that you should not obey the truth, before whose eyes Jesus Christ hath been set forth, crucified among you? This only would I learn of you: Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith? Are you so foolish, that, whereas you began in the Spirit, you would now be made perfect by the flesh? Have you suffered so great things in vain? If it be yet in vain. He therefore who giveth to you the Spirit, and worketh miracles among you; doth he do it by the works of the law, or by the hearing of the faith?

As it is written: Abraham believed God, and it was reputed to him unto justice. Know ye therefore, that they who are of faith, the same are the children of Abraham. And the scripture, foreseeing, that God justifieth the Gentiles by faith, told unto Abraham before: In thee shall all nations be blessed. Therefore they that are of faith, shall be blessed with faithful Abraham. For as many as are of the works of the law, are under a curse. For it is written: Cursed is every one, that abideth not in all things, which are written in the book of the law to do them.

But that in the law no man is justified with God, it is manifest: because the just man liveth by faith. But the law is not of faith: but, He that doth those things, shall live in them. Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written: Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree: That the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Christ Jesus: that we may receive the promise of the Spirit by faith. Brethren (I speak after the manner of man,) yet a man’ s testament, if it be confirmed, no man despiseth, nor addeth to it.

To Abraham were the promises made and to his seed. He saith not, And to his seeds, as of many: but as of one, And to thy seed, which is Christ. [.....] For you are all the children of God by faith, in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as have been baptized in Christ, have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek: there is neither bond nor free: there is neither male nor female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you be Christ’ s, then are you the seed of Abraham, heirs according to the promise. Galatians 3: 1-29

You can only surmise that Pope Francis has never read Galatians, chapter 3. Whatever he has learned about the text could only have been derived from secondary sources attempting to indoctrinate by an exegesis that is ideologically driven. The liberation theologians Pope Francis admires routinely used these methods. Suffice to say, St. Paul is not berating the Galatians because they claimed to “possess the whole truth” but because they did not “obey the truth.” They could not be chastised for failing to “obey the truth” if they in fact did not “possess the whole truth.” They had been “bewitched” by Judaizers whose purpose in persecuting the Catholic Church was to reduce it to a Jewish sect and destroy it. The Galatians were called “foolish” for turning away from the “whole truth” which they had received from St. Paul and following the Judaizers. Perhaps the “bewitching” was the fault of the first pope, St. Peter, who was guilty of Judaizing by his “dissimulation” when he “walked not uprightly unto the truth of the gospel.”

But when Cephas was come to Antioch, I withstood him to the face, because he was to be blamed. For before that some came from James, he did eat with the Gentiles: but when they were come, he withdrew and separated himself, fearing them who were of the circumcision. And to his dissimulation the rest of the Jews consented, so that Barnabas also was led by them into that dissimulation. But when I saw that they walked not uprightly unto the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas before them all: If thou, being a Jew, livest after the manner of the Gentiles, and not as the Jews do, how dost thou compel the Gentiles to live as do the Jews? We by nature are Jews, and not of the Gentiles sinners. Galatians 2: 11-15

St. Peter was guilty of the same sin that Pope Francis regularly commits, Judaizing. It is the sin that characterizes Protestantism, particularly the Calvinist variety. Pope Francis has claimed that the Old Testament is still valid and has performed Old Testament rituals. Suffice to say, Pope Francis is as ignorant as a stick in his understanding of St. Paul’s letter to the Galatians. The Catholics he addresses were “bewitched” because, they were led by the “dissimulation” of St. Peter, and like him, “walked not uprightly unto the truth of the gospel.”

Pope Francis says that “Ideologies are bewitching.” True. And no one is more “bewitched” than Francis/Bergoglio himself who, like our first pope, must be “withstood to the face.” Pray that the grace of God may prevail upon him. Until then, whenever this “senseless” man is quoting scripture let the listener beware!

Thus, We have reached one of the principal points in the Modernists' system, namely the origin and the nature of dogma. For they place the origin of dogma in those primitive and simple formulae, which, under a certain aspect, are necessary to faith; for revelation, to be truly such, requires the clear manifestation of God in the consciousness. But dogma itself they apparently hold, is contained in the secondary formulae.

To ascertain the nature of dogma, we must first find the relation which exists between the religious formulas and the religious sentiment. This will be readily perceived by him who realises that these formulas have no other purpose than to furnish the believer with a means of giving an account of his faith to himself. These formulas therefore stand midway between the believer and his faith; in their relation to the faith, they are the inadequate expression of its object, and are usually called symbols; in their relation to the believer, they are mere instruments.

Hence it is quite impossible to maintain that they express absolute truth: for, in so far as they are symbols, they are the images of truth, and so must be adapted to the religious sentiment in its relation to man; and as instruments, they are the vehicles of truth, and must therefore in their turn be adapted to man in his relation to the religious sentiment. But the object of the religious sentiment, since it embraces that absolute, possesses an infinite variety of aspects of which now one, now another, may present itself. In like manner, he who believes may pass through different phases. Consequently, the formulae too, which we call dogmas, must be subject to these vicissitudes, and are, therefore, liable to change. Thus the way is open to the intrinsic evolution of dogma. An immense collection of sophisms this, that ruins and destroys all religion. Dogma is not only able, but ought to evolve and to be changed. This is strongly affirmed by the Modernists, and as clearly flows from their principles. For amongst the chief points of their teaching is this which they deduce from the principle of vital immanence; that religious formulas, to be really religious and not merely theological speculations, ought to be living and to live the life of the religious sentiment. This is not to be understood in the sense that these formulas, especially if merely imaginative, were to be made for the religious sentiment; it has no more to do with their origin than with number or quality; what is necessary is that the religious sentiment, with some modification when necessary, should vitally assimilate them. In other words, it is necessary that the primitive formula be accepted and sanctioned by the heart; and similarly the subsequent work from which spring the secondary formulas must proceed under the guidance of the heart. Hence it comes that these formulas, to be living, should be, and should remain, adapted to the faith and to him who believes. Wherefore if for any reason this adaptation should cease to exist, they lose their first meaning and accordingly must be changed. And since the character and lot of dogmatic formulas is so precarious, there is no room for surprise that Modernists regard them so lightly and in such open disrespect. And so they audaciously charge the Church both with taking the wrong road from inability to distinguish the religious and moral sense of formulas from their surface meaning, and with clinging tenaciously and vainly to meaningless formulas whilst religion is allowed to go to ruin. Blind that they are, and leaders of the blind, inflated with a boastful science, they have reached that pitch of folly where they pervert the eternal concept of truth and the true nature of the religious sentiment; with that new system of theirs they are seen to be under the sway of a blind and unchecked passion for novelty, thinking not at all of finding some solid foundation of truth, but despising the holy and apostolic traditions, they embrace other vain, futile, uncertain doctrines, condemned by the Church, on which, in the height of their vanity, they think they can rest and maintain truth itself.

....... To finish with this whole question of faith and its shoots, it remains to be seen, Venerable Brethren, what the Modernists have to say about their development. First of all they lay down the general principle that in a living religion everything is subject to change, and must change, and in this way they pass to what may be said to be, among the chief of their doctrines, that of Evolution. To the laws of evolution everything is subject - dogma, Church, worship, the Books we revere as sacred, even faith itself, and the penalty of disobedience is death.

St. Pius X, Pascendi

The faith of Pope Francis is directed toward his utopian dream and the facts of current apostasy and decay are immaterial to his judgment for apostasy and decay are of “space” and his utopian dream is of “time”!

“Time is Greater than Space: A constant tension exists between fullness and limitation. Fullness evokes the desire for complete possession, while limitation is a wall set before us. Broadly speaking, “time” has to do with fullness as an expression of the horizon which constantly opens before us, while each individual moment has to do with limitation as an expression of enclosure. People live poised between each individual moment and the greater, brighter horizon of the utopian future as the final cause which draws us to itself. Here we see a first principle for progress in building a people: time is greater than space.”

Pope Francis, Evangelii Gaudium, “Time is Greater than Space”

“God manifests himself in historical revelation, in history. Time initiates processes, and space crystallizes them. God is in history, in the processes. We must initiate processes, rather than occupy spaces.”

Pope Francis, Interview with Anthony Spadaro

Since “time is greater than space,” I would make it clear that not all discussions of doctrinal, moral, or pastoral issues need to be settled by interventions of the magisterium. Unity of teaching and practice is certainly necessary in the Church, but this does not preclude various ways of interpreting some aspects of that teaching or drawing certain consequences from it. This will always be the case as the Spirit guides us towards the entire truth (cf. Jn 16:13), until he leads us fully into the mystery of Christ and enables us to see all things as he does. Each country or region, moreover, can seek solutions better suited to its culture and sensitive to its traditions and local needs. For “cultures are in fact quite diverse and every general principle…needs to be inculterated, if it is to be respected and applied.”

Pope Francis, Amoris Laetitia

“If you love me you will keep my commandments… He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them; he it is that loveth me. And he that loveth me, shall be loved of my Father: and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him… If you keep my commandments, you shall abide in my love; as I also have kept my Father’ s commandments, and do abide in his love… In this we know that we love the children of God: when we love God, and keep his commandments.” (John 14:15; 14:21; 15:10; 1 John 5:2)

Pope Francis will learn, souls are “condemned for ever” who teach the Lutheran heresy of justification & deny the Catholic dogma that to abide in “true charity” is “conditional” upon keeping the commandments!

The way of the Church is not to condemn anyone for ever; it is to pour out the balm of God’s mercy on all those who ask for it with a sincere heart… For true charity is always unmerited, unconditional and gratuitous….

It is a matter of reaching out to everyone, of needing to help each person find his or her proper way of participating in the ecclesial com-munity and thus to experience being touched by an “unmerited, unconditional and gratuitous” mercy. No one can be condemned for ever, because that is not the logic of the Gospel!

Pope Francis, Amoris Laetitia, paragraphs 296 and 297

CATHOLIC PROPHECY

May 13, 1820: I saw also the relationship between the two popes. . . I saw how baleful would be the consequences of this false church. I saw it increase in size; heretics of every kind came into the city (of Rome). The local clergy grew lukewarm, and I saw a great darkness. . . Then, the vision seemed to extend on every side. Whole Catholic communities were being oppressed, harassed, confined, and deprived of their freedom. I saw many churches close down, great miseries everywhere, wars and bloodshed. A wild and ignorant mob took to violent action. But it did not last long.

Once more I saw that the Church of Peter was undermined by a plan evolved by the secret sect, while storms were damaging it. But I saw also that help was coming when distress had reached its peak. I saw again the Blessed Virgin ascend on the Church and spread her mantle [over it]. I saw a Pope who was at once gentle, and very firm. . . I saw a great renewal, and the Church rose high in the sky.

Sept. 12, 1820: I saw a strange church being built against every rule. . . No angels were supervising the building operations. In that church, nothing came from high above. . . There was only division and chaos. It is probably a church of human creation, following the latest fashion, as well as the new heterodox church of Rome, which seems of the same kind. . .

I saw again the strange big church that was being built there (in Rome). There was nothing holy in it. I saw this just as I saw a movement led by Ecclesiastics to which contributed angels, saints and other Christians. But there (in the strange big church) all the work was being done mechanically (i.e. according to set rules and formulae). Everything was being done according to human reason. . .

I saw all sorts of people, things, doctrines, and opinions. There was something proud, presumptuous, and violent about it, and they seemed to be very successful. I did not see a single Angel nor a single saint helping in the work. But far away in the background, I saw the seat of a cruel people armed with spears, and I saw a laughing figure which said: “Do build it as solid as you can; we will pull it to the ground.”

Blessed Anna Katherina Emmerich, Catholic Prophecy by Ives DuPont

Moreover, one baptism regenerating all baptized in Christ, just as “one God and one faith”, is to be faithfully confessed by all, which, celebrated in water in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, we believe to be the perfect remedy for salvation for both adults and children…... one is the universal Church…. Outside of which absolutely no one is saved, one is the Lord, one is the faith and one is the baptism of all.

Pope Clement V, Council of Vienne, 1311-1312

For there must be also heresies: that they also, who are approved, may be manifest among you.

St. Paul, 1 Corinthians 11:19

Holy baptism, which is the gateway to the spiritual life, holds the first place among all the sacraments; through it we are made members of Christ and of the body of the Church. And since death entered the universe through the first man, ‘unless we are born again of water and the Spirit, we cannot,” as the Truth says, “enter into the Kingdom of Heaven’ (John 3:5). The matter of this sacrament is real and natural water.

Pope Eugene IV, Exultate Deo, Council of Florence

COMMENT: It always gets back to the first heresy on which Vatican II was grounded. John XXIII declared at the opening convocation that there existed a disjunction between the truths of faith and their dogmatic formulations, that the truths of our faith were one thing and how they were expressed another thing altogether. This Modernist error had already been exposed and condemned by St. Pius X yet it was accepted without opposition by the assembled bishops.

Now Pope Francis takes the error a step further when he says that, “It is not enough to find a new language in which to articulate our perennial faith; it is also urgent, in the light of the new challenges and prospects facing humanity, that the Church be able to express the “new things” of Christ’s Gospel, that, albeit present in the word of God, have not yet come to light. This is the treasury of “things old and new” of which Jesus spoke when he invited his disciples to teach the newness that he had brought, without forsaking the old”.

The Church Fathers have always understood the “things old and new” to refer to the Old Testament and the New Testament of Jesus Christ who said, “Do not think that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets. I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill.” Francis is claiming that when Jesus Christ said to His apostles that He would send the Holy Ghost, the “Spirit of Truth,” to “lead them into all truth,” He really meant that He would not lead them into all truth but would lead their successors into all truth, or rather, that He would lead Francis himself into all truth so that he could declare a new gospel.

Those who hold that the pope is the rule of faith will be lead into heresy by Pope Francis. Only those who hold the perennial Catholic truth that Dogma is the rule of faith will be able to keep it whole and inviolate. Tradition is only a “living reality” in the sense that the faith is received by living people. As St. Paul said, “For I have received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you,” (Cor 11:23) and “Therefore, brethren, stand fast; and hold the traditions which you have learned, whether by word, or by our epistle.” (2 Thes 2:14). The truth of the matter is that St. Vincent of Lerins would condemn everything that Pope Francis has done.

These two articles from Vatican Insider offer the best, but most feeble defense of Francis the Destroyer.

“Doctrine cannot be preserved without allowing it to develop”

In Francis’ words at the conference for the 25th anniversary of the promulgation of Catechism, the key to read the current debate on Amoris laetitia

Vatican Insider | andrea tornielli | vatican city | Octover 12, 2017

The theme that Pope Francis wanted to focus his attention on when he spoke at the meeting promoted by the Department for the New Evangelization was that of the death penalty and the need of a “more adequate and coherent treatment” in the Catechism. Given its relevance, it was only natural that this topic attracted the attention of the media. But the intervention of the Pontiff served also to reaffirm that doctrine and Tradition can really be preserved and handed down only by “allowing it to develop”. Considerations based on the Church’s fathers and councils, which help to frame the debate also on other topics of which the “fidelity to doctrine” is called into question.

Francis started by quoting Saint John XXIII, who opened the Second Vatican Council on October 11, 1962 with the historic sentence, “It is necessary first of all that the Church should never depart from the sacred patrimony of truth received from the Fathers. But at the same time she must ever look to the present, to the new conditions and new forms of life introduced into the modern world, which have opened new avenues to the Catholic apostolate”. “Our duty - continued Pope Roncalli - is not only to guard this precious treasure, as if we were concerned only with antiquity, but to dedicate ourselves with an earnest will and without fear to that work which our era demands of us, pursuing thus the path which the Church has followed for twenty centuries.”

Pope Bergoglio has therefore explained that “to guard” and “to pursue” are “in the very nature of the Church, so that the truth present in Jesus’ preaching of the Gospel may grow in fullness until the end of time”. Saint John Paul II himself, in presenting the new Catechism of the Catholic Church, said that “it must take into account the doctrinal statements which down the centuries the Holy Spirit has made known to his Church. It should also help illumine with the light of faith the new situations and problems which had not yet emerged in the past”.

Today’s challenges are not those of a century ago and not even those of thirty years ago. For this reason, there are Councils and Synods, and for this reason two assemblies of bishops have been held to discuss marriage and family, in social contexts that change at a very fast pace.

It is not enough - Francis explains - to find a new language in which to articulate our perennial faith; it is also urgent, in the light of the new challenges and prospects facing humanity, that the Church be able to express the “new things” of Christ’s Gospel, that, albeit present in the word of God, have not yet come to light. This is the treasury of “things old and new” of which Jesus spoke when he invited his disciples to teach the newness that he had brought, without forsaking the old”.

Bergoglio, after recalling a text of the Roman Catechism, highlighted by the new Catechism stating that “The whole concern of doctrine and its teaching must be directed to the love that never ends. Whether something is proposed for belief, for hope or for action, the love of our Lord must always be made accessible” - returns to speak of Tradition as “a living reality”.

“Only a partial vision - Francis explains - regards the “deposit of faith” as something static. The word of God cannot be moth-balled like some old blanket in an attempt to keep insects at bay! No. The word of God is a dynamic and living reality that develops and grows because it is aimed at a fulfilment that none can halt.” Then Pope reaffirms “the happy formulation” of Saint Vincent of Lérins, “annis consolidetur, dilatetur tempore, sublimetur aetate” namely a dogma of the Christian religion that should be, “consolidated by years, enlarged by time, refined by age”. A formulation, Francis states, that “is a distinguishing mark of revealed truth as it is handed down by the Church, and in no way represents a change in doctrine.”

Therefore, “Doctrine cannot be preserved without allowing it to develop, nor can it be tied to an interpretation that is rigid and immutable without demeaning the working of the Holy Spirit. ‘God, who in many and various ways spoke of old to our fathers’ (Heb 1:1), uninterruptedly converses with the bride of his beloved Son” (Dei Verbum, 8). We are called to make this voice our own by “reverently hearing the word of God” (ibid., 1), so that our life as a Church may progress with the same enthusiasm as in the beginning, towards those new horizons to which the Lord wishes to guide us.”

As for those significant changes that indicate how doctrine should “look to the present, to the new conditions”, as Pope Roncalli said, one can remember the great leap represented by John Paul II’s Familiaris Consortio. In that post-synodal exhortation, Wojtyla made clear the existence of attenuating circumstances, “Pastors must know that, for the sake of truth, they are obliged to exercise careful discernment of situations. There is in fact a difference between those who have sincerely tried to save their first marriage and have been unjustly abandoned, and those who through their own grave fault have destroyed a canonically valid marriage. Finally, there are those who have entered into a second union for the sake of the children’s upbringing, and who are sometimes subjectively certain in conscience that their previous and irreparably destroyed marriage had never been valid”.

And he affirmed, breaking with a centuries-old tradition, that divorcees in second union, who for various reasons cannot return to their now broken marriages, could access the sacraments if they committed themselves to living as brother and sister, that is, refraining from sexual intercourse. This decision was an important innovation at that time. The divorced who remarried and were willing to live as brothers and sisters (circumstance that obviously has to do with their intimacy and is not written in their identity documents or badges), could not only be welcomed into the Christian community, but could also participate in the Eucharist.

A few years later, in his letter to Cardinal Penitentiary Major William Wakefield Baum (22 March 1996), Pope Wojtyla stated, “ It should also be remembered that the existence of sincere repentance is one thing, the judgement of the intellect concerning the future is another: it is indeed possible that, despite the sincere intention of sinning no more, past experience and the awareness of human weakness makes one afraid of falling again; but this does not compromise the authenticity of the intention, when that fear is joined to the will, supported by prayer, of doing what is possible to avoid sin”. And the following year, in Cardinal Alfonso Lopez Truijllo’s vademecum for confessors concerning some aspects of the morality of conjugal life, we read that “Frequent relapse into sins of contraception does not in itself constitute a motive for denying absolution; absolution cannot be imparted, however, in the absence of sufficient repentance or of the resolution not to fall again into sin.”

A more accurate and serene reflection on the history of the Church and on theology would help to understand, for example, that the teaching of Amoris laetitia is traditional, where it says that in the evaluation of guilt there may be mitigating factors. In chapter 8 of the exhortation, result of two Synods, the Pope, in the wake of this tradition, opened to the possibility - without falling into casuistry and without permissiveness or indiscriminate “green lights” - that in some cases divorced persons in second union (who cannot live as sister brother but are aware of their condition and have begun a journey) may also have access to the sacraments, after a period of discernment accompanied by a priest. After all it already happened in the past in some cases.

Memo to Theologians: No to Theological Mob Rule

Theologian Stephen Walford urges the theological community to resist the temptation to create a parallel magisterium that does nothing more than foster disunity in the Church

Vatican Insider | stephen walford | vatican city | October 18, 2017

On October 11, 2017, Pope Francis addressed participants of a meeting organised by the Pontifical Council for Promoting the New Evangelization. The event marked the twenty fifth anniversary of St. John Paul II’s promulgation of the Catechism of the Catholic Church. In his speech, the Holy Father focused on the death penalty and his desire for it to be eradicated from all nations. Naturally, he referred to the teachings of the Church in this regard and expressed sadness that even its use in the Papal States had meant the “primacy of mercy over justice” had been neglected.

Pope Francis spoke forcefully maintaining that capital punishment is an “inhumane measure” that “abases human dignity”. Not only that. He went as far as to state that it is “per se contrary to the Gospel” because it entails the “wilful suppression of a human life that never ceases to be sacred in the eyes of its Creator and of which – ultimately – only God is the true judge and guarantor.”

Citing the great fifth century theologian St Vincent of Lerins, the Holy Father explained the indispensable factor (in reference to Tradition) of doctrinal development. “Doctrine cannot be preserved without allowing it to develop, nor can it be tied to an interpretation that is rigid and immutable without demeaning the working of the Holy Spirit.” However, the Pontiff was careful to point out that this is no rupture from the past “Here we are not in any way contradicting past teaching, for the defence of the dignity of human life from the first moment of conception to natural death has been taught by the Church consistently and authoritatively.”

Within hours of course, in the present climate of dissent, some were quick to accuse the Pope of another heresy; this hot on the heels of the “correctio filialis.” Accusations included claims that all past popes who had allowed the death penalty were now guilty of approving “intrinsically evil acts”.

The reality of the Pope’s teaching seems quite different if taken from the perspective of authentic doctrinal development. On the one hand from a purely legal procedure, by stating there is no contradiction from past papal teaching, Francis would seem to accept the reality that in a very unstable world of the past, the death penalty might have been the only recourse, that only most reluctantly should have been imposed. Now however those circumstances simply don’t exist, thus there is no longer an excuse to utilise this dreadful form of justice.

The controversy though surrounds his teaching that the death penalty is per se contrary to the Gospel. Why this should be problematic is not entirely apparent. The reality is that the Gospel concerns life. Jesus showed that time and again in his ministry of healing and renewal. We need only look at the way he saved the woman caught in the act of adultery from stoning to know that mercy was his signature. Most significant of all is the truth that Jesus specifically came to save us from the death penalty–the eternal death penalty. Divine justice was now manifest in the application of mercy, and the One sentenced to death freely embraced that punishment, without any desire that we should experience the same fate.

It seems to me that several factors need separating here: On the one hand is the law on a human level. Jesus said “give to Caesar what belongs to Caesar, and to God what belongs to God”; this would also apply to the application of civil law. But on the other hand, divine law is not bound to that code; it exists in another realm where mercy takes primacy over justice. For too long a temptation has existed with millenarian tendencies to “pull” Jesus down to an earthly level, to reduce the full power of eternal realities. But the truth is that Jesus came with the command to transform the world from within until the time that he comes again. This involves the gradual full revelation of the beauty and dignity of every human life. Let us ask, would St Robert Bellarmine of St Thomas More advocate the burning at the stake of heretics if they were on earth now? The Church is called to imitate its Master in an ever more perfect way, and the development of this doctrine as taught recently by Pope Francis is proof that it seeks to do just that.

Thus if the death penalty was a legitimate tool of human law in former times as previous popes taught, it never conformed to the principle of divine law by which God always desires the salvation of all through repentance, forgiveness and mercy. For some, that opportunity of a new beginning, which Jesus would have surely blessed, would never have had the chance to materialise.

The reaction to this speech of Pope Francis from certain theologians, along with the correctio filialis, the threatened formal correction of Cardinal Burke, and the letter of 45 theologians several years ago, raises important questions about the relationship between theologians and the magisterium. One could be forgiven for wondering who claims to have ultimate teaching authority in the Church. However, when we look at the teachings of St John Paul II in this area, a clear picture emerges that should serve as a reminder to dissenting theologians of their proper place in the life of the Church.

The Polish Pontiff defines theologians as those who are to “guard the word of God, to study it more deeply, to explain it, to teach it, to defend it…Theologians have special qualifications for studying and elucidating the reasons for the doctrinal and moral teaching of the Church. By their training and scholarship, and following their specific method, theologians are in a position to probe and illustrate the data of faith and the interpretation that the Magisterium gives of these data in doctrine and morals.” (1)

So the question arises as to the exact nature of the relationship between theologian and magisterium. Can the theologian correct the magisterium? Can he place limits on the development of magisterial teaching?

The Pope states that the principle of harmony is the regulating feature where the relationship between the two is concerned, since both are at the service of divine Revelation. But there is a crucial distinction in terms of the authoritativeness of theological teaching:

“The fruitful exercise of the Magisterium requires us to reflect on various aspects of the mystery of God’s word and its transmission in the Church. We know that the authentic Magisterium of the Church is characterized by unity. It makes no claim to be above the word of God; rather it seeks humbly to serve that word, through its specific charism, exercised in the name of Christ and by his authority. As such, the Magisterium has no parallel in the Church. There is only one authentic ecclesial Magisterium, and it belongs to the Bishops. On the part of individual Bishops, the communion of teaching with the Pope and the whole College is of extreme importance, because it is the guarantee of authentic doctrine and of the supernatural effectiveness of every pastoral initiative.” (2)

From the beginning of his Pontificate, John Paul II had desired to ensure that no misunderstanding could result in theologians creating their own alternate magisterium, “Only when the teaching of theologians is in conformity with the teaching of the College of Bishops, united with the Pope, can the people of God know with certitude that that teaching is ‘the faith which has been once and for all entrusted to the Saints’ (Jude 3). This is not a limitation for theologians, but a liberation.” (3)

Similar words are found in a homily given in Treviso Italy “The lay person, aware of the vocation of the apostolate, will never seek to act in discord, to exalt his independence from the Magisterium, will not assume as source of his proclamation his own subjective experience of faith, but will seek from the doctrine proclaimed by the Church the strength of truth.” (4)

The truth of the matter, and one that is being contested daily it seems, is that regardless of something being proclaimed infallibly or not, Christ preserves the Magisterium from error in matters of faith and morals. For instance we read in a general audience from May 1985:

“The Magisterium is called to safeguard the whole truth contained in divine revelation. To believe in a Christian way means to adhere to this truth by taking advantage of the guarantee of truth which comes to the Church through its institution by Christ himself. This holds true for all the faithful, and also for theologians and exegetes at the right level and in the proper degree. In this field the merciful providence of God is revealed for everyone. God has willed to grant us not only the gift of his self-revelation, but also the guarantee of its faithful preservation, interpretation and explanation, entrusting it to the hands of the Church.” (5)

The question of why many things are not proclaimed infallibly is not because they are erroneous– which would be in direct contradiction to the guarantee given by Christ through the Holy Spirit– but because certain teachings and disciplinary measures are either contingent on historical circumstances, or the wisdom of the Church decrees that further theological exploration is needed before any irreformable definition is given. It may also be– as in the case of the doctrine of Mary Co Redemptrix–at least for now, that the term although a teaching of the magisterium is likely to cause too much confusion if it is raised to the level of infallibility. It seems safe to say that in a sense, infallibility “hovers” over all matters related to faith and morals and is there to be utilised when the necessary conditions apply. (6)

St. John Paul II was fully aware of the necessity if doctrinal development along the lines proposed by St Vincent of Lerins and taught by Pope Francis, “Revealed truth, however, has been entrusted to the Church once and for all. It has reached its completion in Christ. Hence the profound significance of the Pauline expression “deposit” of faith. At the same time, this deposit allows for a further explanation and for a growing understanding as long as the Church is on this earth.” (7)

It seems to me that the theologians, laypeople and priests who during the present Pontificate have sought to question or even correct the teachings of Pope Francis need to question their own understanding of the way in which God protects his Church. The question needs to be asked: “Is my understanding of doctrinal development and papal authority deficient rather than the Pope’s?” Cardinal Muller recently clarified that the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith doesn’t have the right to correct the Pope and thus that applies to every other person.

Theology on its own is simply a science, but in order to grasp its greater depth it must be allied to a life of prayer and openness to the possibility that the Holy Spirit has more to reveal. Pope Francis several years ago stated:

“The theologian who is satisfied with his complete and conclusive thought is mediocre. The good theologian and philosopher has an open, that is, an incomplete, thought, always open to the maius of God and of the truth, always in development, according to the law that St. Vincent of Lerins describes as: “annis consolidetur, dilatetur tempore, sublimetur aetate” (Commonitorium primum, 23: PL 50, 668): it is strengthened over the years, it expands over time, it deepens with age. This is the theologian who has an open mind. And the theologian who does not pray and who does not worship God ends up sunk in the most disgusting narcissism. And this is an ecclesiastical illness. The narcissism of theologians, of thinkers, is disgusting.” (8)

I hope that these reflections will serve to show that the theological community must resist the temptation to create a parallel magisterium that does nothing more than foster disunity in the Church, and instead, begin to look into what the Spirit is saying to the Churches at this particular time. There can be no heresy emanating from the See of Peter; that is clear from doctrinal development over the centuries concerning papal primacy, and because of that, mistrust must turn to hope that the Lord is guiding his Bride to a better way of confronting and dealing with the sicknesses so visible of the world.

1. St John Paul II, “Ad Limina address to US Bishops”, October 22, 1983

2. Ibid

3. St John Paul II, “Address to Priests, Missionaries, Religious Brothers and Sisters”, Maynooth Ireland, October 1, 1979

4. St John Paul II, “Homily at Mass in Treviso”, June 16, 1985, The Pope Teaches 1985/7 p 194

5. St John Paul II “General Audience” May 1, 1985, Ibid, p 199

6. Cf. Pius XI, Divini Illius Magistri no 18, Bl Pius IX, Qui Pluribus, no 10, Pius XII, Humani Generis, no 18

7. St John Paul II, “Ad Limina Address to US Bishops”, October 15, 1988

8. Pope Francis, Address to the Community of the Pontifical Gregorian University, April 10, 2014

* Stephen Walford is a theologian and lives in Southampton, England with his wife Paula and five children. Educated at Bristol University, he is the author of two books: Heralds of the Second Coming: Our Lady, the Divine Mercy, and the Popes of the Marian Era from Bl Pius IX to Benedict XVI (Angelico Press), and Communion of Saints: The Unity of Divine Love in the Mystical Body of Christ (Angelico Press). He has written articles for various publications on eschatological and mariological themes. He is also a pianist and teacher.

Sins That Cry to Heaven for Vengeance:

1. Willful murder

2. The sin of Sodom

3. Oppression of the poor

4. Defrauding the laborer of his wages

Nine Ways of Being Accessory to Another's Sin

1. By counsel

2. By command

3. By consent

4. By provocation

5. By praise or flattery

6. By concealment

7. By partaking

8. By silence

9. By defense of the ill done

“Gender Ideology”? - How Queer! Perhaps a case of Theological AIDS! The Homosexual Lobby has mutated into the Homosexual Bureaucracy!

50. Homosexuals have gifts and qualities to offer to the Christian community: are we capable of welcoming these people, guaranteeing to them a fraternal space in our communities? Often they wish to encounter a Church that offers them a welcoming home. Are our communities capable of providing that, accepting and valuing their sexual orientation, without compromising Catholic doctrine on the family and matrimony?

51. The question of homosexuality leads to a serious reflection on how to elaborate realistic paths of affective growth and human and evangelical maturity integrating the sexual dimension: it appears therefore as an important educative challenge. The Church furthermore affirms that unions between people of the same sex cannot be considered on the same footing as matrimony between man and woman. Nor is it acceptable that pressure be brought to bear on pastors or that international bodies make financial aid dependent on the introduction of regulations inspired by gender ideology.

52. Without denying the moral problems connected to homosexual unions it has to be noted that there are cases in which mutual aid to the point of sacrifice constitutes a precious support in the life of the partners. Furthermore, the Church pays special attention to the children who live with couples of the same sex, emphasizing that the needs and rights of the little ones must always be given priority. [All emphases added.]

Extra-Ordinary Synod on the Family from the Extra-Ordinary Pope Francis

The Mystical Body of Christ is the Roman Catholic Church, and it is therefore, both a divine and human institution. The Church does not join “cultural revolutions.”

There is a real cultural revolution on the horizon of history at this time. The Church must, first and foremost, be part of it. In this perspective, it is essential to honestly recognize her weaknesses and shortcomings. Forms of subordination that have sadly characterized women's history should definitely be abandoned. A new beginning must be written in the ethos of the peoples, and this can be done by a renewed culture of identity and difference.

Pope Francis the Pretender, addressing the Academy of Life, October 6, 2017

One just soul can attain pardon for a thousand sinners.

St Margaret Mary Alacoque

“Have confidence, I have overcome the world.” John 16:33

We have here a prophecy of four great facts: first, of a revolt, which shall precede the second coming of our Lord; secondly, of the manifestation of one who is called “the wicked one”; thirdly, of a hindrance, which restrains his manifestation; and lastly, of the period of power and persecution, of which he will be the author. [.....] It seems to need little proof that this revolt or apostasy is a separation, not from the civil, but from the spiritual order and authority; for the sacred writers, again and again, speak of such a spiritual separation; and in one place St. Paul seems expressly to declare the meaning of this word. He forewarns St. Timothy that in the later days, “some shall depart or apostatise from the faith” ; and it seems evident that the same spiritual falling away is intended by the apostasy in this place. The authority, then, from which the revolt is to take place is that of the kingdom of God on earth, prophesied by Daniel as the kingdom which the God of heaven should set up, after the four kingdoms should be destroyed by the stone cut out without hands, which became a great mountain and filled the whole earth; or, in other words, the one universal Church, founded by our Divine Lord, and spread by His Apostles throughout the world. [....] The three notes (of the apostasy) will be schism, heresy and the denial of the Incarnation. [....] The theory, that politics and religion have different spheres, is an illusion and a snare. For history can only be truly read in the light of faith; and the present can only be interpreted by the light of revelation: for above the human wills which are now in conflict, there is a Will, sovereign and divine, which is leading all things to fulfill its own perfect end.

Cardinal Henry Edward Manning, The Present Crisis of the Holy See

A very simple but profoundly True faithful Catholic observation that every bishop at Vatican II failed to see!

The implications are wider than those applied to marriage and the church. The partial/fullness breakdown implies that any good in anything can be considered “on the way to fullness.” The problem is that, since evil simply is the privation of good, and anything insofar as it has being at all is good, everything falls into this category. Hence, according to the Vatican II logic, any evil whatsoever can be regarded as, while not meeting the fullness of goodness, possessing a part of it and perhaps some “element of sanctification.” Metaphysically, it is either a meaningless analysis with no implications for morals or it covers (and in some sense excuses?) literally everything; e.g., rape may not be the fullness of conjugal union, but it expresses a part of the real desire for marital unity..... We already see this language applied to the divorced and remarried, but by the same logic it applies to any evil act you can think of. This is a major problem of Lumen Gentium that has to be rectified by a serious theological determination on the part of the church.

“BM”, posted on OnePeterFive commenting on the question of giving communion to Catholics living in adultery because there exists some “good” in their adulterous relationships.

Pope Francis the Sophist: He believes in “Absolute Truth” but denies that it can be know or communicated to other!

“We believers and of course above all we priests and we bishops believe in the Absolute, but each in their own way because each one has his own head and thought. So our absolute truth, shared by us all, is different from person to person. We do not avoid discussions in the case where our different thoughts confront each other. So there is a kind of relativism among us as well.”

Pope Francis, quoted by Eugenio Scalfari in La Repubblica, 10-10-17

Breaking News from Una Voce Malta: Modernist Vatican will only allow the traditional Mass to be said within the context of the New Church (beginning Advent 2018) if it accepts the Lectionary and Calendar of the Novus Ordo. This would mean that the traditional Catholic Mass would not be allowed within the context of New Church. Notice the section of the story about the Fraternity of St. Peter and the Institute of Christ the King. Also, the SSPX will only be given a “temporary exemption” “in order to make the reconciliation possible.” No other exemptions will be allowed! Note the smug establishment description of Una Voce of itself. Basically, the True Mass with Catholic worship and prayers and celebrations will only be possible in, what Fr. Malachi Martin called 20 years ago, the “Underground Church.”

Peter Chojnowski, Ph.D.

Pope Francis rejects moral absolutes of God!

Papal adviser: We can no longer ‘judge people’ based on moral norms

LifeSiteNews | BOSTON, Massachusetts | October 6, 2017 -- Jesuit priest and papal confidant Father Anthony Spadaro said that Pope Francis holds that the Catholic Church can no longer set down general norms that apply to entire groups of people.

Spadaro, editor of the Italian magazine La Civiltà Cattolica, made the comment today at a conference at Boston College where liberal Cardinals met with dissident theologians to discuss strategies for implementing Pope Francis’ controversial teachings on marriage and family in dioceses across the United States.

The Jesuit priest told attendees that Amoris Laetitia, the Pope's 2016 teaching on marriage and family, recognizes that people living in "irregular" family situations, such as the divorced and remarried living in adultery, "can be living in God's grace, can love and can also grow in a life of grace."

"We must conclude that the Pope realizes that one can no longer speak of an abstract category of persons and ... [a] praxis of integration in a rule that is absolutely to be followed in every instance," he said, according to a report by National Catholic Reporter.

"Since the degree of responsibility is not equal in all cases, the consequences or effects of a rule need not necessarily always be the same," he added.

"It is no longer possible to judge people on the basis of a norm that stands above all," he concluded.

Jesuit Fr. James Keenan, a dissident theologian at Boston College and one of the main organizers of the October 5-6 event, said the conference will “fortify and further the ongoing reception of Amoris in the U.S."

He said that the event is about “setting an agenda for the future of the Church” in the U.S.

Today’s discussions at the conference focused on Amoris Laetitia’s call for pastors to, in the words of the National Catholic Reporter, “listen to laypeople and respect decisions they make about their lives after undertaking a process of discernment.”

During his talk, Spadaro praised guidelines issued by the Sicilian Bishops Conference this summer that authorized priests to give Communion to the divorced and civilly remarried without annulment (i.e. in a state of public and permanent adultery).

"The Sicilian document concludes with clarity that in some circumstances as regards the divorced and remarried, according to the evaluation of the confessor ... it is possible to admit absolution and to admit him or her to the Eucharist," Spadaro said.

The Boston College conference consisted of panel discussions between prelates, theologians, and canon lawyers, many of whom hold positions contrary to perennial Catholic teaching on marriage, the sacraments, conscience, and the existence of absolute moral norms.

The conference comes about two weeks after 60 Catholic clergy and lay scholars from around the world issued a “Filial Correction” to Pope Francis for “propagating heresy.” They asserted that Pope Francis has supported heretical positions about marriage, the moral life, and the Eucharist that are causing a host of “heresies and other errors” to spread throughout the Catholic Church.

Pope Francis wants to impose his ideology as a moral absolute!

Pope wants Catholic opposition to death penalty increased

AFP | October 11, 2017

Pope Francis speaks during a meeting with participants of the Pontifical Council at the Vatican on

Vatican City (AFP) - Pope Francis called Wednesday for categoric opposition to capital punishment to be written into an update of the most important guide to Catholic teaching.

His comments, which will be controversial with many fundamentalist Christians and some Catholics, came in a speech to clerics attending a conference in Rome to mark the 25th anniversary of the publication of the Catechism of the Catholic Church.

The catechism is a question and answer guide to what Catholics should think about a wide range of moral and social issues.

Acknowledging that the Vatican itself had historically had "recourse to the extreme and inhuman remedy" of judicial execution, Francis said past doctrinal errors should be put aside.

"We have to restate that, however grave the crime that may be committed, the death penalty is inadmissible because it attacks the inviolability and the dignity of the person," he said.

The execution of a human being was fundamentally against the teachings of Christ because, by definition, it excluded the possibility of redemption, he argued.

The Catholic church has steadily increased the strength of its opposition to the use of capital punishment in recent years.

Pope John Paul II made an appeal for a global consensus on abolition in 1999 and Francis's predecessor, Benedict XVI issued a similar call in 2011.

The 1992 text of the catechism says authorities should take appropriate measures in the interest of the common good without excluding the use of the death penalty in extremely grave cases.

More recent updates say justifying circumstances are now rare if not practically inexistant. And a version of the catechism aimed at younger people now includes a question, "Why is the Church opposed to the death penalty?"

Francis has made clear his own personal opposition to the death penalty on numerous occasions.

"It doesn't give justice to victims, but it feeds vengeance," he said in June 2016, arguing that the biblical commandment "thou shall not kill," applied to the innocent as well as the guilty.

Recant! Responding to the Lutheran Heresy of Pope Francis

OnePeterFive | October 11, 2017

Editor’s note: The following comes from Paolo Pasqualucci, a retired professor of philosophy of the law at the University of Perugia, Italy.

It is impossible to forget the stunning high praise Martin Luther’s personality and doctrine won from no less than a Roman pontiff – that is, from the reigning Pope Francis, during one of his customary impromptu speeches. Conversing in Italian and Spanish with the accredited journalists while flying back from Armenia, he answered a question on the relationship between the Catholic Church and the Lutheran world in the following way:

I think that Martin Luther’s intentions were not mistaken; he was a reformer. Perhaps some of his methods were not right, although at that time, if you read Pastor’s history, for example – Pastor was a German Lutheran who experienced a conversion when he studied the facts of that period; he became a Catholic – we see that the Church was not exactly a model to emulate. There was corruption and worldliness in the Church; there was attachment to money and power. That was the basis of his protest. He was also intelligent, and he went ahead, justifying his reasons for it.

