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A Breaking Point in the Papacy?

At the beginning of 2018, Steve Skojec predicted that this year would mark “the beginning of the end” of Pope Francis’ power. It is now becoming increasingly clear that this pontificate might be facing several distinct points of fracture. Francis’ international standing is being undermined. There are at least five areas where the pope has become vulnerable: the Cardinal Marx scandal; the Bishop Barros abuse case; the Chinese crisis; the controversy concerning the upcoming World Meeting of Families in Ireland; and the growing resistance to Amoris Laetitia.

Cardinal Marx and Homosexual Unions

Let us first consider Cardinal Reinhard Marx’ welcoming comments concerning the idea to bless homosexual couples in the Catholic Church. While inviting such steps only for individual parishes, he made it clear that for him, homosexual acts are not any more a sin. This new “Marxist move” has caused much indignation among faithful Catholics in Germany, among them Mathias von Gersdorff.

But Dr. Markus Büning – Catholic theologian and book author –  has also lost his patience after the recent German push on the homosexual front. (Büning had, not long ago, and after an initial support of the four cardinals’ dubia, made a turn and signed the recent Pro-Pope Francis initiative.) Now, Büning has called upon Pope Francis to rectify the chaos caused by Marx. He is astonished that “one of the highest-ranking collaborators in the Church’s senate – Munich’s Archbishop, Cardinal Marx – can proclaim in front of the world a grave moral heresy” while merely proposing such a “liturgical affirmation” on the local level. Büning comments:

It is rather funny that this kind of Catholic “case-by-case logic” would not also apply to those Catholics who now, after these scandalous demands of a bishop, seriously, for sure, consider leaving the Church of the “Church Tax” [“Kirchensteuer”-Kirche]

While he does not propose to exit the Catholic Church, Büning makes it clear that this contradiction shows the “mercilessness of these shepherds.” The German theologian then proceeds to call out to Pope Francis to correct Cardinal Marx:

In my view, it is now clearly up to him who holds the highest teaching office in the Universal Church – the pope. If he is silent with regard to such a demand – supposing that he knows of this bold demand of the C8 [sic] – Cardinal Marx [member of the pope’s council of cardinals] – one necessarily has to conclude that he approves of it. Then also the pope has a problem! […] Did the pope do it [approve of this Marxian approach], he would not fulfill his office and mission to preserve the unity of the Universal Church in questions of Faith and Morals in a credible manner.

The Bishop Barros Scandal

Some similar tones of concern come to us from Guido Horst – Rome Correspondent of the German Catholic newspaper Die Tagespost – who is also known for his usually conciliatory attitude toward Pope Francis. In the wake of the papal trip to Chile, Horst entitled an article with the words: “The Papacy at a Turning Point?” In it, he wrote about the papal visit to Chile and pointed out how this visit seems to have become a pivotal moment for Francis, inasmuch as he has earned much criticism for his demeaning remarks about those victims of sexual abuse who criticized him for protecting Bishop Juan Barros, accused of actively witnessing said abuse and doing nothing about it. Francis, says Horst, appointed Barros, “even though the Vatican Congregation for the Clergy, as well as the Chilean Nuncio, both had already come to the conclusion to ask Barros to resign.” The rumors against Barros as a man who covered up the misdeeds of his spiritual leader, Father Fernando Karadima, never stopped. According to Horst, Barros himself even offered his resignation, but the pope would not accept it.

After the papal remarks in the airplane, where Francis demeaned the victims of abuse, Cardinal Seán O’Malley – the pope’s own top adviser on clergy sexual abuse – criticized the remarks, calling them “a source of great pain for survivors of sexual abuse by clergy.” As Horst comments:

For the first time, it happened that one of the closest collaborators of the pope distanced himself from Francis; and that the pope himself backed off. Many had done the same earlier – the cardinals Joachim Meisner, Carlo Caffarra, Raymond Leo Burke, Walter  Brandmüller, Robert Sarah, Gerhard Müller, or Janis Pujats of Riga. Francis ignored them all, but not the Capuchin O’Malley.

In Horst’s eyes, the pope seemed to have “lost the favor of the media and of the public” in Chile.

These critical words of Horst have been followed now by a much more stunning report from the secular press, namely that, already in 2015, Pope Francis had – against his own claims – received a piercing description of Barros’ involvement in the sexual abuse cases.

The American Catholic journalist Michael Brendan Dougherty writes today at the National Review  that no matter how one looks at the way the letter was handled, it signals a serious problem in papal leadership. And further: “The leaks about the hand-delivery of this letter to the pontiff may be evidence itself that senior churchmen are losing confidence in his pontificate. The barque of Peter sails into choppy waters.”

The China-Vatican Compromise

Additionally, Pope Francis is coming more and more under pressure for giving a friendly hand to the Communist-appointed bishops in China, and then even asking some faithful and suffering true bishops to resign. La Nuova Bussola Quotidiana‘s Riccardo Cascioli from Italy thus entitled one of his recent articles: “The Vatican’s ‘Long March’ Towards Surrender to China.” Scholar Steven Mosher, a Catholic author and expert on Chinese Communism, just effectively repeated this sentiment in an interview with EWTN’s Raymond Arroyo, saying that the Vatican’s negotiations with China are nothing more than “simply negotiating the surrender of the underground Church” to the false church created by the Communists.

