I want to say to you, about myself, that I am a child of this age, a child of unfaith and scepticism, and probably (indeed I know it) shall remain so to the end of my life.
– Fyodor Dostoyevsky
I find it on any showing quite ludicrous to suppose that, for nineteen of Christendom’s twenty centuries, Christians were credulous idiots ready to believe any tomfoolery the Bible fostered. . . For one thing, it would seem to me that our twentieth century, far from being notable for scientific scepticism, is one of the most credulous eras in all history. It is not that people believe in nothing – which would be bad enough – but that they believe in anything – which is really terrible.
– Malcolm Muggeridge
While Amoris Laetitia is turning hot the ecclesial cold war between novelty and tradition that erupted in the wake of Vatican II, there is still a tendency to be myopic about our times. Ross Douthat has pronounced that the battle over Amoris Laetitia has reached the level of “genuinely historic theological controversy (Jesuit-Jansenist level, at least, if not quite Arian-Athanasian).” We see the speck, but we do not see the beam. Worse than Jansenism, worse than Arian heresy, for the past 500 years, the Church has been torn apart – certainly by Modernism, that heresy of “synthesis,” but also by Modernism’s close cousin, modernity.
Modernity is the admixture of two different heresies: Martin Luther’s attack on Catholic theology, which rent the individual Christian from the Church, and Henry VIII’s attack on the Church’s teaching concerning the jurisdictional boundaries between Church and State. Though contemporaries, Luther and Henry were enemies. Henry penned his famous attack on Luther in 1521, “In Defense of the Seven Sacraments (Assertio septem Sacramentorum adversus Martin Lutherum),” which won the English king the title “Defender of the Faith” (Fidei defensor) from Pope Leo X. Luther responded by showing his mettle: a world-class foul mouth and penchant for ad hominem attacks, responding to Henry’s reasoned arguments simply by calling him “a pig, dolt, and liar who deserved, among other things, to be covered in excrement.” Yet despite the personal dislike these two men had for each other, they unleashed the tandem of forces destined to destroy Christendom: Luther’s isolated individualism and Henry’s monolithic state were amalgamated into the twin pillars of modern secularism.
In the early 16th century, few could understand what was happening. Not surprisingly, one was St. Thomas More.
More additionally expressed concern to his son-in-law William Roper that because of complacent Catholic attitudes, the war against Luther would not be won: “I pray God … that some of us, as high as we seem to sit upon the mountains, treading heretics under our feet like ants, live not the day, that we gladly would wish to be at league and composition with them, to let them have their churches quietly to themselves; so that they would be content to let us have ours quietly to ourselves.”1
More was not a theologian, but a lawyer. For him, law was not an end in itself, but an indispensable aid in assisting individuals and societies to attain their proper temporal and spiritual ends. He believed – consistent with the Gelasian theory of the two swords – that the Church and the State had different roles and different jurisdictions. More understood that harmony between the two was essential and that if the balance were disturbed, man would suffer evils to body and soul.
While Thomas More is best known for his defense of the papacy, which led to his execution, More had an earlier disagreement with Henry VIII wherein he, ironically, claimed that Henry had given the papacy an unduly large role in temporal affairs. Though an enemy of Tudor totalitarianism, the great saint and scholar was no ultramontanist.
In recent years, we seemingly have seen the Roman pontiff ambiguously; indirectly; unofficially; and, by way of proxy, all but officially approve the attempted Kasperite transvaluation of adultery from mortal sin into a mulligan-worthy bad break. The mechanism of this “mercy” is a counterfeit version of “conscience,” warped to look more Lutheran than Catholic. The meme of Pope Francis as Luther is no joke; rather, it captures the hopes of some (the Kasperites) and the fears of others (serious Catholics) within the Church.
While Kasperism’s deformed theology has been well documented, what has received less attention is Cardinal Kasper’s completely misguided approach to Church-State relations. Formerly, the Church understood that the proper realm of the Church was the administration of the divine law, while the State administered the natural law. In other words, the Church preserved and promulgated the Good News for the salvation of souls; the State took care for the temporal common good of its citizenry (which oftentimes could contain non-Christians). While the framework of the Church’s thought was theological, the common good was rooted in natural law – rational precepts that Christians, Jews, and pagans were bound to acknowledge.