Nowadays, Lutherans and Catholics, and all Protestants, are in agreement on the doctrine of justification: on this very important point he was not mistaken. He offered a “remedy” for the Church, and then this remedy rigidified in a state of affairs, a discipline, a way of believing, a way of acting, a mode of liturgy. But there was not only Luther: there was Zwingli, there was Calvin[.] … And behind them? The princes, “cuius regio eius religio”. We have to place ourselves in the context of the times. It is a history that is not easy to understand, not easy[.] …

Then things moved on. Today, the dialogue is very good and I believe that the document on justification is one of the richest ecumenical documents, one of the richest and most profound. Right? There are divisions but they also depend on the churches[.] [1]

This sort of scandal – a pope expressing praise and even admiration for a condemned heretic – was bound to happen after the official agreement reached (after many years of mutual “dialog”) between Catholics and Lutherans on the doctrine of justification. An agreement on this delicate matter, or Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification by the Lutheran World Federation and the Catholic Church, was indeed signed on Oct. 31, 1999.

The existence of such an agreement implies that Luther had made no mistakes in his doctrine of justification – Martin Luther, the great heretic, one of the fiercest enemies of the Catholic Church who ever appeared on Earth! But now, after 500 years, we understand that his doctrine “on the very important point of the justification” appears to be so good as to be de facto adopted in the Joint Declaration itself!

The disgraceful Joint Declaration is an unbelievable document, something undoubtedly unique in the whole history of the Catholic Church, the only and true Church of Christ. We are now being told that there are articles of faith that we share with the Lutheran heretics, on the same matters the Lutherans have been misinterpreting and distorting for 500 years. Of course, there remain some mutual differences, the Declaration tells us, but they are obviously minimized. Since they squarely contradict the contents of the various “joint declarations” scattered in the document, they are left rotting in the cellar, so to say, while the ancient condemnations are devalued to mere “salutary warnings to which we must attend in our teaching and practice”[2]!

Let’s look at some of the Lutheran tenets shared by this Declaration.

In §3, The Common Understanding of Justification, we read, no. 15: “Together we confess: By grace alone, in faith in Christ’s saving work and not because of any merit on our part, we are accepted by God and receive the Holy Spirit, who renews our hearts while equipping and calling us to good works”[3].

Same paragraph, no. 17: it is jointly declared that “God’s saving action in Christ tells us that as sinners our new life is solely due to the forgiving and renewing mercy that God imparts as a gift and we receive in faith, and never can merit in any way” [4].

Finally, there is §4.1, Human Powerlessness and Sin in Relation to Justification, no. 19, where it is jointly stated, as if it were absolutely obvious to us Catholics, that “[j]ustification takes place solely by God’s grace”[5].

As far as good works are concerned, the Declaration proclaims, in §4.7, The Good Works of the Justified, no. 37: “We confess together that good works – a Christian life lived in faith, hope and love – follow justification and are its fruits.”[6] This last sentence appears to contradict the truths defined by the Council of Trent, which has solemnly reaffirmed the meritorious character of the good works for eternal life, given the fact that, according to Holy Scripture, they necessarily concur in obtaining it.

All this considered, we cannot be amazed at Pope Francis’s devastating proclamation that “on this very important point Luther was not mistaken.” Indeed, if he was not mistaken, his doctrine of the justification was correct. If it was theologically correct, then Luther was in the right – so much in the right that this doctrine of his is nowadays clearly purported by the Joint Declaration.

Can we accept this? No. As Catholics, as milites Christi, it is our duty to proclaim that this joint profession of faith with the Lutherans openly contradicts the true doctrine of the justification solemnly defined by the dogmatic Council of Trent. At the end of its Decree on Justification, 13 January 1547, we find 33 canons that recapitulate the doctrine expounded and inflict the related anatemata.

Canon no. 9, condemning the heresy of justification sola fide:

If any one saith, that by faith alone the impious is justified; in such wise as to mean, that nothing else is required to co-operate in order to the obtaining the grace of Justification, and that it is not in any way necessary, that he be prepared and disposed by the movement of his own will; let him be anathema. [7]

Canon no. 11, condemning the related heresy of justification sola gratia:

If any one saith, that men are justified, either by the sole imputation of the justice of Christ, or by the sole remission of sins, to the exclusion of the grace and the charity which is poured forth in their hearts by the Holy Ghost, and is inherent in them; or even that the grace, whereby we are justified, is only the favour of God; let him be anathema. [8]

Canon no. 24, condemning the heresy according to which good works are merely the fruits or consequences of justification obtained sola fide et sola gratia, with absolute exclusion of any cooperation on our part by means of our good works:

If any one saith, that the justice received is not preserved and also increased before God through good works; but that the said works are merely the fruits and signs of Justification obtained, but not a cause of the increase thereof; let him be anathema. [9]

The anonymous “one” whose heretical opinions are here condemned obviously includes Luther and all those who share and will share his opinions on these matters. Judging from the abstracts quoted above, doesn’t the Joint Declaration seem to be quite clear in its reasoning Lutherana mente?

On this appalling Declaration there is much more to say, but here I want only to make this last point: we cannot forget that this Joint Declaration is the final result of a “dialog” entertained with the Lutherans over the last decades, with the encouragement and approval of Pope John Paul II and cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, afterward Pope Benedict XVI. As far as I know, they have never found anything wrong with the joint declarations of the Joint Declaration! They have, on the other hand, repeatedly credited Martin Luther with a “profound religiosity” and a “Christ-centered spirituality” [10]!

Notwithstanding, let’s pose a humble and simple question: Is Pope Francis’s public praise of Luther’s doctrine on justification, formally condemned as heretical by the Church, to be considered heretical, too?

In fact, declaring to the whole world that Luther “was not mistaken” in his doctrine on justification sola fide et sola gratia, Pope Francis forces us to draw the only possible conclusion in accordance with elementary logic: Luther’s doctrine must be right, given the fact that in itself it is not wrong. But if the Lutheran doctrine is right, then heresy is falsely changed into right doctrine, and we must conclude that Pope Francis is subscribing to what the Church has condemned as heresy for 500 years on end.

But no pope whatsoever can approve of a heresy. By divine command (Lk. 22:32), the sovereign pontiff has the duty to maintain and defend the depositum fidei; he simply cannot modify or alter it, nor is he allowed to pretend it does not exist. Therefore, he simply cannot profess or share errores in fide or haereses, not even as a “private theologian.” If such a disgraceful event happens, the clergy and the faithful are morally obliged to ask him to recant publicly and to reaffirm the right and perennial doctrine of the Church – as it happened in the fourteenth century with reigning pope John XXII.

Against the prevailing belief, the aging John XXII suddenly began to preach in his sermons that the souls of the beati had to wait until the day of the Final Judgment to be admitted to the visio beatifica. After long, passionate, and even violent public discussions, initially promoted by the pope himself, he recanted his opinion in front of three cardinals shortly before his death. His successor, Pope Benedict XII, with the Apostolic Constitution Benedictus Deus, on 29 January 1336 defined the doctrine of the immediate vision as the sole and unique doctrine to be believed by all Christians [11].

John XXII recanted his personal unwise opinion on a matter that had not yet been formally defined as an article of faith by the supreme authority of the Church. He had proposed but not imposed a new doctrine that was in the end rejected as erroneous by the great majority of the Catholics. The famous and solitary example of John XXII – of a papal recantation – serves us as a true precedent, and especially in this sense: that a pope must recant his wrong interpretations of doctrine, even if propagated by him as a mere “private theologian.”

But John XXII never praised heresies already and formally condemned by the Church, as Pope Francis has done. It seems that his unwise and unacceptable praise of Luther’s heresy has no real precedent in the history of the Church.

In fact, thanks to his impromptu remarks, Pope Francis has heavily damaged the authority of the whole Magisterium of the Church in the eyes of world public opinion. If Luther was not in the wrong, who was? Someone must surely have been in the wrong during that great and tragic chaos known as the Lutheran schism. To declare that the heresiarch was not in the wrong implies that all those who condemned him as a formal heretic were – i.e., the three popes that excommunicated him as well as the dogmatic Council of Trent. To say Luther “was not wrong,” then, simply means to contradict five hundred years of Church Magisterium, sapping the authority of this same Magisterium, guilty (we now understand) of condemning for five centuries the righteous, very religious, Christ-centered person Luther was supposed to be.

At this point, someone might perhaps ask the following question: Is it legitimate to say that he who openly shares a known heresy proves to be a heretic himself?

Yes, absolutely. He who approves in his mind of the errors professed by a known heretic becomes his accomplice, morally and spiritually speaking. When we approve something – action or notion – being fully aware of what we are doing, it becomes ours. The alien opinion I freely share becomes my own, first in my mind and then in the eyes of the world, if I inform the public of this approval of mine.

One further objection could be the following: Pope Francis’s peculiar statements were issued while conversing as a “private theologian.” Therefore, they possess no magisterial value. Why don’t we just ignore them?

It is true that Pope Francis’s so far multifarious declarations as a “private theologian” have no magisterial value. However, since they almost always deal with relevant aspects of our faith and morals, it is not possible to ignore them. The heterodox slant they often show has a profoundly negative effect on the faithful. The fact is that a pope, even when he is releasing an interview as a private individual, can never be considered a mere private person. Even when he is not speaking ex cathedra, a pope is always the pope, in the sense that every sentence of his is always studied and weighed as if pronounced ex cathedra. The pope always embodies a superior authority: he is the authority par excellence, his being the authority of an institution (the pontificate) that represents in this world no less than the divine authority and supernatural powers of Our Lord Jesus Christ.

It is in no way acceptable, therefore, for Pope Francis, even as a “private theologian,” privately or publicly, to praise and extol well known heresies, formally damned by the Magisterium of the Church.

For the salvation of his own soul and our own, to avert the legitimate wrath of God on all of us, to repair the offense inflicted against the honor of Our Lord, Pope Francis should publicly recant his imprudent utterances as soon as possible and repeat and confirm the solemn condemnation of Lutheranism in all its aspects.

Notes

[1]In-flight Press Conference of His Holiness Pope Francis from Armenia to Rome, papal flight, Sunday, 26 June 2016, w2.vatican.va, pg. 8/12. Emphasis added. The pope was speaking in Italian. The present article is my own non-literal translation into English of a longer article, originally posted by me in Italian on the blog iterpaolopasqualucci.blogspot.ie on 23 September 2017 and subsequently by Maria Guarini on her blog Chiesaepostconcilio.blogspot.ie on 26 September 2017. The English text has been checked by 1Peter5 staff.

[2]Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification, www.vatican.va, §5, The Significance and Scope of the Consensus Reached, no. 42, pg. 10/20. Emphasis added.

[3]Ibidem, pg 4/20. Emphasis added.

[4]Ibidem, pg 5/20. Emphasis added.

[5]Ibidem, pg 5/20. Emphasis added.

[6]Ibidem, pg 9/20. Emphasis added. The notion of “good works” hinted at here seems vague.

[7]The Catholic Encyclopedia, www.thecounciloftrent.com/ch6.htm, pg. 10/16. See also: DS 819/1559.

[8]Ibidem. See also: DS 821/1561.

[9]Op. cit., pg 11/18. See also: DS 834/1574.

[10]See John Paul II, letter of 31 Oct. 1983 (w2.vatican.va, letters of John Paul II, 1983); speech on 22 June 1996 (w2.vatican.va, speeches of John Paul II, 1996). And also Benedict XVI, speech in the Convent of Erfurt (w2.vatican.va, speeches of Benedict XVI, 2011).

[11]On this specific argument see Fr. Jean-Michel Gleize, FSSPX, in a collection of six short articles entitled En cas de doute…, ‘Courrier de Rome,’ Jan 2017, LII, no. 595, pg. 9-11. These articles deal with the doctrinal issue of the “heretical pope” (si deprehendatur a fide devius). See also Giovanni XXII, entry of Enciclopedia Treccani, by Charles Trottman, It. transl. by Maria Paola Arena, pg 25/45, available online. For the magisterial documentation: DS 529-531/990-991; 1000-1002. Benedict XII also confirmed the traditional belief according to which the souls of the damned are precipitated into Hell by Our Lord immediately after their death (mox post mortem suam ad inferna descendunt).

Where does the “morality underlying Amoris Laetitia” actually come from?

Dignitatis Humanae (Religious Liberty) taught the novel doctrine that the dignity of man is so great that he does not have to believe the truth that God has revealed or obey his commandments! This article argues that the corrupt immorality of Pope Francis is “proven” by Dignitatis Humanae! What in fact is offered is material proof that Religious Liberty is heretical and a grave sin that overturns all Catholic morality!

In Amoris Laetitia, Francis' model of conscience empowers Catholics

National Catholic Reporter | Michael G. Lawler, Todd A Salzman | September 7, 2016

….The essential point for conscience as object-orientation is the relevance of the objective norm from the perspective of the inquiring subject in light of the understanding of all the circumstances in a particular historical cultural context. The implications of this perspective on the relationship between conscience as object-orientation and objective norms is that conscience should be guided by those norms but the authority of conscience is not identified with whether or not it obeys the objective norm. Otherwise, Dignitatis Humanae could not advocate for religious freedom, where "every man has the duty, and therefore the right, to seek the truth in matters religious in order that he may with prudence form for himself right and true [objective] judgments of conscience, under use of all suitable means."

If mere obedience to objective norms was the sole role of conscience, then conscience that leads people to follow religious traditions other than the Roman Catholic church could never be tolerated. That religious pluralism is recognized and affirmed in Dignitatis Humanae shifts authority from the objective norm to conscience as object-orientation, informed by objective norms, where the hermeneutical lens of the conscience as subject-orientation facilitates the process of understanding, judgment and decision of conscience. […..]

St. Joseph’s forgotten role in Fatima’s ‘Miracle of the Sun’

Voice of the Family | 10-5-2017 – The 13^th of October 2017 will be the centenary of the Miracle of Sun and the final apparition of Our Lady of Fatima. Despite being essential for understanding the period of history that we are now living through, the details of these remarkable events are far too little known, including amongst Catholics. In this article, we wish to draw attention to the much-neglected role of St Joseph during that momentous event.

Following the Miracle of Sun, and at the culmination of Our Lady’s final apparition, St Joseph also appeared to the three young seers. Father John de Marchi, in his book The True Story of Fatima, describes it as follows:

To the left of the sun, Saint Joseph appeared holding in his left arm the Child Jesus. Saint Joseph emerged from the bright clouds only to his chest, sufficient to allow him to raise his right hand and make, together with the Child Jesus, the Sign of the Cross three times over the world. As Saint Joseph did this, Our Lady stood in all Her brilliancy to the right of the sun, dressed in the blue and white robes of Our Lady of the Rosary. Meanwhile, Francisco and Jacinta were bathed in the marvelous colors and signs of the sun, and Lucia was privileged to gaze upon Our Lord dressed in red as the Divine Redeemer, blessing the world, as Our Lady had foretold. Like Saint Joseph, He was seen only from His chest up. Beside Him stood Our Lady, dressed now in the purple robes of Our Lady of Sorrows, but without the sword. Finally, the Blessed Virgin appeared again to Lucia in all Her ethereal brightness, clothed in the simple brown robes of Mount Carmel.

This final apparition at Fatima points us towards three particular forms of devotion towards Our Lady that we are called to practice during this “final battle” against Satan. These are devotion to:

· her Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart

· the Holy Rosary

· the Brown Scapular.

However, it is of the greatest importance to note that the final apparition of Fatima also directs us towards the intercession of St Joseph, whom Our Lord intimately associated with Himself in his blessing of the world.

Father de Marchi wrote:

Our Lord, already so much offended by the sins of mankind and particularly by the mistreatment of the children by the officials of the county, could easily have destroyed the world on that eventful day. However, Our Lord did not come to destroy, but to save. He saved the world that day through the blessing of good Saint Joseph and the love of the Immaculate Heart of Mary for Her children on earth. Our Lord would have stopped the great World War then raging and given peace to the world through Saint Joseph, Jacinta later declared, if the children had not been arrested and taken to Ourem.

On the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, 8 December 1870, Blessed Pope Pius IX, following appeals received from bishops worldwide, had declared St Joseph to be Patron of the Universal Church, “in this most sorrowful time” when “the Church herself is beset by enemies on every side and oppressed by heavy calamities, so that impious men imagine that the gates of Hell are at length prevailing against her.”

Pope Leo XIII, to whom it was revealed in 1884 that Satan would be given, for a time, increased power to work for the destruction the Church, instituted a new devotion to St Joseph in his encyclical letter Quamquan pluries, promulgated on the Feast of the Assumption, 15 August 1889. The Supreme Pontiff wrote:

During periods of stress and trial – chiefly when every lawlessness of act seems permitted to the powers of darkness – it has been the custom in the Church to plead with special fervour and perseverance to God, her author and protector, by recourse to the intercession of the saints – and chiefly of the Blessed Virgin, Mother of God – whose patronage has ever been the most efficacious.

He further explained:

We see faith, the root of all the Christian virtues, lessening in many souls; we see charity growing cold; the young generation daily growing in depravity of morals and views; the Church of Jesus Christ attacked on every side by open force or by craft; a relentless war waged against the Sovereign Pontiff; and the very foundations of religion undermined with a boldness which waxes daily in intensity. These things are, indeed, so much a matter of notoriety that it is needless for Us to expatiate on the depths to which society has sunk in these days, or on the designs which now agitate the minds of men. In circumstances so unhappy and troublous, human remedies are insufficient, and it becomes necessary, as a sole resource, to beg for assistance from the Divine power.

More than a century after the promulgation of this encyclical the evils identified by Pope Leo XIII have intensified to a degree that would have been inconceivable to most people in 1889. Thousands of innocent children are slaughtered every day with the approval of the governments that ought to be defending them, the sanctity of marriage is defiled by divorce, adultery and contraception, and the bonds between parents and their children are being deliberately targeted for destruction by the most powerful states and institutions in the world. Worst of all, the Pope himself is responsible for the spread of heresies which are leading the flock away from Christ and towards eternal damnation.

Pope Leo XIII urged the faithful, just as Our Lady would do twenty-eight years later at Fatima, to combat these evils through the prayer of the Holy Rosary:

At this proximity of the month of October, which We have already consecrated to the Virgin Mary, under the title of Our Lady of the Rosary, We earnestly exhort the faithful to perform the exercises of this month with, if possible, even more piety and constancy than heretofore. We know that there is sure help in the maternal goodness of the Virgin, and We are very certain that We shall never vainly place Our trust in her. If, on innumerable occasions, she has displayed her power in aid of the Christian world, why should We doubt that she will now renew the assistance of her power and favour, if humble and constant prayers are offered up on all sides to her? Nay, We rather believe that her intervention will be the more marvellous as she has permitted Us to pray to her, for so long a time, with special appeals.

But then, once more anticipating Fatima, he directed the faithful also towards St Joseph:

But We entertain another object, which, according to your wont, Venerable Brethren, you will advance with fervour. That God may be more favourable to Our prayers, and that He may come with bounty and promptitude to the aid of His Church, We judge it of deep utility for the Christian people, continually to invoke with great piety and trust, together with the Virgin-Mother of God, her chaste Spouse, the Blessed Joseph; and We regard it as most certain that this will be most pleasing to the Virgin herself.

He further explained:

The divine house which Joseph ruled with the authority of a father, contained within its limits the scarce-born Church. From the same fact that the most holy Virgin is the mother of Jesus Christ is she the mother of all Christians whom she bore on Mount Calvary amid the supreme throes of the Redemption; Jesus Christ is, in a manner, the first-born of Christians, who by the adoption and Redemption are his brothers. And for such reasons the Blessed Patriarch looks upon the multitude of Christians who make up the Church as confided specially to his trust – this limitless family spread over the earth, over which, because he is the spouse of Mary and the Father of Jesus Christ he holds, as it were, a paternal authority. It is, then, natural and worthy that as the Blessed Joseph ministered to all the needs of the family at Nazareth and girt it about with his protection, he should now cover with the cloak of his heavenly patronage and defend the Church of Jesus Christ.

Therefore the Holy Father instituted a new prayer to said after the Holy Rosary throughout the month of October. He intended this prayer to be said, not just in October 1889, but in October every year. As we prepare for the centenary of the Miracle of Sun, let us learn the lesson of St Joseph’s apparition at Fatima, and turn to him for help and protection.

St Joseph, terror of demons, pray for us!

The Sin of Calumny takes two: a big mouth and an itching ear who share a common vice!

Cardinal Müller: I heard it from some houses here, that people working in the Curia are living in great fear: If they say one small or harmless critical word, some spies will pass the comments directly to the Holy Father, and the falsely accused people don’t have any chance to defend themselves. These people, who are speaking bad words and lies against other persons, are disturbing and disrupting the good faith, the good name of others whom they are calling their brothers.

The Gospel and the words of Jesus are very strong against those who denounce their brothers and who are creating this bad atmosphere of suspicion. I’ve heard that nobody speaks; everyone is a little afraid because they can be snitched on. It’s not the behavior of adult people, but that of a boarding school.

Cardinal Gerhard Müller: excerpt from interview on September 12 with Professor Claudio Pierantoni, one of the signatories of the recent “Filial Correction” of Pope Francis, published by LifeSiteNews on September 29, 2017

Apparently, the Homosexual Lobby is running the Vatican!

Psychiatrist: Archbishop behind Vatican sex-ed should be evaluated by sex abuse review board

LifeSiteNews | September 2, 2016 — A renowned psychiatrist who has worked with victims of priestly sexual abuse and priest abusers has strongly condemned the Vatican’s new sex education program as abusive and “the most dangerous threat to Catholic youth” he has seen in the past 40 years.

The gravely concerned psychiatrist is Dr. Rick Fitzgibbons, a counseling center director who has been a consultant to the Congregation for the Clergy at the Vatican and has served as adjunct professor at the John Paul II Institute for Studies on Marriage and Family at the Catholic University of America. In an essay published today by LifeSiteNews, Fitzgibbons warns that the material found in the Vatican’s newly-released sex ed program The Meeting Point “constitutes sexual abuse of Catholic adolescents” and contains pornographic images “similar to those used by adult sexual predators of adolescents.”

“In a culture in which youth are bombarded by pornography, I was particularly shocked by the images contained in this new sex education program, some of which are clearly pornographic,” Fitzgibbons wrote. “My immediate professional reaction was that this obscene or pornographic approach abuses youth psychologically and spiritually. … As a professional who has treated both priest perpetrators and the victims of the abuse crisis in the Church, what I found particularly troubling was that the pornographic images in this program are similar to those used by adult sexual predators of adolescents.”

Fitzgibbons called for Archbishop Vincenzo Paglia, who oversaw the development and release of the program when he was head of the Pontifical Council for the Family, to be evaluated according to norms adopted by the United States Catholic Bishops in the wake of the sex abuse scandal.

Paglia “should be required in justice to go through an evaluation by a review board as described in the Dallas Charter norms for placing youth at risk,” Fitzgibbons wrote. “Such a review is particularly important as he is now been put in charge of further teaching regarding sexuality and marriage at the John Paul II Institute for Family Studies.” [……]

Pope Francis, in corrupting the Sacrament of Matrimony, has perpetrated a terrible injustice to countless Catholics!

Many Catholic families had hoped that the Synod on the Family would address the serious problem of the divorce epidemic and its long-term damage to youth, innocent spouses, the sacrament of marriage, the culture, and the Church. (It did not!) The divorce plague has inflicted severe pain upon Catholic families worldwide. Married couples need to be encouraged by the Church not to give up on their marriages during stressful, unhappy times, and to persevere in loyalty to their marital vows. [.....] Over the past forty years, I have never worked with a Catholic marriage in which both spouses wanted a divorce. In the majority of marriages under stress, one spouse remains happy with the marriage, believes the conflicts can be resolved and is loyal to the sacramental bond.

The spouses who are not happy and who want to pursue divorce and a decision of nullity most often refuse to address their own weaknesses. Instead, they portray themselves as victims of insensitive treatment or emotional abuse.[......]

The majority of spouses who pursue divorce — in our experience with several thousand couples — have never worked on these issues. This explains, in part, why the national survey of divorced men and women, conducted by the Office of Survey Research at the University of Texas at Austin, found the honest response that only one in three divorced spouses claimed that both they and their ex-spouses worked hard enough to try to save their marriage. There is reason to be hopeful about the resolution of marital difficulties. In a major study from the University of Chicago among spouses who rated their marriages as very unhappy, 86 percent of those who persevered reported themselves as happily married five years later.

One grave danger to Catholic marriages and families from the changes made in canon law made by the Holy Father (without a careful study by a commission of experts) is that spouses will not be motivated to engage in the hard work of addressing personal psychological and spiritual weaknesses. Instead, they will pursue divorce and with a belief that they are entitled to a decision of nullity if they can meet the criteria cited, including the new one, “etcetera.”

With all due respect, the determination of nullity by only one priest or by a bishop after 30 to 45 days, is seriously flawed because they lack the proper mental health training to uncover and evaluate the numerous complex psychological conflicts that lead to a decision for divorce. This new process is a grave injustice and, therefore, a manifestation of a severe lack of mercy towards the sacrament of marriage, innocent spouses, children, and Catholic families.

In his closing talk at the Synod, the Holy Father criticized bishops and priests, whom he claimed hide behind rigid doctrines and ignore wounded families. In fact, his radical change in canon law in regard to annulments, made prior to the Synod, will weaken and harm Catholic marriages and families. [.....]

Rick, Fitzgibbons, Psychological Science and the Evaluation of Nullity, published by “The Catholic Thing”

Apparently, the “morality underlying Amoris Laetitia” does not forbid lying!

In fact I hear many comments – they are respectable for they come from children of God, but wrong – concerning the post-synod apostolic exhortation. To understand Amoris Laetitia you need to read it from the start to the end. Beginning with the first chapter, and to continue to the second and then on … and reflect. And read what was said in the Synod

A second thing: some maintain that there is no Catholic morality underlying Amoris Laetitia, or at least, no sure morality. I want to repeat clearly that the morality of Amoris Laetitia is Thomist, the morality of the great Thomas. You can speak of it with a great theologian, one of the best today and one of the most mature, Cardinal Schönborn.

I want to say this so that you can help those who believe that morality is purely casuistic. Help them understand that the great Thomas possesses the greatest richness, which is still able to inspire us today. But on your knees, always on your knees…

Pope Francis, Attributing the vulgar immorality of Amoris Laetitia to St. Thomas, interview Sept 28, 2017

EcoWatch | Lorraine Chow | Aug. 30, 2017

Pope Francis, who has a strong belief in the science of climate change, called upon world leaders on Wednesday to “listen to the cry of the Earth and the cry of the poor, who suffer most because of the unbalanced ecology.”

Francis and Patriarch Bartholomew I, the head of the Orthodox Christian Church, will issue a joint message to commemorate the annual “World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation” on Friday, the Associated Press reported.

In 2015, the Pope designated Sept. 1 as “a precious opportunity to renew our personal participation in this vocation as custodians of creation,” framing the preservation of the environment as a moral responsibility.

Similarly, Bartholomew—who backed Francis' 2015 encyclical on the environment, Laudato Si—once said:

“There has never been so much turmoil on our planet, but there has never been greater opportunity for communication, cooperation and dialogue. Basic human rights such as access to water, clean air and sufficient food should be available to everyone without distinction or discrimination. We are convinced that we cannot separate our concern for human dignity, human rights or social justice from the concern for ecological preservation and sustainability.”

Pope Francis has long pressed for strong climate action. In May, during their meeting at the Vatican, the pontiff gifted President Trump a copy of the climate encyclical right as POTUS considered whether the U.S. should exit from the Paris climate agreement. Trump, a notorious climate skeptic who does not agree with Francis about the global phenomenon, apparently didn't take the Pope's message to heart—he controversially withdrew the U.S. from the Paris accord just a month later.

Just as the denial on one Dogma destroys the Faith, the overturning of one commandment destroys the entire moral law!

Amoris Laetitia is a ticking ‘atomic bomb’ set to obliterate all Catholic morality: philosopher

LIfeSiteNews | August 23, 2017— One of the world’s top Catholic philosophers has called Pope’ Francis’ Exhortation Amoris Laetitia a ticking “theological atomic bomb” that has the capacity to entirely destroy all Catholic moral teaching.

Dr. Josef Seifert, founding rector of the International Academy of Philosophy in Liechtenstein, said the only way the theological bomb can be defused is by Pope Francis retracting at least one major error in his 2016 Exhortation.

With philosophical precision, Seifert pinpoints the main problem in Amoris Laetitia (AL) to a passage that he said suggests that God actively wills people, in certain situations, to commit acts that have always been considered objectively evil by the Catholic Church.

He quotes directly from passage 303 of Amoris where Pope Francis speaks about “irregular couples” living in habitual adultery who decide to forgo following the Six Commandment.

“Yet conscience can do more than recognize that a given situation does not correspond objectively to the overall demands of the Gospel,” wrote Pope Francis in his 2016 Exhortation.

“It can also recognize with sincerity and honesty what for now is the most generous response which can be given to God, and come to see with a certain moral security that it is what God himself is asking amid the concrete complexity of one’s limits, while yet not fully the objective ideal,” he added.

Commented Seifert: “In other words, besides calling an objective state of grave sin, euphemistically, ‘not yet fully the objective ideal,’ AL says that we can know with ‘a certain moral security’ that God himself asks us to continue to commit intrinsically wrong acts, such as adultery or active homosexuality.”

But Seifert pointed out that if just one intrinsically immoral act, such as adultery, can be permitted and even willed by God, then there is nothing stopping such a principle being applied to “all acts considered ‘intrinsically wrong.’”

If it is true that God can want an adulterous couple to live in adultery against the Sixth Commandment, he said, then there is nothing to keep the other nine Commandments from falling.

According to such logic, Seifert continued, evils such as murder, abortion, euthanasia, suicide, lying, thievery, perjury, and betrayal can be “justified in some cases and ‘be what God himself is asking amid the concrete complexity of one’s limits, while yet not fully the objective ideal.’”

“Does not pure logic demand that we draw this consequence from this proposition of Pope Francis?” the philosopher said.

Seifert said that if his above question is answered in the affirmative, then the “purely logical consequence of that one assertion of Amoris Laetitia seems to destroy the entire moral teaching of the Church.”

The professor’s concern is similar to one of the dubia (questions) raised by the four cardinals to Pope Francis last year asking him to clarify the meaning of his Exhortation.

Question two of five asks the Pope if, with the publication of Amoris, does one still need to regard as valid the teaching of St. John Paul II in Veritatis Splendor that there are “absolute moral norms that prohibit intrinsically evil acts and that are binding without exceptions?”

In his paper, Seifert pleaded with Pope Francis to withdraw and condemn the notion that God sometimes wills people to commit intrinsically evil acts. [.....]

“In Freemasonary it is allowed to kill.”

Nedeljko Čabrinović, 1895 –1916, one of seven young men of a Masonic secret society known as the Black Hand who conspired to assassinate Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria in Sarajevo in June 1914, on October 12, 1914 at his trial for the murders.

Amid Nationwide Controversy, St. Junípero Serra Statue Vandalized in LA

CNA/EWTN News | August 22, 2017 | LOS ANGELES — A statue of St. Junípero Serra in a Los Angeles public park appeared to have been vandalized last week in a time of national debate about historical statues.

The statue portrays the Franciscan friar in a favorable light, with his arm on the shoulder of an indigenous child. The park is across the street from the Mission San Fernando in the Mission Hills community of Los Angeles. The mission was founded by Father Fermin Lasuen, another Franciscan, in 1797.

A picture of the statue was circulated on social media, showing it spray-painted red with the word “murder” written on the priest in white.

The Novus Ordo is “irreversible” because it lost its way long ago. There can be no retracing its steps. The fruit of the Novus Ordo is apostasy. It is a memorial meal with an ever changing menu. Pope Francis does not possess the authority to overturn Dogma, therefore, he cannot overturn God's liturgical laws any more than he can overturn God's laws regarding Sodomy, Fornication and Adultery.

“After this magisterium, after this long journey, we can affirm with certainty and with magisterial authority that the liturgical reform is irreversible.”

Pope Francis the Destroyer, addressing the 68th Italian National Liturgical Week, August 24, 2017

“If anyone shall say that the received and approved rites of the Catholic Church accustomed to be used in the solemn administration of the sacraments may be disdained or omitted by the minister without sin and at pleasure, or may be changed to other new rites by any church pastor whomsoever : let him be anathema.”

Council of Trent, Den. 856

Whether in the Ordinary or Extra-ordinary flavor: The “Assembly…Celebrates.”

General Instruction on the Novus Ordo Mass

The Lord’s supper or Mass is the sacred assembly or congregation of the people of God gathering together, with a priest presiding, in order to celebrate the memorial of the Lord. For this reason, Christ’s promise applies supremely to such a local gathering of the Church: “Where two or three come together in my name, there am I in their midst.”

Article 7(1969)

COMMENT: “Almost any believing Protestant of whatever denomination would be able to assent to such a definition.”

Msgr. Klaus Gamber

Why is it that so often Curial Officials only make truthful comments in secular interviews and not in official Vatican documents?

“They (documents of Vatican II) are not about doctrines or definitive statements, but, rather, about instructions and orienting guides for pastoral practice. One can continue to discuss these pastoral aspects after the canonical approval, in order to lead us to further clarifications.”

“This is certainly not a conclusion on our part, but it was already clear at the time of the Council. The General Secretary of the Council, Cardinal Pericle Felici, declared on 16 November 1964: ‘This holy synod defines only that as being binding for the Church what it declares explicitly to be such with regard to Faith and Morals.’ Only those texts assessed by the Council Fathers as being binding are to be accepted as such. That has not been invented by ‘the Vatican,’ but it is written in the official files themselves.”

“The secretary for the Unity of Christians said on 18 November 1964 in the Council Hall about Nostra Aetate: ‘As to the character of the declaration, the secretariat does not want to write a dogmatic declaration on non-Christian religions, but, rather, practical and pastoral norms.’ Nostrae Aetate does not have any dogmatic authority, and thus one cannot demand from anyone to recognize this declaration as being dogmatic. This declaration can only be understood in the light of tradition and of the continuous Magisterium.

“For example, there exists today, unfortunately, the view — contrary to the Catholic Faith — that there is a salvific path independent of Christ and His Church. That has also been officially confirmed last of all by the Congregation for the Faith itself in its declaration, Dominus Jesus. Therefore, any interpretation of Nostrae Aetate which goes into this direction is fully unfounded and has to be rejected.”

Archbishop Guido Pozzo, secretary, Pontifical Commission of Ecclesia Dei, Interview German newspaper Die Zeit, August 2016

What's Going on in Bergoglio's Pontifical Academy for Life Anyway?

Is there no end to the anti-life scandals at Pontifical Academy for Life? Or is it Death?

Karolinska Institute is NOT a “Medical University.” It’s a Big Auschwitz for unborn children.

In the selection of its members, the Vatican must also consider the institution that the member represents. In the case of Katarina Le Blanc that institution is the Karolinska Institute – one of the world’s foremost promoters of abortion and abortifacients. The Institute also is involved in non-therapeutic fetal experimentation and the provision of fetal tissues from aborted babies. Its eugenic mind-set is illustrated by its pioneer promotion of human embryo pre-implantation diagnosis and in-vitro Fertilization.

Either remove Le Blanc and all the other anti-life characters which infest the “academy” or just shut the growing hell-hole down! Enough is enough!

Randy Engel, U.S. Coalition for Life, July 19, 2017

Building Bridges to Hell – The homosexual agenda is not seeking to be left alone in their vices but seeking to have their vices recognized as perfectly normal moral behavior!

Many of the gay persons who I met that week revealed a deep spirituality and faith. And most interesting of all, the people I met asked that we, as ministers of the Church, be people of compassion and understanding, and not be afraid to teach the message of the Gospel and the Church with gentleness and clarity even in the midst of ambiguity of lifestyle, devastation, despair and hostility. As a Church and as pastoral ministers, we still have a long journey ahead of us as we welcome strangers into our midst and listen to them.

Over the past weeks, I read many of the critical comments of Jesuit Fr. James Martin’s book, Building a Bridge. I shook my head in bewilderment several times as I read venom and vitriol in some of the critiques. It is one thing to critique and raise questions. It is another to condemn, disparage and dismiss. I sensed palpable fear and anger in some of the negative commentaries. I made it a point to read the book in one sitting last weekend. I was astounded that what I read in commentaries, blogs, some bishops’ messages, had very little to do with what I considered to be very mild, reflections offered by a well-known Jesuit priest who simply invited people to build bridges with those who are on distant shores. Fr. Martin’s book is not dogma or doctrine. It is by no means revolutionary. It is merely an invitation to sit down and talk, face-to-face with people we consider to be different.

Whereas Fr. Martin and Pope Francis invite us to build bridges and become instruments of dialogue, critics of both Fr. Martin, the Pope, and many of us who support Pope Francis thrive in erecting high, impenetrable walls and noisy echo chambers of monologue.

Fr. Thomas Rosica, Vatican spokesman for English speaking people, addressing homosexuals in their haven, Most Holy Redeemer Church, in San Francisco. Fr. Rosica is defending to homosexuals the homosexual friendly book by the Jesuit, Fr. James Martin. Homosexuals cannot praise each other too highly. Martin’s book does not endorse any Catholic ministries that support conversion, repentance, or chastity. He endorses only those organizations that reject Catholic morality, such as, New Ways Ministry.

The National Catholic Reporter said:

It was a real-life horror story that galvanized Martin to write this manuscript. Just weeks after the massacre of 49 people at Pulse, a gay nightclub in Orlando (by a conflicted Moslem Homosexual), he was offered the Bridge Building award from New Ways Ministry, a longtime Catholic advocacy and ministry organization for LGBT Catholics and their families. Building a Bridge is an expansion of his acceptance speech. […..] Part of what motivated Martin to accept the Bridge Building Award was the inadequate response offered by Catholic bishops to the Pulse tragedy. Although many church leaders expressed both horror and sorrow, only a handful of the more than 250 Catholic bishops used the words gay or LGBT,” Martin writes. “I found this revelatory.”

Homosexuals define themselves by their “sexual tendencies”! If they did not, no one would know they are homosexuals!

I am glad that we are talking about “homosexual people” because before all else comes the individual person, in his wholeness and dignity. And people should not be defined only by their sexual tendencies: let us not forget that God loves all his creatures and we are destined to receive his infinite love.

Pope Francis

Let the reader accept the reasonable fact that the Pontiffs who pronounced these decrees (on No Salvation Outside the Church) were perfectly literate and fully cognizant of what they were saying. If there were any need to soften or qualify their meanings, they were quite capable of doing so..... Dogmas of the faith, like Outside the Church There is No Salvation, are truths fallen from heaven. The very point of a dogmatic definition is to DEFINE PRECISELY and EXACTLY what the Church means by the very words of the formula. If it does not do this by those very words in the formula then it has failed in its primary purpose – to define – and was pointless and worthless. ANYONE who says that we must interpret or understand the meaning of a dogmatic definition, in a way which contradicts its actual wording, is denying the whole point of Papal Infallibility and dogmatic definitions. They who insist that infallible DEFINITIONS must be interpreted by non-infallible statements (e.g., from theologians, catechisms, etc.) are denying the whole purpose of these infallible truths fallen from heaven. They are subordinating the dogmatic teaching of the Holy Ghost to the re-evaluation of fallible human documents,thereby inverting their authority, perverting their integrity and denying their purpose".

Fr. James Wathen, Who Shall Ascend?

Wisdom is only possible for those who hold DOGMA as the Rule of Faith!

Besides, every dogma of faith is to the Catholic cultivated mind not only a new increase of knowledge, but also an incontrovertible principle from which it is able to draw conclusions and derive other truths. They present an endless field for investigation so that the beloved Apostle St. John could write at the end of his Gospel, without fear of exaggeration: “But there are also many other things which Jesus did: which if they were written every one, the world itself, I think, would not be able to contain the books that should be written.”

The Catholic Church, by enforcing firm belief in her dogmas—which are not her inventions, but were given by Jesus Christ—places them as a bar before the human mind to prevent it from going astray and to attach it to the truth; but it does not prevent the mind from exercising its functions when it has secured the treasure of divine truth, and a “scribe thus instructed in the kingdom of heaven is truly like a man that is a householder, who bringeth forth out of his treasure new things and old.” He may bring forth new illustrations, new arguments and proofs; be may show now applications of the same truths, according to times and circumstances; he may show new links which connect the mysteries of religion with each other or with the natural sciences as there can be no discord between the true faith and true science; God, being the author of both, cannot contradict Himself and teach something by revelation as true which He teaches by the true light of reason as false. In all these cases the householder “brings forth from his treasure now things and old.” They are new inasmuch as they are the result of new investigations; and old because they are contained in the old articles of faith and doctrine as legitimate deductions from their old principles.

Fr. Joseph Prachensky, S.J., The Church of Parables and True Spouse of the Suffering Saviour, on the Parable of the Scribe

Wisdom of St. Francis of Assisi

The springs of action are to be found in belief, and conduct ultimately rests upon conviction.

St. Francis of Assisi, on the grounds of moral acts

There are many who if they commit sin or suffer wrong often blame their enemy or their neighbor. But this is not right, for each one has his enemy in his power, - to wit, the body by which he sins. Wherefore blessed is that servant who always holds captive the enemy thus given into his power and wisely guards himself from it, for so long as he acts thus no other enemy visible or invisible can do him harm.

St. Francis of Assisi, on Mortification

How much interior patience and humility a servant of God may have cannot be known so long as he is contented. But when the time comes that those who ought to please him go against him, as much patience and humility as he then shows, so much has he and no more.

St. Francis, on Patience

And let no man be bound by obedience to obey any one in that where sin or offence is committed.

St. Francis of Assisi, Letter to all the Faithful

Women “religious” support taxpayer funded Abortions by Planned Parenthood!

Don’t repeal, don’t reduce the ACA, say US sisters

NationalCathlicReporter | Dan Stockman | Jul 25, 2017

As the United States Senate prepares to again tackle health care reform this week, senators will have the voices of thousands of sisters to consider.

A letter signed by 7,150 women religious from all 50 states was delivered to the Senate on July 24, urging senators to vote against any bill that repeals the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act or cuts Medicaid. The effort was coordinated by NETWORK, a Catholic social justice lobby.

“The mission of Catholic Sisters has always been to serve our nation’s most vulnerable people,” Social Service Sr. Simone Campbell, executive director of NETWORK and the letter’s author, said in a statement. “As such, we are united in opposition to the current Republican healthcare proposals.”

A similar letter in 2010 was key to the passage of the Affordable Care Act.