Ireland and LGBT

On top of all of these troubling developments, the pope is now being pushed into making a decision about where he stands with regard to the LGBT issue. At the beginning of February, the story broke that Mary McAleese, the former President of Ireland, had been barred by Cardinal Kevin Farrell – the head of the Dicastery for the Laity, Family, and Life – from speaking at a conference on women that was to take place on Vatican grounds. This act on the part of Cardinal Farrell has now provoked the indignation of the Archbishop of Dublin, Diarmuid Martin, who claims not to have been consulted prior to this decision. McAleese is a prominent promoter of homosexual “marriage” and other progressivist agendas such as the ordination of women. Archbishop Martin himself is now concerned that his message of “inclusion” for the upcoming August 2018 World Meeting of Families  – see our story on the homosexual imagery and themes in the program for this event here – would be negatively affected by this recent act of “exclusion” on the part of the Vatican. He insisted that this event – which Pope Francis has also been expected to attend – “will be an inclusive event, open to all families and family members.”

In Ireland itself, pro-LGBT groups are so indignant about the recent decision by Cardinal Farrell that they now even advocate a removal of support for the World Meeting of Families and Pope Francis’ planned upcoming visit to Ireland.

This seems to put Pope Francis at odds with both Ireland as a state, as well as with Archbishop Martin as the organizer of the upcoming Catholic event. On the other side, if he were to make a gesture toward them, he would have to make a signal of approving of the LGBT agenda. Only time will show how Pope Francis will resolve this conflict, a conflict where he will have to show where he truly stands in this matter.

The Ongoing Resistance to Amoris Laetitia

Last but not least: Amoris Laetitia does not stop causing serious disruptions in the Catholic Church, so much so that the number increases of those bishops who now have publicly come out to support the initiative of Bishop Athanasius Schneider – and two of his fellow bishops from Kazakhstan – to reject the idea of giving Holy Communion to adulterers. Just yesterday, Bishop emeritus Elmar Fischer, of Austria, added his name to the list of signatories; the other signatories are Bishop emeritus Andreas Laun (Austria), Auxiliary Bishop Marian Eleganti (Switzerland), Cardinal Janis Pujats (Latvia), the former Apostolic Nuntio Carlo Maria Viganò (Italy), Archbishop Luigi Negri (Italy), Bishop emeritus René Gracida (U.S.). Thus, the number of signatories has now increased to ten, with possibly more to come, according to our sources.

It appears that these potential cracks in the pontificate of Francis could lead to a breaking point; one that could potentially stop — or at least weaken — the papal agenda of adapting the Church to the modern world in such a way that the fullness of the Catholic Faith is no longer recognizable. If so, it might bring needed relief to the many souls at stake.

This post has been updated. 

102 thoughts on “A Breaking Point in the Papacy?”

  1. In many Catholic circles, Pope Francis has become the elephant in the room which many are doing their best to ignore. On both EWTN and Relevant Radio, it is apparent they are laboring to avoid the inevitable confrontation
    with the “holy” father.

    Reply
    • Arthur, I see a lot of articles about this Argentinian (I read Spanish) and some very direct innuendo in a few quarters (both in Spanish and English), but nothing that amounts to much more than malicious gossip and supposition. The innuendo hints at circumstances so shocking that they would have long ago made the fortune of enterprising scandal publications around the globe. But since they have not, one has to conclude there is nothing to them. Am I missing something?

      Reply
      • “Grassy knoll” and “conspiracy theory” were conversation squelchers for 54 years. Last December, documents were published that showed Kennedy was shot from the front and back.

        “If there were anything to X, we would know all about it already.”

        Says who?

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        • Perhaps so, but to “open the door to a Francis-free future” will require more than stuff interesting only to Inforwars.

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  2. I think the saddest thing I read on 1 Peter 5 was yesterday.
    The pope approved of a Lenten Retreat. The topic was ‘queer theology”. I don’t get it.
    Speaking of Jesuits…
    Today is the Feast of Jesuit St. Paul Miki.
    St. Paul Miki (1565?-1597) and his companions were martyred in Japan at the end of the sixteenth century. A native Japanese, Paul entered the Society of Jesus (the Jesuits) as a young man. He worked as a missionary brother, along with St. Leo Karasuma (a Korean layman), and six Franciscan missionaries from Europe, led by St. Peter Baptist of Spain.
    Building on the earlier work of St. Francis Xavier (December 3), the missionaries preached the Gospel around the city of Nagasaki, and were initially very successful. However, the captain of a visiting Spanish ship foolishly (and falsely) boasted that the missionaries’ efforts were paving the way for a Spanish and Portuguese invasion of Japan.
    The Japanese shogun (warlord) Hideyoshi, already envious of the missionaries’ success, used this as an excuse to begin a severe attack on all foreign influences, including Christianity. Many Christians were martyred, including Paul Miki, John Goto, and James Kisai of Japan; Peter Baptist, Martin de Aguirre, Francis Blanco, and Francis-of-St. Michael of Spain; Philip de las Casas of Mexico; Gonsola Garcia of India, and seventeen Japanese lay people. These were all crucified and pierced with a lance. While hanging on the cross, Paul Miki spoke to the Japanese gathered below: “As I come to this supreme moment of my life, I am sure none of you would suppose I want to deceive you. And so I tell you plainly: There is no way to be saved except the Christian way. My religion teaches me to pardon my enemies and all who have offended me. I do gladly pardon the Emperor and all who have sought my death. I beg them to seek baptism and be Christians themselves.”

