Bishop Johan Bonny was back in the news last week following his selection by the Vatican as a participant at the upcoming Synod on the Family in Rome. Bishop Bonny, you may recall, said the following back in December:
“We have to look inside the Church for a formal recognition of the kind of interpersonal relationship that is also present in many gay couples. Just as there are a variety of legal frameworks for partners in civil society, one must arrive at a diversity of forms in the Church.”
For readers of OnePeterFive, Bishop Bonny’s comment was hardly surprising. Last September we told you about a letter the Belgian bishop wrote to the faithful of his diocese. Embracing moral relativism over doctrine, the arguments made by him against immutable truths leads one to ask why anyone would even welcome Bishop Bonny’s participation at a synod on the family.
As I noted at the time, Bishop Bonny’s letter presents several scenarios in such a manner as to all but undermine traditional marriage, the conjugal union, and natural conception itself. Regarding the latter, his letter proposed the following hypothetical:
“A and L did everything they could to have a baby. As L approached her 40th the situation became more urgent. Their desire to have a child was genuine and generous, and supported moreover by a deep Christian faith. Medical problems led them to opt for homologous in vitro fertilisation. Can we say in general terms of this couple that because of their medical option they open a door to the domination of technology over the destiny of the human person, that their deeds are in conflict with the common dignity of parents and children, and that they see their child as a piece of property? Or might we not try to understand their profound desire to keep love and fertility conjoined, and hope that their desire to have a child will be fulfilled with the help of skilled and meticulous medical experts?”
Then, in defense of contraception, Bishop Bonny’s “pastoral” letter argues:
“K and P have been married for thirty years and have four children, roughly three times the average number of children in a Belgian family. After the birth of their fourth child they had reached their limit and decided to use birth control to prevent further conceptions. Can we say without nuance of these parents with four children that because of their method of birth control they are falsifying conjugal love, that they have ruptured the essential bond between marriage and fertility and that they no longer give themselves to one another completely? Or might we not value their generosity as parents, encourage them in the attention they devote to their relationship and to the further development of a welcoming home for their children?”
Whether it is same sex “marriage”, cohabitation, contraception or in vitro fertilization, Bishop Johan Bonny has apparently embraced the errors of the current age, arguing for the Church to ponder these errors as if they are deserving of our consideration. What he apparently fails to grasp is that intrinsic evils are never in season for Holy Mother Church.
In the end, the question I find myself asking is this: If you or I wouldn’t even trust Bishop Bonny to teach a pre-Cana class at our local parish, who in the Vatican thought it was a good idea to invite him to the synod?
Francis is either the most unaware and deceived Pope in History or the most deceptive and devious. Bonny like most of Francis appointees Koch, Cupich, Drew McKeown Ireland, Bishop in Chile infamous for protecting perverts like Danniels of Belgium seem to have no clue including Francis of what faith and morals of the faith are let alone promote and defend them.
I think we are all surmising the same thing. He is either blind, deaf and dumb or devious. We will see in October.
“… who in the Vatican thought it was a good idea to invite him to the synod?”
Indeed. I believe we all know the answer to that question.
I’m afraid we do.
Unfortunately we do indeed.
These inexplicable actions and people that the Vatican advances really make the faithful question the Church and its fidelity to Christ. When doubt enters one’s mind, how likely are the weak of faith likely to remain in the Church? The Vatican seams to go out of its way to embrace and promote every type of heretic and dissenter it can find for its own personnel academic dialogue. When argument and dialogue are perceived as more important to faithful witness than the Truth, the faithful will leave and find Truth in other places. Pray that the Vatican will screw its head on quickly and stop scandalizing itself.
Using His Excellency’s logic, one could rationalize almost anything
And that’s the point…
While this is beyond frustrating, ironically, this sort of mischief ultimately amounts to a backhanded authentication of our Catholic faith; for when the devil works so furiously to destroy the Bride of Christ, he paradoxically makes his own perverse witness to her glory.
It’s also been foretold in Scripture: As St. Paul was parting from his beloved flock in Ephesus, he admonished them accordingly: “I know that, after my departure, ravening wolves will enter in among you, not sparing the flock. And of your own selves shall arise men speaking perverse things, to draw away disciples after them.” (Acts 20:29-30)
The time for mincing words is over. In Bonny and his ilk we have before us the very ravening wolves that St. Paul warned about; and in their voices we hear the voice of the
ancient serpent himself.
In each subtle equivocation, in each “Or might we not…” the bishop is simply restating that fateful primeval question: “Did God really say…”
Our job is to say loud and clear what Adam should have said: “Yes He did you forked tongued liar”, or in this case, “No we may not you deceiving heretic.”
The stronger satan tries to hit, less can he disguise his presence, and weaker then is the blow. From personal experience, I think that this realization helped me more than once in spiritual warfare.
I’d never trust a guy who uses the fake-ingenuous “Just askin'” tactic when discussing moral questions. What’s all this “Can we say…?” crap? You’re the bishop, dude. You’re supposed to be the one with the answers.
My Bonny lies over the ocean
My Bonny lies over the seas
My Bonny descends on the Synod
Where he’ll bend over for queers, you’ll see
Lefeu (Shakespeare) wondered whether someone was a knave or merely a fool. The question comes forcefully to mind here.
Please see our petition, this is how it is started: ”Beloved Holy Father, Pope Francis, we laity and clergy are very
concerned about Holy Mother Church. We experience confusing messages
daily both from the pulpit, our fellow
Catholics and the secular community that we pray you will immediately
address.” We address everything like this in it and in the comment section below the petition that has become an add on to it.
http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/concerns-of-laity-and-clergy-to-the-holy-father
Who’s next…Peter Singer…the president of Planned Patenthood? Well, even if we had an anti-pope, the Church is still spotless despite the “old, white men” and the Pharisees, Herod Antipas and Pilate were allowed by God to be their leaders, though unjust commands cannot not followed. Pope Francis is hardly they.