The letter states:

As Catholic women religious, we have witnessed firsthand the moral crisis of lack of quality, affordable healthcare in this country. We have seen early and avoidable deaths because of lack of insurance, prohibitive costs, and lack of access to quality care. We fought for the expansion of coverage in the Affordable Care Act because we saw the life-giving value of crucial healthcare programs such as Medicaid. This program covers over 70 million Americans, including children, pregnant women (and nearly half of all births in this country), people with disabilities, people struggling to get by, and senior citizens. Further, some of our fellow women religious rely on Medicaid in nursing homes when we can no longer care for our sisters at home.

The House of Representatives passed a bill in May to repeal and replace parts of the Affordable Care Act, but the Senate has twice failed to pass its own version. As of July 24, senators still did not know whether they would be voting on the House bill, one of the two Senate bills or a bill to repeal the Affordable Care Act without a replacement.

Pope Francis, the leader of the Homosexual Lobby!

U.S. bishop criticizes Vatican advisor for being part of ‘LGBT lobby…within the church’

LifeSiteNews | SPRINGFIELD, Illinois | July 27, 2017 -- A U.S. bishop said that the outcry from “within the Church” against his statement prohibiting unrepentant homosexuals from receiving Communion or a public funeral within his diocese shows the existence of a “strong…LGBT lobby” that has infiltrated the Church.

Illinois Bishop Thomas Paprocki singled out newly-appointed Vatican advisor Father James Martin, S.J., for getting “a lot wrong” in his criticism of the bishop’s June 12 decree.

Father Martin is a Jesuit and editor-at-large of America magazine. In his June 2017 book titled Building a Bridge he urges Catholics who identify as “gay” to begin “conversations” with their bishops so as to move the Church in the direction of eventually accepting homosexuality as part of God’s creation.

When Bishop Paprocki issued his decree on same-sex “marriage” last month, Fr. Martin responded to it with a series of critical tweets.

Tweeted the priest as quoted by the bishop: “If bishops ban members of same-sex couples from funeral rites, they must also ban divorced and remarried Catholics without annulments ... women who have children out of wedlock, members of straight couples living together before marriage, anyone using birth control ... To focus only on LGBT people, even those in same-sex marriages, without a similar focus on the sexual or moral behavior of straight people is in the words of the Catechism a ‘sign of unjust discrimination.’”

Paprocki said that the “fact that there would be such an outcry against this decree is quite astounding and shows how strong the LGBT lobby is both in the secular world as well as within the church.”

He went on to address specific points raised by Fr. Martin, saying that the priest “gets a lot wrong in those tweets.”

“[C]anon law prohibits ecclesiastical funeral rites only in cases of ‘manifest sinners’ which gives ‘public scandal,’ and something such as using birth control is a private matter that is usually not manifest or made public,” he said. [......]

..the great movement of apostasy being organized in every country for the establishment of a One-World Church which shall have neither dogmas, nor hierarchy, neither discipline for the mind, nor curb for the passions, and which, under the pretext of freedom and human dignity, would bring back to the world (if such a Church could overcome) the reign of legalized cunning and force, and the oppression of the weak, and of all those who toil and suffer. [...] Indeed, the true friends of the people are neither revolutionaries, nor innovators: they are traditionalists.

St. Pius X, Notre Charge Apostolique (Our Apostolic Mandate), August 15, 1910

Pius XII - the man responsible for planting the seed of liturgical destruction!

Fr. Annibale Bugnini had been making clandestine visits to the Centre de Pastorale Liturgique (CPL), a progressivist conference centre for liturgical reform which organized national weeks for priests.
Inaugurated in Paris in 1943 on the private initiative of two Dominican priests under the presidency of Fr. Lambert Beauduin, it was a magnet for all who considered themselves in the vanguard of the Liturgical Movement. It would play host to some of the most famous names who influenced the direction of Vatican II: Frs. Beauduin, Guardini, Congar, Chenu, Daniélou, Gy, von Balthasar, de Lubac, Boyer, Gelineau etc.

It could, therefore, be considered as the confluence of all the forces of Progressivism, which saved and re-established Modernism condemned by Pope Pius X in Pascendi.
According to its co-founder and director, Fr. Pie Duployé, OP, Bugnini had requested a “discreet” invitation to attend a CPL study week held near Chartres in September 1946.

Much more was involved here than the issue of secrecy. The person whose heart beat as one with the interests of the reformers would return to Rome to be placed by an unsuspecting (?) Pope (Pius XII) in charge of his Commission for the General Reform of the Liturgy.
But someone in the Roman Curia did know about the CPL – Msgr. Giovanni Battista Montini, the acting Secretary of State and future Paul VI – who sent a telegram to the CPL dated January 3, 1947. It purported to come from the Pope with an apostolic blessing. If, in Bugnini’s estimation, the Roman authorities were to be kept in the dark about the CPL so as not to compromise its activities, a mystery remains. Was the telegram issued under false pretences, or did Pius XII really know and approve of the CPL? [.....]

This agenda (for liturgical reform) was set out as early as 1949 in the Ephemerides Liturgicae, a leading Roman review on liturgical studies of which Fr. Annabale Bugnini was Editor from 1944 to 1965.
First, Bugnini denigrated the traditional liturgy as a dilapidated building (“un vecchio edificio”), which should be condemned because it was in danger of falling to pieces (“sgretolarsi”) and, therefore, beyond repair. Then, he criticized it for its alleged “deficiencies, incongruities and difficulties,” which rendered it spiritually “sterile” and would prevent it appealing to modern sensibilities.
It is difficult to understand how, in the same year that he published this anti-Catholic diatribe, he was made a Professor of Liturgy in Rome’s Propaganda Fide (Propagation of the Faith) University. His solution was to return to the simplicity of early Christian liturgies and jettison all subsequent developments, especially traditional devotions.
These ideas expressed in 1949 would form the foundational principles of Vatican II’s Sacrosanctum Concilium. For all practical purposes, the Roman Rite was dead in the water many years before it was officially buried by Paul VI.

Dr. Carol Byrne, How Bugnini Grew Up under Pius XII

“A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit.”

Matt 7:18

Major player at Vatican II confesses to concealing homosexual sex life

LifeSiteNews | February 17, 2017— 93-year-old Gregory Baum, a famed Canadian Catholic ex-priest, has in his latest book revealed that he secretly led an active homosexual life for decades.

Baum, who was a peritus or expert at the Second Vatican Council, reportedly composed the first draft of the conciliar document Nostra aetate, the Declaration on the Relation of the Church with Non-Christian Religions. Baum advocated for the elimination of the Church’s efforts to encourage Jews to recognize Christ as the Messiah and has since pushed social justice and liberation theology.

The influential cleric reveals candidly in The Oil Has Not Run Dry: The Story of My Theological Pathway, “I did not profess my own homosexuality in public because such an act of honesty would have reduced my influence as a critical theologian.” “I was eager to be heard as a theologian trusting in God as salvator mundi and committed to social justice, liberation theology, and global solidarity.”

Baum was also influential in the Catholic Church in Canada despite his openly heretical positions on sexuality, which he published in various journals. His public dissent from the 1968 declaration of the Church maintaining the ban on contraception — Humanae Vitae — was instrumental in the Canadian bishops’ own dissent from the encyclical of Pope Paul VI. As the foremost expert on the Canadian bishops’ dissent, Monsignor Vincent Foy has written, “If it had not been for the black shadow of Baum over Winnipeg, his influence over some Bishops, the Canadian theological establishment and pressure groups, the Winnipeg Statement of the Canadian Bishops on Humanae Vitae would not have refused to endorse the teaching of the encyclical as it did.”

In his new book, Baum writes, “I was 40 years old when I had my first sexual encounter with a man. I met him in a restaurant in London. This was exciting and at the same time disappointing, for I knew what love was and what I really wanted was to share my life with a partner.”

He says he considered resigning from the priesthood but didn’t go through with the formality, rather choosing to announce it in the national newspaper. He later married a divorced ex-nun who he says “did not mind that, when we moved to Montreal in 1986, I met Normand, a former priest, with whom I fell in love.” Normand, he explains, “is gay and welcomed my sexual embrace.”

Dr. Michael Higgins, the vice president for Mission and Catholic Identity at Sacred Heart University in Fairfield, Connecticut, in a tribute to Baum published in Commonweal in 2011 noted his key role during Vatican Council II. “The council was the making of Gregory Baum,” he wrote. “He served in various capacities on the commissions charged with preparing documents. … Beginning his work in November 1960, he concluded it with the council’s end in December 1965, an apprenticeship that culminated in his writing the first draft of Nostra aetate.” [....]

Homosexual Heresy - The Great Vatican Silence

· “We must clearly, explicitly and reservedly say: yes, there is a strong homosexual underground in the Church ... such circles in the Church strongly oppose the truth, morality and Revelation, cooperate with enemies of the Church [and] incite revolt against Peter of our times.

· “It is for [his] accuracy of opinion that he is so vehemently opposed, or even hated by some in the Church, especially by members of the homolobby which represents the very center of internal opposition against the Pope.”

· “If homolobbyists are allowed to act freely, [in Poland] in a dozen or so years they may destroy entire congregations and dioceses — like in the USA, where priestly vocation is more and more now called a gay profession.”

· “The global network of the homolobbies and homomafias must be counterbalanced by a network of honest people. An excellent tool that can be used here is the Internet, which makes it possible to create a global community of people concerned about the fate of the Church, who have resolved to oppose homoideology and homoheresy. The more we know, the more we can do.”

· “This is about the Church’s to be or not to be. If homolobbyists are allowed to act freely, in a dozen or so years they may destroy entire congregations and dioceses – like in the USA, where the priestly vocation is more and more now called a gay profession (particularly with reference to American Jesuits), or like in Ireland, where men are hesitant about joining the emptying seminaries for fear of being suspected of suffering from some disorders.”

· “The Church does not generate homosexuality, but falls victim to dishonest men with homosexual tendencies, who take advantage of its structures to follow their lowest instincts. Active homosexual priests are masters of camouflage. They are often exposed by accident. ... The real threat to the Church are cynical homosexual priests who take advantage of their functions on their own behalf, sometimes in an extraordinarily devious way. Such situations cause great suffering to the Church, the priestly community, the superiors. The problem is indeed a very difficult one.” F. Józef Augustyn

Fr. Dariusz Oko, Ph.D., WITH THE POPE AGAINST THE HOMOHERESIES

Ss. Peter & Paul Roman Catholic Mission refused the offer of becoming an Indult community. Our reply to the Bishop of Harrisburg was that the immemorial ecclesiastical traditions are in fact necessary attributes of the Faith without which it can neither be known nor communicated to others. These traditions are not nor have ever been matters of mere Church discipline, but are in fact grounded in Catholic dogma, the formal object of divine and Catholic Faith. Therefore, the immemorial Roman rite of Mass can never in fact be reduced to ignominious status of an Indult or grant of legal privilege. Those who have accepted the 1962 Indult Mass as a grant of legal privilege have already relinquished any claim of right and have no grounds of complaint if what is described in this article comes to be.

Vatican rumblings: Pope Francis aiming to end Latin Mass permission

LifeSiteNews | ROME | July 26, 2017 – Sources inside the Vatican suggest that Pope Francis aims to end Pope Benedict XVI’s universal permission for priests to say the Traditional Latin Mass (TLM), also known as the Extraordinary Form of the Mass. While the course of action would be in tune with Pope Francis’ repeatedly expressed disdain for the TLM especially among young people, there has been no open discussion of it to date.

Sources in Rome told LifeSite last week that liberal prelates inside the Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith were overheard discussing a plan ascribed to the Pope to do away with Pope Benedict’s famous document that gave priests freedom to offer the ancient rite of the Mass.

Catholic traditionalists have just celebrated the tenth anniversary of the document, Summorum Pontificum. Pope Benedict XVI issued it in 2007, giving all Latin Rite priests permission to offer the TLM without seeking permission of their bishops, undoing a restriction placed on priests after the Second Vatican Council.

The motu proprio outraged liberal bishops as it stripped them of the power to forbid the TLM, as many did. Previously priests needed their bishop’s permission to offer the TLM.

Additionally, Summorum Pontificum stated that wherever a group of the faithful request the TLM, the parish priests should willingly agree to their request.

The overheard plans are nearly identical to comments from an important Italian liturgist in an interview published by France’s La Croix earlier this month. Andrea Grillo a lay professor at the Pontifical Athenaeum of St Anselmo in Rome, billed by La Croix as “close to the Pope,” is intimately familiar Summorum Pontificum. Grillo in fact published a book against Summorum Pontificum before the papal document was even released.

Grillo told La Croix that Francis is considering abolishing Summorum Pontificum. According to Grillo, once the Vatican erects the Society of Saint Pius X as a Personal Prelature, the Roman Rite will be preserved only within this structure. "But [Francis] will not do this as long as Benedict XVI is alive.” […..]

Worth recalling how the Catholic universities in the U.S. were destroyed. This was orchestrated by the president of Notre Dame University, Fr. Theodore Hesburgh, who divorced Catholic education from Catholic doctrine and Catholic morality at the Land O’Lakes Conference in 1967. These schools have not simply been secularized but have in fact become anti-Catholic. A Catholic student is much more likely to keep his faith in a secular university than in a “Catholic” university. This revolution by Hesburgh was unopposed by the Catholic hierarchy!

50 years later, Catholic colleges still reeling from statement rejecting Church authority

LifeSiteNews | DENVER, Colorado | July 26, 2017– On the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the Land O’Lakes statement on Catholic education, Lincoln Bishop James Conley likened the controversial declaration to the ultimate rejection of God.

Bishop Conley described the statement as the “the ‘non serviam’ moment of many of America’s Catholic universities.”

“Non serviam,” a Latin phrase for “I shall not serve,” is typically attributed to Lucifer’s Old Testament words expressing his rejection of serving God. The prophet Jeremiah also used it to describe the Hebrew people’s disobedience to God.

“The Land O’Lakes statement proposed to redefine the mission of the Catholic university,” Bishop Conley said. “It rejected the authority of the Church, and of her doctrinal teaching.”

“It rejected the idea that faith and reason work best in communion with one another,” he continued. “It prioritized the standards and culture of secular universities over the authentic mission of Catholic education. It was a statement of self-importance, and self-assertion.”

This self-importance “defies an authentically Catholic view of education,” he said.

The statement “declared that Catholic universities would become independent from the hierarchy of the Church, from any obligation to orthodoxy, and from the authentic spirituality of the Church,” the bishop went on to say.

Speaking July 5 to teachers and principals at the Regional Catholic Classical Schools Conference at the Institute for Catholic Liberal Education in Denver, Bishop Conley said, “Fifty years ago, a ‘declaration of independence’ in Catholic education transformed the Church.”

The document came from some 26 presidents and administrators from 10 institutions who convened at a retreat center in Land O’Lakes, Wisconsin, for the North American summit for the International Federation of Catholic Universities. Holy Cross Father Theodore Hesburgh, Notre Dame’s president and head of the federation at the time, had summoned the attendees.

The meeting’s purpose was to establish a vision for Catholic higher education in the wake of Vatican II. The “Statement on the Nature of the Contemporary Catholic University” was signed July 23, 1967.

It is considered by many to have devastated Catholic education because of the ensuing loss of Catholic identity in Catholic colleges and universities. Bishop Conley spoke about the ripple effects on the U.S. church.

“Land O’Lakes sought to make many parts of the Catholic university indistinguishable from secular counterparts,” Bishop Conley said. “And that has impacted the entire Church in the United States.”

In the 50 years since the statement, he said, secularization in Catholic universities has caused secularization in many Catholic elementary and high schools. There are textbooks that don’t reflect Catholic perspectives and, he said, “teachers who have, regrettably, not been trained to think or teach from the heart and wisdom of the Church.”

“An entire generation of bishops, priests, religious, and lay Catholics — myself included — were formed in the wake of Land O’Lakes,” stated Bishop Conley. “And we formed another generation, which now forms another, all of us doing the best we can, but regrettably, without being exposed to much of truth, goodness, and beauty of the Church’s tradition.” […..]

COMMENT: Bishop Athanasius Schneider, abandoning his own diocesan duties, has been traveling throughout the world for the last five years playing the role of the Judas Goat to bring traditional Catholics under to direct control of Novus Ordo structures. The problem with Vatican II is not simply a question of ambiguities but of heretical statements that are incompatible with Catholic faith. The biggest heresy of all was uttered by John XXIII at the opening bell of the Council that established the Council’s overriding theme when he announced that the truth of dogma was one thing and the words to express dogma were quite another. He divorced revealed truth from the effective sign established by God to signify the truth. Pope John said while we must keep the unvarying truth, we are free to change the words by which dogma is expressed to better communicate to a modern generation. This is a condemned modernist error that could only lead to the destruction of dogma. The entire theme of Vatican II was to change dogma by changing praxis and usher in the great apostasy. Bishop Schneider advises Catholics to just keep their teeth tightly clenched while the swallowing the swill.

Vatican II should be clarified, not rejected: Bishop Schneider

LifeSiteNews |July 25, 2017 — Ambiguous teachings in the Second Vatican Council (1962-65) have been used for the past five decades and are still being used today to create “another church” that claims to be Catholic, but is not, said Kazakhstan Bishop Athanasius Schneider.

This does not mean, however, that Vatican II must be rejected, but it must be interpreted according to the “entire Tradition and of the constant Magisterium of the Church,” he wrote in an article published July 21 by Rorate Caeli.

Stated Schneider: “As to the attitude towards the Second Vatican Council, we must avoid two extremes: a complete rejection (as do the sedevacantists and a part of the Society of St. Pius X (SSPX) or a ‘infallibilization’ of everything the council spoke.”

“Vatican II was a legitimate assembly presided by the Popes and we must maintain towards this council a respectful attitude. Nevertheless, this does not mean that we are forbidden to express well-founded doubts or respectful improvement suggestions regarding some specific items, while doing so based on the entire tradition of the Church and on the constant Magisterium,” he added.

The Bishop’s article comes at a time when many faithful Catholics perceive a general crisis within the Church and have a tendency to place the blame for the crisis squarely on the shoulders of Vatican II.

Schneider said the Vatican II council must be interpreted as the Council Fathers meant it to be, namely a “primarily pastoral council,” not a council that proposed “new doctrines.” […..]

The Reform-of-the-Reform is back on the front burner!

A common calendar and lectionary for the Novus Ordo and TLM?

A committee already tried, and failed:
Cardinal Sarah's La Nef article marking the 10th anniversary of Summorum Pontificum has awakened the debate over the possibility (and desirability) of a "common rite" derived from the Traditional Latin Mass and the Novus Ordo. One of Cardinal Sarah's main proposals is that of common calendar and lectionary for the TLM and the NOM. The proposal does not come out of the blue; versions of it have been floated by some proponents of the Reform of the Reform since the 1990's. Furthermore, from 1991 to 2007 the use of the Novus Ordo lectionary was theoretically permitted in celebrations of the 1962 Missal, and was actually imposed on such celebrations in a handful of dioceses.
Right after the article came out, the Claretian liturgist Fr. Matías Augé -- an old liberal but very well-informed - noted that a common calendar and lectionary was already attempted in the previous pontificate:

“In fact, the cardinal has the merit of expressing his concrete proposal to arrive ‘at a reformed common Rite in order to facilitate reconciliation within the Church.’ First of all, the cardinal hopes that we can arrive at a common liturgical calendar for the two forms of the Roman Rite, and also to a ‘convergence’ of the lectionaries. His Eminence knows better than I, that an ad hoc committee had worked during the years of the pontificate of Pope Ratzinger without being able to produce a concrete proposal, given the difficulty of the task.”

“The child belongs to the father,” and is, as it were, the continuation of the father’s personality; and speaking strictly, the child takes its place in civil society, not of its own right, but in its quality as member of the family in which it is born. And for the very reason that “the child belongs to the father” it is, as St. Thomas Aquinas says, “before it attains the use of free will, under the power and the charge of its parents.” The socialists, therefore, in setting aside the parent and setting up a State supervision, act against natural justice, and destroy the structure of the home.

Leo XIII, Rerum Novarum

God, who is the perfect and infinite intelligence—that is, the infinite and perfect reason—created man to His own likeness, and gave him a reasonable intelligence, like His own. As the face in the mirror answers to the face of the beholder, so the intelligence of man answers to the intelligence of God. It is His own likeness. What, then, is the revelation of faith, but the illumination of the Divine reason poured out upon the reason of man? The revelation of faith is no discovery which the reason of man has made for himself by induction, or by deduction, or by analysis, or by synthesis, or by logical process, or by experimental chemistry. The revelation of faith is a discovery of itself by the Divine Reason, the unveiling of the Divine Intelligence, and the illumination flowing from it cast upon the intelligence of man; and if so, I would ask, how can there be variance or discord? How can the illumination of the faith diminish the stature of the human reason? How can its rights be interfered with? How can its prerogatives be violated? Is not the truth the very reverse of all this? Is it not the fact that the human reason is perfected and elevated above itself by the illumination of faith?

Cardinal Edward Henry Manning, The Revolt of the Intellect Against God

Vatican Response: Three days later the Vatican released information linking Benedict/Ratzinger’s brother, Fr. Georg Ratzinger, with homosexual ring abusing boys during Fr. Georg Ratzinger’s tenure with the Regensburger Domspatzen Boys Choir.

What particularly impressed me from my last conversations with the now passed Cardinal was the relaxed cheerfulness, the inner joy and the confidence at which he had arrived. We know that this passionate shepherd and pastor found it difficult to leave his post, especially at a time in which the Church stands in particularly pressing need of convincing shepherds who can resist the dictatorship of the spirit of the age and who live and think the faith with determination. However, what moved me all the more was that, in this last period of his life, he learned to let go and to live out of a deep conviction that the Lord does not abandon His Church, even if [sometimes] the boat has taken on so much water as to be on the verge of capsizing.

Bishop of Rome Emmeritus, Benedict/Ratzinger, message delivered at the funeral of Cardinal Joachim Meisner’s

As if homosexual “marriage” was not a “bursting of a dam.” Anyway, didn’t the homophilic pope already apologize? Anyway, why just homosexuals? How about all those other paraphilics out there still labeled with their DSM-IV codes?

Cardinal Marx: Homosexuals deserve an apology from the Church

LifeSiteNews | AUGSBURG, Germany | July 19, 2017– Cardinal Reinhard Marx is more concerned about the Catholic Church apologizing for its inaction against previous German law prohibiting homosexuality than the country’s recent legalization of gay “marriage.”

The Munich cardinal, who is head of the German bishops’ conference and a member of Pope Francis’ Council of Cardinals, was decisive in saying he firmly upholds the Church’s teaching on marriage in a recent interview with Augsberger Algemeine.

But he criticized the Church for not being at the forefront on homosexual rights in Germany and said the Church must express regret for not acting to oppose the former law against homosexuality.

It must be recalled, Cardinal Marx said, “that the Church has not exactly been a trailblazer as far as the rights of homosexuals are concerned.”

“We must express our regret that we did nothing to oppose homosexuals from being prosecuted,” he continued.

“The (German) law (against homosexuality) was not rescinded until 1994,” he said, “and we, as a Church, did not concern ourselves with it.”

The German parliament voted 393 to 226 on June 30 to legalize gay “marriage.”

The new law was not a defeat for the Church, Cardinal Marx said, because marriage and family were issues that extend beyond the Church.

“The Christian position is one thing. It’s another thing to ask if I can make all the Christian moral concepts (state) laws,” he said, according to LaCroix International. “Whoever fails to understand that the one does not automatically lead to the other has not understood the essence of modern society.”

He also dismissed concerns that legalized gay “marriage” would lead to incest and threesome marriages in Germany.

“The new law is concerned with allowing same-sex partners – and not close relations or three or more people – to marry,” he said. “One shouldn’t immediately conjure up the bursting of a dam.” [.....]

Pope says Church should ask forgiveness from gays for past treatment

Philip Pullella | Reuters | 6-26-16

ABOARD THE PAPAL PLANE (Reuters) – Pope Francis said on Sunday that Christians and the Roman Catholic Church should seek forgiveness from homosexuals for the way they had treated them.

Speaking to reporters aboard the plane taking him back to Rome from Armenia, he also said the Church should ask forgiveness for the way it has treated women, for turning a blind eye to child labour and for “blessing so many weapons” in the past.

In the hour-long freewheeling conversation that has become a trademark of his international travels, Francis was asked if he agreed with recent comments by a German Roman Catholic cardinal that the Church should apologise to gays.

Francis looked sad when the reporter asked if an apology was made more urgent by the killing of 49 people at a gay club in Orlando, Florida this month.

He recalled Church teachings that homosexuals “should not be discriminated against. They should be respected, accompanied pastorally.”

He added: “I think that the Church not only should apologise … to a gay person whom it offended but it must also apologise to the poor as well, to the women who have been exploited, to children who have been exploited by (being forced to) work. It must apologise for having blessed so many weapons.”

The Church teaches that homosexual tendencies are not sinful but homosexual acts are, and that homosexuals should try to be chaste.

Francis repeated a slightly modified version of the now-famous “Who am I to judge?” comment he made about gays on the first foreign trip after his election in 2013.

“The questions is: if a person who has that condition, who has good will, and who looks for God, who are we to judge?”

FORGIVENESS, NOT JUST APOLOGY

Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi said that the pope, by saying “has that condition”, did not imply a medical condition but “a person in that situation”. In Italian, the word “condition” can also mean “situation”.

“We Christians have to apologise for so many things, not just for this (treatment of gays), but we must ask for forgiveness, not just apologise! Forgiveness! Lord, it is a word we forget so often!” he said.

Francis has been hailed by many in the gay community for being the most merciful pope towards them in recent history and conservative Catholics have criticised him for making comments they say are ambiguous about sexual morality.

He told reporters on the plane “there are traditions in some countries, some cultures, that have a different mentality about this question (homosexuals)” and there are “some (gay) demonstrations that are too offensive for some”.

But he suggested that those were not grounds for discrimination or marginalisation of gays.

The pope did not elaborate on what he meant by seeking forgiveness for the Church “having blessed so many weapons”, but it appeared to be a reference to some Churchmen who actively backed wars in the past.

In other parts of the conversation, Francis said he hoped the European Union would be able to give itself another form after the United Kingdom’s decision to leave.

“There is something that is not working in that bulky union, but let’s not throw the baby out with the bath water, let’s try to jump-start things, to re-create,” he said. He also denied reports that former Pope Benedict, who resigned in 2013, was still exercising influence inside the Vatican.

“There is only one pope,” he said. He praised Benedict, 89, for “protecting me, having my back, with his prayers”. Francis said he had heard that when some Church officials had gone to Benedict to complain that Francis was too liberal, Benedict “sent them packing”.

“Global Warming” elevated to the level of certainty of a Novus Ordo Dogma!

Vatican archbishop: All should accept that global warming is a fact

LifeSiteNews | ROME, Italy | July 19, 2017– The head of the Vatican’s Pontifical Academy of Sciences has again inferred that denial of the controversial concept of manmade climate change equates to flat earth mentality.

“From the scientific point of view, the sentence that the earth is warmed by human activity is as true as the sentence: The earth is round!” said Archbishop Marcelo Sánchez Sorondo.

The archbishop has been a consistent and zealous promoter of manmade climate change as a non-negotiable Church issue, despite the status of care for the environment as a prudential matter.

Climate change ideology continues to be contested as a ploy perpetrated with manipulated data by the left to enact environmental regulations and taxes.

Even so, Archbishop Sorondo dismissed deniers of climate change in a recent Vatican Radio interview as “a small, negligible minority.”

The interview conducted in German contained the headline: “Vatican: ‘Climate change is a fact,’” and centered on reception of Pope Francis’ eco-encyclical Laudato Si’ two years after its release.

Archbishop Sorondo went on in the interview to say that human-affected climate change was considered science. He added that the pope not only has the right but also the duty to rely on science in addition to doctrine and philosophy in seeking out truth.

If the pope expresses himself on such a subject, then this was not arbitrary, he said, as the pope’s words are not restricted to the area of ”doctrine of faith and morals.”

The pope makes use of the truths of science or philosophy to not only explain to man how to get to heaven, said the archbishop, but also what he must do on earth.

All human activities have to do with ethics, the Argentinean archbishop said, so they are already within the jurisdiction of the pope.

Archbishop Sorondo is a close adviser to Pope Francis and the Chancellor of both the Pontifical Academy of Sciences and the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences. He has repeatedly welcomed pro-abortion and population control advocates to the Vatican for conferences under the pretext of the climate issue.

Last month, just before President Donald Trump announced the U.S. would pull out of the controversial Paris Climate Agreement, the archbishop likened climate ideology skeptics to flat-earthers as well.

Withdrawal from the Paris accord “would not only be a disaster but completely unscientific,” he said.

“Saying that we need to rely on coal and oil is like saying that the earth is not round,” Archbishop Sorondo stated. “It is an absurdity dictated by the need to make money.”

He has also repeatedly made the claim that those who don’t subscribe to the manmade climate change theory are in some way subsidized by the oil industry. He did so again in the Vatican Radio interview. [.....]

In his Confessions of a Revolutionist, M. Proudhon wrote these remarkable words: “It is wonderful how we ever stumble on theology in all our political questions.” There is nothing here to cause surprise, but the surprise of M. Proudhon. Theology, inasmuch as it is the science of God, is the ocean which contains and embraces all sciences, as God is the ocean which contains and embraces all things. […..]

Donoso Cortes, Marquis of Valdegamas, Essays on Catholicism, Liberalism, and Socialism

Close apparatchinks of Pope Francis supported by the international Jew George Soros attack U.S. traditional Catholics as “Catholic Integralists” who engage in an “ecumenism of hate” because they align with conservative Protestants in opposition to “abortion, same-sex marriage, religious education in schools and other matters generally considered moral or tied to values” and become “xenophobic and Islamophobic.”

There is no such thing as separation of Church and state, for all political problems are ultimately theological problems. The liberal preaches separation of church and state because he does not want any other religion competing with his own. Below is a typical example of this vulgar hypocrisy of the Catholic left:

Evangelical Fundamentalism and Catholic Integralism in the USA: A surprising ecumenism

Antonio Spadaro S.J., Editor-in-chief of La Civiltà Cattolica

Marcelo Figueroa, Presbyterian pastor, Editor-in-chief of the Argentinean edition of L’Osservatore Romano

[….]Fundamentalist ecumenism

Some who profess themselves to be Catholic express themselves in ways that until recently were unknown in their tradition and using tones much closer to Evangelicals. They are defined as value voters as far as attracting electoral mass support is concerned. There is a well-defined world of ecumenical convergence between sectors that are paradoxically competitors when it comes to confessional belonging. This meeting over shared objectives happens around such themes as abortion, same-sex marriage, religious education in schools and other matters generally considered moral or tied to values. Both Evangelical and Catholic Integralists condemn traditional ecumenism and yet promote an ecumenism of conflict that unites them in the nostalgic dream of a theocratic type of state.

However, the most dangerous prospect for this strange ecumenism is attributable to its xenophobic and Islamophobic vision that wants walls and purifying deportations. The word “ecumenism” transforms into a paradox, into an “ecumenism of hate.” Intolerance is a celestial mark of purism. Reductionism is the exegetical methodology. Ultra-literalism is its hermeneutical key.

Clearly there is an enormous difference between these concepts and the ecumenism employed by Pope Francis with various Christian bodies and other religious confessions. His is an ecumenism that moves under the urge of inclusion, peace, encounter and bridges. This presence of opposing ecumenisms – and their contrasting perceptions of the faith and visions of the world where religions have irreconcilable roles – is perhaps the least known and most dramatic aspect of the spread of Integralist fundamentalism. Here we can understand why the pontiff is so committed to working against “walls” and any kind of “war of religion.”

The temptation of “spiritual war”

The religious element should never be confused with the political one. Confusing spiritual power with temporal power means subjecting one to the other. An evident aspect of Pope Francis’ geopolitics rests in not giving theological room to the power to impose oneself or to find an internal or external enemy to fight. There is a need to flee the temptation to project divinity on political power that then uses it for its own ends. Francis empties from within the narrative of sectarian millenarianism and dominionism that is preparing the apocalypse and the “final clash.”[2] Underlining mercy as a fundamental attribute of God expresses this radically Christian need.

Francis wants to break the organic link between culture, politics, institution and Church. Spirituality cannot tie itself to governments or military pacts for it is at the service of all men and women. Religions cannot consider some people as sworn enemies nor others as eternal friends. Religion should not become the guarantor of the dominant classes. Yet it is this very dynamic with a spurious theological flavor that tries to impose its own law and logic in the political sphere.

There is a shocking rhetoric used, for example, by the writers of Church Militant, a successful US-based digital platform that is openly in favor of a political ultraconservatism and uses Christian symbols to impose itself. This abuse is called “authentic Christianity.” And to show its own preferences, it has created a close analogy between Donald Trump and Emperor Constantine, and between Hilary Clinton and Diocletian. The American elections in this perspective were seen as a “spiritual war.”[3]

This warlike and militant approach seems most attractive and evocative to a certain public, especially given that the victory of Constantine – it was presumed impossible for him to beat Maxentius and the Roman establishment – had to be attributed to a divine intervention: in hoc signo vinces.

Church Militant asks if Trump’s victory can be attributed to the prayers of Americans. The response suggested is affirmative. The indirect missioning for President Trump is clear: he has to follow through on the consequences. This is a very direct message that then wants to condition the presidency by framing it as a divine election. In hoc signo vinces. Indeed.

Today, more than ever, power needs to be removed from its faded confessional dress, from its armor, its rusty breastplate. The fundamentalist theopolitical plan is to set up a kingdom of the divinity here and now. And that divinity is obviously the projection of the power that has been built. This vision generates the ideology of conquest.

The theopolitical plan that is truly Christian would be eschatological, that is it applies to the future and orients current history toward the Kingdom of God, a kingdom of justice and peace. This vision generates a process of integration that unfolds with a diplomacy that crowns no one as a “man of Providence.”

And this is why the diplomacy of the Holy See wants to establish direct and fluid relations with the superpowers, without entering into pre-constituted networks of alliances and influence. In this sphere, the pope does not want to say who is right or who is wrong for he knows that at the root of conflicts there is always a fight for power. So, there is no need to imagine a taking of sides for moral reasons, much worse for spiritual ones.

Francis radically rejects the idea of activating a Kingdom of God on earth as was at the basis of the Holy Roman Empire and similar political and institutional forms, including at the level of a “party.” Understood this way, the “elected people” would enter a complicated political and religious web that would make them forget they are at the service of the world, placing them in opposition to those who are different, those who do not belong, that is the “enemy.”

So, then the Christian roots of a people are never to be understood in an ethnic way. The notions of roots and identity do not have the same content for a Catholic as for a neo-Pagan. Triumphalist, arrogant and vindictive ethnicism is actually the opposite of Christianity. The pope on May 9 in an interview with the French daily La Croix, said: “Yes Europe has Christian roots. Christianity has the duty of watering them, but in a spirit of service as in the washing of feet. The duty of Christianity for Europe is that of service.” And again: “The contribution of Christianity to a culture is that of Christ washing the feet, or the service and the gift of life. There is no room for colonialism.” […..]

Definition:

Catholic Integralist: A Catholic who believes the revealed truth of God literally and makes a real and sincere effort to actually keep the commandments of God.

The Pope’s Dubia?

Source: Before Dismissal of Cardinal Müller, Pope Asked Five Pointed Questions

Maike Hickson | July, 10, 2017 | OnePeterFive

The following information comes from the report of a trustworthy German source, who spoke to OnePeterFive on condition of anonymity. He quotes an eyewitness who recently sat with Cardinal Müller at lunch in Mainz, Germany. During that meal, Cardinal Müller is alleged to have disclosed in the presence of this eyewitness certain information about his final meeting with the pope, during which he was informed that his mandate as Prefect of the CDF would not be renewed.

According to this report, Cardinal Müller was called to the Apostolic Palace on 30 June, and he thus went there with his working files, assuming that this meeting would be a usual working session. The pope told him, however, that he only had five questions for him:

· Are you in favor of, or against, a female diaconate? “I am against it,” responded Cardinal Müller.

· Are you in favor of, or against, the repeal of celibacy? “Of course I am against it,” the cardinal responded.

· Are you in favor of, or against, female priests? “I am very decisively against it,” replied Cardinal Müller.

· Are you willing to defend Amoris Laetitia? “As far as it is possible for me,” the Prefect of the Congregation for the Faith replied: “there still exist ambiguities.”

· Are you willing to retract your complaint concerning the dismissal of three of your own employees? Cardinal Müller responded: “Holy Father, these were good, unblemished men whom I now lack, and it was not correct to dismiss them over my head, shortly before Christmas, so that they had to clear their offices by 28 December. I am missing them now.”

Thereupon the pope answered: “Good. Cardinal Müller, I only wanted to let you know that I will not extend your mandate [i.e., beyond 2 July] as the Prefect of the Congregation for the Faith.” Without any farewell or explanation, the pope left the room. Cardinal Müller at first thought that the pope left in order to fetch a token of gratitude, and thus he waited patiently. But, there was no such gift, nor even an expression of gratitude for his service. The Prefect of the Papal Household, Archbishop Georg Gänswein, then had to explain to him that the meeting was over, and that it was time for him to leave.

At the time of this writing, we have not been able to obtain confirmation of these events from Cardinal Müller, nor from his secretary, to whom we reached out for comment. Similarly, we requested a comment from Greg Burke at the Vatican Press Office has denied the story, saying the reconstruction of events as we have presented it is “totally false”. [….]

‘A Fish Rots From the Head’

I’m not interested in converting Evangelicals to Catholicism. I want people (excepting traditional Catholics) to find Jesus in their own community. There are so many doctrines we will never agree on. Let’s not spend our time on those. Rather, let’s be about showing the love of Jesus.

Pope Francis, Ecumenical Dinner Meeting with garden variety of Protestant ministers, June 23, 2014

The Voters have “become so corrupt” as to “entrust the government to scoundrels and criminals.”

If the people have a sense of moderation and responsibility, and are most careful guardians of the common weal, it is right to enact a law allowing such a people to choose their own magistrates for the government of the commonwealth. But if, as time goes on, the same people become so corrupt as to sell their votes, and entrust the government to scoundrels and criminals; then the right of appointing their public officials is rightly forfeit to such a people, and the choice devolves to a few good men.

St. Augustine, De Lib. Arb. i, 6

We are know by those we admire!

Not long after becoming Pope, Bergoglio privately got in touch with one of the liberation theologians most reviled by Rome – the former Franciscan priest Leonardo Boff, who was condemned to ‘obsequious silence’ and suspended from his religions duties by the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith for his theology (i.e.: liberation theology and neo-pagan Gaia earth worship ecology). Pope Francis asked Boff to send him his writings on eco-theology in preparation for a major encyclical Francis is considering on environmental matters.

Paul Valley, from his book, Pope Francis: Untying the Knot, 2013

Today, however, we have to realize that a true ecological approach always becomes a social approach; it must integrate questions of justice in debates on the environment, so as to hear both the cry of the earth and the cry of the poor.

Pope Francis, Laudato Si, quoting, without attribution, the liberation theologian, pantheist, earth-worshiping, neo-pagan, ex-priest, Leonardo Boff’s book, “Cry of the earth, Cry of the Poor.”

The customs of God’s people and the institutions of our ancestors are to be considered as laws. And those who throw contempt on the customs of the Church ought to be punished as those who disobey the law of God.

St. Augustine, Ep. ad Casulan. xxxvi

God, who is the perfect and infinite intelligence—that is, the infinite and perfect reason—created man to His own likeness, and gave him a reasonable intelligence, like His own. As the face in the mirror answers to the face of the beholder, so the intelligence of man answers to the intelligence of God. It is His own likeness. What, then, is the revelation of faith, but the illumination of the Divine reason poured out upon the reason of man? The revelation of faith is no discovery which the reason of man has made for himself by induction, or by deduction, or by analysis, or by synthesis, or by logical process, or by experimental chemistry. The revelation of faith is a discovery of itself by the Divine Reason, the unveiling of the Divine Intelligence, and the illumination flowing from it cast upon the intelligence of man; and if so, I would ask, how can there be variance or discord? How can the illumination of the faith diminish the stature of the human reason? How can its rights be interfered with? How can its prerogatives be violated? Is not the truth the very reverse of all this? Is it not the fact that the human reason is perfected and elevated above itself by the illumination of faith?

Cardinal Henry Edward Manning, The Revolt of the Intelligence Against God

Once again, the Novus Order Regime in Rome endorses the United Nations call for One World Government based upon a “Genuine and Profound Humanism”!

As Benedict XVI has affirmed in continuity with the social teaching of the Church: “To manage the global economy; to revive economies hit by the crisis; to avoid any deterioration of the present crisis and the greater imbalances that would result; to bring about integral and timely disarmament, food security and peace; to guarantee the protection of the environment and to regulate migration: for all this, there is urgent need of a true world political authority, as my predecessor Blessed John XXIII indicated some years ago.” […….] Here, continuity is essential, because policies related to climate change and environmental protection cannot be altered with every change of government. Results take time and demand immediate outlays which may not produce tangible effects within any one government’s term. That is why, in the absence of pressure from the public and from civic institutions, political authorities will always be reluctant to intervene, all the more when urgent needs must be met. To take up these responsibilities and the costs they entail, politicians will inevitably clash with the mindset of short-term gain and results which dominates present-day economics and politics. But if they are courageous, they will attest to their God-given dignity and leave behind a testimony of selfless responsibility. A healthy politics is sorely needed, capable of reforming and coordinating institutions, promoting best practices and overcoming undue pressure and bureaucratic inertia. It should be added, though, that even the best mechanisms can break down when there are no worthy goals and values, or a genuine and profound humanism to serve as the basis of a noble and generous society.

Pope Francis, Laudato Si’, On earth worship, global warming, etc.

Pope Francis the Creep and his Creepy Friends

Cardinal linked to Vatican gay orgy emphasized ‘positive elements’ in gay lifestyle

LifeSiteNews | ROME | July 6, 2017 -- A high-ranking Vatican Cardinal who is one of Pope Francis’ key advisers spoke positively about homosexual relationships prior to his secretary being arrested by Vatican police for hosting a cocaine-fueled homosexual orgy in a building right next to St. Peter’s Basilica.

Cardinal Francesco Coccopalmerio, the Vatican’s top canonical official as head of the Pontifical Council for the Interpretation of Legal Texts, said in a 2014 interview that Catholic leaders, such as himself, must “emphasize” the “positive realities” that he said are present in homosexual relationships.