In a journal article from 1990, Cardinal Kasper praises the post-Vatican II practice of addressing the secular world in theological language rather than in terms of the Natural law:
[W]e Christians cannot counter the threat to humanity merely by an appeal to a minimal consensus founded in natural law. We must respond with all the concrete fullness and the concentrated strength of our Christian faith, and mobilize all its forces against the powers of injustice, violence, and death.2
In typical Kasperspeak, the cardinal criticized the “abstract foundation” of former practice in favor of “concrete realization.” The idea that it is more effective to address “the world” in theological language is idiotic, naïve, and disingenuous. Why? Because the “concrete realization” is that if I am an avowed Jew or Muslim or Buddhist or Hindu or agnostic or atheist, chances are, I don’t give a flying fig about what Jesus said or did, nor about the theological position His Church may take on issues. On the other hand, an appeal to natural reason demands respect from the rational non-Christian (and if your interlocutor isn’t reasonable, should you really be dialoguing in the first place?). What Kasper’s theory of Church-State dialogue does is sideline the Church as an intellectual and cultural force.
For the muddled modern mind, not knowing how to talk about a subject belies not knowing how to act, either. While Pope Francis’s actions (and inactions) have led to his earning crypto-Lutheran credentials in some quarters, his foray into launching an investigation into the internal affairs of the Sovereign Military Order of the Knights of Malta might earn him another meme as Pope Henry VIII, destroyer of the Gelasian two-swords theory.
Rather than lament what seems to be a clash between the Knights of Malta and the Vatican, we should view current developments as a blessing. The theological errors of Luther have become inextricably intertwined with the jurisdictional errors of Henry, and both need to be addressed before salvation history can move on. When the new Christian springtime does come, it will be rooted in the soil of the perennial teachings of the Church, both theological and social.
1 Roper’s Life of More
2 “The Theological Foundations Of Human Rights,” The Jurist 50 (1990), 148-166
Excellent observations, but I’d like to add a couple more;
First, in response to your {accurate} statement: “The idea that it is more effective to address ‘the world’ in theological language is idiotic, naïve, and disingenuous”, I’d like to add the reverse which I see far more commonly today among modernists including the Pope “The idea that it is more effective to address ‘the Church’ in secular language is idiotic, naïve, and disingenuous.”
Furthermore, I’d like to make an addition to your “Dual Monarchy” of Anglicanism and Lutheranism to form the unholy Anti-Trinity that seems to govern the mind of our Pope’s view of the Church; Orthodoxy.
The Pope truly has been an expressed aficionado of the “Synodal Church” and Orthodoxy with its “decentralized” authority {by that I mean institutional chaos}. So in reality we have a world view that embraces Anglicanism, Lutheranism and Orthodoxy streaming from the current leadership. In short, with fawning all over Islam and other religions added to the mix, we see the celebration of ANYTHING but the Catholic faith with all players equals on an equal moral and value playing field.
I guess, unless of course there is a disagreement.
Then it’s: “I’m the pope, and I don’t have to give reasons for any of my decisions.”
Dear Mr Rossi, am I to understand that as a professing Catholic, you, according to the title of this article, are asserting that the Modern, Synthetic Church cannot possibly be the same institution as the indefectible and immutable Catholic Church?
I didn’t read anything of the sort. Unless I am badly mistaken, it appears clear that the piece is an indictment of those who would affirm the characteristics so described. That the true Church is as you say I have no doubt and neither do I believe the author does as well, but the Church of appearances that we see so often and is so commonly lived out by the prelates and it appears, sadly, even the Pope himself, is aptly described as he says.
I am merely asking the question about that pesky elephant in the room.
There seems to be a common opinion which says, “This is the way the Church is today. It’s different, synthetic and new. Get over it. There’s no other explanation.”
I hope Mr Rossi thinks otherwise.
The present situation is a sign –not “another Church” but a sign like the removal of the “constant sacrifice” mentioned by the prophet Daniel– By said sign we know of the nearness of God’s intervention. One could have said at a certain point during the Passion of Our Lord: “Is this the Messiah, the Christ? Look at him all covered in blood and thoroughly humiliated?” but we know now that would have been a grave mistake.