    Other Saints We Remember Today
    St. Dorothy (303) Virgin, Martyr, Patroness of Florists
    St. Titus (96), Bishop
    From an account of the martyrdom of Saint Paul Miki and his companions, by a contemporary writer
    You shall be my witnesses
    The crosses were set in place. Father Pasio and Father Rodriguez took turns encouraging the victims. Their steadfast behaviour was wonderful to see. The Father Bursar stood motionless, his eyes turned heavenward. Brother Martin gave thanks to God’s goodness by singing psalms. Again and again he repeated: “Into your hands, Lord, I entrust my life.” Brother Francis Branco also thanked God in a loud voice. Brother Gonsalvo in a very loud voice kept saying the Our Father and Hail Mary.
    Our brother, Paul Miki, saw himself standing now in the noblest pulpit he had ever filled. To his “congregation” he began by proclaiming himself a Japanese and a Jesuit. He was dying for the Gospel he preached. He gave thanks to God for this wonderful blessing and he ended his “sermon” with these words: “As I come to this supreme moment of my life, I am sure none of you would suppose I want to deceive you. And so I tell you plainly: there is no way to be saved except the Christian way. My religion teaches me to pardon my enemies and all who have offended me. I do gladly pardon the Emperor and all who have sought my death. I beg them to seek baptism and be Christians themselves.”
    Then he looked at his comrades and began to encourage them in their final struggle. Joy glowed in all their faces, and in Louis’ most of all. When a Christian in the crowd cried out to him that he would soon be in heaven, his hands, his whole body strained upward with such joy that every eye was fixed on him.
    Anthony, hanging at Louis’ side, looked toward heaven and called upon the holy names – “Jesus, Mary!” He began to sing a psalm: “Praise the Lord, you children!” (He learned it in catechism class in Nagasaki. They take care there to teach the children some psalms to help them learn their catechism).
    Others kept repeating “Jesus, Mary!” Their faces were serene. Some of them even took to urging the people standing by to live worthy Christian lives. In these and other ways they showed their readiness to die.
    Then, according to Japanese custom, the four executioners began to unsheathe their spears. At this dreadful sight, all the Christians cried out, “Jesus, Mary!” And the storm of anguished weeping then rose to batter the very skies. The executioners killed them one by one. One thrust of the spear, then a second blow. It was over in a very short time. (Roman Franciscan Breviary)

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  3. The end cannot cone soon enough. Let him become a useless figurehead who rambles and fumes incoherently in his homilies while everyone simply ignores him. Let him pass whatever acts he desires, while the curia simply ignores them. Let us all, difficult as it may be, simply practice the Faith while not giving a damn what he says.

    At this point, my attitude is “Let him try.” If he tries to suppress the classical rite, I expect priest of good conscience to refuse to comply. An unjust law does not bind. Francis has made it clear he has no concept of what authentic Catholicism is. Let him have his liberation theology, his Marxism, his pedophile enabling. We have the Faith. Let him try to take it from us. We have Our Lady’s Rosary and her intercession, along with the intercession of countless saints, on our side.

    Reply
    • Non Serviam. This is the only Catholic response in this situation. The hierarchy of virtues has been hijacked by a mad man.

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    • The problem with him being figurehead is that this fool is allowed to make Cardinals. And he only makes liberals Cardinals. Pretty soon the majority of voting age cardinals will be FrancisCardinals.

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      • If Bergoglio’s papacy is valid, his cardinals are cardinals. However, if it is not, then his cardinals are not cardinals at all, but remain bishops. Only a valid pope can create cardinals. No votes they cast for the next pope would be valid.

        In either case, his bishops are valid bishops, but if his papacy is invalid, they are illicit valid bishops.

        If Bergoglio is not pope, that will not help the present situation at all, as he does control all the resources and levers of power. However, it will help in the cleanup afterwards.

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  4. Catholics need to learn how to recognize error, and resist the continuing heresy from the modern Vatican II Church. This so called Pope is an embarrassment to any traditional, devout Catholic. The Church’s indefecibility dogma also speaks of the immutability of her teaching. “In the sacraments of the living the obstacle to grace is a consciousness of grievous sin, the necessary disposition is a state of grace.” (FCD Dr. Ludwig Org, p. 346) So, Pope Francis in his Amorous Latitia has broken with unchangeable Church teaching to allow public adulterers and homosexuals to receive communion!