“If I meet a homosexual couple, I notice immediately that their relationship is illicit: the doctrine says this, which I reaffirm with absolute certainty. However, if I stop at the doctrine, I don’t look anymore at the persons. But if I see that the two persons truly love each other, do acts of charity to those in need, for example ... then I can also say that, although the relationship remains illicit, positive elements also emerge in the two persons. Instead of closing our eyes to such positive realities, I emphasize them. It is to be objective and objectively recognize the positive of a certain relationship, of itself illicit,” he said in a 2014 interview with Rossoporpora.

When the interviewer noted that some attendees at the Synod on the Family were tending in such a direction towards homosexuals, Coccopalmerio agreed. He then immediately went on to criticize those who feared that “valuing the positive elements” of homosexual relationships would be “undermining” the Church’s doctrine on marriage and sexuality, saying such a conclusion was “problematic.”

Italian media broke the news last week of the Cardinal’s secretary Monsignor Luigi Capozzi being arrested some two months ago in a raid of the former Palace of the Holy Office. Capozzi and others were allegedly engaged in homosexual activities while high on cocaine.

Pope Francis/Bergoglioisms - The mouth with nothing to say but just can’t stop talking!

· Jesus only pretends to be angry with his disciples;

· The child Jesus “probably had to beg forgiveness“ from Mary and Joseph for his “little escapade” at the Temple;

· Saint Paul declared “I boast only of my sins“ (apparently confusing Saint Paul with Martin Luther);

· When Mary was at the foot of Cross “surely she wanted to say to the Angel: ‘Liar! I was deceived’“;

· When we go to confession “it isn’t that we say our sin and God forgives us. No, not that! We look for Jesus Christ and say: ‘This is your sin, and I will sin again’,”

· The “Tower of Babel was a “wall“ symbolizing xenophobia;

· When we appear before Him for judgment, God will not ask us if we went to Mass;

· Priests should grant absolution even to people who are “afraid” to disclose their sins because the “language of gesture“ suffices (thus encouraging invalid absolutions);

· Matthew resisted his calling by Christ and clung to his money—”No, not me! No, this money is mine”;

· The Gospel is merely a “reflection” on the “gestures” of Christ, because the Church “does not give lectures on love, on mercy“ (that’s Francis’s job!);

· Christ’s miracle of the multiplication of the loaves and fishes is “more than a multiplication, it is a sharing, animated by faith and prayer.”

Pope Francis/Bergoglioisms - Political “correctness” and predictable liberal alignment!

· Francis’s warm relations with socialist dictators;

· His lauding of pro-abortion and pro-”gay” politicians;

· His abuse of the papal office as a platform for globalist enviornmentalism (thus advantaging the same transnational corporations he professes to deplore);

· His refusal to intervene in opposition to the legalization of “gay marriage” because “the Pope belongs to everybody, he cannot enter the concrete, domestic politics of a country. This is not the Pope’s role”;

· His demand—flatly contradicting his professed abstention from domestic politics—for universal abolition of the death penalty (while declining to demand the abolition of abortion), open borders in Europe and America, and policies of environmental regulation and wealth redistribution;

· His conspicuous failure to identify government policy, particularly in socialist countries, as a primary cause of the poverty he attributes entirely to the greed of the wealthy.

Compiled by Christopher Ferrara

The apostasy of the city of Rome from the vicar of Christ and its destruction by Antichrist may be thoughts very new to many Catholics, that I think it well to recite the text of theologians of greatest repute. First Malvenda, who writes expressly on the subject, states as the opinion of Ribera, Gaspar Melus, Biegas, Suarrez, Bellarmine and Bosius that Rome shall apostatize from the Faith, drive away the Vicar of Christ and return to its ancient paganism. Then the Church shall be scattered, driven into the wilderness, and shall be for a time, as it was in the beginning, invisible; hidden in catacombs, in dens, in mountains, in lurking places; for a time it shall be swept, as it were from the face of the earth. Such is the universal testimony of the Fathers of the early Church.

Henry Edward Cardinal Manning, The Present Crisis of the Holy See, 1861

Persecution of Faithful by Vatican Apparatchiks Underway

Bishop takes away pastoral duties from priest who upholds authentic Church teaching on marriage

LifeSiteNews | PALERMO, Italy | July 5, 2017– A Catholic priest in Sicily was removed from his parish and had his faculties suspended because he defended the sanctity of marriage, his parishioners say.

Palermo Archbishop Corrado Lorefice has forbidden Don Alessandro Maria Minutella of St. John Bosco Parish to celebrate Mass, administer the sacraments, or preach, Italian journalist Marco Tosatti reported.

According to some parishioners, one of the official reasons for the measures was Don Minutella’s “not knuckling down to the teaching of this current pontificate.” The problem, they believe, is dueling interpretations of Amoris Laetitia. The priest does not believe the Post-synodal Exhortation allows the distribution of Holy Communion “to divorced people who live in an objective condition of sin.” Instead, he reaffirmed the teachings of John Paul II, saying ‘there being a lack of clarity on the part of Francis to the questions asked by the four cardinals,’ and has stuck to the age-old denial of communion to those in adulterous relationships.

Parishioners told Tosatti that there are other controversial priests in Palermo — “only these in the sense of being hyper-progressive and gay friendly” — and the rest of Italy, but they are “spared thanks to the compliance” of Church hierarchy. But for the pastor of St. John Bosco, “suspensions and anathemas struck like lightning.” [....]

Pope’s rhetoric against ‘fundamentalist’ Catholics could help pave way for active persecution.

LifeSiteNews | John Henry Westen | June 15, 2016

It’s one of the most frequent talking points of Pope Francis. It’s definitely part of his appeal for the media and simultaneously one of the most hurtful things for those inside the Church for whom the faith means everything. I’m speaking of the Pope’s penchant for castigating faithful adherents of the Catholic faith as “obsessed,” “doctors of the law,” “neo-pelagian,” “self-absorbed,” “restorationist,” “fundamentalist,” “rigid,” “ideological,” “hypocritical,” and much more.

The effect of the all-too-frequent barrage from the lips of the Pontiff himself is potentially deadly. It confirms the prejudice of the world against faithful Christians as the media constantly portrays them – as hypocrites and worse. Moreover, it permits the false categorization of adherent Christians with fundamentalist Islamic radicals who need to be suppressed to ensure public safety.

Who can blame the media for such comparisons when the Pope has made them himself? “Fundamentalism is a sickness that we find in all religions,” said the Pope in November while flying home from Africa. “Among Catholics there are many, not a few, many, who believe to hold the absolute truth,” he added. “They go ahead by harming others with slander and defamation, and they do great harm. … And it must be combated.” […..]

· From the September 19, 2013 Jesuit magazine interview: “If the Christian is a restorationist, a legalist, if he wants everything clear and safe, then he will find nothing... Those who today always look for disciplinarian solutions, those who long for an exaggerated doctrinal ‘security,’ those who stubbornly try to recover a past that no longer exists—they have a static and inward-directed view of things. In this way, faith becomes an ideology among other ideologies.”

· Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii Gaudium (The Joy of the Gospel) released November 26, 2013: “A supposed soundness of doctrine or discipline leads instead to a narcissistic and authoritarian elitism, whereby instead of evangelizing, one analyzes and classifies others, and instead of opening the door to grace, one exhausts his or her energies in inspecting and verifying. … Since it is based on carefully cultivated appearances, it is not always linked to outward sin; from without, everything appears as it should be. But if it were to seep into the Church, it would be infinitely more disastrous than any other worldliness which is simply moral.”

· June 2014 interview with Spanish-language magazine La Vanguardia: “The three religions, we have our fundamentalist groups, small in relation to all the rest. A fundamentalist group, although it may not kill anyone, although it may not strike anyone, is violent. The mental structure of fundamentalists is violence in the name of God.”

· In his October 19, 2014 closing address to Extraordinary Synod on the Family, Pope Francis spoke of “traditionalists” with their “hostile inflexibility,” and their failure to allow themselves to be “surprised by God.”

· In the January 2015 book-length interview, The Name of God is Mercy, Pope Francis says “scholars of the law” are “the principal opposition to Jesus; they challenge him in the name of doctrine.” And he adds, “This approach is repeated throughout the long history of the Church.”

· In a September 2015 radio interview with Radio Milenium, Pope Francis said, “Fundamentalists keep God away from accompanying his people, they divert their minds from him and transform him into an ideology. So in the name of this ideological god, they kill, they attack, destroy, slander. Practically speaking, they transform that God into a Baal, an idol. … No religion is immune from its own fundamentalisms. In every religion there will be a small group of fundamentalists whose work is to destroy for the sake of an idea, and not reality.”

· In his closing address to the Synod on the Family in October of 2015, the Pope condemned “the closed hearts which frequently hide even behind the Church’s teachings or good intentions, in order to sit in the chair of Moses and judge, sometimes with superiority and superficiality, difficult cases and wounded families."

· Pope Francis’ homily on January 18, 2016 reads: “Christians who say ‘it’s always been done that way,’ and stop there have hearts closed to the surprises of the Holy Spirit. They are idolaters and rebels who will never arrive at the fullness of the truth.”

· The official Vatican radio report on his homily of June 9, 2016 reads: “Pope Francis warned on Thursday against an excessive rigidity, saying those within the Church who tell us ‘it’s this or nothing’ are heretics and not Catholics.”

Pope Francis identifies new “heretical” doctrine! Whoever says, “or this or that” instead of “this and that” – Anathema Sit! Such as, we cannot say, ‘Pope Benedict or Pope Francis’ but rather, ‘Pope Benedict and Pope Francis’?

How many times do we in the Church hear these things: how many times! ‘But that priest, that man or that woman from the Catholic Action, that bishop, or that Pope tell us we must do it this way!’ and then they do the opposite. This is the scandal that wounds the people and prevents the people of God from growing and going forward. It doesn’t free them. . . . This (is the) healthy realism of the Catholic Church: The Church never teaches us the ‘or this or that.’ That is not Catholic. The Church says to us, ‘this and that.’ . . . This is not Catholic, this is heretical.

Pope Francis, June 9, 2016, Vatican Radio

Religion at the Service of Ecology
Francis’ Laudato Si and the Boff Connection
CATHOLIC FAMILY NEWS | By John Vennari
            The purpose of Pope Francis’ Laudato Si is to promote “ecological awareness,” “ecological conversion,” and to advance responsible “ecological citizenship”. Everything else in the document – everything else – is meant to serve this final goal.
            Even the most “Catholic parts” of the document at the end – where there is mention of the Eucharist, the Blessed Trinity, Our Lady, St. Joseph – are not for the sake of leading people in devotion to these Divine goods as ends in themselves, but to provide a basis to spur us toward ecological awareness and ecological conversion.
Laudato Si is a blatant case of religion at the service of humanity, religion at the service of ecology.
            The spirit of the neo-pagan Leonardo Boff also pervades Francis’ text, which we will spell out below.
            Those who take excessive comfort in the “Catholic elements” of Laudato Si miss the point of the document, which is clearly laid out by Pope Francis himself.
            In the beginning of the Laudato Si, #15, Francis establishes the six-point plan that explains the document’s central goal: to increase ecological awareness, and the ecological conversion of all planetary citizens.
            “It is my hope,” writers Francis, “that this Encyclical Letter … can help us to acknowledge the appeal, immensity and urgency of the challenge we face. I will begin by briefly reviewing several aspects of the present ecological crisis, with the aim of drawing on the results of the best scientific research available today, letting them touch as deeply and provide a concrete foundation for the ethical and spiritual itinerary that follows.” It is here that Francis accepts uncritically – in an alleged magisterial document – the questionable science of climate-change alarmism.
            In other words, unlike John XXIII, Francis urges us to listen to the “prophets of doom.”
            Francis continues explaining the purpose of his eco-text: “I will then consider some principles drawn from the Judaeo-Christian tradition which can render our commitment to the environment more coherent.”
            Please observe what I noted, the religious and scriptural citations in this document are for one reason: “to render our commitment to the environment more coherent.”
            Francis goes on, “I will then attempt to get to the roots of the present situation, so as to consider not only its symptoms but also its deepest causes. This will help to provide and approach to ecology which respects our unique place as human beings in the world and our relationship to our surroundings. In light of this reflection, I will advance some broader proposals for dialogue and action, which would involve each of us as individuals, and also affect international policy. Finally, convinced as I am that change is impossible without motivation and a process of education, I will offer some inspired guidelines for human development to be found in the treasures of Christian experience.” In other words, all references in Chapter 6 to the Eucharist, the Trinity, Our Lady, are actually motivations for ecological action.. […….]

I cannot help but look at this approach as a process of manipulation. Nothing Francis says in the final “Catholic section” of Chapter Six leads the soul to conversion from sin, toward the life of sanctifying grace, towards acceptance of perennial Catholic doctrine, toward true devotion to these Catholic goods as ends in themselves.
Rather, these holy images: the Eucharist, the Trinity, Our Lady, Saint Joseph, are mentioned by Francis to urge us toward the naturalistic end of ecological awareness and ecological conversion. This manipulation of supernatural treasures is an abuse of the Papal Office, and indicates the man presently holding the office does not know what the Papacy is. [……]

Dogma - The Proximate Rule of Faith, the Formal Object of Divine & Catholic Faith

Now, first of all, let us see what is dogma. In the mouth of the world it means some positive, imperious, and overbearing assertion of a human authority, or of a self-confident mind. But what does it mean in the mouth of the Church? It means the precise enunciation of a divine truth, of a divine fact, or of a divine reality fully known, so far as it is the will of God to reveal it, adequately defined in words chosen and sanctioned by a divine authority.

It is the precise enunciation of a divine truth or of a divine reality; for instance, the nature and the personality of God, the Incarnation, the coming of the Holy Ghost, and suchlike truths and realities of the mind of God, precisely known, intellectually conceived, as God has revealed or accomplished them. Every divine truth or reality, so far as God has been pleased to reveal it to us, casts its perfect outline and image upon the human intelligence. His own mind, in which dwells all truth in all fulness and in all perfection, so far as He has revealed of His truth, is cast upon the surface of our mind, in the same way as the sun casts its own image upon the surface of the water, and the disc of the sun is perfectly reflected from its surface. So, in the intelligence of the Apostles, when, by the illumination of the Holy Ghost on the Day of Pentecost, the revelation of God was cast upon the surface of their intellect, every divine truth had its perfect outline and image, not confused, nor in a fragmentary shape, but with a perfect and complete impression. For instance, that God is One in nature; that in God there are Three Persons, and one only Person in Jesus Christ. Next, it is not enough that a truth should be definitely conceived; for if a teacher know the truth, and is not able to communicate it with accuracy, the learner will be but little the wiser. And therefore God, who gave His truth, has given also a perpetual assistance, whereby the Apostles first, and His Church from that day to this, precisely and without erring declare to mankind the truth which was revealed in the beginning; and in declaring that truth the Church clothes it in words, in what we call a terminology: and in the choice of those terms the Church is also guided. There is an assistance, by which the Church does not err in selecting the very language in which to express divine truth. For who does not see that, if the Church were to err in the selection of the words, the declaration of truth must be obscured? We are conscious every day that we know with perfect certainty what we desire to say, but, from the difficulty of finding or choosing our words, we cannot convey our meaning to another. The Church is not a stammerer as we are. The Church of God has a divine assistance perpetually guiding it, to clothe in language, that is, in adequate expression, the divine truth which God has committed to her trust. Therefore a dogma signifies a correct verbal expression of the truth correctly conceived and known. But, lastly, it is not sufficient that it be clearly understood in the intellect and accurately expressed in words, unless the authority by which it is declared shall be divine; because without a divine authority we cannot have a divine certainty; without a divine authority we can have no such assurance that the doctrine which we hear may not be erroneous. The Apostles were such a divine authority, for they spoke in the Name of their Master. Their successor to this day is the Church, which, taken as a whole, has been, by the assistance of the Holy Ghost, promised by our Divine Lord and never absent from it, perpetually sustained in the path of truth, and preserved from all error in the declaration of that truth. Therefore ‘He that heareth you heareth Me’ is true to this day. He that hears the voice of the Church hears the voice of its Divine Head, and its authority is therefore divine. This, then, is a dogma: a divine truth clearly understood in the intellect, precisely expressed in words and by a divine authority. There are many things which follow from this. First, it proves that the Church of God must be dogmatic: and that any body which is not dogmatic is not the Church of God. Any body or communion that disclaims a divine, and therefore infallible, authority cannot be dogmatic, because it is conscious that it may err. And therefore the- Catholic Church alone, the Church which is one and undivided throughout the world, united with its centre in the Holy See,—this, and this alone, is a dogmatic Church (as the world reproachfully reminds us), and on that I build my proof that it alone is the Church of God. A teaching authority which is dogmatic and not infallible is a tyranny and a nuisance: a tyranny, because it binds the consciences of men by human authority, liable to err; and a nuisance, because as it may err, in the long-run it certainly will, and ‘if the blind lead the blind, shall they not both fall into the ditch?’ We see, then, what dogma means. The Holy Catholic Church always has been and always must be dogmatic. In this, and in no other sense, is it dogmatic; for it delivers nothing to us to be believed except upon divine authority, and that which it so delivers was revealed by God.

Cardinal Henry Edward Manning, Glories of the Sacred Heart

Health experts: ‘Transgender’ men will bear children within next decade

LifeSiteNews | July 4, 2017 — Health experts in the UK predict that men, and those who are born as males but who identify as females, will be able to receive womb transplants and bear children within a decade.

Doctors in Europe have already successfully transplanted wombs into wombless women who have gone on to bear healthy children.

Now ‘male-to-female transgenders’ are demanding that they be able to receive womb transplants too, at the government health service’s expense.

Dr. Francoise Shelfield, an infertility specialist and lecturer in obstetrics and gynaecology at University College London pointed out that transgenders’ right to such medical services is “enshrined in legislation.” [....]

Cardinal Gerhard Müller is out as head of the CDF. During his tenure, if he accomplished anything, it is known only to God. It is not the job of the CDF to perform a "balancing act" but to defend the Catholic Faith and identify its enemies even at the cost of his life. Cardinal Müller did neither and appears to be in excellent health.

Cardinal Müller is one of the cardinals who sought to interpret Amoris Laetitia (The Joy of Love), Pope Francis’ apostolic exhortation on the family, “according to a hermeneutic of continuity with the Tradition of the Church.” It added that that had made him a critic of the direction taken by the Pope. Cardinal Müller has had to perform a difficult balancing act as prefect, not least over the interpretation of Amoris Laetitia...

Edward Pentin, National Catholic Register

Pope Francis Appoints Spanish Jesuit Ladaria to Succeed Cardinal Müller

Archbishop Luis Ladaria Ferrer, currently Secretary to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, takes over as prefect of the important dicastery, replacing Cardinal Gerhard Müller whose five-year mandate was unusually not renewed.

Edward Pentin | National Catholic Register | June 30, 2017

The Vatican has announced that Pope Francis has appointed Spanish Jesuit Luis Ladaria Ferrer to replace Cardinal Gerhard Müller as prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.

Archbishop Ladaria, 73, who has served as Secretary, or number two, to the CDF since 2008, will succeed 69-year old Cardinal Müller whose five year mandate as prefect expires on Sunday.

Unusually for a cardinal prefect of a dicastery, the Pope has decided not to confirm him in that position for another five years.

In a statement issued at noon today, the Vatican said the Holy Father “thanked the Most Eminent Cardinal Gerhard Ludwig Müller at the end of his five-year mandate as prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, as president of the Pontifical Commission ‘Ecclesia Dei’, the Pontifical Biblical Commission and the International Theological Commission.”

The statement added that Archbishop Ladaria would assume all these positions held by Cardinal Müller. There was no announcement of a new appointment for the German cardinal.

Although rare for a cardinal prefect not to have his mandate renewed, Benedict XVI did the same with Cardinal Crescenzio Sepe, whom he transferred in 2006 from serving as prefect of the Congregation for the Evangelization of the Peoples to being Archbishop of Naples.

Majorca native

Born in Manacor, on the Spanish island of Majorca, Archbishop Ladaria is known to be a kind, affable and theologically conservative prelate who has a special interest in patristics, the branch of theology that deals with the lives, writings, and doctrines of the early Christian theologians.

On being appointed by Benedict XVI as Secretary to the CDF in 2008, he gave an interview with the magazine 30Giorni in which he said “it doesn’t take much effort to find out the relevance of the Fathers of the Church” whose work we must “read and savor” to be “better able to approach the freshness of the Gospel message, Jesus.” He said that is of “permanent value rather than something tied to what is topical, which by its nature is variable, changing minute by minute.”

He also said he does not like “extremisms, either progressive, or traditionalist ones” but believes “there is a via media” which is the “correct path to take, even if each of us has his own peculiarities, because, thanks be to God, we do not repeat, we are not clones.”

In the same interview, he underlined the role of the CDF which is first about “promoting and then, if necessary, protecting” the faith. He added that the Congregation “always moves with discretion and speaks exclusively through its acts.”

From 2004, Archbishop Ladaria had served as Secretary-General of the International Theological Commission and led the Commission's evaluation, beginning in 2006, of the concept of limbo which, he said, found “more appropriate ways to address the issue of the fate of children who die without having received baptism, for whom a hope of salvation cannot be ruled out.”

As Secretary, Benedict XVI appointed him in 2009 as a member of the Holy See's ill-fated commission that sought to bring the Society of St. Pius X back into full communion. Now, as president of 'Ecclesia Dei,' he will again be at the center of those efforts.

Last August, Pope Francis named Archbishop Ladaria president of the Study Commission on the Women’s Diaconate, which is considering the possibility of allowing women to serve as deacons. He has said privately he expects the commission to complete its work in two years, so possibly August next year.

Views on Amoris Laetitia

The Spanish prelate has publicly said little, if anything, about the Pope’s apostolic exhortation Amoris Laetitia (The Joy of Love). How he will deal with the thorny issue of interpreting the document is therefore unclear, but as a Jesuit and given his personality, he is expected to take a less disputed position than that of his predecessor, even though his official stand on admitting remarried divorcees to Holy Communion has been clearly in conformity with previous papal teaching.

Cardinal Müller always maintained that the most contentious passages of the document, in particular whether it allows Holy Communion for remarried divorcees without an annulment and without a firm purpose of amendment of life, could be read in accordance with the Church’s teaching and Tradition.

But that position became increasingly harder for him to maintain when it became clear that the Holy Father supported interpretations that did allow Holy Communion for such divorced and remarried couples in certain cases — a position critics have said is not in conformity with past papal teaching (in a leaked letter, later authenticated by the Vatican, the Pope told Argentine bishops there were “no other interpretations” of the document).

In an interview in February, Cardinal Müller warned bishops to stop interpreting Amoris Laetitia in ways that contradicted unchangeable Church doctrine. His comments came after bishops’ conferences such as Germany’s said it allows Holy Communion for some remarried divorcees living in what the Church has always taught is an objective state of adultery, while others such as Poland’s emphatically said it doesn't. Individual bishops around the world have similarly been at odds over the issue.

Cardinal Müller backed the four cardinals who sent the Pope five dubia in an effort to seek clarification of Francis’ position on this and other disputed passages in Amoris Laetitia, sayint they had every right to ask such questions. However, he was opposed to the initiative being made public, and also thought a “fraternal correction” of the Pope was "not possible at this time" because the document posed “no danger to the faith.”

News of the German cardinal’s departure also comes at a time when the CDF has been increasingly isolated during this pontificate on doctrinal matters. In February, it emerged that despite lodging a large number of corrections of Amoris Laetitia before its publication last April, none was accepted.

Having a Jesuit in charge may help bring it in from the cold, but some will feel uneasy about having two members of the Society of Jesus holding the two most senior positions in the Church.

Asked in 2008 what he thought about being the first Jesuit to be appointed Secretary to the CDF, he said he didn’t think it was a problem but that Benedict XVI chose him because he “seemed to him to be the best person.”

Dubia Cardinals Audience Request to Pope Francis Has Gone Unanswered For Months

OnePeterFive | Steve Skojec | June 19, 2017 Earlier today, a letter emerged on Settimo cielo, the blog of Sandro Magister. It is claimed to have been written by Cardinal Carlo Caffarra, one of the four so-called Dubia Cardinals, on behalf of all four of those prelates who had requested clarity from the pope on specific points of confusion arising from the post-synodal apostolic exhortation Amoris Laetitia.

It appears that the cardinals wrote to the pope on April 25th, renewing their “absolute dedication and our unconditional love for the Chair of Peter and for Your august person, in whom we recognize the Successor of Peter and the Vicar of Jesus”, but also requesting, “moved solely by the awareness of the grave responsibility arising from the munus of cardinals: to be advisers of the Successor of Peter in his sovereign ministry”, that a papal audience be granted so that they might discuss the dubia which have not yet been answered.

Two months later, this request has also been completely ignored. [….]

“Vatican II was a pastoral council by its teachings, that is, its doctrines. In a word, Vatican II was pastoral by being doctrinal.”

Fr. John O’Malley, Jesuit “historian and theologian,” author of What Happened at Vatican II, speaking at Caritas International Conference, “Vatican II, Remembering the Future: Ecumenical, Interfaith and Secular Perspectives on the Council's Impact and Promise.” The event was co-hosted by Georgetown, Marymount University in Arlington, Va., and the Washington National Cathedral.

COMMENT: This is a remarkable admission of the necessary relationship between Catholic doctrine and Catholic practice. It is a Truth of our Faith that has been constantly denied by the Modernists since Vatican II because, if this Truth had been admitted, no one would have accepted the Council’s novel teachings which were imposed by a corruption of practice. Ss. Peter & Paul Roman Catholic Mission has affirmed that every Catholic possesses a right to the immemorial traditions of our Church because we have a duty imposed by God to profess our faith openly and publicly which these traditions perfectly signify. And thus, these immemorial traditions constitute necessary attributes of the Faith because without them, the Faith cannot be known or communicated to others. And now, those who have foolishly adopted the novel practices dictatorially imposed after Vatican II are to understand that they in fact do signify a new doctrine, that “Vatican II was pastoral by being doctrinal.” The Modernists want the new doctrines to be professed that the new practices signify. No Catholic is bound by any novel doctrine, therefore, no Catholic is bound by any novel practice which signifies these new doctrines. The only reason that Fr. O’Malley is now admitting this Catholic truth is to impose formally the novel doctrines which the Novus Ordo practice signifies.

READ CARFULLY: Benedict/Ratzinger does not possess the power to alter what Christ established!

Completeness or not of Fatima message is beside the point: what matters is that what is known is unfolding

Roberto de Mattei | Corrispondenza Romana | May 25, 2016

The centenary year of Fatima was opened on Pentecost Sunday to news that caused quite a sensation.

The German theologian Ingo Dollinger revealed to the “OnePeterFive” site that after the publication of the Third Secret of Fatima, Cardinal Ratzinger had confided to him: “Das ist noch nicht alles!”, “We didn’t publish everything”. The Vatican Press Office intervened with an immediate denial in which it stated: “Pope emeritus Benedict XVI declares never to have spoken with Professor Dollinger about Fatima’, clearly affirming that the remarks attributed to Professor Dollinger on the matter ‘are pure inventions, absolutely untrue’, and he confirms decisively that ‘the publication of the Third Secret of Fatima is complete.”

The denial doesn’t convince those like Antonio Socci who had always sustained the existence of an undisclosed part of the secret, which would refer to the abandonment of the faith by a part of the Church’s hierarchy. Other scholars like Dr. Antonio Augusto Borelli Machado, think the secret disclosed by the Vatican is complete and tragically eloquent. On the basis of the information at our disposal, today we cannot affirm with absolute certainty, either the entirety of the Third Secret text nor its incompleteness. What appears absolutely certain is that the prophecy of Fatima is unfulfilled and that its fulfilment concerns an unprecedented crisis in the Church.

Regarding this, an important hermeneutic principle needs to be borne in mind. The Lord, through revelations and prophecies, which add nothing to the deposit of the faith, at times offers us some “spiritual direction” to guide us through the darkest periods of history. Yet if it’s true that the Divine words cast light on dark times, the opposite is also true: historical events, in their dramatic unfolding, help us to understand the significance of prophecy.

On July 13th 1917, when Our Lady announced at Fatima that if humanity didn’t convert Russia would have spread its errors throughout the world, these words appeared incomprehensible. It was the historical facts that revealed their significance. After the Bolshevik Revolution of October 1917, it was clear that the expansion of Communism was the instrument God wanted to use as a punishment to the world for its sins.

Between 1989 and 1991, the evil empire of the Soviet Union apparently crumbled, but the disappearance of its political packaging allowed for the diffusion all over the world of Communism, which has its ideological nucleus in philosophical evolution and moral relativism. The “philosophy of praxis” which according to Antonio Gramsci sums up the Marxist cultural revolution, has become the theological horizon of the new pontificate, outlined by theologians like the German Cardinal, Walter Kasper and the Argentinean Archbishop, Victor Manuel Fernàndez, inspirers of the Apostolic Exhortation Amoris Laetitia.

In this sense it’s not the Fatima Secret we need to start from in order to understand the reality of a tragedy in the Church, but from the crisis in the Church[itself]in order to understand the ultimate meaning of the Fatima Secret. A crisis which goes back to the 1960s, but with Benedict XVI’s abdication and Pope Francis’ pontificate, has seen a shocking acceleration.

While the Vatican Press Office was making haste to defuse the Dollinger case, another bomb exploded with an even greater impact. During the presentation of Prof. Don Roberto Regoli’s book, Oltre la crisi della Chiesa. Il pontificato di Benedetto XVI (Lindau, Turin, 2016) held in the auditorium at the Gregorian Pontifical University, Monsignor Georg Gänswein highlighted Pope Ratzinger’s act of renunciation with these words:

“From February 11th 2013, the papal ministry is not the same as before. It is and remains the foundation of the Catholic Church; and yet it is a foundation that Benedict has profoundly and lastingly transformed by his exceptional pontificate”.

According to Archbishop Gänswein, the Pope’s resignation is “epochal” as it introduced into the Catholic Church the new institution of “Pope emeritus” transforming the concept of munus petrinum - “the petrine ministry”. “Before and after his abdication, Benedict intended and intends his task as a participation in a “petrine ministry” such as this. He left the Papal Throne and yet with his step on February 11th 2013, he did not entirely abandon this ministry. Rather he integrated the personal office with a collegial and synodal dimension, almost a shared ministry (...). From the election of his successor, Pope Francis—on 13 March 2013—there are not then two Popes, but de facto an enlarged ministry with an active and a contemplative member. For this reason, Benedict has not renounced either his name or his white cassock. For this reason, the correct title with which we must refer to him is still “Holiness.” Furthermore, he has not retired to an isolated monastery, but [has retired]within the Vatican, as if he had simply stepped aside to make space for his Successor, and for a new stage in the history of the Papacy.(...). With this act of extraordinary boldness he has instead renewed the office (even against well-meaning and undoubtedly competent advisors) and in a last endeavour has strengthened it (as I hope). This certainly will only be demonstrated by history. However, in the history of the Church, 2013 will remain the year that the renowned Theologian on the Throne of Peter became the first “Pope Emeritus” in history.”

This discourse is of an explosive nature, and, by itself, demonstrates how we are not “over” the crisis in the Church but more than ever in it. The Papacy is not a ministry that can be “enlarged”, since it is an “office” given personally by Jesus Christ to a sole Vicar and a sole successor of Peter. What distinguishes the Catholic Church from every other church or religion is precisely the existence of a unitary and indissoluble principle in the person of the Supreme Pontiff. Monsignor Gänswein’s discourse(it is difficult to understand where he wants to go with it) suggests a two-headed Church and adds confusion to a situation already far too confusing.

One sentence connects the second and third part of the Fatima Secret: “In Portugal the dogma of the faith will always be kept.” Our Lady is talking to three little Portuguese shepherds and assures them that their country will not lose the faith. But where will the faith be lost? It has always been thought that Our Lady was referring to the apostasy of entire nations, but today is seems increasingly clearer that the greatest loss of faith is occurring among churchmen.

A “bishop dressed in white” and “various other bishops, priests and religious” are at the centre of the Third Secret, in a setting of death and ruin, legitimate to imagine as not only material, but spiritual. Before writing the Third Secret, the revelation that Sister Lucia had at Tuy on January 3rd 1944 confirms this, and is hence indissolubly linked to it. After the vision of a terrible cosmic catastrophe, Sister Lucia recounts that she had heard in her heart “a soft voice that said: ‘in time, one faith, one baptism, one Church, Holy Catholic, Apostolic. In eternity Heaven!’!”

These words represent a radical negation of any form of religious relativism which the heavenly voice contradicts with the exaltation of Holy Mother Church and the Catholic Faith. In history the smoke of Satan can invade the Church, but whoever defends the integrity of the Faith against the powers of hell will see, in time and in eternity, the triumph of the Church and the Immaculate Heart of Mary, definitive seal of the dramatic but fascinating Fatima prophecy.

The Novus Ordites recognize that all morality follows doctrine. They find the revealed truth of Catholic doctrine to be “too abstract and artificially constructed theological ideal” which creates in “concrete situations” a moral standard that is a practical impossibility to uphold. This is just a restatement of the errors of Martin Luther that were categorically condemned as heresy at the Council of Trent!

The Plan of “Reinterpretation” for Humanæ Vitæ

Roberto de Mattei | Corrispondenza Romana | June 14, 2017

It will be Monsignor Gilfredo Marengo, Professor at John Paul II Pontifical Institute, the coordinator of the commission nominated by Pope Francis to “re-interpret” the encyclical Humanæ Vitæ by Paul VI, in the light of Amoris laetitia, on the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of the former’s promulgation, which falls next year. The initial rumors of the existence of this commission, still secret, reported by Vatican reporter Marco Tosatti, were of a sound source.[……]

Monsignor Gilfredo Marengo, the prelate Pope Francis has entrusted with the task of re-reading Humanæ Vitæ, belongs, on the other hand, to the category of prelates who are convinced they are able to reconcile the irreconcilable. In September 2015, commenting in Vatican Insider on the work of the Synod on the Family, he suggested “abandoning a conception of the doctrinal patrimony of the Church as a closed system, impermeable to questions and provocations of the here and now, in which the Christian community is called to justify its faith, through its proclamation and testimony:”

In a more recent article in the same Newspaper (Vatican Insider, March 23rd 2017) with the significant title, Humanæ Vitæ and Amoris laetitia, Monsignor Marengo asks if: “the polemical game – the pill yes – the pill no, like today’s - Communion to the divorced yes – Communion to the divorced no - is only an appearance of discomfort and strain, [which is] much more descisive in the fabric of ecclesial life.” In fact, “every time the Christian community falls into error and proposes models of life derived from too abstract and artificially constructed theological ideals, it conceives its pastoral action as the schematic application of a doctrinal paradigm.” “A certain way of defending and acknowledging the teaching of Paul VI – he adds – was, probably one of the factors for which – he cites Pope Francis at this point – we have presented a too abstract theological ideal on marriage, almost artificially constructed, far from the concrete situation and the effective possibilities of families as they really are. This excessive idealization, above all when we have reawakened trust in grace, has not made marriage more attractive and desirable, but quite the opposite.” (Francis).

However, if the antithesis “the pill yes – the pill no – like today’s “Communion to the divorced yes – Communion to the divorced no” is only a polemical game, the same principle could be applied to all of the great themes of the Faith and Morality: “abortion yes – abortion no”, but also “the Resurrection yes – the Resurrection no” “original sin yes – original sin no” and so on. The very contraposition between truth and error and good and evil, becomes at this point “a polemical game”.

It should be noted that Monsignor Marengo does not propose to read Amoris laetitia along the lines of the hermeneutic of continuity. He does not deny the existence of a contradiction between the two documents: he admits that Amoris laetitia authorizes what Humanæ Vitæ prohibits. But he retains that every theological and doctrinal antithesis should be relativized and superseded in a synthesis which is able to reconcile opposites. The true dichotomy is that between the abstract and the concrete, between truth and life. What counts, for Monsignor Marengo, is to immerse oneself in pastoral praxis, without bending to “too abstract and artificially constructed theological ideals.”

It will be praxis and not doctrine that indicates the line of action. Behavior, in short, is born of behavior. And no behavior can be subject to abstract theological and moral valuations. “Models for life” do not exist, there is only the flow of life, which accepts everything, justifies everything, sanctifies everything. The principle of immanence, struck down by St. Pius X in the encyclical Pascendi (1907), has been re-proposed in an exemplary manner.

Will there be any priest or theologian faced with this program of the “reinterpretation” of Humanæ Vitæ, have the courage to utter the word “heresy”?

Jesuit_head_Fr. Arturo Sosa.jpg How could he doubt the reality of the devil?

“Christians believe that we are made in the image and likeness of God, and God is free, but He always chooses to do good because He is all goodness.

“We have formed symbolic figures such as the devil to express evil. Social conditioning can also represent this figure, since there are people who act [in an evil way] because they are in an environment where it is difficult to act to the contrary.”

Fr. Arturo Sosa, Superior of the Jesuits, May 28, 2017

Jesus does not condemn them for having denied and abandoned him during his passion, but instead grants them the spirit of forgiveness. The Spirit is the first gift of the risen Lord, and is given above all for the forgiveness of sins. Here we see the beginning of the Church, the glue that holds us together, the cement that binds the bricks of the house: forgiveness. Because forgiveness is gift to the highest degree; it is the greatest love of all. It preserves unity despite everything, prevents collapse, and consolidates and strengthens. Forgiveness sets our hearts free and enables us to start afresh. Forgiveness gives hope; without forgiveness, the Church is not built up.

Pope Francis, excerpt for Pentecost address

COMMENT: The “first gift of the risen Lord” is Faith in His divine resurrection. Faith is the cause and sign of Unity in the Church. In Pope Francis’ address on ‘unity in diversity and diversity in unity’, the word “faith” is not once mentioned. “Without faith it is impossible to please God.” It is Faith that is “the glue that holds us together, the cement that binds the bricks of the house.”

Faith is preliminary to and necessary for the forgiveness of any sin. The virtue of Wisdom is the knowledge of the most important truths in their proper order. Pope Francis never places Catholic truths in their proper order of reference which in the end corrupts truth. Why? Because Faith is an obstacle to the unity with Pope Francis seeks.

Pope Francis, attempting to be insightful and profound, again butchers Catholic Truth!

Pope Francis says ‘God cannot be God without man’. And we need another clarification

LifeSiteNews | VATICAN, June 7, 2017 -- Pope Francis again sparked calls for clarification today as he stated before the crowds in St. Peter’s Square: “God cannot be God without man.”

The pope was speaking from a written text at his Wednesday general audience.

According to theologians who spoke with LifeSite, there is a danger the phrase by itself could be taken in an erroneous way.

In context, the Pope said:

“Dear brothers and sisters, we are never alone. We can be far, hostile; we can even say we are ‘without God.’ But Jesus Christ’s Gospel reveals to us that God cannot be without us: He will never be a God ‘without man’; it is He who cannot be without us, and this is a great mystery! God cannot be God without man: this is a great mystery!”

John Paul Meenan, professor of theology at Our Lady Seat of Wisdom, a Catholic college in Eastern Ontario, told LifeSiteNews that while the second phrase (God cannot be God without man) is open to misinterpretation, the Pope’s first wording (He will never be a God ‘without man’) is less problematic since it is in the future tense, “since God is now in an eternal covenant with man.” Professor Meenan said it is not true that ‘God cannot be God without man’ in a universal sense.

Meenan was particularly concerned about the statement because it could be taken to support a modernist falsehood known as “process theology” which posits “God perfects himself by creation or grows with creation.”

Another credentialed Catholic lay theologian known to LifeSiteNews but wishing to remain anonymous explained, “Because of The Incarnation of Our Lord Jesus Christ, it is true that God remains eternally joined to mankind through the human nature of Jesus Christ, Second of the Three Divine Persons of The Most Blessed Trinity.”

“Nonetheless, God has absolutely no actual need of mankind, our relationship with God being entirely dependent on that gratuitous superabundance of the infinite Divine Love of The Father, Son and Holy Spirit,” the theologian added.

Saint Irenaeus of Lyons (c.130-c.208), a bishop, martyr, and Father of the Church, wrote in his famous work Against the Heresies:

“In the beginning it was not because he had need of man that God fashioned Adam but so as to have someone on whom to set his blessings. For, not only before Adam but even before creation, the Word glorified the Father while dwelling in him and was glorified by the Father.”

Saint Irenaeus added:

“When people stand in the light, it is not they who illumine the light and cause it to shine but who are illumined and made to shine by it. Far from contributing anything at all to it, they benefit from the light and are lit up by it. This is how it is in serving God: our service contributes nothing to God for God has no need of man's service; but to those who serve and follow him God gives life, incorruptibility and eternal glory.”

On the evil of Gender Ideology – a twenty fold increase in the suicide rate!

However, there is long-term research on the mental health of adults who transitioned with Gender Dysphoria. This reveals that despite initial relief of the dysphoria, one or more decades after transition, they often present with worse mental health than that of the general population, including a suicide rate nearly twenty times greater. This observation raises more questions than it answers, and should, therefore, give pediatric health professionals great pause — at least those who value evidence-based medicine and are dedicated to ‘first do no harm’.

American Academy of Pediatricians, excerpt from public statement that opposes drug and surgical abuse of children in modern gender reassignment therapy.

Novus Ordo World Perversion Reaches New Lows

Nun celebrates her Catholic schools’ leadership in allowing transgender students

LifeSiteNews | JEFFERSON CITY, Missouri, June 7, 2017– While controversy still swirls over a contentious new program to admit "transgender" students to Catholic schools, a nun who serves as the superintendent is touting the process as putting the diocese "in the lead."

Jefferson City is “a pioneer among other U.S. dioceses,” the LGBT blog Proud Parenting says, citing the controversial “Pastoral Process of Accopmaniment and Dialogue.”

The LGBT blog pulled from a Jefferson City News Tribune report over the weekend that said the superintendent of schools, Sister Elizabeth Yongs, viewed the diocese as a forerunner among other U.S. dioceses because of the accompaniment and dialogue program.

Critics of the process say it was crafted clandestinely and that neither parents nor priests in charge of parishes with schools were consulted. They say as well that it pushes gender ideology, upends Christian morality, scandalizes children in diocesan schools, and makes the diocese remiss in addressing potentially abusive situations.

"We probably are in the lead," Sister Youngs stated to the News Tribune.