In Emmaus, when the disciples recognize the Lord at the inn, Jesus disappears and only the Consecrated Bread remains. That is the first time Our resurrected Lord shows Himself to the disciples (He had appeared to Mary and to the Magdalene that morning) and is also the first Eucharistic lesson after the Resurrection. That was “in the beginning” of the Church. There will come a time when the Consecrated Bread will not be there and then Our Lord will be manifested for all to see. We seem to be approaching that moment: invalid Eucharist is no Eucharist. God will not allow the heretics to throw what is holy to the swine. It is impossible to completely remove Christ from the world because He has conquered it.
If the reality of the Eucharist is not there, Christ must appear suddenly just as He disappeared from the table at Emmaus.
Well, that’s an interesting idea.
Indeed. It’s been prophesied by several alleged mystics over the years.
From what I have read, assuming the mystics are correct, many Catholics, including a large portion of clerics, will lose the Faith entirely.
As a result, they will lose the validity of the Mass, similar to what happened with the Protestants.
Now that the highest authority in the Church appears to sanction sacrilege, it would be a most fitting, but terrible, punishment.
The following is merely my opinion, and I do not declare it binding upon anyone, and if the Church teaches otherwise at some future point, I retract what I say in advance.
I think the Novus Ordo Missae could be the abomination of desolation for two reasons.
First, it offers false worship. God revealed his Truth, i.e the Deposit of Faith, through the Church. The Novus Ordo Missae deliberately suppresses many elements of the Deposit of Faith – most importantly that the Mass is the renewal of the Sacrifice of Calvary upon the Altar under the appearance of bread and wine – and offers this new, synthetic rite back to God – supposedly as the official worship of God by His Church. What an insult to the Precious Blood, to suppress those very Truths He gave us, which Blood Our Lord Jesus Christ shed to purchase His Church. (Acts 20:28)
Secondly, it is of doubtful validity; simply by the mere fact that a minister uses this rite, and not the Roman Catholic Rite manifests a defect of intention. The minister does not manifest the intention to do what the Church does, and therefore it is doubtful that the Sacrament is confected.
The Novus Ordo is a theological parallel of a protestant Lord’s Supper service, not a propitiatory Sacrifice offered for the living and the dead, which is the infallible teaching of the Church.
So how do we know the Novus Ordo minister/presider has the intention to do what the Church does? We simply don’t. Even if he tells you he has the right intention, but then uses this new rite – which does not “profess” the Catholic Faith – then we can only assume that he does not intend to do what the Church does. This lack of external manifestation of correct intention, by itself either makes the mass doubtfully valid or outright invalid.
Yes, it’s a dark age we live in, but the sun will come out eventually. In the meantime, as far as I can make out, the best and safest thing to do is to go to an SSPX chapel, receive the Sacraments as they have been handed on since the time of the Apostles, and hold fast to all of tradition.
My favorite part of the NO is, “…it will become our spiritual drink.”
Gatoraide is a drink. Grape juice is a drink.
Here’s a few quotes from heretics talking about their understanding of the sacraments being received only “spiritually“; the quotes were collected together in Patrick Henry Omlor’s “The Robber Church”. You can see why they inserted this phrase “spiritual drink” into the Novus Ordo – to please the heretics and effectively deny the Divinely revealed truth of transubstantiation.
(1) Wycliffe: “The Body of Christ is given, taken, and eaten in the Supper only after an heavenly and spiritual manner. And the mean whereby the Body of Christ is received and eaten in the Supper is faith.”
(2) Ridley: “He left the same in mystery to the faithful in the Supper, to be received after a spiritual communication, and by grace.”
(3) Coverdale: “(W)e think not our Lord Jesus Christ to be so vile that He may be contained in corruptible elements. Again, lest the force of this most sacred mystery should be diminished, we must think that it is wrought by the secret and wonderful power of God,and that His Spirit is the bond of this partaking, which is for that cause called spiritual.”
(4) Cranmer: “Although Christ be not corporally in the bread and wine … He is effectually present, and effectually worketh, not in the bread and wine, but in the godly receivers of them, to whom He giveth His own flesh spiritually to feed
upon.”