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  5. Francis is also poised to undermine the teaching of Humane Vitae with his “concrete realities” gobbledygook.

    Everything he touches he subverts and perverts.

    He has two jobs, affirm the brethren in the faith and protect the deposit of the faith. By his words and actions he’s undermining both the faith of the brethren and the deposit of the faith.

    He’s bringing the papacy into disrepute and bringing disgrace to the Catholic Church.

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  6. He ought to do Ireland a favor and reject the Christian hating LGBTwhatever “community” and defrock Martin (anybody named Martin!) while he is at it.

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  7. Time for bishop against bishop, priest against priest. The faithful Clergy will be against Francis the apostate. The majority will apostasize.

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  8. This aint my Church. This aint the Church which taught me the Faith and prepared me for the Sacraments. I’m not sure where that Church is or went to but this is an abomination.

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    • Don’t confuse *Churchmen* with the Church. The Church per se is the true church that Christ founded. *Churchmen* (and laity too) may or may not correspond with the grace that God gives them.

      We believe in one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church, built by Jesus Christ on that rock which is Peter. She is the Mystical Body of Christ; at the same time a visible society instituted with hierarchical organs, and a spiritual community; the Church on earth, the pilgrim People of God here below, and the Church filled with heavenly blessings; the germ and the first fruits of the Kingdom of God, through which the work and the sufferings of Redemption are continued throughout human history, and which looks for its perfect accomplishment beyond time in glory.(24) In the course of time, the Lord Jesus forms His Church by means of the sacraments emanating from His plenitude.(25) By these she makes her members participants in the Mystery of the Death and Resurrection of Christ, in the grace of the Holy Spirit who gives her life and movement.(26) She is therefore holy, though she has sinners in her bosom, because she herself has no other life but that of grace: it is by living by her life that her members are sanctified; it is by removing themselves from her life that they fall into sins and disorders that prevent the radiation of her sanctity. This is why she suffers and does penance for these offenses, of which she has the power to heal her children through the blood of Christ and the gift of the Holy Spirit.

      http://w2.vatican.va/content/paul-vi/en/motu_proprio/documents/hf_p-vi_motu-proprio_19680630_credo.html

      Nota bene the date. ????

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  9. As someone said here on 1P5, “Drain the Ecclesiastical Swamp”. When PF is no longer Pope, there’s still a whole heap of progressive Cardinals such as Maradiaga, Danneels, Tobin, Tagle to name a few who’ll happily carry on the progressive banner.

    I’m trying not to be pessimistic but it really reveals the damage that can be done to the church when you consecrate bad bishops or make bad cardinals, or worse yet, one of them one day becomes pope and enforces their agenda rather than act as the vicar of Christ.

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    • Happily, Maradiaga has serious problems with a financial investigation back home in Honduras. And if he has the nerve to reemerge into public life, he will never live down his statement that the paedo crisis was exaggerated by the Jewish controlled media. Or his fake replica of the fake shrine in Medjugorje. Without Francis, he is nothing.

      And Danneels is nothing without Francis. He is very old and hopelessly compromised by the paedo scandals in Belgium.

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        • Johnny,

          I went there in Sept 1996. I had my first doubts when I noticed that some of my fellow pilgrims were madder than a sackful of cut snakes, to borrow the great Australian simile.
          A very intelligent young woman from London was dressed as a nun in a habit unfamiliar to me. She explained that she had designed her own habit as she was the sole member of her religious order. She told me that there was a nun in one of the stained glass windows in St James, the very ordinary modern parish church of Medjugorje, who had a habit just like hers and this confirmed her vocation. I checked out the church – no such window.
          Then there was the retired NURSE from Glasgow who looked at the hot sun, apparently as you might see some sort of solar miracle as per Fatima. She came away still able to see….
          Then there was the luxurious houses of the “visionaries”….er, no, I don’t think anyone is volunteering to die penniless in a convent as per St Bernadette of Lourdes.
          Then there was the group visit to one of the “visionaries” who reeled off another very unexceptional “message” from Our Lady. She might have been reciting a recipe for weedkiller for all we could tell, as obviously none of us monoglot Brits spoke a word of Croat and we were totally dependent on our interpreter for an accurate translation. I gather that some translators are so bored with the obvious shite that they invent their own words to keep the punters happy.
          Then there was the vile Franciscan at Mostar who explained how the recent savage civil war in the country was the fault of everyone except the Croats. The real villains were, of course, “the merchants” [i.e. the Jews]. The rogue Franciscans in Medj are the real movers and shakers behind the “visions”.
          Mostar had been very badly damaged in the fighting and the evidence of war destruction was everywhere, including the Franciscan church. We met this Franciscan down in the crypt of the church. An ex-Army guy in our group confirmed my suspicions that this crypt was in fact a massively fortified bunker. There was nothing religious about its design or ornamentation.
          During my period working in Michigan (1998-2000) I spoke to Dr E Michael Jones, author of “The Medjugorje Deception” – highly recommended. Dr Jones told me that the Vatican had already known for years that Medj is a total fraud. Why the **** didn’t they tell the wider Church, you might ask?
          Apparently JP2 wanted to back a seeming Catholic miracle in a Communist country, especially as he was a devout Marian. Obviously, the anti-Communist reason had vanished by 1996. The pilgrimage trade was recovering in Medj in 1996, but it was a fraction of its present volume. The monster is too big to be easily strangled now and ever increasing numbers are being deceived.