The proposed procedure, referenced by the diocese as a process — not a policy — and also termed by the media as guidance, encompasses students who identify as LGBT, along with those who live with same-sex or co-habiting couples.

The 17-page document dated May 9, 2017, was presented to priests and educators by diocesan officials in early May.

“Wherever possible, enrollment is the goal,” the document states.

According to the diocese, the program was crafted using the guidance of Pope Francis’ controversial document Amoris Laetitia. The diocese cited the passage in Amoris Laetitia that references integrating individuals living in “irregular situations” into the life of the Church. […..]

“Is your diocese next?” the Courageous Priest blog asked in a post.

“This diocesan policy will be the fundamental policy for every diocese with accommodating bishops,” the blog said. “To anyone who has been permitted to read this document, it is apparent that the diocese now plans to join the secular world in questioning the very binary gender system created by God Himself.”

Phil Lawler, news director at CatholicCulture.org, commented on the Jefferson City diocese’s statement about enrollment being the goal.

“A cynic might rewrite the principle: ‘Whenever possible, collecting tuition is the goal,’” Lawler said.

“Look,” he wrote “if a school promotes the faith, it cannot encourage a student to profess that God made a mistake assigning his/her sexuality. If a school promotes the truth, it cannot encourage other students to accept a falsehood about that troubled student’s sexual identity.”

“If the parish school promotes neither the faith nor the truth,” continued Lawler, “shut it down.”

Those who have both known the requests of heaven and have had the opportunity to fulfill the First Saturday devotions of Reparation to the Immaculate Heart of Mary but have failed to do so will have a much to answer for.

“Look My daughter, at My Heart, surrounded with thorns with which ungrateful men pierce Me at every moment by their blasphemies and ingratitude. You, at least, try to console Me, and announce in My Name that I promise to assist at the hour of death, with all graces necessary for salvation, all those who, on the first Saturdays of five consecutive months, confess, receive Holy Communion, recite the Rosary and keep Me company for fifteen minutes meditating on the fifteen mysteries of the Rosary with the intention of making reparation to Me.”

Blessed Virgin Mary to Sister Lucy, December 10, 1925

“Whether the world has war or peace depends on the practice of this devotion, along with the consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. This is why I desire its propagation so ardently, especially because this is also the will of our dear Mother in Heaven.”

Sister Lucy, 1939

“Father, the Devil is fighting a decisive battle”
Sr. Lucy also told me:

“Father, the Devil is fighting a decisive battle against the Virgin and, as you know, what most offends God and what will gain him the greatest number of souls in the shortest time is to gain the souls consecrated to God. For this also leaves unprotected the field of the laity and the Devil can more easily seize them.
“Also, Father, tell them that my cousins Francisco and Jacinta made sacrifices because they always saw the Blessed Virgin was very sad in all her apparitions. She never smiled at us. This anguish that we saw in her, caused by offenses to God and the chastisements that threaten sinners, penetrated our souls. And being children, we did not know what measures to devise except to pray and make sacrifices. …”
Referring to the vision of Hell that Our Lady showed her and Jacinta and Francisco, she said:
“For this reason, Father, it is my mission not just to tell about the material punishments that will certainly come over the earth if the world does not pray and do penance. No, my mission is to tell everyone the imminent danger we are in of losing our souls for all eternity if we remain fixed in sin.
“Father, we should not wait for a call to the world from Rome on the part of the Holy Father to do penance. Nor should we wait for a call for penance to come from the Bishops in our Dioceses, nor from our Religious Congregations. No, Our Lord has often used these means, and the world has not paid heed. So, now each one of us must begin to reform himself spiritually. Each one has to save not only his own soul, but also all the souls that God has placed on his pathway.
“Father, the Blessed Virgin did not tell me that we are in the last times of the world, but I understood this for three reasons:
“The first is because she told me that the Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God or we are with the Devil; there is no middle ground.
“The second reason is because she told me, as well as my cousins, that God is giving two last remedies to the world: the Holy Rosary and devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. And, being the last remedies, that is to say, they are the final ones, means that there will be no others.

“And the third, because in the plans of the Divine Providence, when God is going to chastise the world He always first exhausts all other remedies. When He sees that the world pays no attention whatsoever, then, as we say in our imperfect way of talking, with a certain fear He presents us the last means of salvation, His Blessed Mother.
If we despise and reject this last means, Heaven will no longer pardon us, because we will have committed a sin that the Gospel calls a sin against the Holy Spirit. This sin consists in openly rejecting – with full knowledge and will – the salvation that is put in our hands.
“Also, since Our Lord is a very good Son, He will not permit that we offend and despise His Blessed Mother. We have as obvious testimony the history of different centuries where Our Lord has shown us with terrible examples how He has always defended the honor of His Blessed Mother.
“Prayer and sacrifice are the two means to save the world. As for the Holy Rosary, Father, in these last times in which we are living, the Blessed Virgin has given a new efficacy to the praying of the Holy Rosary. This in such a way that there is no problem that cannot be resolved by praying the Rosary, no matter how difficult it is - be it temporal or above all spiritual - in the spiritual life of each of us or the lives of our families, be they our families in the world or Religious Communities, or even in the lives of peoples and nations.
“I repeat, there is no problem, as difficult as it may be, that we cannot resolve at this time by praying the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary we will save ourselves, sanctify ourselves, console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls.
“Then, there is devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, our Most Holy Mother, holding her as the seat of mercy, goodness and pardon and the sure door to enter Heaven. This is the first part of the Message referring to Our Lady of Fatima, and the second part, which is briefer but no less important, refers to the Holy Father.”

Sister Lucy of Fatima to Fr. Augustin Fuentes in 1957

The “New Evangelization” and the “New Ecclesial Realities”

The “new evangelization” identifies “new ecclesial realities” as the “work of the Holy Spirit” and thus, regards them as the means by which God will bring about a rebirth of Christian faith since the collapse following Vatican II. These “ecclesial realities” include such entities as the Neocatechumenal Way, Communion and Liberation, the Focolare Movement, and the Charismatic Renewal. They all embody the novel teachings of Vatican II, which the hierarchy denies as having any causal relationship with the collapse of faith that the “new ecclesial realities” are expected to restore. These “ecclesial realities” have developed more in Europe and Latin America than in the United States. The most obvious reason for this is that the U. S. is already a religious pluralistic society that has similar entities as these “ecclesial realities” in every city. The Masonic brotherhood religion for world peace has a lot in common with Focolare. The Neocatechumenal Way is comparable to a Baptist Evangelical church and they have a Lutheran theological conception of the Holy Eucharist. The common thread among all these “ecclesiastical realities” is that they seek an encounter with Christ without the burden of dogma or moral restrictions that dogma imposes. Cardinal Ratzinger nevertheless at the World Congress of Ecclesial Movements, May 27, 1998, compared these “ecclesial realities” to St. Anthony of the Desert and the early monastic movement, to St. Francis and St. Dominic, St. Ignatius and the Jesuits, St. Teresa of Avila and St. Catherin of Siena. JP II addressed them on the vigil of Pentecost in 1998 and said:

With the Second Vatican Council, the Comforter recently gave the Church, which according to the Fathers is the place “where the Spirit flourishes” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, n. 749), a renewed Pentecost, instilling a new and unforeseen dynamism. Whenever the Spirit intervenes, he leaves people astonished. He brings about events of amazing newness; he radically changes persons and history. This was the unforgettable experience of the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council during which, under the guidance of the same Spirit, the Church rediscovered the charismatic dimension as one of her constitutive elements: “It is not only through the sacraments and the ministrations of the Church that the Holy Spirit makes holy the people, leads them and enriches them with his virtues. Allotting his gifts according as he wills (cf. 1 Cor 12:11), he also distributes special graces among the faithful of every rank.... He makes them fit and ready to undertake various tasks and offices for the renewal and building up of the Church” (Lumen gentium, n.12). […….] Today the Church rejoices at the renewed confirmation of the prophet Joel's words which we have just heard: “I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh” (Acts 2:17). You, present here, are the tangible proof of this “outpouring” of the Spirit. Each movement is different from the others, but they are all united in the same communion and for the same mission. Some charisms given by the Spirit burst in like an impetuous wind, which seizes people and carries them to new ways of missionary commitment to the radical service of the Gospel, by ceaselessly proclaiming the truths of faith, accepting the living stream of tradition as a gift and instilling in each person an ardent desire for holiness.[….] In our world, often dominated by a secularized culture which encourages and promotes models of life without God, the faith of many is sorely tested, and is frequently stifled and dies. Thus we see an urgent need for powerful proclamation and solid, in-depth Christian formation. There is so much need today for mature Christian personalities, conscious of their baptismal identity, of their vocation and mission in the Church and in the world! There is great need for living Christian communities! And here are the movements and the new ecclesial communities: they are the response, given by the Holy Spirit, to this critical challenge at the end of the millennium. You are this providential response.

John Paul II, speech addressing “ecclesial movements and new communities.” May 30, 1998, Vigil of Pentecost

Now, Pope Francis, who took credit for introducing the Charismatic movement into Argentina, addressed these “new ecclesial realities” on the vigil of Pentecost and looks to them as the hope for the “new evangelization.” Pope Francis, who has knelt before Protestant evangelical charismatics to receive their “blessing,” cannot possible have a clue regarding discernment of spirits. St. Francis and Peter Waldo embraced radical poverty but they were of a entirely different spirit. One was a saint, the other a heretic. There is no encounter with Christ without believing His revealed truth, that is, all dogma as a formal objects of Divine and Catholic faith, and keeping His commandments. None of the saints identified by Cardinal Ratzinger ever held any of our ecclesiastical traditions in contempt as these “new ecclesial realities” clearly have done. And every one of these saints gave evidence of personal holiness and performed the remarkable miracles as a testimony to the truth of their mission. The winter of Vatican II will be getting a colder and darker.

Nuns practice ‘transgender’ school policy with disturbing role-play

LifeSiteNews | JEFFERSON CITY, Missouri | May 30, 2017– Catholic nuns from the Diocese of Jefferson City facilitated a role-play of same-sex couples at a recent gathering to implement a new diocesan process that opens the door for children who identify as “transgender” to attend schools in the diocese.

The Pastoral Process of Accompaniment and Dialogue Addressing Children and Youth in Relation to Gender Concerns and Non-Traditional Families was presented to priests and educators of the diocese in recent weeks by diocesan officials. […..]

Jesuit chaplain to U.S. House: Church teaching on homosexuality is a ‘dead end’

LifeSiteNews | May 30, 2017— In an undated video interview published March 31, 2015, on YouTube, the U.S. House of Representatives Jesuit chaplain declares that Catholic teaching on homosexuality is a "dead end."

He doesn’t stop there. Many of Fr. Patrick Conroy’s statements challenge not only the Magisterium, but they defy natural law.

The high-profile chaplain suggests that Catholic teaching is outdated and has not kept up with the times.

“Now, we have theology on all this stuff and the answer is ‘gays can never engage in this and can never be married,’" he said. "But that’s a theology that goes back centuries before there was any understanding of human psychology, human individuality, human sexuality and all those kinds of understandings of the human psychosis, and the human person that weren’t as complete prior to these kinds of advances in understanding.”

Fr. Conroy is suggesting that teaching on homosexuality is culturally conditioned, and that advancements in understanding in the worlds of psychology, sociology and pastoring lead not to better means of caring for the same-sex attracted but rather to allow, if not encourage, the same-sex attracted to sin.

He continues, “Human beings procreate male-female, but human sexuality isn’t just about that. It’s about so much more ... which is self-evident.”

Fr. Conroy misuses the term ‘self-evident,’ which applies to observable truth. What Fr. Conroy describes as self-evident are observable contortions and breaches of natural law.

There was a popular t-shirt a few years ago at gay pride events that said, “If the hearts fit, the parts fit.” No matter how popular this meme may have been, it’s a falsehood, a wistful statement based on pure emotion and imagination, not fact. […..]

Vatican calls President Trump’s Rejection of Pro-Abortion Earth Worship Paris Agreement “a huge slap in the face for us” and “a disaster for everyone.”

Trump: ‘We’re getting out’ of ‘very unfair’ Paris Climate Agreement

LifeSiteNews | PARIS, France, June 1, 2017— President Trump made good on a major campaign promise today, announcing that the U.S. will “cease all implementation of the non-binding Paris accord,” commonly called the Paris Climate Agreement.

The agreement seeks to reduce worldwide carbon dioxide emissions with quotas enforced by taxes and subsidies for poorer countries.

Pro-life organizations opposed the Paris Climate Agreement because they say it was pro-abortion. Voice of the Family said “the agreement contains language designed to promote abortion and contraception.”

The Paris agreement calls for countries to “promote … gender equality, empowerment of women and intergenerational equity,” among other things. These phrases, pro-lifers say, are common to U.N. documents as euphemisms for the promotion of homosexuality and abortion.

The U.N. Sustainable Development Goals lists 17 major goals with 169 subsidiary “targets” to be funded. One major goal is “gender equality” to “empower all women and girls.” Its “target” to be funded is to “ensure universal access to sexual and reproductive health and reproductive rights.”

Other U.N. documents also use “gender equality” and “empowerment of women” to mean the promotion of abortion.

The president focused on economic reasons for his decision, explaining that the Obama-negotiated agreement put U.S. employers and employees at a “permanent disadvantage” with China, India, and other countries. He said the agreement would “punish” his country with “onerous energy restrictions” that would slow the nation's economic recovery from its recession under Obama.

The president also pointed out that the agreement places an unfair financial burden on the U.S., which has already reduced its carbon-dioxide emissions by 12 percent since 2006 and is already a Clean Energy leader.

Critics of the agreement say it would ultimately cost the U.S. $3 trillion and also 6.5 million industrial and manufacturing sector jobs. Furthermore, the agreement would punish the U.S. for emissions but allow other countries such as China to get away with heavy emissions. In fact, critics claim that under the Paris Agreement China will actually increase emissions until 2030.

“The bottom line is that the Paris accord is very unfair at the highest level to the United States,” Trump explained.

Trump criticized the agreement's Green Climate Fund, which seeks to take $100 billion from affluent countries to subsidize poorer countries' climate change efforts. “This agreement is less about the climate and more about other countries gaining financial advantage over the United States,” he reasoned.

The one concession Trump offered was an openness to negotiating a new agreement that would be less burdensome to U.S. companies. “We’re getting out,” Trump characteristically blurted, “but we will start to negotiate and we will see if we can make a deal that’s fair.”

Liberal politicians, environmentalists and globalists condemned the president's move. Former Vice President Al Gore called it “reckless and indefensible.” Former President Barack Obama issued a statement charging, “This administration joins a small handful of nations that reject the future.” Democrat politicians called it a “betrayal,” “traitorous,” and “one of the worst foreign policy blunders in our nation's history.” Environmentalists called Trump’s nation a “climate deadbeat” and accused Trump himself of having “total contempt for our planet's future.”

The Vatican entered the climate agreement fray as well. Bishop Marcelo Sanchez Sorondo, chancellor of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, characterized Trump's decision as “a huge slap in the face for us” and “a disaster for everyone.” […..]

“Whosoever killeth you will think that he doth a service to God. And these things will they do to you, because they have not known the Father, nor Me.” Jesus Christ

When the Catholic faithful are persecuted and martyred it will be at the direction of the Novus Ordo clerics just as the first Christians where persecuted and martyred by the Synagogue!

Pro-life professor on suspension from Catholic university: ‘Our Lord is eternally victorious’

LifeSiteNews | June 1, 2017 – The young professor facing termination from his job at Belgium's Catholic University of Louvain for showing his students pro-life arguments says he doesn't fear for his future because “Our Lord is eternally victorious.”

Stéphane Mercier, who is currently under “investigation” by the Belgian university, spoke to LifeSiteNews at the 2017 Rome Life Forum. He revealed that his inspiration for the lecture that caused so much backlash was articles he read on LifeSiteNews.

“It’s thanks to LifeSiteNews that I felt somewhat compelled to say a few things to my students about the truth about abortion,” he said. “Your work has determined me in the best of ways.”

He says he wondered “what would I say on the day of judgment, when the Lord will ask me, 'what have you done with your teaching activity?’ I’ve done quite a few interesting things in my opinion, but nothing that really matters from an existential point of view,” Mercier explained. “And so, I thought that I should speak about human dignity.” To “allow the students to reflect on the importance of human dignity from the very beginning in the mother’s womb,” Mercier showed them non-religious arguments for the humanity of the pre-born child.

“I told them that I’m not here to teach them what to believe,” he said. “I’m here to teach them that they have to reflect by themselves, not on the basis of slogans that are being given by the mass media or the culture of death. They have to think by themselves and reflect on real arguments... as I teach philosophy, I didn’t want to enter the theological realm. I strictly kept to philosophy.”

Mercier “developed, in a rhetorical way, arguments that show that you don’t change from one species to another while in the course of your development...when you are an embryo, it’s a human embryo, when you are a child, it’s a human child, and so on.”

Most of the students were “quite welcoming” to considering this viewpoint, he said. But a few weeks later, he made “another strong statement,” this time against gender studies and its accompanying ideology. He explained how gender ideology is “a matter of ignoring biology” and reality. Using summaries of books from prestigious Paris book publishers, Mercier made the case for why gender ideology is “completely confused and wicked.”

Just a few days later, the Belgian media ”became rabid” – not about Mercier's comments on gender, but about his abortion lecture from a few weeks before. His gender presentation hadn't yet been published on his lecture website, and he said if his opponents were going to call him “homophobic,” then they should be calling the prestigious Paris publishers whose books he used “homophobic” as well.

“The authorities of the university reacted very quickly and very emotionally in favor of the media and against me,” he said.

The university quickly issued a statement saying it “defends the fundamental right to abortion, and particularly women’s right to choose.” It suspended Mercier and launched an investigation into the matter.

The Catholic University of Louvain said that regardless of what its investigation concludes, “the right to abortion is enshrined in Belgian law and the note that was brought to the attention of UCL is at odds with the values upheld by the university. Conveying standpoints that contradict these values in the framework of a teaching course is unacceptable.” [……]

From Adam to this day, divine worship that is acceptable to God has always been, without exception, the creation of God.

Christ chose the Cenacle In which to celebrate the Passover, because there lived, died, and were buried Melchisedech, David, Solomon and all the kings of David’s family till the Babylonian Captivity.

Melchisedech comes into history under this name in the account of the four Mesopotamian kings, who went into Palestine, captured Lot, Abraham’s nephew, and started for home. Abraham roused his servants, fell on them at night, rescued Lot, took their spoils, and returning passed by Salem, as Jerusalem then was named.

“But Melchisedech, the king of Salem, bringing forth bread and wine, for he was a priest of the most high God, blessed him and said: ‘Blessed be the most high God by whose protection thy enemies are in thy band.’ And be gave him tithes of all.”

Here for the first time in Holy Writ we find a priest “of the most high God” offering the “bread and wine” of the Passover and Mass. Eight centuries of silence pass, and 1,100 years before Christ, David wrote of Christ’s priesthood: “Thou are a priest forever according to the order of Melchisedech.” Then this great pontiff-king appears no more, in Holy Writ, till St. Paul in his Epistle to the Hebrews mentions him eight times as a type of Christ. [.....]

But here for the first time in history, comes forth another order of priests, this mysterious Melchisedech offering bread and wine of the Last Supper and Mass. To him Abraham offered tithes—the tenth part of the fruits of his victory. Therefore Melchisedech's priesthood was higher than that of Abraham; it was to be eternal; it pointed to Christ’s priesthood of the Last Supper and of the Catholic Church. The whole prophetic scene in that vale beside the sacred city was emblematic of the future.

[.....] Who was Melchisedech? St. Paul says: “Without father, without mother without genealogy, having neither beginning of days, nor end of life, but likened unto the Son of God, continueth a priest forever.” [.....] Melchisedech was the patriarch Sem, sole survivor of the flood, eldest son and heir of Noe, king and high priest of the world. Noe established the right of primogeniture, that the eldest son should succeed the father in his property, kingship and priesthood, a custom coming down to our day.

Fr. James L. Meagher, D.D., How Christ Said the First Mass

Iconoclasm Revisited: The Great Neo-Modernist Heresy – The belief that there exists a merely accidental relationship between the “revealed truths” and the dogmatic “manner of stating those truths and theological doctrines.”

Students must learn to distinguish between on the one hand revealed truths, which all require the same assent of faith, and on the other hand the manner of stating those truths and theological doctrines. As far as the formulation of revealed truths is concerned, account will be taken of what is said by, among others, the declaration of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith's Mysterium Ecclesiae, n. 5: “The truths which the Church intends actually to teach through its dogmatic formularies are, without doubt, distinct from the changing conceptions proper to a given age and can be expressed without them, but it can nonetheless happen that they will be expressed by the magisterium, in terms that bear traces of those conceptions. Account having been taken of these considerations, it must also be said that from the beginning the dogmatic formularies of the magisterium have always been appropriate for communicating revealed truth and that, remaining unchanged, they will always communicate it to those who interpret them properly”. Students should therefore learn to make the distinction between the “deposit of faith itself or the truths which are contained in our venerable doctrine”, and the way in which these truths are formulated; between the truths to be proclaimed and the various ways of perceiving them and shedding light upon them; between the apostolic Tradition and strictly ecclesiastical traditions, and at the same time they should learn to recognize and respect the permanent value of dogmatic formulations. From the time of their philosophical formation, students should be prepared to appreciate the legitimate diversity in theology which derives from the different methods and language theologians use in penetrating the divine mysteries. From which it follows that different theological formulations are often more complementary than contradictory.

The Ecumenical Directory

To live together as brother and sister? Of course I have high respect for those who are doing this. But it’s a heroic act, and heroism is not for the average Christian. I would say that people must do what is possible in their situation. We cannot as human beings always do the ideal, the best. We must do the best possible in a given situation.

Cardinal Kasper, interview with Commonweal, May 7, 2016

If a divorced and remarried person is truly sorry that he or she failed in the first marriage, if the commitments from the first marriage are clarified and a return is definitively out of the question, if he or she cannot undo the commitments that were assumed in the second civil marriage without new guilt, if he or she strives to the best of his or her abilities to live out the second civil marriage on the basis of faith and to raise their children in the faith, if he or she longs for the sacraments as a source of strength in his or her situation, do we then have to refuse or can we refuse him or her the sacrament of penance and communion, after a period of reorientation? [.....]

Cardinal Walter Kasper, The Gospel of the Family

Pope Francis makes the error of Kasper his own!

49. In such difficult situations of need, the Church must be particularly concerned to offer understanding, comfort and acceptance, rather than imposing straightaway a set of rules that only lead people to feel judged and abandoned by the very Mother called to show them God’s mercy. Rather than offering the healing power of grace and the light of the Gospel message, some would “indoctrinate” that message, turning it into “dead stones to be hurled at others.”

122. We should not however confuse different levels: there is no need to lay upon two limited persons the tremendous burden of having to reproduce perfectly the union existing between Christ and his Church, for marriage as a sign entails “a dynamic process…, one which advances gradually with the progressive integration of the gifts of God.”

Pope Francis, Amoris Laetitia

The sign of the Ark condemned a sinful world!

Why is it that only Catholics like the Franciscans of the Immaculate can possess “schismatic tendencies”? Is there any example of religious orders being destroyed because of “liberal tendencies,” “modernist tendencies,” “heretical tendencies”? The answer is known by everyone but not publically stated. Modernist Rome hates the Catholic faith and any sign of its material manifestation because those signs are analogous to the sign of Noe. The sign of the Ark condemned a sinful world!

As already said: Francis will end Conservative Catholicism; they are forced to choose sides!

Priest: Pope’s ambiguity a ‘true blessing’ because it draws false Church out of shadows

LifeSiteNews | ROME, May 24, 2017 -- Pope Francis’ influence in the Catholic Church has been a “great and true blessing” since his ambiguous teachings have drawn the “anti-Church” out of the shadows into clear view for all the faithful to see, a priest told a gathering of pro-life and pro-family leaders in Rome last week.

“The advent of Pope Francis has, in the divine order of things, proved a great and true blessing,” Fr. Linus Clovis of Family Life International said in his talk at the Rome Life Forum on May 18.

“A hidden conflict has been raging in the Church for over one hundred years…Under Francis, the first Jesuit pope, the first pope from the Americas and the first pope whose priestly ordination was in the New Rite, it is now full blown, with the potential of rendering the Church smaller but more faithful,” he added. [……]

Council of Trent, Session VI, decrees on Justification

· CANON XVIII -If any one saith, that the commandments of God are, even for one that is justified and constituted in grace, impossible to keep; let him be anathema.

· CANON XIX -If any one saith, that nothing besides faith is commanded in the Gospel; that other things are indifferent, neither commanded nor prohibited, but free; or, that the ten commandments nowise appertain to Christians; let him be anathema.

· CANON XX -If any one saith, that the man who is justified and how perfect soever, is not bound to observe the commandments of God and of the Church, but only to believe; as if indeed the Gospel were a bare and absolute promise of eternal life, without the condition of observing the commandments ; let him be anathema.

· CANON XXI -If any one saith, that Christ Jesus was given of God to men, as a redeemer in whom to trust, and not also as a legislator whom to obey; let him be anathema.

· CANON XXII -If any one saith, that the justified, either is able to persevere, without the special help of God, in the justice received; or that, with that help, he is not able; let him be anathema.

COMMENT: Conservative Catholics recognize the heresy of Pope Francis/Bergoglio and his lapdog, Cardinal Walter Kasper, only in the practical moral application of their doctrinal errors. They apparently never recognized that Kasper was just as much a heretic during his curial days with John Paul II and Benedict XVI. He has been promoting situation ethics in an effort to overturn Catholic doctrinal and moral truths for a long, long time. How is it that they now find the moral relativism of Francis/Bergoglio so offensive while never complaining about the doctrinal relativism of the Assisi Prayer Meetings and the interfaith events in Jewish synagogues invoking their “common god”? Now they muse about the good-old-days under less radical conciliar popes as if that offers a safe-harbor. To invoke the concilarist popes, John Paul II's Familiaris Consortio and Benedict XVI's Sacramentum Caritatis against Francis/Bergoglio's corrupting the sacrament of Marriage is not just futile, but stupid, for all of them, without exception, embraced the heresy as a first principle of their Modernist faith that Catholic dogma does and must necessarily evolve. Francis/Bergoglio has done nothing that could possible offend John Paul/Wojtyla or Benedict/Ratzinger. Are we expected to employ the same Novus Ordo salami techniques that were used by concilarists to corrupt the Catholic faith in order to help conservative Catholics recover it? It does not work that way. Either conservative Catholics will repent and conform themselves to the “rule of faith” which is Catholic dogma or they will continue to do what they have done over the last fifty years – that is, nothing beyond attacking those whose acts condemn their effeminacy. They, along with Francis/Bergoglio and Kasper need to understand that when God abandons anyone to their “reprobate sense” they will no longer be able to recognize Truth.

But yet the Son of man, when he cometh, shall he find, think you, faith on earth? (Luke 18:8)

The survey of 1,007 self-identified adult Catholics was commissioned by the U.S. bishops' Department of Communications and conducted by the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate at Georgetown University in Washington. A 178-page report on the results was released April 13…. Only 2 percent of Catholics across all generations said they participated in the sacrament of reconciliation once a month or more, 12 percent said they did several times a year, 12 percent said they did once a year, 30 percent said less than once a year and 45 percent said they never made a sacramental confession… However, the study found that only 36 percent of the younger Catholics attend Mass at least once a month, compared with 64 percent of the older generation. Sixty-eight percent of all Catholics surveyed said they agreed that they believed they could be in good standing with the Church without going to weekly Mass. Only 43% of Catholics say they look to Church teachings, the pope and their bishops “in deciding what is morally acceptable.”

Pope lashes back against faithful Catholics who defend DOGMA

So we are faced with two groups of people. The group of the apostles who want to discuss the problem, and the others who go and create problems. They divide, they divide the Church, they say that what the Apostles preached is not what Jesus said, that it is not the truth.

There were many [councils], up until Vatican II, which clarified doctrine: for example, when we recite the Creed, it is the result of councils that have defined doctrine… It is a duty of the Church to clarify doctrine so that what Jesus said in the Gospels is better understood, what is the Spirit of the Gospels….

But there were always those people who, without any commission, go about disturbing the Christian community with speeches that upset souls: ‘Eh, no, someone who says that is a heretic, you can’t say this, or that; this is the doctrine of the Church.’ And they are fanatics about things that are not clear, such as these fanatics who go about there, sowing discord in order to divide the Christian community. And this is the problem: when the doctrine of the Church, that which comes from the Gospel, that which the Holy Spirit inspires – because Jesus said, 'He will teach us and remind you of all that I have taught’ – that doctrine becomes an ideology. And this is the great error of these people.

Pope Francis the Fanatic, open confession of his ideological driven obfuscation of doctrine, May 19, 2017

Since the Year of Mercy is long gone.... No more Mr. Nice Guy!

The Cardinal who sustains this, is a disillusioned man, inasmuch as he wanted power and lost it. He thought he was the highest authority in the United States.... He is not the Magisterium: the Holy Father is the Magisterium, and it is he who teaches the entire Church. The other just states his own ideas, and they deserve no further comment. These are the words of a poor man..... The Catholic right-wing wants power and not truth. If they say they find some “heresy” in Francis’ words, they are greatly mistaken, since they think like men and not as the Lord wills.

Cardinal Rodriguez Maradiaga’s petty insults against Cardinal Raymond Burke, Only the Gospel is Revolutionary

Hermeneutics of Continuity/Discontinuity

Catholic Church Teaches:

“That the mystical body of Christ and the Catholic Church in communion with Rome are one and the same thing, is a doctrine based on revealed truth” Pius XII, Humani Generis

(Modernism teaches that) “the formulas which we call dogma must be subject to these vicissitudes, and are, therefore, liable to change. Thus the way is open to the intrinsic evolution of dogma. Here we have an immense structure of sophisms which ruin and wreck all religion.” Pope St. Pius X, Pascendi, 1907

With truly lamentable results, our age, casting aside all restraint in its search for the ultimate causes of things, frequently pursues novelties so ardently that it rejects the legacy of the human race. Thus it falls into very serious errors, which are even more serious when they concern sacred authority, the interpretation of Sacred Scripture, and the principal mysteries of Faith. The fact that many Catholic writers also go beyond the limits determined by the Fathers and the Church herself is extremely regrettable. In the name of higher knowledge and historical research (they say), they are looking for that progress of dogmas which is, in reality, nothing but the corruption of dogmas. Pope St. Pius X, Lamentabili Sane, 1907

The Vatiacan II Church Teaches:

“Church of Christ… subsits in the Catholic Church.” Lumen Gentium, Vatican II

NOTE: The author of this term, “subsist in,” was Pastor Wilhelm Schmidt, a Protestant minister who made the suggestion to Cardinal Augustin Bea, the ecumenist, modernist biblical scholar, patron of Fr. Annibale Bugnini, and confessor to Pope Pius XII, who in turn recruited the support of Fr. Joseph Ratzinger who then convinced Cardinal Josef Frings of Cologne to bring the matter to the Council. This story was personally verified by Fr. Franz Schmidberger, First Assistant to the Superior General of the SSPX, by directly contacting Pastor Schmidt.

The problem remains if Lumen Gentium strictly and exclusively identifies the Mystical Body of Christ with the Catholic Church, as did Pius XII in Mystici Corporis. Can we not call it into doubt when we observe that not only is the attribute "Roman" missing, but also that one avoids saying that only Catholics are members of the Mystical Body. Thus they are telling us that the Church of Christ and of the Apostles subsistit in, is found in the Catholic Church. There is consequently no strict identification, that is exclusive, between the Church of Christ and the "Roman" Church. Vatican II admits, fundamentally, that non-Catholic Christians are members of the Mystical Body and not merely ordered to it.

Yves Cardinal Congar

Church of Christ is not exclusively identical to the Roman Catholic Church. It does indeed subsist in Roman Catholicism but it is also present in varying modes and degrees in other Christian communities. (Bold face in original).

Avery Cardinal Dulles, a member of the International Theological Commission

It is difficult to say that the Catholic Church is still one, Catholic, apostolic, when one says that the others (other Christian communities) are equally one, Catholic and apostolic, albeit to a lesser degree. ---- at Vatican Council II, the Roman Catholic Church officially abandoned its monopoly over the Christian religion.

Fr. Edward Schillebeeckx

Concretely and actually the Church of Christ may be realized less, equally, or even more in a Church separated from Rome than in a Church in communion with Rome. This conclusion is inescapable on the basis of the understanding of Church that emerges from the teaching of Vatican Council II.

Fr. Gregory Baum

And we now ask: What does it mean to restore the unity of all Christians?... This unity, we are convinced, indeed subsists in the Catholic Church, without the possibility of ever being lost (Unitatis Redintegratio) the Church in fact has not totally disappeared from the world. On the other hand, this unity does not mean what could be called ecumenism of the return: that is, to deny and to reject one’s own faith history. Absolutely not!

Pope Benedict XVI, addressing Protestants at World Youth Day, August 19, 2005

Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith Offers Clarification (?):
QUESTION: What is the meaning of the affirmation that the Church of Christ subsists in the Catholic Church?
RESPONSE:
Christ “established here on earth” only one Church and instituted it as a “visible and spiritual community”, that from its beginning and throughout the centuries has always existed and will always exist, and in which alone are found all the elements that Christ himself instituted. “This one Church of Christ, which we confess in the Creed as one, holy, catholic and apostolic […]. This Church, constituted and organized in this world as a society, subsists in the Catholic Church, governed by the successor of Peter and the Bishops in communion with him”.
In number 8 of the Dogmatic Constitution Lumen Gentium ‘subsistence’ means this perduring, historical continuity and the permanence of all the elements instituted by Christ in the Catholic Church, in which the Church of Christ is concretely found on this earth.

REPLY:

Lutherans, Methodists, Anglicans, and many other Protestant groups recite the Nicene Creed professing a belief in the “one, holy, catholic, apostolic Church.” They clearly do not define the word “catholic” in the same sense as Roman Catholics do. Is the CDF giving a Catholic or Protestant meaning to the word “catholic” when it explains the word “subsist”? Is the comment of Cardinal Congar explaining the significance of the failure to use the word “Roman” important to our understanding of the CDF’s response? Is this a cleaver corruption of dogmatic truth through corruption of language? Should we be grateful to Cardinal Congar for his open and honest comments? Since the “ecumenism of return” is rejected then, do Protestants that do not have to “return” to the Roman Catholic Church already belong to the “Church of Christ”? Is there salvation in the “Church of Christ” separated from the Roman Catholic Church?

Our “Open Letters” to the Dioceses of Harrisburg and Philadelphia, and to Rome illustrate the results of Aggiornamento: The “Modern Mind” subsumes the Novus Ordo Cleric!

The third and far the most formidable element of Main Opposition to the Faith today, is what I propose to call by its own self-appointed and most misleading title: “The Modern Mind.” [.....] Upon dissecting it we discover the “Modern Mind” to contain three main ingredients and to combine them through the force of one principle. Its three ingredients are pride, ignorance, and intellectual sloth; their unifying principle is a blind acceptance of authority not based on reason. Pride causes those who suffer from this disease to regard whatever they think they have learned, whatever they have absorbed, through no matter how absurd a channel, as absolute and sufficient. Ignorance forbids them to know with any thoroughness what men have discovered about these things in the past, and how certainly. Intellectual sloth forbids them to examine an argument, or even to appreciate the implications of their own assertions.

With most men who are thus afflicted the thing is not so much a mixture of these vices as the mere following of a fashion; but these vices lie at the root of the mental process in question. As to the principle of blindly accepting an authority not based on reason, it runs through the whole base affair and binds it into one: Fashion, Print, Iteration, are the commanders abjectly obeyed and trusted. [.....] The color in which the whole of the “Modern Mind” is dyed is essentially stupidity: it will not think—and that is a very strange weakness for anything which calls itself a “mind”!

If it were an active enemy, its lack of reason would be a weakness: being (alas!) not active, but a passive obstacle, like a bog, it is none the weaker for being thus irrational.

Hilaire Belloc, Survivals and New Arrivals, The Modern Mind

Pope Francis paying public homage Kisses the Hand of, and concelebrates Novus Ordo with, Notorious Homosexual Activist Priest - some sample quotations from this degenerate:

Today the Church's attitude to homosexuals is strict, inhuman and has caused much suffering by claiming that homosexuality is sin. Some church people say, “It is acceptable to be gay, but they must not have any relationships, they cannot love each other”! The maximum is hypocrisy. This is like talking to a plant, and saying, 'you cannot bloom, you may not bear fruit.' (sic)

Don Michele De Paolis, Interview with LGBT group Bethel of Genoa, Italy.

In the holy Church of God, not everyone is suffering from homophobia. Those who want to make you “heterosexuals,” as it is called, would be force you to act contrary to nature and to make you unhappy psychopaths. We need to put into our heads that God our Father wants us, his children, to be happy, by making fruitful the gifts that He has placed us in our “nature”! [.....] You have the right to go looking for a partner. And be quite unconcerned: where agape is, is God. Live your love with joy. And with our mother Church we must have patience. Her attitude to homosexuals will change. In this sense numerous initiatives have already been engaged. Don Michele De Paolis, Addressing gathering of homosexual activists

We must liberate our thinking from a risk: fundamentalism, that is, to take literally what the Bible says. The new obedience to the gospel is free, responsible and conscious. Instead of wasting energy in endless religious polemics, it aims to a new Christian spirituality of joyful acceptance of yourself forming gratitude to God, knowing that homosexual love is His gift, which is not less than the heterosexual. Don Michele De Paolis, Essay

In like manner, the ceremonies of the Old Law prefigured Christ as having yet to be born and to suffer; whereas our Sacraments signify Him as already born and having suffered. Consequently, just as it would be a mortal sin now for anyone, in making a profession of faith, to say that Christ is yet to be born, which the fathers of old said devoutly and truthfully; so too, it would be a mortal sin now to observe those ceremonies which the fathers of old accomplished with devotion and fidelity. Such is the teaching of St. Augustine. St. Thomas Aquinas

Hermeneutics of Continuity/Discontinuity

Martin Luter:

"God does not save factious sinners. Be a sinner and sin boldly, but believe and rejoice in Christ every more boldly. No sin will separate us form the Lamb, even though we commit fornication and murder a thousand times a day." Martin Luther

When I awoke last night the Devil came and wanted to debate with me arguing that I was a sinner. To this I replied, "Tell me something new, Devil! I already know that perfectly well; I have committed many a solid and real sin. Indeed there must be good honest sins not fabricated and invented ones for God to forgive." Martin Luther

In translating St. Paul, “We account a man to be justified by faith” (Romans 3:28), Luther added the word, "alone." In answer to those who objected to his mutilating Sacred Scripture, he answered: “If your Papist annoys you with the word (alone), tell him straightway: Dr. Martin Luther will have it so. Whoever will not have my translation, let him give it the go-by; the devil’s thanks to him who censures it without my will and knowledge. Dr. Martin Luther will have it so, and he is a doctor above all the doctors in Popedom.”

Pope Francis the Lutheran:

"I think that Marin Luther's intentions were not mistaken. He was a reformer.... And today, Luther and Catholics, Protestants, all of us agree on the doctrine of justification. On this point which is very important, he did not err."

Pope Francis, public interview, June 26, 2016

Catholic Faith: Council of Trent: Selected Canons on Justification

CANON IX.-If any one saith, that by faith alone the impious is justified; in such wise as to mean, that nothing else is required to co-operate in order to the obtaining the grace of Justification, and that it is not in any way necessary, that he be prepared and disposed by the movement of his own will; let him be anathema.

CANON XII.-If any one saith, that justifying faith is nothing else but confidence in the divine mercy which remits sins for Christ's sake; or, that this confidence alone is that whereby we are justified; let him be anathema.

CANON XIV.-If any one saith, that man is truly absolved from his sins and justified, because that he assuredly believed himself absolved and justified; or, that no one is truly justified but he who believes himself justified; and that, by this faith alone, absolution and justification are effected; let him be anathema.

CANON XV.-If any one saith, that a man, who is born again and justified, is bound of faith to believe that he is assuredly in the number of the predestinate; let him be anathema.

CANON XIII.-If any one saith, that it is necessary for every one, for the obtaining the remission of sins, that he believe for certain, and without any wavering arising from his own infirmity and disposition, that his sins are forgiven him; let him be anathema.

CANON XV.-If any one saith, that a man, who is born again and justified, is bound of faith to believe that he is assuredly in the number of the predestinate; let him be anathema.

CANON XIX.-If any one saith, that nothing besides faith is commanded in the Gospel; that other things are indifferent, neither commanded nor prohibited, but free; or, that the ten commandments nowise appertain to Christians; let him be anathema.

CANON XXIX.-If any one saith, that he, who has fallen after baptism, is not able by the grace of God to rise again; or, that he is able indeed to recover the justice which he has lost, but by faith alone without the sacrament of Penance, contrary to what the holy Roman and universal Church-instructed by Christ and his Apostles-has hitherto professed, observed, and taugh; let him be anathema.

CANON XXXIII.-If any one saith, that, by the Catholic doctrine touching Justification, by this holy Synod inset forth in this present decree, the glory of God, or the merits of our Lord Jesus Christ are in any way derogated from, and not rather that the truth of our faith, and the glory in fine of God and of Jesus Christ are rendered (more) illustrious; let him be anathema.

In the Moral Order – Modernism is the Refuge of the Slothful

Sloth in general, pigritia, is a voluntary and culpable repugnance to work, to effort, and consequently a tendency to idleness, or at least to negligence, to pusillanimity, which is opposed to generosity or magnanimity. Sloth is an evil disposition of the will and of the sensible appetites, by which one fears and refuses effort, wishes to avoid all trouble, and seeks a dolce farniente….. When idleness affects the accomplishment of the religious duties necessary to sanctification, it is called acedia. It is an evil sadness: opposed to spiritual joy, which is the fruit of generosity in the love of God. Acedia is a disgust for spiritual things, a disgust which leads one to perform them negligently, to shorten them, or to omit them under vain pretexts. It is the cause of tepidity. This sadness, which is radically opposed to that of contrition, depresses the soul and weighs it down because it does not react as it should. Then it reaches a voluntary disgust for spiritual things, because they demand too much effort and self-discipline. Whereas devotion, which is the promptness of the will in the service of God, lifts the soul up, spiritual sloth weighs down and crushes the soul and ends by causing it to find the yoke of the Lord unbearable and to flee the divine light, which reminds it of its duties. St. Augustine says: “Light which is so pleasant to pure eyes, becomes hateful to infirm eyes which can no longer bear it.” This depressing sadness, the result of negligence, and this disgust, which is at least indirectly voluntary, are quite different from the sensible or spiritual aridity which, in divine trials, is accompanied by true contrition for our sins, by fear of offending God, by a keen desire for perfection, by a need of solitude, of recollection, and of the prayer of simple gaze.

Rev. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P., The Three Ages of the Interior Life

Humility restrains the appetite from aiming at great things against right reason, while magnanimity urges the mind to great things in accord with right reason. Hence it is clear that magnanimity is not opposed to humility, indeed, they concur in this, that each is according to right reason.

St. Thomas

It should be our principal business to conquer ourselves, and, from day to day, to go on increasing in strength and perfection. Above all, however, it is necessary for us to strive to conquer our little temptations, such as fits of anger, suspicions, jealousies, envy, deceitfulness, vanity, attachments, and evil thoughts. For in this way we shall acquire strength to subdue greater ones.

St. Francis de Sales

Again, if we are to avoid the errors which are the source and fountain-head of all the miseries of our time, the teaching of Aquinas must be adhered to more religiously than ever. For Thomas refutes the theories propounded by:

· the Modernists in every sphere,

· in philosophy, by protecting, as We have reminded you, the force and power of the human mind and by demonstrating the existence of God by the most cogent arguments;

· in dogmatic theology, by distinguishing the supernatural from the natural order and explaining the reasons for belief and the dogmas themselves;

· in theology, by showing that the articles of faith are not based upon mere opinion but upon truth and therefore cannot possibly change;

· in exegesis, by transmitting the true conception of divine inspiration;

· in the science of morals, in sociology and law, by laying down sound principles of legal and social, commutative and distributive, justice and explaining the relations between justice and charity;

· in the theory of asceticism, by his precepts concerning the perfection of the Christian life and his confutation of the enemies of the religious orders in his own day.

· Lastly, against the much vaunted liberty of the human reason and its independence in regard to God he asserts the rights of primary Truth and the authority over us of the Supreme Master.

Pope Pius X, Doctoris Angelici, 1914

Religious Liberty - the doctrine that the creature possesses the right from the Creator to disregard His truths and disobey His Commandments, that is, to hold his Creator in contempt - is the fruit of Pride!

What is clear concerning St. Thomas Aquinas' teaching on the virtue of humility is that it is both a necessary virtue for salvation, along with being an inclusive perfection. With true humility, the soul virtually possesses all of the perfections necessary for salvation. Such is the unique character of humility and the way in which it most accurately mirrors the greatest of the virtues, charity. Since humility is a confession and affirmation of the majesty of God, it engenders a spiritual condition by which we are disposed to accept all that which God desires for us. “Be humble, and thou shalt obtain every grace from God” (Ecclus iii, 21). Because it by means of this virtue, and this virtue alone, that a free and intellectual creature is rightly subordinated to its Creator, which is the “position” all such creatures must be in to receive any of the spiritual benefits of the Blessed Trinity. St. Thomas teaches that, “Acquired humility is in a certain sense the greatest good” (Humilitas acquisita est maximum bonum secundum quid).

Not only is humility an encompassing virtue and perfection, engendered both by the grace of God and the cooperative will of the free creature, it is, also, a matter of divine mandate. Man, because of his metaphysical relationship to God, has the moral obligation to cooperate with the Holy Ghost in His pacification of the soul. It is impossible to achieve man's final, supernatural end without humility's passive acceptance of the perfect good which God seeks to give, the good of His own being. “No one reaches the kingdom of Heaven except by humility” (Ad regnum coelorum nemo venit nisi per humilitatem sine aliis) says St. Augustine.

Dr. Peter Chojnowski, Humility and the Great-Souled Man

Humility in human relations: It is not humility to subject what is of God in ourselves to what is of man in worldy clerics!

In man, two things have to be considered: that which is of God, and that which is of man. . . But humility in the strict sense means the awe in virtue of which man subjects himself to God. Consequently man, with regard to that which is of himself, must subject himself to his neighbor with regard to that which is of God in him. But humility does not require that one subject that which is of God in himself to that which seems to be of God in the other. . . Humility likewise does not require that one subject that which is of himself to that which is of man in the other.

St. Thomas Aquinas

Hermeneutics of Continuity/Discontinuity

As Pope Pius XII explained in Humani Generis, it is impossible to affirm the Catholic dogma of that “Lord Jesus Christ... is consubstantial with the Father” or the Catholic dogma of Transubstantiation if the concept of “substance” is rejected in the same sense used by scholastic theologians found in the perennial realist philosophical tradition and fixed forever by its usage in dogma.

Benedict/Ratzinger denies the meaning of “substance” and then, necessarily, denies the dogma of the True Presence. Benedict/Ratzinger’s entire “hermeneutic of reform” vs. the “hermeneutic of rupture” is predicated upon accepting his Neo-Modernist philosophy. There is no philosophical difference between Benedict/Ratzinger and his chosen replacement Francis who marks, as Benedict/Ratzinger predicted in December before his abdication, the “beginning of the new Church and the end of the old.” The only difference between the two, apart from superficial style, is that Francis is wholly formed by the Novus Ordo Church and suffers no misgivings of conscience about the direction he is dragging the Church because he knows no other way. Those conservative Catholic who are nostalgic for a return of Benedict/Ratzinger or John Paul II in the face of Francis’ infidelities are even more superficial than Francis!

Some even say that the doctrine of transubstantiation, based on an antiquated philosophic notion of substance, should be so modified that the real presence of Christ in the Holy Eucharist be reduced to a kind of symbolism, whereby the consecrated species would be merely efficacious signs of the spiritual presence of Christ and of His intimate union with the faithful members of His Mystical Body.

Pope Pius XII, Humani Generis

“…the medieval concept of substance has long since become inaccessible to us. In so far as we use the concept of substance at all today we understand thereby the ultimate particles of matter, and the chemically complex mixture that is bread certainly does not fall into that category.”

Joseph Ratzinger, Faith and the Future, p. 14

“Eucharistic devotion such as is noted in the silent visit by the devout in church must not be thought of as a conversation with God. This would assume that God was present there locally and in a confined way. To justify such an assertion shows a lack of understanding of the Christological mysteries of the very concept of God. This is repugnant to the serious thinking of the man who knows about the omnipresence of God. To go to church on the ground that one can visit God who is present there is a senseless act which modern man rightfully rejects.”

Joseph Ratzinger, Die Sacramentale Begrundung Christliche Existenz

“One Lord, One Faith, One Baptism.”

With reference to its object, faith cannot be greater for some truths than for others. Nor can it be less with regard to the number of truths to be believed. For we must all believe the very same thing, both as to the object of faith as well as to the number of truths. All are equal in this because everyone must believe all the truths of faith--both those which God Himself has directly revealed, as well as those he has revealed through His Church. Thus, I must believe as much as you and you as much as I, and all other Christians similarly. He who does not believe all these mysteries is not Catholic and therefore will never enter Paradise.

St. Francis de Sales, The Sermons of Saint Francis de Sales for Lent Given in 1622

The overthrow of Christ the King and the enthronement of the kingship of Man

“Christ is King in the sense that in Him, in the testimony that He rendered to the truth, is manifested the ‘kingship’ of every human being, the expression of every person’s transcendent character. Such is the Church’s proper inheritance.” The kingship that Jesus claims before Pilate “is not first of all to exercise authority over others; it is a manifestation of the kingly character of man. This kingly character is embedded within human nature, within the structure of the human personality.”

Cardinal Karol Wojtyla, Lenten Conference given to Pope Paul VI and the Vatican Curia, 1979

Old Evangelization vs. New Evangelization

The old evangelization holds that any man, like all men born with original sin and an enemies of God, if he believes what God by His Son, Jesus Christ, has revealed and repents from his sins, can be raised by the sacrament of Baptism to the dignity by being a “child of God” and heir to eternal life with God in heaven because the sacrament of Baptism with the desire to receive it marks his soul with an indelible character and removes all guilt of sin and punishment due to original sin and actual sins.

The Novus Ordo Church holds the novel doctrine of Religious Liberty which is the belief that the natural dignity of man is so great that he possesses the right not to believe what God has revealed or do what God commands. Oddly, the Novus Ordo Church holds that Baptism actually lowers the dignity of man because it takes away his right of Religious Liberty, makes him a slave to the arbitrary whims of the pope, and if he should, for some reason, become a Traditional Catholic, well then, he would be so undignified as to become a “heretic” and “schismatic.”

Has a more inanely naive comment ever been uttered?

The conditions of modern life have eliminated those innumerable obstacles by which, in the past, the sons of this world impeded the free action of the Church.

Pope “Novus Ordo Saint” John XXIII

What shall I say of fortitude, without which neither wisdom nor justice is an any worth? Fortitude is not of the body, but is a constancy of soul; wherewith we are conquerors in righteousness, patiently bear all adversities, and in prosperity are not puffed up. This is fortitude he lacks who is overcome by pride, anger, greed, drunkenness, and the like. Neither have they fortitude who when in adversity make shift to escape at their souls' expense; wherefore the Lord saith, "Fear not those who kill the body, but cannot fill the soul." In like manner those who are puffed up in prosperity and abandon themselves to excessive joviality cannot be called strong. For how can they be called strong who cannot hide and repress the heart's emotion? Fortitude is never conquered, or if conquered, is not fortitude.

St. Bruno

The Apostles, disciples of Christ, are held to be teachers of the faithful; the valiant Confessors give battle, the heroic martyrs triumph, and Christian hosts, armed by God, always prevail over the devil. All these have been men, alike in valor, unlike in their strife, glorious in their victory. Hence, O Christian, you are but a faint-hearted soldier if you think you can conquer without a battle, triumph without a struggle. Use your strength, fight manfully, wage a fierce battle. Remember your covenant, consider your situation, study your battlefield. You have pledged yourself to a contract, you have taken up a responsibility, you have enlisted in an army.

St. John Chrysostom

From God-Man to man-god!

All of you who are still seeking God, all of you who already have the inestimable good fortune to believe, and also you who are tormented by doubt: please listen once again, today in this sacred place, to the words uttered by Simon Peter. In those words is the faith of the Church. In those same words is the new truth, indeed, the ultimate and definitive truth about man: the son of the living God—”You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”

John Paul II, first homily, October 27, 1978

The hopeful news is that more and more conservative Catholics are publically recognizing that the pope is not the “rule of faith.” The remote “rule of faith” is sacred Scripture and Tradition. The proximate “rule of faith” is Dogma. When the pope stands against Dogma, faithful Catholics must stand against the pope. It is the Faith that is the primary sign and cause of the unity of the Church, not the pope!

Pope Francis’ teaching on marriage is not ‘in the Spirit of Christ’: scholar

LifeSiteNews | May 1, 2017 -- Pope Francis’ teachings on marriage do not “breathe the Spirit of Christ” since they offer an “accommodation to human weakness,” said one of the world's top Catholic experts on the Church Fathers in an exclusive interview with LifeSiteNews.

Dr. Anna M. Silvas, a professor at the University of New England, said there has been a “fierce war” going on within the Church over the nature of marriage. On one side is the teaching of the Church on the matter as developed by the Fathers of the early Church. On the other side are those who seek to undermine and change that teaching.

“There's a fierce war that's been going on on this issue for some decades. And currently, Pope Francis thinks he's winning. But he's not doing things in the Spirit of Christ. Whatever it is, it does not breathe the Spirit of Christ,” she said.

Silvas said that Catholics seeking to be faithful to the Church must “cleave” to Christ more than ever.

“And we have to center on Him absolutely. Popes come and go, but Jesus Christ is the real Lord and Master, and the Bridegroom of the Church, absolutely. The same yesterday, today and forever. Getting a good, strict purchase on that will be the one remedy, at least in our own pained situations, individually, that we can look for,” she said. […….]

Pope Francis tries to reframe what Catholics have long understood as the truth about marriage and chastity as merely an ideal, possibly an impossible or oppressive one, if taken too seriously by mere Christians. He pits his concept of mercy against marriage, as if a true understanding of the latter were a threat to the former. Pope Francis reveals himself to be a pope of his times, and embodies the defects of the Church he leads; Amoris Laetitia is characterized by loquacity and evasiveness in trying to dignify and disguise moral cowardice borne from a lack of faith.

Michael Brendan Dougherty, The Cowardice and Hubris of Pope Francis, THE WEEK, April 11, 2016

“But a stranger they follow not, but fly from him, because they know not the voice of strangers.... I am the Good Shepherd.... My sheep hear my voice: I know them, and they follow me.”

Today, unlike in the parable of the lost sheep, the Church has one sheep and the other ninety-nine are missing !

Pope Francis, June 17, 2013

Christ the King

As long as the dark foundation of our nature, grim in its all-encompassing egoism, mad in its drive to make that egoism into reality, to devour everything and to define everything by itself, as long as that foundation is visible, as long as this truly original sin exists within us, we have no business here and there is no logical answer to our existence. Imagine a group of people who are all blind, deaf and slightly demented and suddenly someone in the crowd asks, “What are we to do?”... The only possible answer is “Look for a cure”. Until you are cured, there is nothing you can do. And since you don't believe you are sick, there can be no cure. But if the faith communicated by the Church to Christian humanity is a living faith, and if the grace of the sacraments is an effectual grace, the resultant union of the divine and the human cannot be limited to the special domain of religion, but must extend to all Man's common relationships and must regenerate and transform his social and political life.

Vladimir Solovyov, Minding the Monarchical Church, Russian Philosopher and Orthodox convert to the Catholic Church, friend of Dostoyevsky, died 1900, pauper and homeless.

The very best (or worst) of “Brave New World” and “1984” rolled into one utopian (dystopian) nightmare!

The Novus Ordo Church always plays ‘catch-up’ with modern trends but this should force even them to do a little sober reflection before getting on board with the new political correctness. They don’t want to be accused of “systemic violence” in peddling the insensitive “biblical worldview” of “transphobic misinformation” but still, changing “gender identity… daily” might even make them sick. The up-side to this, Feminism is dead. Feminist theory is based upon “fixed binaries” and “biological essentialism” that intentionally “misgender” half the population. The whole thing will just have to go!

Harvard: Students can change gender daily, saying otherwise is ‘violence’

LifeSiteNews | CAMBRIDGE, Massachusetts |April 24, 2017 -- One of the world’s premier academic institutions has published a student guide that states one’s gender can “change from day to day” and merely saying that’s not true “is a form of … violence.”

Homosexual activists in the Harvard University office of “LGBTQ Student Life” passed out a school-sponsored guide that urges students to “fight transphobia.”

Among other claims presented as facts, the guide decrees that “there are more than two sexes.”

“Gender is fluid and changing,” the guide instructs.

Using carefully worded transgender phraseology, the guide refers to biological gender as one’s “sex assigned at birth.”

“How are you supposed to write a law that protects against gender or sex discrimination if a person’s ‘gender identity’ can change daily?” Chris Pandolfo at the Conservative Review asks. “James Madison might’ve said something important about ‘mutable’ or constantly changing government and ‘incoherent’ laws once.”

Furthermore, the Harvard guide admonishes students that “fixed binaries” (in other words, referring to the two sexes of male and female) and “biological essentialism” (in other words, considering a boy to be a boy and a girl to be a girl) “threaten(s) the lives of trans people.”

Calling a male by a male pronoun is considered gender assault. “Misgendering someone” is considered life-threatening. The biblical worldview is characterized as “transphobic misinformation.”

“Transphobic misinformation is a form of systemic violence,” the guide claims.

Critics say the most dangerous claim of the Harvard encyclical is that opposing views are “a form of systemic violence.” In other words, “traditional understandings of the roles of men and women and the distinctions between male and female are ‘violence.’“

“If you follow this line of thinking, then when, for example, Jesus says in Matthew 19, ‘Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female’… — that’s violence,” Pandolfo pointed out.

Campus Reform reports that several Harvard students expressed outrage about the misuse of tuition money for the politically correct student guide, but “all declined to comment on the record due to concerns about potential repercussions from the school.”

Pandolfo opined, “One wonders if Harvard’s administration has paused to consider whether they are providing a ‘Safe Space’ for students who think that men are men and women are women.”

“This is the sad state of affairs at colleges and universities,” Pandolfo concludes. ”Traditional values are called violent. Mob violence to silence free speech is called justice.”

From Pope Francis down, the homosexual lobby is running the Vatican show!

Pro-homosexual Vatican consultant radically reinterprets Christ’s last words

LifeSiteNews | WASHINGTON, D.C. | April 19, 2017 – Cardinal Donald Wuerl honored LGBT-endorsing Jesuit Father James Martin on Good Friday by having him speak at his cathedral’s liturgy commemorating the crucifixion and death of Christ.

Father Martin led an hour of reflection on the Seven Last Words of Jesus at the Cathedral of St. Matthew the Apostle in Washington, the Archdiocese of Washington’s newspaper reported. The talk was followed by the Liturgy of the Lord's Passion, with Cardinal Wuerl presiding.

The editor-at-large for Jesuit America magazine, Father Martin is a frequent promoter of LGBT issues on his prominent social media accounts and in other media.

Pope Francis recently appointed the Jesuit as one of 13 consultants of the Secretariat for Communications.

The Vatican office that Father Martin will be working with runs the pope’s official Twitter account, Vatican radio and TV, and the Holy See's website. […..]

Father Martin added the following day on his Facebook page that he was honored by the invitation from Cardinal Wuerl to preach the Seven Last Words liturgy.

Reinterpreting the Lord

In his Good Friday talk on the Seven Last Words of Christ during His crucifixion, Father Martin implied reduced complicity for the Lord’s executioners in their actions.

And he cast doubt upon the meaning of Christ’s statement that “It is finished.”

While the phrase is widely understood to be the fulfillment of God’s will, the Catholic Standard reported that Father Martin suggested it could also be interpreted as a resignation on the part of Christ — that Jesus might not have known whether the apostles would carry on His work after He died.

Father Martin told those in attendance at the Good Friday liturgy that his favorite theological question to ponder is whether Jesus knew what was going to happen on Easter Sunday before He died.

Apparently disregarding Christ’s divine nature, he said Jesus desired to do the Father’s will, but that the answer to the question of whether he knew what this regarding Easter was “is a mystery.”

In conflict with Church teaching on homosexuality

In February after President Trump reversed the Obama-era edict imposing “transgender” bathroom access in public schools, Father Martin tweeted numerous times support for allowing gender-confused children into the bathroom of the opposite sex.

The priest, who has some 100K Twitter followers, attempted to justify the stance by implying it was one Jesus would take.

The Catholic Church opposes the concept of gender fluidity, as Church teaching holds that God created humans as male and female and that God does not make mistakes.

Father Martin’s tacit support for the 2015 Obergefell (legalizing homosexual “marriage”) ruling drew considerable pushback on social media.

In response, he lamented “the level of hatred around homosexuality.”

And he bypassed the Church’s teaching on homosexual activity in selectively stating, “The Catholic church [sic] must do a much better job of teaching what the Catechism says: that we should treat our LGBT brothers and sisters with ‘respect, sensitivity and compassion.’”

The Catholic Church teaches that marriage is a sacrament between one man and one woman, and that sexual intercourse is reserved for marriage. The Church also teaches that all people are called to be chaste, which means celibacy for those not married.

Specifically regarding homosexuality, Church teaching says that while homosexuals must not be subject to “unjust discrimination,” homosexual tendencies are disordered and gravely immoral when acted upon.

During the 2014 Vatican Extraordinary Synod on the Family, Father Martin posted on Facebook a call to pray for “an end to the kind of language, especially within our church, that may lead to hatred for, rejection of, or violence against gays.”

The post was accompanied by an image of "The Passion of Matthew Shepherd." Shepherd was the young homosexual man from Wyoming killed brutally in a drug deal gone bad whose story has been exploited by activists to advocate LGBT issues.

In 2012, Father Martin posted an America article from an openly gay priest endeavoring to justify how Catholics could vote against a marriage protection amendment under consideration there at the time.

“Comments will be monitored closely and anything that is mean-spirited will be deleted,” he warned.

Father Martin expressed to a workshop audience at the 2005 LA Religious Education Conference that more open role models of homosexual priests were needed.

“ … if only there were more public models of gay priests,” he said. “In the absence of any healthy gay priests for Catholics to reflect on publicly, and with the only examples being notorious pedophiles, the stereotype of the gay priest as child abuser only deepens.”

Putting it in print

In his new book titled Building A Bridge: How the Catholic Church and the LGBT Community Can Enter into a Relationship of Respect, Compassion, and Sensitivity, Father Martin argues that Catholic Church employees shouldn't be fired for contravening Church teaching by espousing homosexual acts or openly professing homosexuality.

He accepted an award last year from the pro-homosexual group New Ways Ministry, which has been condemned by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) and the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

During his speech before homosexual activists, Father Martin said the Church should embrace homosexuality’s “special gifts.”

He also praised a 17-year-old for “coming out” on a retreat, and likened sexual tendencies to race and age. Father Martin said the Catholic Church must “lay to rest” its language about the “objectively disordered” nature of homosexual inclinations and acts.

Father Martin claimed that the Catechism’s language is “needlessly cruel” and “needlessly hurtful” because it says “that one of the deepest parts of a person — the part that gives and receives love — is ‘disordered’ in itself.”

[Modernism is the] synthesis of all heresies [whose] system means the destruction not of the Catholic religion alone, but of all religion.... [Modernists] partisans of error are to be sought not only among the Church’s open enemies; but what is to be most dreaded and deplored, in her very bosom, and are all the more mischievous the less they keep in the open.... They put themselves forward as reformers of the Church [though they are] thoroughly imbued with the poisonous doctrines taught by the enemies of the Church.... They assail all that is most sacred in the work of Christ.... [They are] the most pernicious of all the adversaries of the Church... They lay the axe not to the branches and shoots, but to the very root, that is, to the Faith and its deepest fibers.... The most absurd tenet of the Modernists, that every religion according to the different aspect under which it is viewed, must be considered as both natural and supernatural. It is thus that they make consciousness and revelation synonymous. From this they derive the law laid down as the universal standard, according to which religious consciousness is to be put on an equal footing with revelation, and that to it all must submit, even the supreme authority of the Church. St. Pius X, Pascendi

Therefore: In the Novus Ordo Church of Sweet Dreams where harshness is always frowned upon unharshly!

· Religious Liberty is the doctrinal validation of “Religious Consciousness.”

· Ecumenism is the collectivization and synthesis through dialogue of the individual’s “Religious Consciousness.”

· “Faith” is the affirmation of the subjective “Religiousness Consciousness” on the authority of the believer.

· “Dogma” is the historical and transitory expression of “Religiousness Consciousness” for a particular age.

· “Tradition” is the historical experience from which the present “Religious Consciousness” has evolved.

Ecumenical Talking Points for Luther’s Upcoming 500^th Anniversary

“And the fifth Angel sounded the trumpet; and I saw a star fall from Heaven upon the earth, and to him was given the key to the bottomless pit. And he opened the bottomless pit: and the smoke of the pit ascended as the smoke of a great furnace; and the sun was darkened, and the air with the smoke of the pit: And from the smoke of the pit, there came out locusts upon the earth, and power was given to them, as the scorpions of the earth have power.” (Apoc: 9:1-3)

Luther did truly open the pit and let loose against the Church all the fury of hell. Therefore modern interpreters almost universally see in this fallen star, Luther.

The whole description of the locusts fits down to the last detail the kings and princes who established by force the heresy of the 16th Century. When Luther propounded his heretical and immoral doctrine, the sky became as it were obscured by smoke. It spread very rapidly over some regions of the earth, and it brought forth princes and kings who were eager to despoil the Church of her possessions. They compelled the people of their domains and in the territories robbed from the Church to accept the doctrines of Luther. The proponents of Protestantism made false translations of the Bible and misled the people into their errors by apparently proving from the ‘Bible’ (their own translations) the correctness of their doctrines. It was all deceit, lying and hypocrisy. Bad and weak, lax and lukewarm, indifferent and non-practicing Catholics and those who had neglected to get thorough instruction were thus misled; and these, seeing the Catholic Church now through this smoke of error from the abyss and beholding a distorted caricature of the true Church, began both to fear and hate her.

Luther did everything to instill hatred of the [Catholic] Church into the hearts of his followers. The princes of Germany eagerly took up Lutheranism to become the spiritual heads of the churches in their domains and to plunder the Church. Their assumed jurisdiction in spiritual matters was usurpation ... In Denmark, Norway and Sweden the Kings imposed Lutheranism upon the people by the power of the sword and by lying, deceit and hypocrisy. They left the altars in the churches and had apostate priests use vestments and external trappings of the Catholic Church to mislead the people. They crushed out the Catholic faith by terrorism, by making it a felony and treason to remain a Catholic. Each monarch made himself the spiritual head of the church in his kingdom. They had so-called historians falsify history to arouse hatred against the Church in the hearts of the people. They pretended to prove the truth of Lutheranism by false translations of the Bible made by Luther and by others and by still falser interpretations of it. Those princes and kings were the locusts appearing in the vision of St. John. They had the teeth of lions to terrify lukewarm Catholics into submission. Rev. Fr. Herman Bernard Kramer, The Book of Destiny

As we have already said, the heresy will end conservative Catholicism!

“The document will mark the start of the greatest revolution experienced by the Church in 1500 years.”

Cardinal Walter Kasper, comment on the final document of the Synod on the Family to be released directly

A Historical Indictment

               “Yet you, Holy Father, who are always cold and detached regarding the dogma of the Church, have uncritically wed yourself to absurd ecological dogmas … making a granitic profession of faith in that absurd climatist ideology… [I]t is improper and ridiculous that a Pope makes the climate and the environment (to which he dedicated the first encyclical he penned) the heart of his preaching… The Lord did not say: ‘Convert and believe in global warming,’ but rather: “Convert and believe in the Gospel.” And He never commanded: ‘Separate your refuse’ but rather ‘Go and baptize all peoples’“ (p. 134)..... “But above all, Father Bergoglio [a reference to the Pope’s penchant for introducing himself thus], how is it possible that you do not notice and do not indicate other emergencies than those of the climate, or at least with equal insistence? The apostasy of entire peoples from the faith of the true God is not a drama that merits your most ardent appeals? The war against the family and against life? The neglect of Christ and the massacre of Christian communities? It seems that only the environment and other themes of the religion of political correctness merit your passion.
               “A great French intellectual, Alain Finkielkraut, has described you as “Supreme Pontiff of the world journalistic ideology.” Is he wrong? Does he exaggerate?
               “In effect, in ‘your’ Church it seems that the themes of separating refuse and recycling take precedence over the tragedy of entire peoples who, in the turn of a few years, have abandoned the faith. You sound the alarm over “global warming” while the Church for two millennia has sounded it concerning the fire of Hell” (p. 142).

“Before the spiritual catastrophe of the eternal perdition of multitudes, which induced the mother of God to come earnestly to Earth, I find it frankly incomprehensible that you preoccupy yourself for the most part—as you did in your encyclical Laudato si —with biodiversity, the fate of worms and little reptiles, the lakes, and the abuse of plastic bottles and air-conditioning” (p. 148).

               “I invite you, reread attentively these words because they describe dramatically what is occurring during your pontificate. In fact, it is precisely you personally, Holy Father, who accuse of ‘fundamentalism’ those who have a clear and certain faith and bear witness to their fidelity to Catholic doctrine….
               “You, curiously, are convinced that the danger for the Church of today is Christians fervent in their faith and those pastors who defend the Catholic creed. In your Evangelii gaudium you attack “some who dream of a monolithic doctrine” and those who “use a language completely orthodox.”
               “Should we then prefer those who are carried here and there by every ideology and use heretical language? Evidently yes, seeing that they are never attacked by you.
               “If one chooses any day, one will almost always find that you, in your discourse, attack those you call ‘rigorists,’ ‘rigid,’ that is, men with fervent faith, whom you identify with ‘Scribes and Pharisees’“ (p. 153-155).
               “(You)should overcome your personal resentment toward those who have studied; you should know that, in the Christian horizon, it is completely absurd to oppose mercy to Truth, because both are incarnated in the same Jesus Christ. Thus it is false to oppose doctrine to the pastoral, because that would be to oppose the Logos (doctrine) to the Good Shepherd (the Truth made flesh): Jesus is the Logos (the Truth made flesh) and, at the same time, the Good Shepherd” (p. 159).

               “… closed hearts that often hide even behind the teaching of the Church, or behind good intentions, to sit in the chair of Moses and judge, sometimes with superficiality and superiority, to judge difficult cases and wounded families….
               “The true defenders of doctrine are not those who defend the letter but the spirit; not the idea but the man; not the formula, but the gratuitous love of God and of his pardon.”
               “So doing, do you not think that you have disqualified your predecessors and all the Magisterium of the Church, in order to affirm your strictly personal concept of mercy different from the doctrine of the Church?...
               “Evidently, even Jesus would have been, according to you, doctrinaire, a rigorist, one who defends the idea instead of the man.
               “In effect—applying your criterion—we would have to say that Jesus would not have been accepted to a seminary during your pontificate because he was the most fundamentalist of all; in fact, not only was he certain of the truth, but he proclaimed himself the Truth made flesh (‘I am the way, the truth, and the life.’ Jn 14, 6).”

Antonio Socci’s La Profezia Finale

There is one that humbleth himself wickedly, and his interior is full of deceit.

Ecclus. 19:23

Pope horrified by 'unacceptable massacre' in Syria

Catholic News Service | Junno Arocho Esteves | April 5, 2017

Pope Francis strongly condemned a shocking chemical attack in Syria that left some 70 people, including at least 10 children, dead.

"We are horrified by the latest events in Syria. I strongly deplore the unacceptable massacre that took place yesterday in the Idlib province, where dozens of civilians, including many children, were killed," the pope said April 5 before concluding his weekly general audience in St. Peter's Square.

Images of dead men, women and children lying on the streets provoked international outrage following the attack April 4 in a rebel-held area. Pope Francis said, “I appeal to the conscience of those with political responsibility both locally and internationally to cease this tragedy and bring relief to that dear population that for too long has been exhausted by war.”

Western leaders have accused Syrian President Bashar Assad and the country's military of perpetrating the attack, based on reports that warplanes dropped chemical bombs in the early morning.

According to The New York Times, the Syrian military denied attacking the town and said the attack was caused by insurgents who blame the Syrian government for similar attacks "every time they fail to achieve the goals of their sponsors. [……]

COMMENT: The images of children being murdered should always be disturbing. But that is not the case. Only certain images of children designated as official victims being slaughtered are placed before the public conscience by the official media. The images of aborted babies are never displayed by the official media. Neither are the images of Palestinian children slaughtered by the Israel Defense Forces considered acceptable for public viewing. A simple GOOGLE search will show hundreds of images that should disturb everyone but they don’t. Without grace the common man cannot be affected by disturbing images unless he is told that the official response requires that he be disturbed. So the pope in accord with the policy of the official media is appropriately disturbed by images of Syrian children exposed to chemical warfare. The chemical attack without a shred of evidence is blamed on the Syrian President Assad by the Western War Party. The response generated was the unthinking attack by the United States directed by President Trump. This attack constituted an unconstitutional and unprovoked act of war. Is the official media disturbed by this usurpation of power by President Trump? Is the official media even concerned about determining actual guilt? Why does the Catholic Pope whose ignorance knows no limits feel compelled to comment on everything that he knows nothing about? The official media rejoices that a dummy like Francis can be enrolled to support and amplify their artificially contrived indignation for their anti-Christian political ends.

Cardinal Kasper: Pope sees married priests debate ‘positively,’ seeks proposals from bishops’ conferences

LifeSiteNews | April 7, 2017 – German Cardinal Walter Kasper says Pope Francis wants bishops' conferences to submit to him proposals for ordaining married men.

Kasper said this in an interview with Katholisch.de, the official website of the German bishops' conference. Dr. Maike Hickson at OnePeterFive translated his remarks.

There is an "urgent need for action" on the question of married priests, Kasper said. Previous discussions on this topic were "not approved officially by Rome," but now the pope is open to the question. Kasper noted Pope Francis hasn't said where he stands on this, but said he views the discussion "positively."

"This discussion is very urgent" given the shortage of priests in Germany, according to Kasper. The entire country only has 40 candidates for the priesthood; in liberal Cardinal Reinhard Marx’s archdiocese, there's only one.

Pope Francis "wants to leave the decision up to the bishops’ conferences," Kasper claimed. If they make to him a "reasonable request, I have the impression that he is willing to respond then positively to it. It is now up to the bishops’ conferences."

Kasper hinted that Marx "(Francis) wishes to push things ahead" regarding married priests, but "he cannot directly intervene" in every diocese.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church explains, "Called to consecrate themselves with undivided heart to the Lord and to 'the affairs of the Lord,' [priests] give themselves entirely to God and to men. Celibacy is a sign of this new life to the service of which the Church's minister is consecrated; accepted with a joyous heart celibacy radiantly proclaims the Reign of God" (CCC 1579.

Married men may already in some circumstances be ordained Catholic priests. For example, married men are allowed to be ordained in the Eastern churches. And, if a former Episcopal or Anglican priest has converted to Catholicism, there is a special pastoral provision that allows for him to become a Roman Catholic priest and remain married to his wife.

Nevertheless, "priestly celibacy is held in great honor in the Eastern Churches and many priests have freely chosen it for the sake of the Kingdom of God," the Catechism continues. "In the East as in the West a man who has already received the sacrament of Holy Orders can no longer marry".

A number of married Roman Catholic priests, who began as priests of Protestant denominations, have said they don't think married priests should be the norm. They point out that parishes will have to support not only priests but also their (potentially very large) families. They also point out the difficulty of being a shepherd to "two flocks" – a parish and a family.

"A married priesthood alters one of the underlying symbolic systems of the Catholic priesthood. The Catholic priest is 'married to the Church.' Having a wife undermines that essential and traditional symbolism," Father Dwight Longenecker, a married priest, wrote in the New York Times in 2014. [….]

"You might be surprised to know most married Catholic priests are staunch advocates of clerical celibacy," Father Joshua Whitfield, a Catholic priest with a wife and four kids, wrote recently in the Dallas Morning News.

"Laity who have no real idea of what priesthood entails and even some priests who have no real idea of what married family life entails both assume normalizing married priesthood would bring about a new, better age for the Catholic Church," wrote Whitfield. "But it's an assumption with little supporting evidence. One need only look to the clergy shortage in many Protestant churches to see that opening up clerical ranks doesn't necessarily bring about spiritual renaissance or growth at all, the opposite being just as likely."

"But more importantly, calls to change the discipline of celibacy are usually either ignorant or forgetful of what the church calls the 'spiritual fruit' of celibacy, something largely incomprehensible in this libertine age, but which is nonetheless still true and essential to the work of the church," Whitfield continued.

Canon lawyer Father James Bradley, an unmarried convert from Anglicanism, shares Whitfield's view.

High Treason: “Betrayal of your sovereign by acts of aid and comfort to the monarch’s ‘enemies.’”

On the one hand, therefore, it is necessary that the mission of teaching whatever Christ had taught should remain perpetual and immutable, and on the other that the duty of accepting and professing all their doctrine should likewise be perpetual and immutable. “Our Lord Jesus Christ, when in His Gospel He testifies that those who not are with Him are His enemies, does not designate any special form of heresy, but declares that all heretics who are not with Him and do not gather with Him, scatter His flock and are His adversaries: He that is not with Me is against Me, and he that gathereth not with Me scattereth” (S. Cyprianus, Ep. lxix., ad Magnum, n. I).

The Church, founded on these principles and mindful of her office, has done nothing with greater zeal and endeavour than she has displayed in guarding the integrity of the faith. Hence she regarded as rebels and expelled from the ranks of her children all who held beliefs on any point of doctrine different from her own. The Arians, the Montanists, the Novatians, the Quartodecimans, the Eutychians, did not certainly reject all Catholic doctrine: they abandoned only a tertian portion of it. Still who does not know that they were declared heretics and banished from the bosom of the Church? In like manner were condemned all authors of heretical tenets who followed them in subsequent ages. “There can be nothing more dangerous than those heretics who admit nearly the whole cycle of doctrine, and yet by one word, as with a drop of poison, infect the real and simple faith taught by our Lord and handed down by Apostolic tradition” (Auctor Tract. de Fide Orthodoxa contra Arianos).

Pope Leo XIII, Satis Cognitum, On the Unity of the Church

When it is a question of protecting the bishop’s assets from legal forfeiture, then the property is held in “trust” for the faithful. When it is a question of the faithful trying to protect their churches from being closed and the savings confiscated by the diocese, then the property is an asset of the bishop to do with whatever he pleases.

Great Falls-Billings Diocese becomes 15th to file for bankruptcy

National Catholic Reporter | Dan Morris-Young | April 3, 2017

Are parish assets immune from liquidation?

That was a dominant question among those that pastors and others posed to Great Falls-Billings Bishop Michael Warfel leading up to the Montana diocese's March 31 filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, brought on by financial pressures from sex abuse lawsuits.

The diocese embraces the concept that parish assets are held "in trust," Warfel told NCR March 31, but attorneys for the currently 72 claimants caution otherwise.

"It is my understanding that the diocese will assert that some of its real estate holdings, investments and cash assets are held 'in trust' for the benefit of parishes, and are thus not available to fund a settlement or jury verdict should any case proceed to trial," Bryan Smith, an attorney whose firm represents nearly half of current plaintiffs, told NCR in an email.

"However, there does not appear to be any evidence that the parishes are separately incorporated. If the cases do not resolve in mediation, the issue of which assets are reachable in bankruptcy could be the subject of litigation," said Smith, who works for the Tamaki Law firm, which is based in Washington state.

"There has been no court ruling on which diocesan assets are available to fund a potential settlement" and which are "off limits," Smith added. "Whether the court will agree with the diocese or with the abuse survivors on that point is unclear, as it has not yet been raised — and will not be unless the parties are unable to settle the case at mediation."

The diocese filed for Chapter 11 reorganization on Friday afternoon (March 31) in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Montana, becoming the 15th Catholic diocese to seek such protection related to sexual abuse by clergy. Two religious communities have also filed for bankruptcy. […..]

PREDICTION: If President Trump, as commander-in-chief of the armed forces, does not overturn this crude effrontery to his presidency, he will accomplish nothing of any worth.

Lesbian with ‘wife’ and two kids selected to lead U.S. Air Force Academy

LifeSiteNews | Colorado Springs | March 30, 2017— An open lesbian has been chosen to be the next commandant of the U.S. Air Force Academy, according to a USAF Academy report and other media.

Col. Kristin Goodwin has a “wife”and two children. She will take charge of the USAF Academy pending approval by the U.S. Senate. If approved, she likely will assume her new position in May. That is usually a formality, but conservative opposition to her appointment might make it less so.

Air Force Academy alumnus and former Navy Chaplain Gordon James (“Chaps”) Klingenschmitt, a conservative activist, is urging concerned citizens to call their U.S. senators to oppose Goodwin’s nomination to lead the USAF cadets.

Klingenschmitt, who heads the Pray in Jesus Name Project, told LifeSiteNews that Goodwin’s appointment under a Trump presidency is part of a “deep state problem of Obama’s appointments remaining in office while the Senate drags its feet to confirm Donald Trump’s appointments to replace them.” [......]

Center for Medical Progress (CMP) released a new video of Planned Parenthood selling baby body parts. Now CMP directors are the only people criminally charged for revealing this bloody hideous crime! Abortion is really just ritual murder by another name by those who worship at the “tabernacle of Moloch and (follow) the star of (their) god Rempham.” (Acts 7:43)

Planned Parenthood’s Cecile Richards refuses questions about newest baby parts video

LifeSiteNews | Washington, D.C. | March 30, 2017– Cecile Richards, the President of Planned Parenthood, walked away from LifeSiteNews after being asked about the new Center for Medical Progress (CMP) video during which a Planned Parenthood abortionist discusses what to do if babies show signs of life after being unsuccessfully aborted.

Richards also wouldn't comment on two pro-life activists from CMP being charged with felonies for exposing the abortion company's baby body parts sales.

On March 29, the same day the shocking CMP video was released, Planned Parenthood held a rally on Capitol Hill. LifeSiteNews was there and asked Richards for her reaction to the new video and Daleiden being charged. The charges against Daleiden and his co-worker Sandra Merritt were announced March 28.

Richards walked away upon hearing the questions. Planned Parenthood staffers attempted to cover the camera and direct LifeSiteNews away.

CMP's newest undercover video shows Dr. DeShawn Taylor explaining that aborting some babies requires strength causing a need to "hit the gym." She graphically described how to deliver aborted babies intact so that their body parts can be harvested and said she pays "attention to who's in the room" if an aborted baby shows signs of life.

"It’s not a matter of how I feel about it coming out intact, but I gotta worry about my staff and people’s feelings about it coming out looking like a baby," Taylor said of the elective abortions she does up to 24 weeks.

Pro-life investigators charged with 15 felonies for exposing Planned Parenthood baby parts sales

LifeSiteNews | CALIFORNIA | March 28, 2017 – The state of California charged pro-life investigators David Daleiden and Sandra Merritt of the Center for Medical Progress (CMP) with 15 crimes Tuesday.

CMP's undercover videos showing Planned Parenthood executives haggling over the prices of aborted baby body parts spurred a Congressional investigation and calls for the abortion company to be stripped of its federal tax dollars.

"These bogus charges from Planned Parenthood's political cronies are fake news," said Daleiden in a statement to LifeSiteNews. "They tried the same collusion with corrupt officials in Houston, TX and both the charges and the DA were thrown out."

"The public knows the real criminals are Planned Parenthood and their business partners like StemExpress and DV Biologics—currently being prosecuted in Orange County—who have harvested and sold aborted baby body parts for profit for years in direct violation of state and federal law. I look forward to showing the entire world what is on our yet-unreleased video tapes of Planned Parenthood’s criminal baby body parts enterprise." [.......]

Cardinal Marx admits what has been common knowledge for years: Vatican II's Lumen Gentium taught a radically new and heretical ecclesiology. But don't expect him to ever figure out why there is a “great upheaval in the Church” or why out of a diocese of 1.7 million he has only one candidate for the priesthood.

Cardinal Marx: Lay people can run parishes

LifeSiteNews | Munich, Germany | March 28, 2017– German Cardinal Reinhard Marx plans to allow lay people in his archdiocese to run parishes in response to the priest shortage there and is also open to the possibility of married priests.