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          • JPII was ready to lie for money or political reasons, and even more ready to remain silent when he should have spoken.

            He was loud his support of “non-violent” resistance in South Africa, with not one syllable in support of the pro-life rescue movement. (Which was crushed by the FACE Act, with votes from “pro-life” politicians.)

          • I think the worst thing was the fact that not a single Catholic politician was excommunicated for bringing in abortion laws, which spread all over the world like a plague during his pontificate. Words are meaningless without action. The “Catholics” were loud and proud too….always getting photos with Cardinals, going to Mass weekly and bragging how one could be Catholic and pro choice. This utterly destroyed any credibility the Catholic Church had on Pro Life issues. JPII did not so much as lift a finger to stop the bloodshed when he could have, at the very least, sent a clear message. He will be held accountable by the Universal Divine Judge.

          • The first inkling I had about this massive pious fraud was from E Michael Jones’ writing. Later reading did nothing but confirm that these “visionaries” were mostly seeing bank notes, and that the local Franciscans there were a gang of scam artists. I’ll now add your eye witness account to my list indicating Medjugorje is “very fake news.” Thanks.

  10. Pope Francis needs to be confronted about all the craziness in the Church today. Exactly where do you stand Holy Father on clergy molesting children? Where do you stand on gay marriage? Are you going to remain silent despite Cardinal Marx’s comments?

    Are you really sure you want to betray faithful Chinese Catholics? The wonderful Cardinal Zen had some harsh, rather justifiable words for your callous secretary of state today.

    Will you correct the lies regarding marriage created by your own Amoris Laetitia?
    Pope Francis when will you stop mocking God. God WILL NOT BE MOCKED!!!!!!

    It is time for you to decide. Will you convert? Do you wish to continue to dance with the possibility of eternal damnation?

    Reply
    • He has already been “confronted.” He has chosen to “answer” by using the usual liberal tactic of silence. Ask, for example, liberals across the West about the wave of Mohammedan murders and rapes occasioned by their policies (it’s the pope’s policy as well) and you will “hear” the same answer. As I said, it’s a tactic, one that has served the mendacious quite well for many decades.

      Reply
  11. Let’s hope his papacy ends in 2018 and a strong, courageous, holy Pope emerges to confront all the catastrophic happenings in the Church since Vatican II. I think the only way this could happen would be by divine intervention.

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  12. I keep praying that this evil Pontificate falls. The sooner the better to save the Church and countless souls. A message to Pope Francis the Destroyer – “You are evil. Your agenda is evil. Resign now! Your Pontificate will eventually fail and fall. Heresy always loses.”

    Reply
    • I’m afraid there are not so much of those who were deceived anno 2013, but there were more of those who were just glad to have jorge for Pope, and also those who simply were blackmailed (some of them for a longer time).

      Reply
    • Good message, Bob. Just a couple of adjustments to your ‘closet heretic’ remark. He’s a brazen heretic and a closet homosexual. The evidence is all over his pontficate.

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  13. Archbishop Diarmuid Martin speaks of ‘inclusion’. An Argentinian Jesuit Father Scannone wrote an article on Pope Francis and the Theology of the People saying that Evangelii Gaudium was promoting that Theology which is supposed to be a version of Liberation Theology without any Marxism or Hegelism. It suggests that it is not individuals who are saved but ‘peoples’ basing this on a reading of paragraph 9 of Lumen Gentium the second sentence of which reads in the English version:

    “God, however, does not make men holy and save them merely as individuals, without bond or link
    between one another. Rather has it pleased Him to bring men together as one people, a people which
    acknowledges Him in truth and serves Him in holiness.”

    The Latin reads:

    Placuit tamen Deo homines non singulatim, quavis mutua connexione seclusa, sanctificare et salvare, sed eos in populum constituere, qui in veritate Ipsum agnosceret Ipsique sancte serviret.

    The crucial word in the English version is ‘merely’ which suggests that men are saved individually but are also members of a people. I am not sure that the other language versions have this same idea but can be interpreted as saying that men are only saved as part of a people and not individually. In the Theology of the People Father Scannone says that the Marxist idea of class warfare is not a determinant but it is still there. There seems to be a suggestion that belonging to the right people, class or political party is what saves you and what you do as an individual is not important. Thus you can be included in the people of God regardless of whether you are a notorious public sinner or not. I wonder what people think of this.

    Reply
    • The notion of ‘merely’ is clearly an addition to what the Latin cited here actually says. The studied ambiguity here is just one of the Council’s many problematic texts needing clarification and revision, something Bishop Athanasius Schneider recently wrote about.