Cardinal Marx said parishes in the Archdiocese of Munich will have to be reorganized and current requirements for admission to the priesthood be reconsidered. The archdiocese has a Catholic population of more than 1.7 million but just one candidate for the priesthood this year.

“We are experiencing a great upheaval in the Church at the moment,” the cardinal said.

The 63-year-old Marx, who is president of the German Bishops’ Conference and a member Pope Francis’ Council of Cardinals as well as a close adviser of the pope, recently announced a pilot project this fall with parish leadership models.

Cardinal Marx said all of the possibilities were not yet thought through. He cited the “priesthood of all the faithful” and referenced the Second Vatican Council (Chapter 2, Lumen Gentium: “the common priesthood of the faithful and the ministerial or hierarchical priesthood are nonetheless interrelated”). [.....]

Simple Explanation: According to the aesthetical theology of the Desert Fathers, Depression is one of the capital sins along with sloth, avarice, lust, gluttony, anger, envy, and pride. A life without the grace of God is necessarily depressing.

Global depression rates up 18 per cent since 2005: WHO

Reuters | Kate Kelland | LONDON | Mar. 30, 2017

Depression is now the leading cause of ill health and disability worldwide, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Thursday, with more than 300 million people suffering.

Rates of depression have risen by more than 18 per cent since 2005, but a lack of support for the mental health combined with a common fear of stigma means many do not get the treatment they need to live healthy, productive lives.

“These new figures are a wake-up call for all countries to re-think their approaches to mental health and to treat it with the urgency it deserves,” Margaret Chan, the WHO’s director-general, said in a statement from the U.N. agency’s Geneva headquarters.

The WHO is running a mental health campaign to tackle stigma and misconceptions called “Depression: Let’s Talk.”

“For someone living with depression, talking to a person they trust is often the first step towards treatment and recovery,” said Shekhar Saxena, director of the WHO’s mental health department.

Depression is a common mental illness characterized by persistent sadness and a loss of interest and lack of ability in everyday activities and work. It affects around 322 million people worldwide. [.....]

Sodomy, a sin that cries to Heaven for Vengeance!

“But they act in a contrary way, for they come full of impurity to this mystery, and not only of that impurity to which, through the fragility of your weak nature, you are all naturally inclined (although reason, when free will permits, can quiet the rebellion of nature), but these wretches not only do not bridle this fragility, but do worse, committing that accursed sin against nature, and as blind and fools, with the light of their intellect darkened, they do not know the stench and misery in which they are. It is not only that this sin stinks before me, who am the Supreme and Eternal Truth, it does indeed displease me so much and I hold it in such abomination that for it alone I buried five cities by a divine judgment, my divine justice being no longer able to endure it. This sin not only displeases me as I have said, but also the devils whom these wretches have made their masters. Not that the evil displeases them because they like anything good, but because their nature was originally angelic, and their angelic nature causes them to loathe the sight of the actual commission of this enormous sin.

God the Father to St. Catherine of Siena, Dialogues

“No sin in the world grips the soul as the accursed sodomy; this sin has always been detested by all those who live according to God.… Deviant passion is close to madness; this vice disturbs the intellect, destroys elevation and generosity of soul, brings the mind down from great thoughts to the lowliest, makes the person slothful, irascible, obstinate and obdurate, servile and soft and incapable of anything; furthermore, agitated by an insatiable craving for pleasure, the person follows not reason but frenzy.… They become blind and, when their thoughts should soar to high and great things, they are broken down and reduced to vile and useless and putrid things, which could never make them happy.... Just as people participate in the glory of God in different degrees, so also in hell some suffer more than others. He who lived with this vice of sodomy suffers more than another, for this is the greatest sin.”

St. Bernardine of Siena, Sermon

“As the Sacred Scripture says, the Sodomites were wicked and exceedingly sinful. Saint Peter and Saint Paul condemn this nefarious and depraved sin. In fact, the Scripture denounces this enormous indecency thus: ‘The scandal of Sodomites and Gomorrhans has multiplied and their sins have become grave beyond measure.’ So the angels said to just Lot, who totally abhorred the depravity of the Sodomites: ‘Let us leave this city....’ Holy Scripture does not fail to mention the causes that led the Sodomites, and can also lead others, to this most grievous sin. In fact, in Ezechiel we read: ‘Behold this was the iniquity of Sodom: pride, fullness of bread, and abundance, and the idleness of her, and of her daughters: and they did not put forth their hand to the needy, and the poor. And they were lifted up, and committed abominations before me; and I took them away as thou hast seen’ (Ezech. 16: 49-50). Those unashamed of violating divine and natural law are slaves of this never sufficiently execrated depravity.”

St. Peter Canisius, S.J., Doctor of the Church

Or was it his “Wife”? Protocol be damned!

The Prime Minister of Luxembourg is Received in the Vatican With “Husband.”
Adalante Te Fe | March 24, 2017 | Rome: A meeting of Pope Francis held a celebration with 27 leaders of the world on the occasion of the 60th anniversary of the Treaty of Rome, in which this “curious” shot of Luxembourg Prime Minister Xavier Bettel, a well-known pro-sodomy activist, along with his “husband”, was taken.

“One Baptism”?

Around four o’clock in the afternoon on January 3^rd 1944, in the convent chapel of Tuy, in front of the Tabernacle, Our Lady urged Sister Lucia to write the text of the Third Secret and Sister Lucia recounts:

“I felt my spirit inundated by a mystery of light that is God and in Him I saw and heard the point of a lance like a flame that is detached touch the axis of the earth and it trembles: mountains, cities, towns and villages with their inhabitants are buried. The sea, the rivers and clouds exceed their boundaries, inundating and dragging with them in a vortex, houses and people in a number that cannot be counted; it is the purification of the world from the sin in which it is immersed. Hatred, ambition, provoke the destructive war. After I felt my heart racing and in my spirit a soft voice that said: ‘In time, one faith, one baptism, one Church, Holy, Catholic, Apostolic. In eternity, Heaven!’ This word ‘Heaven’ filled my heart with peace and happiness in such a way that, almost without being aware of it, I kept repeating to myself for a long time: Heaven, Heaven!!”

Um Caminho sob o olhar de Maria (A Path under the eyes of Mary), published in 2013 by the sisters of the Carmel of Coimbra

The Jewish question of our time does not differ greatly from the one which affected the Christian peoples of the Middle Ages. In a foolish way it is said to arise from hatred towards the Jewish tribe. Mosaism in itself could not become an object of hate for Christians, since, until the coming of Christ, it was the only true religion, a prefiguration of and preparation for Christianity, which, according to God’s Will, was to be its successor. But the Judaism of the centuries [after Christ] turned its back on the Mosaic law, replacing it with the Talmud, the very quintessence of that Pharisaism which in so many ways has been shattered through its rejection by Christ, the Messiah and Redeemer. And although Talmudism is an important element of the Jewish question, it cannot be said, strictly speaking, to give that question a religious character, because what the Christian nations despise in Talmudism is not so much its virtually non-existent theological element, but rather, its morals, which are at variance with the most elementary principles of natural ethics.

“The Jewish Question in Europe”; La Civiltà Cattolica, Series XIV, Vol. VII, 23 October 1890

Cardinal Gerhard Müller reaffirms what every Catholic child should already know before he receives his first sacramental Confession in preparation for his first Holy Communion:

….. Let us now return to the new Tertio interview itself. Cardinal Müller, when speaking about truth and mercy, explicitly says that “there are no circumstances that would make adultery not be a mortal sin” and that “The merciful God does not dispense of the Commandments.” Pastors “cannot remove the responsibility toward others” and cannot “exempt people from the Commandments.” Cardinal Müller also says that “the teaching on the indissolubility of marriage is clear” and stresses the importance of the “responsibility for the children.” While we all as human beings can commit errors and sins, the cardinal adds, “we need forgiveness for our sins” and have to “beg (God) for mercy.” Cardinal Müller importantly explains: “Again, mercy is not a licence to sin or to live in sin.” In Catholic terms, contrition of heart “must be accompanied by a willingness to convert.” The cardinal insists that “a just mercy helps us to live in truth, and a wrong mercy gives us false assurances, but does not make us free.” Thus, with God’s Grace, marriage can be for a lifetime, and we have to pray for that, and therefore “marriage is an achievable project that makes people happy.”

It is to be hoped that this set of authentic quotes from this latest interview of Cardinal Müller may now spread in lieu of the earlier misrepresentations. [….]

Steve Skojec, editor OnePeterFive, commenting on March 1, 2017 interview by the Belgian Catholic weekly, Tertio, of Cardinal Gerhard Müller, Prefect for the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith

First of all they lay down the general principle that in a living religion everything is subject to change, and must change, and in this way they pass to what may be said to be, among the chief of their doctrines, that of Evolution. To the laws of evolution everything is subject - dogma, Church, worship, the Books we revere as sacred, even faith itself, and the penalty of disobedience is death. The enunciation of this principle will not astonish anybody who bears in mind what the Modernists have had to say about each of these subjects. Having laid down this law of evolution, the Modernists themselves teach us how it works out.

Pope St. Pius X, Pascendi, On the Doctrines of the Modernists.

And just where are the Modernist Liturgists going “forward” to? They won’t tell you because they don’t really know! We should just “Let them alone: they are blind, and leaders of the blind. And if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit.” Matt. 15:14

Reform of the Reform of the Reform of the Reform of the Reform of the Reform of.........

The Last 50 years of Liturgical Wasteland is not enough for the New Barbarians-

“More progress must be made, there is a long way yet to go.... We must always go forward, always forward.....”

The liturgy is not something strange, there, distant, and while it is being celebrated I am thinking of many things, or I pray the Rosary. No, no. There is a correspondence between the liturgical celebration, which I then carry into my life; and on this more progress must be made, there is such a long way yet to go. [.....] Thank you so much, thank you so much for your hospitality, for the prayer with me in the Mass; and we thank the Lord for what He has done in the Church in these 50 years of liturgical reform. It was in fact a courageous gesture of the Church to draw close to the People of God, so that they could understand well what she does, and this is important for us, to follow the Mass in this way. And we cannot go back; we must always go forward, always forward and whoever goes back is mistaken. We go forward on this way.

Pope Francis, March 7, 2015 celebrating the 50th anniversary 1965 Bugnini transitional Missal which is remembered by almost no one. Even the papal documents that imposed this “reform” were formally revoked by Benedict XVI so that the evolutionary changes between the 1962 “extra-ordinary” and the 1969 “ordinary” Bugnini transitional missals would appear as an example of liturgical punctuated equilibrium.

“Beware of disturbing settled questions!”

King Henry VIII, interrupting Cardinal Thomas Wolsey when Wolsey first broached his opinion to King Henry that his marriage to Queen Catherine was invalid thus sowing the seed that led to heresy, schism and the martyrdom of many, many Faithful Catholics.

Pope Francis – his “most gentle manner”!

They (our most holy predecessors) knew the capacity of innovators in the art of deception. In order not to shock the ears of Catholics, the innovators sought to hide the subtleties of their tortuous maneuvers by the use of seemingly innocuous words such as would allow them to insinuate error into souls in the most gentle manner. Once the truth had been compromised, they could, by means of slight changes or additions in phraseology, distort the confession of the faith that is necessary for our salvation, and lead the faithful by subtle errors to their eternal damnation. This manner of dissimulating and lying is vicious, regardless of the circumstances under which it is used. For very good reasons it can never be tolerated in a synod of which the principal glory consists above all in teaching the truth with clarity and excluding all danger of error. Moreover, if all this is sinful, it cannot be excused in the way that one sees it being done, under the erroneous pretext that the seemingly shocking affirmations in one place are further developed along orthodox lines in other places, and even in yet other places corrected; as if allowing for the possibility of either affirming or denying the statement, or of leaving it up the personal inclinations of the individual – such has always been the fraudulent and daring method used by innovators to establish error. It allows for both the possibility of promoting error and of excusing it. It is a most reprehensible technique for the insinuation of doctrinal errors and one condemned long ago by our predecessor St. Celestine, who found it used in the writings of Nestorius, bishop of Constantinople, and which he exposed in order to condemn it with the greatest possible severity. Once these texts were examined carefully, the impostor was exposed and confounded, for he expressed himself in a plethora of words, mixing true things with others that were obscure; mixing at times one with the other in such a way that he was also able to confess those things which were denied while at the same time possessing a basis for denying those very sentences which he confessed.

Pope Pius VI, Auctorem Fidei, 1794 papal bull addressed to all the faithful condemning 85 propositions from the Council of Pistoia, 1786

He preserved “the basic elements, the bread, the wine,” but so did every Protestant sect. The question is, ‘Did he preserve the True Presence? Did he preserve the Sacrifice?

“Certainly, we will preserve the basic elements, the bread, the wine, but all else will be changed according to local traditions: words, gestures, colours, vestments, chants, architecture, decor. The problem of liturgical reform is immense.”

Fr. M. Malinksi, Mon Ami: Karol Wojtyla, Le Centurion, 1980, p.220

Pope Francis never kneels before the Blessed Sacrament! Why?

Then Jesus said to them: Amen, amen I say unto you: Except you eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, you shall not have life in you. He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath everlasting life: and I will raise him up in the last day. For my flesh is meat indeed: and my blood is drink indeed. He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, abideth in me, and I in him. As the living Father hath sent me, and I live by the Father; so he that eateth me, the same also shall live by me. This is the bread that came down from heaven. Not as your fathers did eat manna, and are dead. He that eateth this bread, shall live for ever. John 6:54-59

For as often as you shall eat this bread, and drink the chalice, you shall shew the death of the Lord, until he come. Therefore whosoever shall eat this bread, or drink the chalice of the Lord unworthily, shall be guilty of the body and of the blood of the Lord. But let a man prove himself: and so let him eat of that bread, and drink of the chalice. For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh judgment to himself, not discerning the body of the Lord. 1 Cor 11:26-29

Because for Francis, “This is a hard saying; who can listen to it?” (John 6:60)

Worth Remembering: Pope Francis the Fatuous claims to be morally superior to all previous popes who were too stupid to know anything about the Fifth Commandment!

Pope Francis appeals for global end to capital punishment

Pontiff tells crowd in St Peter’s Square that ‘You shall not kill’ applies to the innocent as well as the guilty

REUTERS | 21 February 2016

Pope Francis has called for the worldwide abolition of the death penalty, saying the commandment “You shall not kill” is absolute and valid for the guilty as well as the innocent.

Using some of his strongest ever words against capital punishment, he also called on Catholic politicians worldwide to make “a courageous and exemplary gesture” by seeking a moratorium on executions during the church’s current holy year, which ends in November.

“I appeal to the consciences of those who govern to reach an international consensus to abolish the death penalty,” he told tens of thousands of people in St Peter’s Square in the Vatican on Sunday.

“The commandment ‘You shall not kill’ has absolute value and applies to both the innocent and the guilty,” he told the crowd. [....]

“Sure as the sun to-morrow”

St. Paul has foretold the coming of one whom he calls the lawless. No word more truly describes the state of the modern world. All ages have, indeed, been lawless, in the sense of violence which breaks the law. But the modern world is lawless in that it rejects the idea of law, and destroys the basis of law, by resolving all authority into the will of numbers. The idea of right as limiting popular aspirations is extinct. Facts are taken to be just, because accomplished; as if robbery could become lawful by completion. The logic of facts is the series of wrongs which, once begun, necessitate each other. And the logic of facts is now one of the supreme reasons of state. The popular will may aspire after its neighbour’s house and goods, all right and justice notwithstanding; for the popular will is a law to itself, and makes law by its aspirations. What it desires it wills, and what it wills is right. What is this but the reign of license, the corruption of liberty, the extinction of morality, the negation of justice, which is the negation of God? And yet such is the substitute in the modern world for the even law of nations and of God, which, at least by public recognition, ruled and sustained Christendom.

And with this lawlessness comes the supremacy of might. Once, right and might met together, sanctioning and confirming each other’s acts. Now, might without right tramples down right without might. The weaker perish, and the stronger reign, till by mutual destruction men and nations execute on each other the just judgment of God. That this is in store for Europe, if these principles prevail, who can doubt? That this will be the solution of the Roman question, if this sacrilege be not repaired, is sure as the sun to-morrow.

Cardinal Henry Edward Manning, Archbishop of Westminster, Rome, the Capital of Christendom, after the unjust war of aggression to overthrow the nearly 1200 year-old Papal State by Victor Emmanuel II, King of Italy, 1870. The temporal power of the pope was the oldest of all western monarchies upon which all others were grounded. After its overthrow, followed the overthrow of all. Victor Emmanuel died in Rome in 1878, after refusing to meet with Blessed Pope Pius IX’s envoy, who was sent with the authority to reverse the excommunication and restore him to the Church in the hope that he would obtain a holy death and his salvation. The unfortunate “father of the Italian state” was buried in the Pantheon, while still technically a Catholic church, is now far closer to its original purpose as a pagan temple. The Italian monarchy ended in 1946.

For the “Hard of Heart” the Law of Moses Still Applies

So says an illustrious biblicist, with a new interpretation of the words of Jesus on marriage and divorce. But the Catholic Church has always preached indissolubility without exception. Will it come to admit second marriages, as in the East?
by Sandro Magister

There are not only the well-known arguments of Cardinal Walter Kasper in favor of communion for the divorced and remarried.
There are also those who are traveling new and original paths, in obedience to the assignment of the synod last October, according to which “the question must be examined further.”
This is the case of one famous biblicist and patrologist, Guido Innocenzo Gargano, a Camaldolese monk, former prior of the Roman monastery of San Gregorio al Celio, and professor at the Pontifical Biblical Institute and the Pontifical Urbaniana University.
In an article in the latest issue of the theology quarterly “Urbaniana University Journal,” Fr. Gargano shows how Jesus’ words about marriage are mainly prompted by what God says through the mouth of the prophet Hosea: “I desire mercy, and not sacrifice.”
And as a result he maintains that Jesus, when he affirms that “man must not divide what God has joined,” does not thereby cancel God’s forbearance with the “hardness of heart” of his people, for whom Moses had permitted divorce.
The keystone of Fr. Gargano’s argument is the statement of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount: “I have come not to abolish the Law or the Prophets, but to fulfill them.”
In his judgment, the significance of this statement is that the two laws - that of “it was said to them of old” and the new one of “but I say to you” - both coexist in the preaching of Jesus and clarify each other.
So much so that Jesus, again in the Sermon on the Mount, does not exclude from the kingdom of heaven but brings in as the “least” even “he who transgresses the least of these precepts” and therefore - Fr. Gargano comments - also the one who makes use of the Mosaic concession of repudiation because of “hardness of heart.”
The author of the article develops these and other points at length and with acuity, without explicating the practical applications that could result from this in the life of the Catholic Church, not only on the “vexata quaestio” of communion for the divorced and remarried, but also on whether or not to allow second marriages.
He limits himself, in fact, to an exercise of New Testament exegesis and theology on texts in Matthew concerning marriage, with only minimal references to the subsequent developments of Church doctrine and practice in East and West, and with complete silence on the dogmatic canons of the Council of Trent and the pastoral constitution of Vatican Council II “Gaudium et Spes,” which confirm the absolute indissolubility of Christian marriage.
Of course, the discussion also remains open on the exegesis that Fr. Gargano makes of the saying of Jesus: “I have come not to abolish the Law or the Prophets, but to fulfill them.” [......]

COMMENT: The first problem is that this Exegetist ignores Dogma. Dogma is the formal object of divine and Catholic faith. It is the direct revelation of God. To ignore Dogma in the exegesis of Holy Scripture and offer an interpretation that is contrary to Dogma is what the faithless Protestants do. To interpret Sacred Scripture contrary to Dogma is to be counted among those censored by St. Peter in his second epistle when he commented upon those corrupting the epistles of St. Paul saying, “As also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things; in which are certain things hard to be understood, which the unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, to their own destruction.” The arguments of this exposition are so weak, so stupid, that they would not have merited a critical comment by a Catholic biblical scholar at the time of the Reformation.

The second problem is that the Church Fathers and Doctors have provided excellent commentary on this scriptural passage. This idiot proceeds as if they had nothing to say, at least nothing that would interest him. The law was fulfilled in Jesus, perfected, not abolished. He did not establish two different moral standards, one for those seeking perfection and another for those still suffering from “hardness of heart.” The restoration of Marriage as indissoluble is possible because of its elevation as a sacrament by God which is the “fulfilling” of the law. What this man argues for, and Pope Francis has done, is a return to “hardness of heart” which cannot have a good ending for it turns away from the grace of God. “But according to thy hardness and impenitent heart, thou treasurest up to thyself wrath, against the day of wrath, and revelation of the just judgment of God” (Romans 2:5). The comments from the Church Fathers referenced in the biblical commentaries of Cornelius a Lapide, St. Thomas’ Catena Aurea, and the Fr. Haydock’s commentary interpret the “least” in the kingdom of heaven to mean that they will not be in the kingdom of heaven at all. Those in the kingdom of Heaven will regard those outside the kingdom who have not kept the law as the “least” or “last.”

When any member of the faithful sees Catholic teaching being eroded or undermined, it is his right—indeed it is even his duty—to speak out in protest. It is not the right of wayward theologians, or of bishops who may acquiesce in their views, to decide that certain parts of the Gospel and Catholic tradition are now antiquated and may be dropped—and then to protest against usurpation of their authority when the faithful demand that they receive the whole Word of God.

John J. Mulloy, conservative Catholic apologist, scholar and editor of Christopher Dawson’s Dynamics of World History

Pope Francis complains of Political Decay in the West – The cause? The failure of the Catholic Church to teach Catholic doctrine and Catholic morals!

Providence is the proper instrument for change, and the test of a statesman is his cognizance of the real tendency of providential social forces… it acts through the instincts and intuitions of our feeble flesh, [demonstrating] that religion and politics are inseparable, that the decay of one must produce the decay of the other.”

Russell Kirk, The Conservative Mind

“Doubts?” What “doubts”? Well, it’s doubtful that the authors of the Dubia are members of the homosexual lobby, but we expect that Bruno already knows that!

“The doubts raised (Dubia) raise doubts about those who raised them because they were present and experienced the collegial spirit for themselves. Amoris laetitia focuses on the crisis of the real family. The message is that despite the wounds and the failure, it is worthwhile support the family. So what is to be done? Love as God does. And how shall this attention be expressed for the wounded? With forgiveness, which is the great power of love…. The way of accompanyment has its summit in the Communion for the remarried divorced, which is a sign of obedience toward the mercy of God.”

Archbishop Bruno Forte, the very same Bruno Forte who during the Synod on the Family praised homosexual unions as possessing positive elements that could contribute to the Church, criticizing the four cardinals who submitted the Dubia to Pope Francis in September 2016 while endorsing the heretical opinion that Holy Communion is permissible for those living in unrepentant adulterous unions. The Dubia has not been formally answered by Francis, which is his duty, but he has on several occasions made indirect insulting remarks against its authors.

Separation of Church and State is impossible. Every state has an established religion with a creedal profession containing articles of faith that it demands its citizens profess. These articles of faith cannot be proven to be true or even demonstrated as consistent with natural law. The U.S.A. is no exception to this rule. We have a state religion but it is called by another name. The secular dogma, ‘Separation of Church and State’, is nothing more than a tool to prevent competition against the state religion in the public forum. The state demands a “faith” in “general values” that are always “relative and changing.”

All organization is action and all action is rude. […..] There is a hierarchy of values which have been expressed in nearly every revolutionary slogan in history…. These values are up on top. The democratic way of life is nothing more than a process, a device, a modus operandi, designed as the best way, we believe, of achieving those values, of growing into them so to speak. Now, those values that I have mentioned cannot be discussed, they cannot be argued, they cannot be debated, they are articles of faith. [..…] In a free and open society, equality is a value you cannot discuss or debate or put on a ballot. If you do not accept our values then you can have no voice in a democratic process. Then get out of our system and go someplace else. [……] These values and goals, out of necessity, are always stated in general terms. Every literate revolutionary knows that you cannot be any more than general (in your) terms because all values are relative and are changing.

Saul Alinsky, Jewish revolutionary, explaining the ‘religion’ of the modern democratic state, 1/17/69, UCLA

Pope Francis will “come to nothing.”

The Church has ever proved indestructible. Her persecutors have failed to destroy her; in fact, it was during times of persecution that the Church grew more and more; while the persecutors themselves, and those whom the Church would destroy, are the very ones who came to nothing.

St. Thomas Aquinas

Why the Modern Clerics Lack “Counsel, Reason, and Inspiration”?

They have been “gathering from strange and unwholesome streams”!

But the chief and special glory of St. Thomas, one which he has shared with none of the Catholic Doctors, is that the Fathers of Trent made it part of the order of conclave to lay upon the altar, together with sacred Scripture and the decrees of the supreme Pontiffs, the Summa of Thomas Aquinas, whence to seek counsel, reason, and inspiration. Our first and most cherished idea is that you should all furnish to studious youth a generous and copious supply of those purest streams of wisdom flowing inexhaustibly from the precious fountainhead of the Angelic Doctor…. be careful to guard the minds of youth from those which are said to flow thence (from St Thomas), but in reality are gathered from strange and unwholesome streams.

Pope Leo XIII, Aeterni Patris (1879)

Society has already reached a sense of being “defeated” and “futureless.” The crime of the Novus Ordo Church is that they are a cause and contributor to this sense rather than a light of hope of union with Jesus Christ!

[You must help] the people in the community… feel so frustrated, so defeated, so lost, so futureless in the prevailing system that they are willing to let go of the past and chance the future. [An] organizer must shake up the prevailing patterns of their lives –agitate, create disenchantment and discontent with the current values, to produce, if not a passion for change, at least a passive, affirmative, non-challenging climate. [You must] fan the embers of hopelessness into a flame of fight.

Saul Alinsky, Rules for Radicals

The progressives have found no substitute for virtue. They can offer only such morbid stopgaps as contraception, abortion, and euthanasia. The Dark Ages understood virtue built a civilization; the progressive age doesn’t understand virtue and is tearing down the civilization it inherited. Euthanasia is a fitting symbol: the last sacrament of a society that cannot aspire to heaven, but only to painless annihilation.

Joe Sobran, “Dark Ages, New Morality”

The Head of the CDF is reduced to using secular press interviews to defend Catholic Dogma!

….. Let us now return to the new Tertio interview itself. Cardinal Müller, when speaking about truth and mercy, explicitly says that “there are no circumstances that would make adultery not be a mortal sin” and that “The merciful God does not dispense of the Commandments.” Pastors “cannot remove the responsibility toward others” and cannot “exempt people from the Commandments.” Cardinal Müller also says that “the teaching on the indissolubility of marriage is clear” and stresses the importance of the “responsibility for the children.” While we all as human beings can commit errors and sins, the cardinal adds, “we need forgiveness for our sins” and have to “beg for mercy.” Cardinal Müller importantly explains: “Again, mercy is not a license to sin or to live in sin.” In Catholic terms, contrition of heart “must be accompanied by a willingness to convert.” The cardinal insists that “a just mercy helps us to live in truth, and a wrong mercy gives us false assurances, but does not make us free.” Thus, with God’s Grace, marriage can be for a lifetime, and we have to pray for that, and therefore “marriage is an achievable project that makes people happy.”

It is to be hoped that this set of authentic quotes from this latest interview of Cardinal Müller may now spread in lieu of the earlier misrepresentations. [….]

Steve Skojec, editor OnePeterFive, commenting on March 1, 2017 interview by the Belgian Catholic weekly, Tertio, of Cardinal Gerhard Müller

Wisdom is the most perfect knowledge, of the most important things, in their right order of reference. Without the “right order of reference”, Wisdom is impossible. Pope Francis has no Wisdom. He does not even know the “greatest commandment in the law”!

Master, which is the greatest commandment in the law? Jesus said to him: Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment.

Matt. 22:36-38

Along with the virtues, this means above all the new commandment, the first and the greatest of the commandments, and the one that best identifies us as Christ’s disciples: “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you” (Jn. 15:12).

Pope Francis, Evangelii Gaudium, (161) On the Proclamation of the Gospel in Today’s World

Why not instead just “demand” the resignation of Pope Francis? After all, he is the owner of these two dogs!

After the latest scandals, we demand the resignation of Archbishop Paglia and Bishop Sanchez Sorondo

By Roberto de Mattei | Rome | March 2, 2017

Among the most recent events, which have caused upset among Catholics, two make for special attention. The first incident is the immense praise for Marco Pannella by the Archbishop of Verona, Vincenzo Paglia, President of the Pontifical Academy for Life. The occasion was the posthumous presentation of Pannella autobiography at the headquarters of the Radical Party in Rome: “Lo Spirito di Marco ci aiuti a vivere in quella stessa direzione” (The Spirit of Marco, help us to live in the same way).

The second incident is the presentation by Dr. Paul Ehrlich, a well-known representative of today’s “culture of death”, which he was able to hold at the invitation of the Roman Catholic, Marcelo Sanchez Sorondo, in the Vatican. The American biologist is connected with Marco Pannella, and both the deceased leader of the Radical Party like Ehrlich, is an abortion advocate and a declared enemy of the Catholic Church. While Mgr. Paglia more or less gave spontaneous explanations as in delirium, Sanchez Sorondo, in his capacity as chancellor of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences and the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences, made an official invitation to Ehrlich.

Sanchez Sorondo, like Paglia, is a confidant of Pope Francis, and although “thousands of people have asked Francis to end this scandal, it goes on,” complained Maria Madise of Voice of the Family. More than 10,000 signatures had been sent by the Catholic Organization of the United States to Pope Francis, with a request to prevent the participation of Ehrlich in the Vatican.

In a joint press release, the Voice of Family, LifeSiteNews, the Lepanto Foundation and Famiglia Domani have emphasized that Ehrlich is one of the most famous Neo-Malthusian abortion representatives. In 1968 he published the bestseller The Population Bomb. He prophesied to mankind a cataclysmic future dominated by overpopulation and demanded compulsory measures for birth control in order to avert them.

Although his predictions did not occur and had even colossally disregarded the facts, Ehrlich continues to assiduously demand selective abortion and mass sterilization as a legitimate means of population control. Ehrlich’s ideas have been implemented in the People’s Republic of China, India, Kenya and other states with governmental authority, making him responsible for the millions of deaths of those unborn.

In an interview by Mara Hvistendahl of 2011, Ehrlich defended selective abortion by saying, “It would be a good idea to leave the people the right to make decisions so that they have only a few children and only those who want them.” The determination of the sex of the born children by abortion and even the killing born children is better for women, says Ehrlich, than the fate that she would expect in an overpopulated world.

In an article published in 2015, Ehrlich attacked the Catholic faith as “dangerous”, because it opposes the contraceptive mentality. In the same year, he openly criticized the encyclical of Laudato si by Pope Francis, because he made passages against the birth control.

In 2014 he said:

“The Pope and many bishops represent a real evil and are part of the backward forces of the planet, which I believe are primarily interested in preserving their power.”

John Henry Westen, the editor-in-chief of LifeSiteNews, wrote that Pope Francis, by not attacking Ehrlich, “does not follow his duty to protect the faith entrusted to the Church by Christ.” Westen added:

“In an interview, Ehrlich told us that he was ‘electrified’ by the direction that Pope Francis is giving to the Catholic Church.”

The invitation of Ehrlich to the Vatican, therefore, represents a scandal which increases the already existing confusion in the Church. Perhaps Monsignor Sanchez Sorondo thinks of Ehrlich what Msgr. Paglia said about Marco Pannella:

“He is a man of great spirituality (...) His death is a great loss to our country (...) His mind blows on ... He was the stimulus of a more beautiful life, not only for Italy, but for our whole world, the more Because every man needs to know how to speak (...) I wish that the spirit of Marco might help us live in the same way.”

Some Catholic associations and media have rightly demanded the resignation of Archbishop Vincenzo Paglia from his office as President of the Pontifical Academy for Life and as Grand Chancellor of the Pontifical Institute John Paul II for Studies on Marriage and the Family. For the same reasons, we also demand the resignation of Bishop Marcelo Sanchez Sorondo from his office as Chancellor of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences and the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences.

Now the Novus Ordo Church has its own Bergoglian Schism!

Warning to all who hope to remain faithful to Jesus Christ: “You can tell if he is misleading you”!

“I want to change, but I know that I am not capable of changing, but I want to change.... You have to pay attention to what the penitent says. If you know- you can tell if he is misleading you.”

Cardinal Francesco Coccopalmerio, President of the Pontifical Council for the INterpretation of Legislative Texts, applying the new Bergoglian Rule that those remaining in adulterous relationships can receive sacramental absolution in the confessional without repentance and Holy Communion if they profess that they want to change but are not capable of changing.

Pope Francis’ Idea of Zero Tolerance!

In Italy there has been an uproar over the act of “mercy” with which Francis has graced Fr. Mauro Inzoli, a prominent priest of the movement Communion and Liberation, reduced to the lay state in 2012 by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith for having abused numerous young boys, but restored to the active priesthood by Francis in 2014, with the admonishment that he lead a life of penance and prayer. In the civil arena, Inzoli was caught again and charged. He has been sentenced to 4 years and 9 months in prison.

Sandor Magister

Do penance: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.[.....] Ye brood of vipers, who hath shewed you to flee from the wrath to come? Bring forth therefore fruit worthy of penance.[.....] For now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that doth not yield good fruit, shall be cut down, and cast into the fire. I indeed baptize you in the water unto penance, but he that shall come after me, is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear; he shall baptize you in the Holy Ghost and fire.

St. John the Baptist

Note: Do penance (Paenitentiam agite). Which word, according to the use of the scriptures and the holy fathers, does not only signify repentance and amendment of life, but also punishing past sins by fasting, and such like penitential exercises.

The Heresy of Ecumenism first denies Truth and then seeks an Accommodation of Error with other Liars!

As the Holy Office affirms, there is no unity without truth. Truth first, unity afterwards, truth the cause, unity the effect. To invert this order is to overthrow the Divine procedure. The unity of Babel ended in confusion; the union of Pentecost fused all nations into one Body and one dogma of the Faith…. Truth alone generates unity.

Cardinal Henry Edward Manning

“In the six hundredth year of the life of Noe, in the second month, in the seventeenth day of the month, all the fountains of the great deep were broken up, and the flood gates of heaven were opened…. And the waters prevailed upon the earth a hundred and fifty days.”

Genesis 7:11 & 24

COMMENT: The Jewish calendar is a lunar calendar, therefore, the dates will not correspond each year with the Gregorian calendar. It is therefore unusual that this year, the “second month (Iyar), in the seventeenth day” when the “flood gates of heaven were opened” falls on May 13 which is the 100th anniversary of the first appearance of the Blessed Virgin at Fatima. The Fatima apparitions continued for five months ending on October 13, 1917 with the Miracle of the Sun. October 13 will be the 300th anniversary of the miraculous finding of the statue of Our Lady of Aparacida which was accompanied by a miraculous draw of fish. The Fatima apparations lasted five months. The flood waters recorded in Genesis prevailed upon the earth for 150 days, that is, five months.

“Sure as the sun to-morrow”

St. Paul has foretold the coming of one whom he calls the lawless. No word more truly describes the state of the modern world. All ages have, indeed, been lawless, in the sense of violence which breaks the law. But the modern world is lawless in that it rejects the idea of law, and destroys the basis of law, by resolving all authority into the will of numbers. The idea of right as limiting popular aspirations is extinct. Facts are taken to be just, because accomplished; as if robbery could become lawful by completion. The logic of facts is the series of wrongs which, once begun, necessitate each other. And the logic of facts is now one of the supreme reasons of state. The popular will may aspire after its neighbour’s houe and goods, all right and justice notwithstanding; for the popular will is a law to itself, and makes law by its aspirations. What it desires it wills, and what it wills is right. What is this but the reign of license, the corruption of liberty, the extinction of morality, the negation of justice, which is the negation of God? And yet such is the substitute in the modern world for the even law of nations and of God, which, at least by public recognition, ruled and sustained Christendom.

Cardinal Henry Edward Manning, Archbishop of Westminster, Rome, the Capital of Christendom, after the unjust war of aggression to overthrow the nearly 1200 year-old Papal State by Victor Emmanuel II, King of Italy, 1870. The temporal power of the pope was the oldest of all western monarchies upon which all others were grounded. After its overthrow, followed the overthrow of all. Victor Emmanuel died in Rome in 1878, after refusing to meet with Pope Pius IX's envoys, who was sent with the authority to reverse the excommunication and restore him to the Church in the hope to obtain a holy death and his salvation. The unfortunate "father of the Italian state" was buried in the Pantheon, while still technically a Catholic church, is far closer to its original purpose as a pagan temple. The Italian monarchy ended in 1946.

The friends of Pope Francis are drawn from the enemies of the Catholic Faith!

I'm not a Catholic, I'm an atheist. But I like the Pope better than you do.

Bill Maher, Jewish entertainer, Real Time with Bill Maher, segment with Rick Santorum

For the “Hard of Heart” the Law of Moses Still Applies

COMMENT: The first problem is that this exegetist ignores Dogma. Dogma is the formal object of divine and Catholic faith. It is the direct revelation of God. To ignore Dogma in the exegesis of Holy Scripture and offer an interpretation that is contrary to Dogma is what Protestants do. To interpret Sacred Scripture contrary to Dogma is to be counted among those censored by St. Peter in his second epistle when he commented upon those corrupting the epistles of St. Paul saying, "As also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things; in which are certain things hard to be understood, which the unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, to their own destruction." The arguments of this exposition are so weak, so stupid, that they would not have merited a critical comment by a Catholic biblical scholar at the time of the Reformation.

The second problem is that the Church Fathers and Doctors have provided excellent commentary on this scriptural passage. This idiot proceeds as if they had nothing to say, at least nothing that would interest him. The law was fulfilled in Jesus, perfected, not abolished. He did not establish two different moral standards, one for those seeking perfection and another for those still suffering from "hardness of heart." The restoration of Marriage as indissoluble is possible because of its elevation as a sacrament by God which is the "fulfilling" of the law. What this man argues for, and Pope Francis has done, is a return to "hardness of heart" which cannot have a good ending for it turns aways from the grace of God. "But according to thy hardness and impenitent heart, thou treasurest up to thyself wrath, against the day of wrath, and revelation of the just judgment of God" (Romans 2:5). The comments from the Church Fathers referenced in the biblical commentaries of Cornelius a Lapide, St. Thomas' Catena Aurea, and the Fr. Haydock's commentary interpret the "least" in the kingdom of heaven to mean that they will not be in the kingdom of heaven at all. Those in the kingdom of Heaven will regard those outside the kingdom who have not kept the law as the "least" or "last."

Once Again, Pope Francis Corrupts the Literal Meaning of Holy Scripture. This time his purpose is to overthrow all Catholic Morality!

He set out from there and went into the district of Judea [and] across the Jordan. Again crowds gathered around him and, as was his custom, he again taught them. The Pharisees approached and asked, “Is it lawful for a husband to divorce his wife?” They were testing him. He said to them in reply, “What did Moses command you?” They replied, “Moses permitted him to write a bill of divorce and dismiss her.” But Jesus told them, “Because of the hardness of your hearts he wrote you this commandment. But from the beginning of creation, ‘God made them male and female. For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother [and be joined to his wife], and the two shall become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, no human being must separate.” In the house the disciples again questioned him about this. He said to them, “Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her; and if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery.”

Mark 10:1-12

Commentary of Pope Francis on Mark 10, 1-12:

Jesus does not answer whether it (divorce) is permitted or not. He does not enter into their (the Pharisees’) classic casuistry. Because they (the Pharisees) thought of faith merely in the framework of “one may not” or “one may” – up to which point one may, up to which point one may not. Thus logic of casuistry: Jesus does not enter into it. And He Himself poses a question: “Now, what did Moses command you? What is written in your law?” And they explain the permission which Moses gave to write a divorce certificate and to dismiss a woman from marriage; and it is they who went into a trap, yes. Because Jesus calls them “hard hearted”: “only because you are so hard hearted, he has given you this law,” and He spoke the truth. Without casuistry, without permissions. The truth.

This is the way of Jesus – it is quite clear – it is the path from casuistry to truth and mercy. Jesus leaves aside the logic of casuistry. To those who wanted to test him, to those who thought of this logic of ‘it is possible’, he termed them – not here, but in another passage of the Gospel – hypocrites. Even with the fourth commandment, they denied assistance to their relatives with the excuse that they had given a good offer to the Church. Hypocrites. The casuistry is hypocritical. It is a form of hypocrisy. ‘You can – you cannot’ … which then becomes more subtle, more evil: I? I can up to this point but from here to here, I cannot. This is the deception of casuistry.

Pope Francis, commentary on Mark 10:1-12

Commentary on Pope Francis’ Commentary on Mark 10, 1-12:

It is hardly possible to be this ignorant. Even a person without faith simply reading the words of this scripture passage and reporting on the literal meaning would articulate a better understand than Pope Francis. The only alternative possible is a willful corruption of the text to bring it into the service of a perverse ideology.

Firstly, Jesus does not beg the question of the Pharisees. He answers it directly and forcefully on a much higher plane. The simple answer is, “it is lawful in your law because Moses permitted it” because of the “hardness of your hearts.” But the higher answer is given by Jesus wherein He indirectly declares his divinity to the Pharisees by asserting His authority to set aside the law of Moses and reestablish the original intent of God for His creation. Only God can give this answer to the Pharisees' question. The reason Francis does not find an answer in Jesus' reply is because he does not believe that Jesus is God any more than the Pharisees did. Divorce was an indult granted by God through Moses to the Jews because of their “hardness of hearts.” His followers would by the grace of God rise above this “hardness of heart” and will be able to keep the law of God. Therefore, the indult granted by Moses is made void by the Word of God. The final answer is divorce is not permitted by the law of God and those who divorce and remarry are guilty of adultery.