      Reply
      • Thanks for that. The problem is that without the word ‘merely’ the sentence is not so ambiguous if taken out of the context of explaining about the Jews as the chosen people and the eventual inclusion of gentiles. It is used by these Latin-American enthusiasts for a Theology of the People to indicate a group of which I suspect they would not regard a semi-pelagian promothean like myself as belonging,

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    • In Croatian translation we read:
      “No Bogu se svidjelo posvetiti i spasiti ljude ne pojedinačno, isključivši svaku svezu među njima, nego ih uobličiti u narod koji bi ga priznavao u istini i sveto mu služio.”
      (Translated: “But God liked to make holy and save people not individually, excluding any relationship among them, but to shape them into a people who would acknowledge him in truth and serve him holy.)

      This version stinks even more on heresy, if you ask me. Without word “merely” (Croatian = “samo”) it says here simply that God do not save people individually. Period. But as a part of chosen (group) of people. Period.
      This is it again, the Jansenism and many other kind of heresies, all included as “All in One” solution called “Liberation Theology” which impossibly can even exist without Marxism and Hegelism and other kind of Poison-ism.

      Reply
  14. St. Paul Miki and Companions yesterday provided a profound and piercing contrast to the hideous profile of contemporary Jesuits — Bergoglio, Sosa, Martin and “companions.” The reading proper for the memorial in the Divine Office is at once heartbreaking and inspiring. It is evident that reading is ignored by “progressives” — if indeed they do not ignore completely their obligation to daily recite the Liturgy of the Hours. How possibly could men of prayer promote the vile notions emanating from this pontificate? You could weep for the tragic betrayal of the Chinese people, the betrayal of SSA persons struggling to grow and maintain virtue, for those in broken marriages struggling to be faithful to their commitment before Christ.
    We are being led to perdition by men of no faith. Cowards. Possessed by the zeitgeist.
    How possibly could a hierarchy rooted in personal and liturgical prayer remain mute during this assault upon the Gospel of Jesus Christ?
    There have not been sufficient millstones in history for the necks of this crew.

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  15. I recall a Jesuit priest at our Parish church saying that when a Jesuit does something wrong their Founder, St Ignatius Loyola, makes a self-rotation by way of atonement, near the throne of God where all the founders of congregations are standing for similar purpose. He continued to say that, depending on the grievousness of the offense, the speed of the rotation is intensified. The present Pope being a Jesuit, the speed at which his founder is rotating must be phenomenal – say 70×7 in a nano second – by way of asking pardon of God for his spiritual son’s attitude and pronouncements with regard to the Catholic Church’s teaching. No wonder St Ignatius had forbidden any of his sons to become popes ever, knowing fully well what his sons would do to him ! Pope Francis has broken that order of his Jesuit Order and the church is paying the price dearly !

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      • Sorry, but I just had to laugh when I read this :-). Those poor Jesuit martyrs must be getting quite stressed, the angels must be trying to minister to them….

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    • I am unfamiliar with the idea of “rotating,” except as the saying, “spinning in one’s grave.” Is there actually a spiritual, *penitential*, aspect to this “saying” based in theology?

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    • Not many people know Jesuits were forbidden by their founder from being popes. We should publicize that more. Maybe someone will remind Jorge and shame him. Not that he’s shameable…

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      • Indeed. Spreading the truth…
        In that year of ‘mercy’, one day with the feast of Martyrs of Gorcum there were people who were selling some ‘useful requisites’ IN the Catholic church of course, instead of outside,… and among other things there was a small kind of bedge with the happy face of Francis. I can’t remember what I exactly said then, but I’m sure it sounded not positively in the ears of the seller women, who was in age of 50 or 55… But I remember very good that she say to me: “But, this pope is so kind, and he is a FRANCISCAN.” Right!!
        We would be very surprised if we knew how MANY people just don’t have a clue, but they all think that he is belongs to Franciscan Order. Btw. The choice of his name was surely NOT just accidentally.

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      • Not many people know it because it isn’t true.

        Jesuits are forbidden to seek honors or high offices in the Church, such as episcopal consecration.

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  16. Re: Cardinal Marx’s remarks on blessing of same-sex unions

    Recall the lightning speed with which Cardinal Sarah was summoned to Rome by Pope Francis for a dressing down when he suggested that some parts of the novus ordo could be done ad orientum. Recall as well that he had to actually misrepresent the GIRM to dress down that solidly orthodox Cardinal.

    Meanwhile, Cardinal Marx puts forward his outrageous heresies and we can hear a pin drop from Rome. The usually verbose Pope Francis goes into a stupor-like silence and all we hear is the chirping of crickets.

    Something is rotten in the state of the Vatican.

    P.S. – I really appreciate this site’s coverage of the German Church which in many ways has been, and continues to be, ground zero for the current mayhem being visited upon the Catholic Church. Needless to say, there’s more rot there than you can shake a stick at.

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  17. So, the facade is beginning to crumble. Makes me think of the Wall coming down in Game of Thrones. Rather than the Ice King coming on board a dragon, it is Faith coming aboard Tradition. One may also think of St. Augustine: “Truth is like a lion; you don’t have to defend it. Let it loose; it will defend itself.” Sadly, whilst the Vatican is delivering our Chinese brethren to the jaws of the Red Dragon, the Pope will be clawed apart by the Lion of Truth, which is non other than the Lion of Juda Himself. And just as the sun breaks down the paint on a car, so will the Sun of Truth break down the facade of “The Pope of Mercy”.

    I would edit a phrase of Napoleon: do not interrupt your enemy when he is destroying himself. No one can destroy a man but himself, so leave the good Pontiff to his ways, and watch the inevitable unfurl. But, let us pray that his actions do not land him in a cell in the Prison of Hell. Remember the words of Our Lord: pray for those who persecute you…..especially when he is the Pope himself.

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  18. In the middle oval this chaos and confusion, many putative Catholics think they can retreat into the “safety” of a schism but even the SPPX hides/protects/transfers their queer clergy.

    https://www.theinquiry.ca/wordpress/misc/abroad/renegade-catholic-order-in-uk-harbours-clergy-accused-of-sexual-abuse-related-articles/

    Saint Vincent of Leris teaches us that scandals will come to the Catholic Church and they are allowed to arise because that is the way God tests us to see if we love Him.

    How can we be said to love Him if we create a schism or succor it?

    We must remain within His Church and suffer as we fight for the truth.

    Leaving to join a schism and wearing Fiddlebacks is no different than the Vietnam Era draft dodgers going to Canada and wearing camouflage uniforms – both are cowardly and treasonous.

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    • It seems to me the sodomites/communists/freemasons had a two pronged attack; 1. make Catholics agnostic or prot via scandal, 2. change the faith. Half the Catholics in a fell swoop became athiest, agnostic or Prot following VII and sex abuse scandals. Now they’re getting rid of the rest. This 180 change in faith will cause Catholics to lose faith period, settle for Prot or adopt a faith that is completely opposed to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Novus Ordo Redux. The only faith left to get rid of after this is SSPX and splinter sede Priests, Diocesan TLM bye bye. SSPX has already messed with the dogmas pertaining to Papacy and sedevacantism is a wilderness. And they WILL send in the sodomites. Guard your boys well wherever you are.

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    • Who is “in union with Rome,” Bergoglio or Cardinal Zen?

      Is Reinhard Marx in schism or not?

      If the Pope goes into schism, and I refuse to go with him, am I in schism?

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    • I think of the case of a spouse who has cancer. Cancer can be horrible and ugly and messy, and it can drain and exhaust the caregiver. But do you abandon your spouse because she is sick and weak and failing? Heck, no! The fact that she is sorely afflicted is all the more reason to stand by her and be faithful to her!

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  19. The undermining of the papacy may also have been a goal and that is being achieved. The true faithful cannot trust almost anything coming from the corrupt leadership in the Church. And the Church has lost her moral voice as the modernists put emphasis on climate, population control, approval of second invalid ‘marriages’, the winking at sodomy and so forth. There is little of the Gospel and of Our Lord or about the salvation of souls. The Church exists to aid souls to achieve holiness and heaven and for the most part, is not doing this. This morning I went to Mass and a sub priest who I call Fr. Ad-lib was the ‘celebrant’. He chose the words to one of the many choices for the ‘service’ and added plenty of his own words. That ‘spiritual drink’ and ‘memorial’ could have been at any Lutheran community. I was disgusted and did not go to communion. I cannot stomach all that. The novus ordo has achieved a goal too: the wholesale loss of faith across the world. The lack of teaching and catechesis that accompanies it is a travesty. To repeat the first reading or something political is not a homily.

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    • Here’s a thought. Before Francis there was in the Church a superstition surrounding the papacy. It wasn’t official, of course, but even some very educated Catholics subscribed to the notion — it was never really anything but a ‘notion’– that the pope was all but infallible in everything but his selection of toothpaste. John Newman feared just such a circumstance when Vatican I first proclaimed the doctrine of papal infallibility; he didn’t oppose the idea, just the use to which it might be put by ordinary Catholics heedless of precision. Time proved his fear well-founded, I believe. Francis’ careening, catastrophic papacy has been so appalling that it may have succeeded in rooting out this error forever. The Francis papacy may someday be seen as the laxative that finally flushed the Catholic system clean of a dangerous disease.

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      • I have been shocked by the number of people–including priests–who I have heard attempt to silence criticism of Bergoglio with “the Holy Spirit chooses the Pope.”

        I have not hesitated to say, “Monsignor, that’s a superstition!”

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    • Didn’t you hear? Pope Francis said homilies must be brief, as in no longer than 10 minutes. Eck…

      Also, I can’t stand various Fathers Ad-lib. Just say the red and do the black. It’s not that hard.