Secondly, the science of moral theology concerns what one must do or not do to avoid sin. It is the science of limits which cannot be crossed without offending God either venially or mortally. The science of mystical and aesthetical theology deals with what one must do or not do to become a saint. Casuistry is a scholastic method of case study to help understand and apply the actual principles of moral theology in particular cases where conflicting obligations exist. Casuistry, like all human acts, can be perverted from its proper end which is to avoid sin. When its end become to permit sin it becomes the science of the Pharisees which can be studied today in the Jewish Talmud. Francis’ morality is Talmudic and not Catholic. The example provided by Francis of the perverse Jewish casuistry that permitted the Jews to break the 4th commandment by claiming that their personal wealth could not be used to support their needy parents because it was set aside for the temple is analogous to what Francis has done by permitting Catholics to live in unrepentant adultery and receive the sacraments of Penance and Holy Communion. In both cases, the law of God is overturned. The hypocrisy of Francis is oozing from his every pore. That is what a perverted casuistry is. Francis the Hypocrite is characterizing all good and necessary moral inquiry as a perverted casuistry which he opposes to “truth and mercy.” He is making war on all morality. There is no opposition between “truth and mercy” and the its practical application in moral norms. The very science of moral theology deals with what “one may not” or “one may” do to keep the friendship of God. It was Jesus who said, “If you love me, keep my commandments.” The sign of the love of God is the keeping of His commandments. Francis by trashing the entire field of moral theology is heaping contempt on the law of God. He embodies everything that Jesus condemned so severely in the Pharisees. The condemnations that Jesus leveled at the Pharisees can be heaped upon this most perverse man.

Lastly, this is the morality of Martin Luther and his sect. Luther taught that it was impossible to keep the law of God and no one should even try. This was specifically condemned at the Council of Trent.

Francis urges priests to ‘welcome’ cohabitating couples in the ‘style of the Gospel’

LifeSiteNews | ROME | February 27, 2017 Pope Francis urged parish priests participating in a Vatican-run course titled the “New Marriage Procedure” to “welcome” cohabitating couples living in fornication who “prefer to live together without getting married.” The pope did not ask priests to admonish such couples for living in grave sin nor did he ask them to work for their conversion and repentance.

“At the same time, make yourselves close with the style of the Gospel itself, in the encounter and welcome of those young people that prefer living together without getting married,” he told priests at the Saturday, February 25 event organized by the Roma Rota, the Vatican’s highest ecclesiastical court.

“On the spiritual and moral plane, they are among the poor and the little ones, toward whom the Church, following in the footsteps of her Teacher and Lord, wants to be a Mother that does not abandon but comes close and takes care. These persons are also loved by Christ’s heart. This care of the last, precisely because it emanates from the Gospel, is an essential part of your work of promotion and defense of the Sacrament of Marriage,” he added.

Last year Francis said that cohabitating couples are in a “real marriage” and receive the grace of the Sacrament. “I’ve seen a lot of fidelity in these cohabitations, and I am sure that this is a real marriage, they have the grace of a real marriage because of their fidelity,” he said at that time.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church calls fornication “gravely contrary to the dignity of persons and of human sexuality which is naturally ordered to the good of spouses and the generation and education of children.”

It further states that situations such as cohabitation “offend against the dignity of marriage; they destroy the very idea of the family; they weaken the sense of fidelity. They are contrary to the moral law. The sexual act must take place exclusively within marriage. Outside of marriage it always constitutes a grave sin and excludes one from sacramental communion.” [......]

Effigy of Pope Francis the Communist being mocked in a Shrove Monday Celebration along with cherub images of Mao, Lenin and Castro. The measure of the man by faithful Catholics is being taken more accurately every day but unfortunately, the measure of the man is doing incalculable damage to the dignity of the office with the loss of many souls.

Catholic saints and the religious that have followed their examples have done more for the poor, for children, for exploited women than all the others throughout all of history. We own no apology to anyone for Catholic charity! Is Francis, the class warior, begging for an apology because he was mistreated?

“I believe that the church not only should apologize to the person who is gay whom it has offended, but has to apologize to the poor, to exploited women, to children exploited for labor; it has to ask forgiveness for having blessed many weapons.”

Pope Francis

Working on the theory that pigs get fed and hogs get slaughtered?

Pro-Pope Francis Cardinals Seek His Resignation to Avoid Schism, Reports Times of London

OnePeterFive | Deacon Nick Donnelly | March 2, 2017

The London Times newspaper is reporting that a group of cardinals who supported Pope Francis now want him to resign and be replaced by Cardinal Pietro Parolin because they fear his reforms will cause a schism “more disastrous” than the Reformation. The Times article draws on a report by the Vatican expert Antonio Socci, a prominent Italian Catholic journalist.

Antonio Socci reports that it is the curial faction of the Holy See that backed the election of Jorge Mario Bergoglio out of “impatience with the rule of his predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI” that now wants Pope Francis to resign out of fear of an impending schism. The Times reports:

A large part of the cardinals who voted for him is very worried and the curia . . . that organised his election and has accompanied him thus far, without ever disassociating itself from him, is cultivating the idea of a moral suasion to convince him to retire.

It was the latter faction who now believed that the Pope should resign and who would like to replace him with Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Vatican secretary of state, Mr. Socci said. He believed that the group numbered around a dozen, but the importance of the members counts more than their number. Four years after Benedict XVI’s renunciation and Bergoglio’s arrival on the scene, the situation of the Catholic church has become explosive, perhaps really on the edge of a schism, which could be even more disastrous than Luther’s [who is today being rehabilitated by the Bergoglio church].

The cardinals are worried that the church could be shattered as an institution. There are many indirect ways in which the pressure might be exerted.

An expert on the Vatican gave this assessment of the latest development:

A good number of the majority that voted for Bergoglio in 2013 have come to regret their decision, but I don’t think it’s plausible that members of the hierarchy will pressure the Pope to resign. Those who know him know it would be useless. [He] has a very authoritarian streak. He won’t resign until he has completed his revolutionary reforms, which are causing enormous harm.

Antonio Socci reports that the significance of this development is that the group who want Pope Francis to resign are not the “conservative” cardinals who have opposed the Holy Father’s innovations, “What was significant, he said, was that the doubters were not the conservative cardinals who had been in open opposition to the Pope since early in his reign.”

Editor’s note from OnePeterFive: this post originally appeared at EWTN Great Britain, but an editorial decision was made to remove it from the website. It is now a 1P5 exclusive. Our thanks to Deacon Nick Donnelly for allowing us to publish it here.

Homosexuals are not “gay”

Depression and Sexual Orientation

Written by Michael Kerr | Medically Reviewed by George Kruick, M.D.

LGBT students are more likely than heterosexual students to report high levels of drug use, feelings of depression, and suicide attempts. [.....]Depression is the leading cause of disability and the second leading cause of years of life lost due to premature death in the world. Major depressive disorders are the number one predictor of suicide and account for between 20 and 35 percent of all suicide deaths each year. Five-hundred thousand Americans attempt suicide each year and the number of those who succeed—30,000—is more than the number that die in motor vehicle accidents annually.

As glum as those numbers are, research shows that things are even worse for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people. Depression affects LGBT people at much higher rates than the general population [......] three times as likely to use illegal drugs as their heterosexual peers, three times as likely to engage in unprotected and “risky” sex, six times as likely to experience high levels of depression, and eight times as likely to attempt suicide.

[.....] A 2001 study published in the American Journal of Epidemiology found 12-month prevalence rates for major depressive disorder (MDD) were 10.3 percent for gay men, compared to 7.2 percent for heterosexual men. Another 21-year study published in the Archives of General Psychiatry in 1999 found lifetime prevalence rates of MDD among gay, lesbian and bisexual people were 71.4 percent, compared to 38.2 percent among heterosexuals.[....]

“But it did not last long.”

I saw many pastors cherishing dangerous ideas against the Church. . . . They built a large, singular, extravagant church which was to embrace all creeds with equal rights: Evangelicals, Catholics, and all denominations, a true communion of the unholy with one shepherd and one flock. There was to be a Pope, a salaried Pope, without possessions. All was made ready, many things finished; but, in place of an altar, were only abomination and desolation. Such was the new church to be, and it was for it that he had set fire to the old one; but God designed otherwise.
Blessed Anna Katherine Emmerich

I saw also the relationship between the two popes.... I saw how baleful would be the consequences of this false church. I saw it increase in size; heretics of every kind came into the city of Rome. The local clergy grew lukewarm, and I saw a great darkness... Then, the vision seemed to extend on every side. Whole Catholic communities were being oppressed, harassed, confined, and deprived of their freedom. I saw many churches close down, great miseries everywhere, wars and bloodshed. A wild and ignorant mob took to violent action. But it did not last long.
Blessed Anna Katherine Emmerich, May 13, 1820

The 14 promises revealed to Brother Estanislao by Our Lord for those who pray the Way of the Cross

· I promise Eternal Life to those who pray from time to time, The Way of the Cross.

· I will grant everything that is asked of Me with faith, when making The Way of the Cross.

· I will follow them everywhere in life and help them, especially at the hour of death.

· Even if they have more sins than blades of grass in the fields, and grains of sand in the sea, all of them will be erased by praying The Way of the Cross.

· Those who pray The Way of The Cross often, will have a special glory in Heaven.

· I will deliver them from Purgatory, indeed if they go there at all, the first Tuesday or Friday after their death.

· At the hour of death I will not permit the devil to tempt them; I will lift all power from him in order that they shall repose tranquilly in My Arms.

· If they pray it with true love, I will make of each one of them a living Ciborium in which it will please Me to pour My grace.

· I will fix My Eyes on those who pray The Way of The Cross often; My hands will always be open to protect them.

· I will bless them at each Way of The Cross, and My blessing will follow them everywhere on earth and after their death, in Heaven for all Eternity.

· As I am nailed to the Cross, so also will I always be with those who honor Me in making The Way of The Cross frequently.

· They will never be able to separate themselves from Me, for I will give them the grace never again to commit a Mortal sin.

· At the hour of death I will console them with My Presence and we will go together to Heaven. Death will be sweet to all those who have honored Me during their lives by praying The Way of the Cross.

· My Soul will be a protective shield for them, and will always help them, whenever they have recourse.

“We have to admit . . . that the testimony of the Fathers, with regard to the possibility of salvation for someone outside the Church, is very weak. Certainly even the ancient Church knew that the grace of God can be found also outside the Church and even before Faith. But the view that such divine grace can lead man to his final salvation without leading him first into the visible Church, is something, at any rate, which met with very little approval in the ancient Church. For, with reference to the optimistic views on the salvation of catechumens as found in many of the Fathers, it must be noted that such a candidate for baptism was regarded in some sense or other as already ‘Christianus,’ and also that certain Fathers, such as Gregory Nazianzen and Gregory of Nyssa deny altogether the justifying power of love or of the desire for baptism. Hence it will be impossible to speak of a consensus dogmaticus in the early Church regarding the possibility of salvation for the non-baptized, and especially for someone who is not even a catechumen. In fact, even St. Augustine, in his last (anti-pelagian) period, no longer maintained the possibility of a baptism by desire.”

Rev. Rahner, Karl, Theological Investigations, Volume II, Man in the Church

The ‘Bergoglio Business Plan’! Now that “apologetics” is nothing more than “subtle theoretical discussions” over “opinions” and “proselytism is solemn nonsense,” how do they measure “strong Christian witness,” “effective evangelization,” “fruitful ecumenical spirit,” and “constructive dialogue”? If the “Mission of the Church in the World” is the supreme law… the salus animarum, how does any of this contribute towards fulfilling this “Mission”? It is never “easy to achieve such a goal” under the best of conditions because to obtain salvation is to enter by the “narrow gate.” Now that every material sign to measure success toward this goal has been destroyed or set aside by the modern Church how can they possibly have any idea what they are doing, unless, of course, the idea is to not have any ides what they are doing?

Today we will present a summary of the work done in recent months to develop the new Apostolic Constitution for the reform of the Curia. The goal to be reached is always that of promoting greater harmony in the work of the various Dicasteries and Offices, in order to achieve a more effective collaboration in that absolute transparency which builds authentic synodality and collegiality.

The reform is not an end in itself, but a means to give a strong Christian witness; to promote a more effective evangelization; to promote a more fruitful ecumenical spirit; to encourage a more constructive dialogue with all.

The reform, strongly advocated by the majority of the Cardinals in the context of the general congregations before the conclave, will further perfect the identity of the same Roman Curia, which is to assist the Successor of Peter in the exercise of his supreme pastoral office for the good of and in the service of the universal Church and the particular Churches. This exercise serves to strengthen the unity of faith and communion of the people of God and promote the mission of the Church in the world.

Certainly, it is not easy to achieve such a goal. It requires time, determination and above all everyone’s cooperation. But to achieve this we must first entrust ourselves to the Holy Spirit, the true guide of the Church, imploring the gift of authentic discernment in prayer.

It is in this spirit of collaboration that our meeting begins, which will be fruitful thanks to the contribution which each of us can express with parrhesía, fidelity to the Magisterium and the knowledge that all of this contributes to the supreme law, that being the salus animarum. Thank You.

Pope Francis, on the agenda of the Consistory for the Reform of the Roman Curia

“If there be no enemy, no fight; if no fight, no victory; if no victory, no crown.”

“Whoever excommunicates me, excommunicates God.”

Fra Girolamo Savonarola, excommunicated by Pope Alexander VI and burned to death as a heretic, was regarded as a saint by many including St. Philip Neri and St. Catherine de Ricci.

Ecumenism, Love, Hatred, and St. John the Evangelist

In his encyclical Mortalium Animos, Pope Pius XI makes notable appeal to the teaching of the Apostle and Evangelist John to distinguish between true and false charity toward non-Catholic Christians:

“These pan-Christians who turn their minds to uniting the churches seem, indeed, to pursue the noblest of ideas in promoting charity among all Christians: nevertheless how does it happen that this charity tends to injure faith? Everyone knows that John himself, the Apostle of love, who seems to reveal in his Gospel the secrets of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and who never ceased to impress on the memories of his followers the new commandment “Love one another,” altogether forbade any intercourse with those who professed a mutilated and corrupt version of Christ’s teaching: “If any man come to you and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into the house nor say to him: God speed you.” For which reason, since charity is based on a complete and sincere faith, the disciples of Christ must be united principally by the bond of one faith. Who then can conceive a Christian Federation, the members of which retain each his own opinions and private judgment, even in matters which concern the object of faith, even though they be repugnant to the opinions of the rest? And in what manner, We ask, can men who follow contrary opinions, belong to one and the same Federation of the faithful? For example, those who affirm, and those who deny that sacred Tradition is a true fount of divine Revelation; those who hold that an ecclesiastical hierarchy, made up of bishops, priests and ministers, has been divinely constituted, and those who assert that it has been brought in little by little in accordance with the conditions of the time; those who adore Christ really present in the Most Holy Eucharist through that marvelous conversion of the bread and wine, which is called transubstantiation, and those who affirm that Christ is present only by faith or by the signification and virtue of the Sacrament; those who in the Eucharist recognize the nature both of a sacrament and of a sacrifice, and those who say that it is nothing more than the memorial or commemoration of the Lord’s Supper; those who believe it to be good and useful to invoke by prayer the Saints reigning with Christ, especially Mary the Mother of God, and to venerate their images, and those who urge that such a veneration is not to be made use of, for it is contrary to the honor due to Jesus Christ, “the one mediator of God and men.” How so great a variety of opinions can make the way clear to effect the unity of the Church We know not; that unity can only arise from one teaching authority, one law of belief and one faith of Christians. But We do know that from this it is an easy step to the neglect of religion or indifferentism and to modernism, as they call it.”

No one understands charity better than St. John, but he understood that the theological virtue of charity must be founded on the theological virtue of faith, and therefore anything that undermines the faith of necessity undermines charity. And therefore he commands us to avoid contact with those who would undermine the faith.

In general one can see that love necessarily cause the one loving to hate anything which threatens to destroy what is loved. Thus, since we naturally love health, therefore we naturally hate disease; since we naturally love life, we naturally hate anything that destroys our lives, and so on. And charity is no exception the supernatural love of God above all things necessarily implies hatred of sin, which is directly opposed to that charity, and error which is opposed to the faith on which it is founded.

But ecumenists have difficulty seeing this. Even if they would perhaps hesitate to use such strong words, they would probably agree with the non-Catholic New Testament scholar Gerd Lüdemann’s judgement on St. John, in his critique of Benedict’s Deus Caritas Est:

“[The] Johannine communities fell far short of exhibiting the love that [Pope Benedict XVI] recommends to the contemporary church. For not only does the First Letter of John—from which the encyclical takes its theme and exhortation—restrict brotherhood to those of orthodox belief, but the Second Letter of John, which quite predictably is not mentioned in the encyclical, takes the same approach and pushes it even further. In verses 9 through 11 of this very brief letter, its author, who identifies himself only as ‘the Elder,’ commands the community to receive into their homes only those brothers who confess Christ’s coming in the flesh. Any present or former brothers who have a different opinion concerning Christ’s incarnation should be spurned. Indeed, “John” forbids the members of his communities even to greet them. He deems this precautionary measure necessary, lest the community of right belief become infected by the evil doctrines and consequent guilt of its dissident brothers. How strange it is to encounter such harsh and hate-filled expostulations in a letter overflowing with assurances of mutual love and attesting to a community’s unanimous recognition of sacred truth!”

Lüdemann’s reasoning is precisely the sort of thing that one is likely to hear from contemporary ecumenists. And the reason is clear: they are not motivated by the supernatural virtue of charity, founded on the one true faith, but rather by a vague benevolence, founded on modernism and indifferentism. And like every kind of love, this vague benevolence causes a hatred of everything that threatens the object of love; they do not (like St. John) hate heresy, rather they hate “fanaticism” and “fundamentalism.” In other words they hate the perennial claim of the Catholic Church to teach the truth.

COMMENT: This was copied from the conservative Catholic blog, Rorate Caeli. It is interesting for two reasons. Firstly, because what it says concerning the virtues of Faith and Charity is what every traditional Catholic already knows and has defended over the last fifty years but, nevertheless we do not tire of hearing it repeated from time to time. It is also interesting because it politely affirms that Pope Benedict, and a fortiori, Pope Francis and Pope John Paul II, by professing the heresy of ecumenism, “are not motivated by the supernatural virtue of charity, founded on the one true faith” and therefore “hate the perennial claim of the Catholic Church to teach the truth.” It is a hopeful sign that younger conservative Catholics recognize that it is first and foremost the Faith, with Dogma as the Rule of Faith, that must be defended by keeping the immemorial ecclesiastical traditions of our Church that make that Faith known and communicable to others. At this time, established publications who claim to be traditional are content with the crumbs offered by Benedict XVI and continually heap praise upon him and his Motu Proprio, Summormum Pontificum, they fail to recognize that the battle has always been and will continue to be the Faith itself that Modernists and Neo-modernists aim to destroy. These younger conservative Catholics will hopefully become the radical traditionalists that are so desperately needed at this time for the Church militant. The Novus Ordo Church keeps two fast days during Lent and abstains on Fridays. Let us keep faithfully the traditional penances during Lent as an act of reparation for our own sins and the welfare of the Church. If traditional Catholics do not do it, it will not be done.

Pope Francis: “Muslim Terrorism Does Not Exist” but “Ecological Crisis is Real”!

Breitbart | Thomas D. Williams, Ph.D. | 17 Feb 2017

In an impassioned address Friday, Pope Francis denied the existence of Islamic terrorism, while simultaneously asserting that “the ecological crisis is real.”

“Christian terrorism does not exist, Jewish terrorism does not exist, and Muslim terrorism does not exist. They do not exist,” Francis said in his speech to a world meeting of populist movements.

What he apparently meant is that not all Christians are terrorists and not all Muslims are terrorists—a fact evident to all—yet his words also seemed to suggest that no specifically Islamic form of terrorism exists in the world, an assertion that stands in stark contradiction to established fact.

“No people is criminal or drug-trafficking or violent,” Francis said, while also suggesting—as he has on other occasions—that terrorism is primarily a result of economic inequalities rather than religious beliefs. “The poor and the poorer peoples are accused of violence yet, without equal opportunities, the different forms of aggression and conflict will find a fertile terrain for growth and will eventually explode.”

The Pope also reiterated his conviction that all religions promote peace and that the danger of violent radicalization exists equally in all religions.

“There are fundamentalist and violent individuals in all peoples and religions—and with intolerant generalizations they become stronger because they feed on hate and xenophobia,” he said.

While denying the existence of Islamic terrorism, Francis also seemed to condemn the denial of global warming, asserting that “the ecological crisis is real.”

“A very solid scientific consensus indicates that we are presently witnessing a disturbing warming of the climatic system,” he said.

We know “what happens when we deny science and disregard the voice of Nature,” the Pope said. “Let us not fall into denial. Time is running out. Let us act. I ask you again—all of you, people of all backgrounds including native people, pastors, political leaders—to defend Creation.”

While acknowledging that science is not “the only form of knowledge,” and that “science is not necessarily ‘neutral’” and often “conceals ideological views or economic interests,” he still insisted that people of good will should not oppose “scientific consensus” regarding global warming.

Leftist media like the liberal Guardian in the U.K. immediately politicized the speech, predictably claiming that the Pope was backing “anti-Trump protests,” despite the fact that the Pope himself denied such a claim, explicitly declaring that “I am not speaking of anyone in particular.”

“I am not speaking of anyone in particular, I am speaking of a social and political process that flourishes in many parts of the world and poses a grave danger for humanity,” he said.

Moreover, although the Guardian claimed that the Pope was “condemning populism,” in point of fact, he was speaking to populist movements and praised their commitment to democracy.

“The direction taken beyond this historic turning-point,” Francis said, “will depend on people’s involvement and participation and, largely, on yourselves, the popular movements.”

Nevertheless, the Vatican’s Secretary of State, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, said Monday that the Holy See is concerned over growing populist and nationalist movements, both in Europe and in the United States.

In an interview for the Italian evening news on the state-owned RAI network, the Cardinal was asked whether the Vatican is worried about what the interviewer called “the spread of nationalism and populism not only in Europe but also in the United States with Donald Trump.”

“I think so, I think so,” Parolin said. “Certainly these closings are not a good sign,” since many of them “are born of fear, which is not a good counselor.”

In his address Friday, the Pope denounced “the guise of what is politically correct or ideologically fashionable,” which he described as a “hypocritical attitude,” while urging real solutions to unemployment, corruption, the identity crisis, and “the gutting of democracies.”

“The system’s gangrene cannot be whitewashed forever because sooner or later the stench becomes too strong,” he said.

Pope Francis Praises Soros-Funded Organization; Encourages “Resistance”

OnePeterFive | Maike Hickson | Feb 20, 2017

On 17 February, Pope Francis released a letter written for those gathered for the World Meeting of Popular Movements held in California from 16-19 February — a meeting organized by the Vatican. Such meetings regularly take place in the Vatican and are initiated by Pope Francis himself in his attempt to work together with a variety of grassroots movements world-wide.

In the letter, which is dated 10 February, Pope Francis publicly praises the organization PICO — People Improving Communities through Organizing — which was one of the promoters of this Vatican event. Francis writes:

I would also like to highlight the work done by the PICO National Network and the organizations promoting this meeting. I learned that PICO stands for “People Improving Communities through Organizing”. What a great synthesis of the mission of popular movements: to work locally, side by side with your neighbors, organizing among yourselves, to make your communities thrive.

What Pope Francis does not mention here is that PICO is heavily funded by George Soros. Leftist watchdog website Discover the Political Networks describes PICO as a group that “uses Alinsky-style organizing tactics to advance the doctrines of the religious left.” As John-Henry Westen, editor-in-chief of LifeSiteNews reported in August of 2016, leaks from the Soros Foundation have shown how Soros funded PICO and other organizations in order to influence the Vatican in favor of certain policies and agendas. Westen reports:

Leaked email through WikiLeaks reveal that billionaire globalist George Soros — one of Hilary Clinton’s top donors— paid $650,000 to influence Pope Francis’ September 2015 visit to the USA with a view to “shift[ing] national paradigms and priorities in the run-up to the 2016 presidential campaign.” The funds were allocated in April 2015 and the report on their effectiveness suggests that successful achievements included, “Buy-in of individual bishops to more publicly voice support of economic and racial justice messages in order to begin to create a critical mass of bishops who are aligned with the Pope.” […] Grantees were PICO, a faith-based community organizing group, and Faith in Public Life (FPL), a progressive group working in media to promote left-leaning ‘social justice’ causes. Soros has funded left-wing causes the world over and was just found to have been funding an effort to eliminate pro-life laws around the globe.

That there are already well-established ties between the Vatican and this progressive, often subversive, Soros-funded organization PICO can also be seen in this part of Westen’s report:

In order to seize on the opportunity provided by the Pope’s visit to the US, says the report, “we will support PICO’s organizing activities to engage the Pope on economic and racial justice issues, including using the influence of Cardinal Rodriguez, the Pope’s senior advisor, and sending a delegation to visit the Vatican in the spring or summer to allow him to hear directly from low-income Catholics in America.”

In 2013 Cardinal Rodriguez endorsed PICO’s work in a video during a visit from PICO representatives to the cardinal’s diocese. “I want to endorse all the efforts they are doing to promote communities of faith,” he said, “… Please, keep helping PICO.”

This same network is right now raking steps to oppose President Donald Trump’s policies with regard to immigration questions, specifically the so-called Immigration Ban. It is organizing protests an different locations in the U.S. As one statement on PICO’s website regarding “Organizing for the Resistance” says:

This morning, PICO National Network, United We Dream, and Church World Service declared together on a media conference call that faith communities in America are taking a prophetic stance against President-elect Trump’s promised persecution of immigrants, Muslims and people of color by providing Sanctuary in more than 800 congregations. And this is just the beginning. […] Now is the time for us to create empathetic space for uncommon encounters across difference, building bridges and disrupting patterns of isolation and fear in our communities. This is a moment for multi-racial, multi-faith communities to reimagine the Beloved Community, taking bold and prophetic action to realize it.

This is part of the managed chaos we have been witnessing in the U.S. for some weeks now. And it seems that Pope Francis, in his own 10 February letter, encourages such crises:

As Christians and all people of good will, it is for us to live and act at this moment. […] The direction taken beyond this historic turning-point—the ways in which this worsening crisis gets resolved—will depend on people’s involvement and participation and, largely, on yourselves, the popular movements. We should be neither paralyzed by fear nor shackled within the conflict. We have to acknowledge the danger but also the opportunity that every crisis brings in order to advance to a successful synthesis. [sic. The dialectical method.] In the Chinese language, which expresses the ancestral wisdom of that great people, the word “crisis” is comprised of two ideograms: Wēi, which represents “danger”, and Jī, which represents “opportunity”. The grave danger is to disown our neighbors.

Pope Francis himself calls for resistance, and implicitly seems to encourage the self-proclaimed “chaos managers”:

But here we also find an opportunity: that the light of the love of neighbor may illuminate the Earth with its stunning brightness like a lightning bolt in the dark; that it may wake us up and let true humanity burst through with authentic resistance, resilience and persistence.

In reiterating some themes discussed before, Pope Francis adds:

Here are the roots of the authentic humanity that resists the dehumanization that wears the livery of indifference, hypocrisy, or intolerance. I know that you have committed yourselves to fight for social justice, to defend our Sister Mother Earth [sic] and to stand alongside migrants. I want to reaffirm your choice and share two reflections in this regard.

The pope adds the importance of protecting nature and his plea for religious tolerance, namely that “no people is criminal and no religion is terrorist. Christian terrorism does not exist, Jewish terrorism does not exist, and Muslim terrorism does not exist. They do not exist.”

Does it surprise us that this Vatican meeting in California “criticizes Trump orders”? As the Miami Herald reports:

Speakers at a Vatican-sponsored conference in Northern California — including an archbishop — denounced President Donald Trump’s orders on immigration and travel and vowed to fight them at a meeting Friday. Los Angeles Archbishop José Gomez said President Barack Obama deported a high number of people, but the harsh tone and cruelty coming out of the new administration was prompting mass fear and panic.

In this context, this conference now called the Catholic Church to investigate its own “racism”:

The gathering of more than 600 clergy and social justice activists also included a session on racism Friday, where speakers encouraged religious people and institutions, including the Roman Catholic Church, to confront their own racism.

In November of 2016, the Italian historian Professor Roberto de Mattei had informed us that, after Hillary Clinton’s loss of the election, Pope Francis might very well now become the world leader of the Left. De Mattei then wrote:

On his return flight from Mexico on February 18th of this year [2016], in commenting Trump’s plan to build a wall between the United States and Mexico in order to slow down the migratory surge the Pope had said that “a person who thinks only of building walls and not bridges, is not a Christian.” […] Yet, no matter how strong the reservations towards Trump can be, for a Catholic it would be difficult to imagine a position of equidistance between him and Hillary Clinton, who had officially inserted a massive implementation of abortion and the LGBT agenda into her programme. [That is,] Unless self-defence against the migratory invasion is considered a graver sin than the legalization of abortion and so-called homosexual marriage.

De Mattei is to be commended for his far-sightedness. He not only predicted Pope Francis’ role as the leader of the Left world-wide, he also pointed to the increasing danger of incited and practiced violence in this regard:

For his part, after Clinton’s defeat, Francesco now remains the only point of reference for the international left, [now] lacking a leader. On November 5th at the conclusion of the Third World Meeting of the so-called “Popular Movements” in the Vatican, in the presence of revolutionary agitators from the five continents, Pope Francis turned to them saying: “I make your cry mine”. But the cry of protest, that is raised by the movements gathered in Paul VI’s audience hall, is, unfortunately, characterized by ideological fanaticism and incitement to violence.

Not two weeks ago, major newspapers in this country came out with stories as to how Donald Trump’s closest advisor, Steve Bannon, now tries to influence the Vatican, with the help of Cardinal Raymond Burke. OnePeterFive’s author Christian Browne responded some of these attacks on Cardinal Burke with charitable indignation. However, if we are concerned about Trump’s advisor trying to influence Vatican policies, we might be just as concerned about Pope Francis trying directly to influence U.S. politics and supporting groups that are funded by George Soros, supporter of Hillary Clinton and Planned Parenthood. Worth noting in this context is the request made by The Remnant, on 20 January 2017, that the Trump administration should investigate “what appears to be a collusion between a hostile [Obama] United States government and a pope who seems to hold as much ill will towards followers of perennial Catholic teachings as he seems to hold toward” Trump himself.

As to the strategic and tactical networks of “revolutionary agitators,” we might recall the gifted Louis Auguste Blanqui (1805-1881) in nineteenth century revolutionary France, and why Vladimir Lenin himself so greatly admired him and learned from him. Pope Francis himself would probably agree that Louis Blanqui was a greater revolutionary agitator and organizer than Saul Alinsky.

COMMENT: “Without Faith, it is impossible to please God.” The “hypocritical Catholic” still possesses the Faith while the “atheist” does not. It is better to have the Faith because it is possible to repent and thus, “please God”. The atheist does not have the Faith therefore he cannot repent. He cannot “please God”. The “hypocritical Catholic” has the possibility of salvation. The atheist does not. So Francis the Hypocrite is better off than Francis the Atheist. But who can tell the difference? And what could be more hypocritical than a pope pretending to have the Faith?

Pope suggests ‘better to be atheist than hypocritical Catholic’

Reuters | VATICAN CITY | February 23, 2017- Pope Francis delivered another criticism of some members of his own Church on Thursday, suggesting it is better to be an atheist than one of “many” Catholics who he said lead a hypocritical double life.

In improvised comments in the sermon of his private morning Mass in his residence, he said: “It is a scandal to say one thing and do another. That is a double life.”

“There are those who say ‘I am very Catholic, I always go to Mass, I belong to this and that association’,” the head of the 1.2 billion-member Roman Catholic Church said, according to a Vatican Radio transcript.

He said that some of these people should also say “‘my life is not Christian, I don’t pay my employees proper salaries, I exploit people, I do dirty business, I launder money, (I lead) a double life’.”

“There are many Catholics who are like this and they cause scandal,” he said. “How many times have we all heard people say, ‘if that person is a Catholic, it is better to be an atheist’.” [….]

Feast of the Holy Face of Jesus

Jesus covered with blood and with much sadness said to Mother Pierina: “See how much I suffer. I am understood by so few: what ingratitude on the part of those who say they love Me! I have given My Heart as a sensible object of My great love for man and I have given My Face as a sensible object of My sorrow for the sins of man. I desire that It be honored by a special feast on Shrove Tuesday. The feast will be preceded by a novena during which the faithful will make reparation to Me, uniting themselves with My sorrow.”

[This year, the feast occurs on February 28 (Shrove Tuesday). The Alpha-Omega novena beings today, Sexagesima Sunday]

"I firmly wish that My face reflecting the intimate pains of my soul, the suffering and love of My heart, be more honored! Whoever gazes upon Me already consoles Me."

Our Lord to Sister Pierina

"All those who, attracted by My love, and venerating My countenance, shall receive, by virtue of My humanity, a brilliant and vivid impression of My divinity. This splendor shall enlighten the depths of their souls, so that in eternal glory the celestial court shall marvel at the marked likeness of their features with My Divine countenance."

Our Lord to St. Gertrude

OFFERING OF THE HOLY FACE TO APPEASE GOD'S JUSTICE AND DRAW DOWN MERCY UPON US

ETERNAL Father, turn away Thine angry gaze from all guilty people whose faces have become unsightly in Thine eyes. Look instead upon the face of Thy Beloved Son, for this is the Face of Him in Whom Thou art well pleased. We now offer Thee this Holy face of Jesus Christ, covered with shame and disfigured by bloody bruises, in reparation for the crimes of our age, in order to appease Thine anger, justly provoked against us. Because Thy Divine Son, our Redeemer, has taken upon His head all the sins of His people that they might be spared, we now beg of Thee, Eternal Father, to grant us mercy. Amen.

O Jesus, who in Thy bitter Passion didst become "the most abject of men, a man of sorrows", I venerate Thy Sacred Face whereon there once did shine the beauty and sweetness of the Godhead; but now it has become for me as if it were the face of a leper! Nevertheless, under those disfigured features, I recognize Thy infinite Love and I am consumed with the desire to love Thee and make Thee loved by all men. The tears which well up abundantly in Thy sacred eyes appear to me as so many precious pearls that I love to gather up, in order to purchase the souls of poor sinners by means of their infinite value. O Jesus, whose adorable face ravishes my heart, I implore Thee to fix deep within me Thy divine image and to set me on fire with Thy Love, that I may be found worthy to come to the contemplation of Thy glorious Face in Heaven. Amen

Promises of Our Lord Jesus Christ to Those Devoted to His Holy Face

1. I will give them contrition so perfect, that their very sins shall be changed in My sight into jewels of precious gold .

2. None of these persons shall ever be separated from Me.

3. In offering My Face to My Father, they will appease His anger, and they will purchase as with celestial coin, pardon for poor sinners.

4. I will open My Mouth to plead with My Father to grant all the petitions that they will present to Me.

5. I will illuminate them with My light. I will consume them with My love. I will render them fruitful of good works.

6. They will, as the pious Veronica, wipe My adorable Face outraged by sin, and I will imprint My divine Features in their souls.

7. At their death, I will renew in them the image of God effaced by sin.

8. By resemblance to My Face, they will shine more than many others in eternal life, and the brilliancy of My Face will fill them with joy.

These inestimable promises are drawn from the works of St. Gertrude, St. Mechtilde and from the writings of Sister Marie de Saint Pierre, a Carmelite who died at Tours, in the odor of sanctity.

Cardinal Henry Edward Manning –

The true Revelation of God is both a Definite and Certain participation in God’s own knowledge. IT is this fundamental truth of revelation that our Neo-Modernist hierarchy reject!

What, then, is the knowledge which God has restored to man through revelation but a definite knowledge, a participation of His own? The truth which has been revealed, what is it in the mind of God who reveals it, but one, harmonious and distinct? What was that know ledge as revealed by the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost, but one, harmonious and distinct? What was the conception of that knowledge in inspired men, but one, harmonious and distinct also? And what was that knowledge when communicated by those who were inspired to those who believed, but one, harmonious and distinct as before? And what is this unity and harmony and distinctness of knowledge, which God revealed of Himself through Jesus Christ, but the faith we confess in our creed? Our baptismal faith, its substance and its letter, the explicit and the implicit meaning, article by article, is as definite, severe, and precise, as any problem in science. It is of the nature of truth to be so; and where definiteness ends, knowledge ceases. Observe, then, the distinction between finite knowledge and definite knowledge. Is not science definite? And yet it is also finite. The theory of gravitation, definite as it is, it is finite too. [……] Go through the whole range of physical sciences, what is it but an example of the same condition of knowledge, definiteness in conception with finiteness of reach? [….] If we have not a definite knowledge of what we believe, we may be sure we have no true knowledge of it.

But, further, it is evident that knowledge must also be certain. When we speak of certainty, we mean one of two things. Sometimes we say, that a thing is certain; at other times, that we are certain. When we say a truth is certain, we mean, that the proofs of that truth are either self-evident, or so clear as to exclude all doubt. This is certainty on the part of the object proposed to our intelligence. But when we say we are certain, we mean that we are inwardly convinced, by the application of our reason to the matter before us, of the sufficiency of the evidence to prove the truth of it. In us, certainty is rather a moral feeling, a complex state of mind. As light manifests itself by its own nature, but sight is the illumination of the eye; so certainty means truth with its evidences illuminating the intelligence, or, in other words, the intelligence possessed by truth with its evidences.

This we call certainty. I ask, then, is there not this twofold certainty in the revelation which God has given? Was not the revelation which God gave of Himself through Jesus Christ made certain on His part by direct evidence of the divine act which revealed it? Is it not also certain on our part by the apprehension and faith of the Church? Was not God manifest in the flesh that He might reveal Himself? Did not God dwell on earth that He might teach His truth? Has not God spoken to man that man might know Him? Did not God work miracles that man might believe that He was present? What evidence on the part of God was wanting that men might know that Jesus Christ was indeed the Son of God? And if there was certainty on the part of God who revealed, was there not certainty also on the part of those that heard? Look back into the sacred history. Had not Prophets and Seers certainty of that which they beheld and heard? […..] What, then, is the first condition of faith but certainty? He that has not certain faith has no faith. We are told that to crave for certainty implies a morbid disposition. Did not Abraham, and Moses, and Daniel, the Apostles and Evangelists desire certainty in faith, and crave to know beyond doubt that God spake to them, and know with definite clearness what God said? Was this a morbid craving? Surely this is not to reproved. But rather the contrary disposition worthy of rebuke. How can we venture to content ourselves with uncertainty in matters where the truth and honour of God and the salvation of our own souls are at stake? This truly is not without sin. […..] And yet, what is the very idea of Revelation but a Divine assurance of Truth? Where faith begins uncertainty ends. Because faith terminates upon the veracity of God; and what God has spoken and authenticated to us by Divine authority cannot be uncertain.

Cardinal Henry Edward Manning, Grounds of Faith

Those men (the Church Fathers) are to be believed, moreover, in accordance with the following rule: Only that is to be held as certain, valid and beyond doubt, which either all or most of them have confirmed in one and the same sense – manifestly, frequently, and persistently, as though a council of masters stood in agreement – and which they have accepted, kept, and handed on. On the other hand, what some saint, learned man, bishop, confessor, or martyr has individually thought outside of, or even contrary to, the general opinion must be considered his personal, particular, and quite private opinion, entirely removed from the common, public and general opinion.

St. Vincent of Lerins

"Chance presupposes teleology and cannot replace it."

Ralph McInerny, Catholic Thomastic philospher

When to set aside the sword, and when to pick it up! Pope Francis has no clue!

It was from this advent of Charity, then, that all these essentially Christian virtues of generosity and meekness and self-sacrifice sprang which Nietsche condemned as hostile to material progress.

For, from henceforth, if a man take thy coat, let him take thy cloak also; if he will compel thee to go with him one mile, go two; if he strike thee on one cheek, turn to him the other also. The Law of Natural Justice is transcended and the Law of Charity and Sacrifice reigns instead. Resist not evil; do not insist always, that is to say, on your natural rights; give men more than their due, and be yourself content with less. Learn of Me, for I am meek and lowly of heart, and find rest to your souls. Forgive one another your trespasses with the same generous charity with which God has forgiven and will forgive you yours. Judge not and you shall not be judged. Do not, in personal matters, insist upon bare justice for yourself, but act on that scale and by those principles by which God Himself has dealt with you.

Meekness, then, is undoubtedly a Christian virtue. Sometimes it is obligatory, sometimes it is but a Counsel of Perfection; it stands, in any case, high among those ideals which it has been the glory of Christianity to create.

But there are other elements in life besides the human and the natural, beyond those personal rights and claims which a Christian may, if he is aiming at perfection, set aside out of charity. The Church is Divine as well as Human.

For the Church has entrusted to her, besides the rights of men, which may be sacrificed by their possessors, the rights and claims of God, which none but He can set aside. He has given into her keeping, for example, a Revelation of truths and principles which, springing out of His own Nature or of His Will, are as immutable and eternal as Himself. And it is precisely in defence of these truths and principles that the Church exhibits that which the world calls intransigeance and Jesus Christ violence.

Here, for example, is the right of a baptized Catholic child to be educated in his religion, or rather, the right of God Himself to teach that child in the manner He has ordained. Here is the revealed truth that marriage is indissoluble; here that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. Now these are not human rights or opinions at all -- rights and opinions which men, urged by charity or humility, can set aside or waive in the face of opposition. They rest on an entirely different basis; they are, so to speak, the inalienable possessions of God; and it would neither be charity nor humility, but sheer treachery, for the Church to exhibit meekness or pliancy in matters such as these, given to her as they are, not to dispose of, but to guard intact. On the contrary here, exactly, comes the command, He that hath not, let him sell his cloak and buy a sword, for here comes the line between the Divine and the Human; let all personal possessions go, all merely natural rights and claims be yielded, and let a sword take their place. For here is a matter that must be resisted, even unto blood.

The Catholic Church then is, and always will be, violent and intransigeant when the rights of God are in question. She will be absolutely ruthless, for example, towards heresy, for heresy affects not personal matters on which Charity may yield, but a Divine right on which there must be no yielding. Yet, simultaneously, she will be infinitely kind towards the heretic, since a thousand human motives and circumstances may come in and modify his responsibility. At a word of repentance she will readmit his person into her treasury of souls, but not his heresy into her treasury of wisdom; she will strike his name eagerly and freely from her black list of the rebellious, but not his book from the pages of her Index. She exhibits meekness towards him and violence towards his error; since he is human, but her Truth is Divine. [……]

She will give up all that is merely human, if the world will have it so, and will resist not evil if it merely concerns herself. But there is one thing which she will not renounce, one thing she will claim, even with violence and "intransigeance," and that is the Royalty with which God Himself has crowned her.

Msgr. Robert Hugh Benson, excerpt from Palm Sunday Sermon

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