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  20. I can’t disagree with the author’s hopeful expectation of “at least relief” for the faithful. It’s realistic. The best short of divine intervention and chastisement would be abdication. The poison already emitted has spread and sunk deep in the minds and hearts of many, and it continues its noxious destruction of the faith and imperils more each day. I pray you and Steve Skojec are more prophetic than myself. There is hope especially as noted in your article on Aux Bishop Marian Eleganti who joins Aux Bishop Athanasius Schneider in what I perceive as a counter reformation to heresy propagated not by definitive magisterial teaching but rather by stealth. The two letters incorporated in the Acta Apostolicae are not Sententia Definitive Intenda required for binding doctrine. My belief has been God won’t permit him, that he knows this and that he has resorted to being cunning. The Holy Spirit does not inspire cunning and duplicity, division and doubt.

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  21. The Catholic Church’s teaching is clear as crystal: Sodomy is a sin that cries out to Heaven for vengeance. That certain clergymen are proposing to “bless” this evil is an unspeakable attack on the Church at Her very heart — Her authority to teach absolute moral truth.

    The source of the problem is that very many people (even in the Church) have come to believe that certain “patterns of sin” — like homosexualist fantasies and behaviour —
    are native or essential to the person as such, rather than being what they truly are: demonic fantasies attacking the person’s intellect.

    The Eastern Catholic Church describes “temptation” as a multi-staged process: The demon sets in motion a provocation, and then the person who is provoked either rebuts the provocation or gives assent to it; if he gives assent (i.e. colludes with the demon), then there is sin; if he repeatedly gives assent to the same provocation, then he can fall into a “pattern of sin” or prepossession toward the sin; if the prepossession continues unchecked, then it can become an evil passion. That describes homosexualism and all its LGBTranshuman outgrowths.

    At this time of chastisement for the Church, may we take comfort and confidence from the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, as recorded in the Book of Revelation and addressing the church in Laodicea (and, evidently, also the Church today):

    “To the angel of the church in Laodicea write: These are the words of the Amen, the faithful and true Witness, the Originator of God’s creation. I know your deeds; you are neither cold nor hot. How I wish you were one or the other. So because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of My mouth! You say, ‘I am rich; I have grown wealthy and need nothing.’ But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind, and naked. I counsel you to buy from Me gold refined by fire so that you may become rich, white garments so that you may be clothed and your shameful nakedness not exposed, and salve to anoint your eyes so that you may see. **Those I love, I rebuke and discipline**. Therefore be earnest and repent. Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in and dine with him, and he with Me. To the one who is victorious, I will grant the right to sit with Me on My throne, just as I overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.” – Rev. 3:14-22

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    • “very many people (even in the Church) have come to believe that certain “patterns of sin” — like homosexualist fantasies and behaviour — are native or essential to the person as such…”

      Even if homosexual orientation were inborn, similarly to the genetic predisposition toward alcoholism, that still would not make acting on those urges excusable. After all, all normal, heterosexual men are born with a very compelling drive to copulate with women, but that does not give them an excuse for fornication. All of us struggle with sexual temptation, but we have a moral obligation to be chaste, whatever our condition or state of life. (For married couples, chastity means faithfulness to each other and avoidance of contraception, for example.) All of us are expected to avoid pornography and masturbation. Our “orientation” has absolutely nothing to do with our moral responsibilities.

      I believe that genetic and/or developmental factors may play a part in some cases of homosexuality. We know that there is a genetic component to many (if not most) cases of alcoholism. These people did not ask for this affliction, and it is a very difficult burden to bear. Life is not fair! But we cannot somehow make it fair by relieving people of their moral responsibility. Every one of us has some onerous burden to bear — think of St. Paul’s “thorn in his side” — but God does not “let us off the hook” just because we have a problem in some area. Instead, He gives us the grace to bear it, if we are open to His grace. Indeed, these particular personal burdens can form the most important avenues for our spiritual growth, if we ask for God’s help!

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  22. I see that the average attendance at the Wednesday Papal Audience has plummeted from 30,000 for the first 21 months of Francis’s reign to an average of 9,000 since the start of 2015 up to the present. That’s one crack in the façade that all the press secretaries, smoke-spreaders and con merchants in the Vatican combined can’t succeed in hiding because it’s hundreds of yards wide and deep.

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  23. In all the above areas, Francis gets a pass by the secular world and the progressive Catholic world. But with the Bishop Barros case, even those two groups are scandalized for once. When liberal Cardinal O’Malley and LGBT poster boy priest, James Martin, call you out, that means you have really stepped in it. I guess Francis missed the briefing, but child sex abuse is the only taboo left in the secular world. He must have forgotten his “Who am I to judge” philosophy because he certainly judged the numerous accusers of Barros. Not only has he shown them contempt, but he was caught in a lie when he said there was not a shred of evidence against the bishop. Where the neo-Pelagian rigid doctors of the law could make no headway in removing Francis, it looks like his own confreres will be the ones to show him the door. His days of usefulness to the progressive/liberal wing of the Church are coming to an end. Two Popes Emeriti – imagine that. Maybe it’s just wishful thinking, but I see a light at the end of the tunnel, thank God.

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