(5) Again Cranmer in replying to Gardiner: “Therefore … we do not pray absolutely that the bread and wine may be made the body and blood of Christ, but …that therewith in spirit and in truth we may be spiritually nourished.”
(6) Latimer: “Then we be assured that we feed upon Him spiritually.”
(7) The Liturgy, of King Edward VI: “For us He hath not only given His body to death and shed His blood, but also doth vouchsafe in a sacrament and mystery to give us His said body and blood spiritually, to feed and drink upon.”
“… (F)or then we spiritually eat the flesh of Christ and drink His blood, then we dwell in Christ and Christ in us.”
“He hath left in these holy mysteries as a pledge of His love, and a continual remembrance of the same, His own blessed body and precious blood, for us spiritually to feed upon, to our endless comfort and consolation.”
(8) Grindall: “This is the spiritual, the very true, the only eating of Christ’s body.”
(9) Jewell: “Thus, spiritually, and with the mouth of faith, we eat the body of Christ and drink his blood.”
(10) Beacon: “He is also eaten or received spiritually when we believe in Christ.”
(11 ) “The Book of Common Prayer” (1549): “but also doth vouchsafe in a Sacrament and mystery to give us his said body and blood to feed upon them spiritually.”
Very interesting, I’d say.
Maybe it’s Our Lord’s way of separating the wheat (Catholics) from the chaff (enemies of Catholics) since the latter were so entrenched–even before the Council. We will not obey or do the will of the enemies of Christ. Not ever. Today, we’re scattered, swept away, maligned, calumnated, hated, and eclipsed.
That a true pope will come to unite everyone l have no doubt, but we must work for it.
Independent fiefdoms will not do it; clinging to bad theology will not do it; and cowardly enabling Newchurch will not do it.
What will do it is praying for one another and praying for the restoration of the Catholic hierarchy. Live as a Catholic according to True Devotion to Mary by St. Louis de Monfort in addition to what is already done that you do. We must mortify ourselves. Live as a catacomb Catholic.
Indeed CT,
In the authentically Catholic understanding of living the “perfect creaturely detached”, interior life. In caritas.
I agree. I believe this is the Passion of the Church — we are not above our Master and we must follow him to Calvary also — and therefore those who want to save themselves will find perdition while those who follow Jesus even unto death will find salvation. There many parts of Scripture that appear to represent this hour. Peter in Matthew 16 having “ideas of men” and being called “Satan”… and later at the Transfiguration “knew not what he was saying.” I find there a prophetic model, the last Peter before the Passion of the Church may hold ideas of men and be as confused as the first Peter contemplating Our Lord transfigured. That may be functional to the end times: the abomination of desolation reaches the throne of Peter and stands where it ought not. That according to Jesus in Matthew 24 is the last sign of the Church as the world descends into the chaos of the Great Tribulation.
Good afternoon Christian West,
Thoughtful and rather intuitive reasoning on your part. It would seem though, that as we human creatures live in a time and space continual reality, there must be ‘ “another Church” ‘ as you refer to it. That which has “removed”, “removal” in your context used above, the ‘ “constant Sacrifice” ‘, as you say and must be replaced with another “pseudo-sacrifice” if you will, as time and space abhors a vacuum and Lucifer cannot just remove, he must replace, or his deception will be void of the act which deceives. In caritas.
As I struggle to understand — and my musings are what they are: honest questions — I wonder if the Eucharist in this case is a sort of toggle switch: Christ disappears, bread remains (Emmaus) bread disappears, Christ comes (Parousia). As for the “two churches” perhaps the best contemporary comment I have read so far comes from an Argentine priest antipodal to Francis (Bergoglio) I quote:
“It boggles the mind to attempt comprehension of how the promises of assistance to the Church by the Divine Spirit in this cabbalistic era are going to be fulfilled, and how it will come to pass that “the gates of Hell shall not prevail.” But just as the Church began as the smallest of the seeds and became a huge tree, in the same manner she can be reduced in size and acquire a more modest shape. We know that the mystery of iniquity is already at work but we do not know the full extent of its power. However there is no difficulty in admitting that the Church in public view can be conquered by the enemy thus converting from Catholic Church to Agnostic Church. There could be two churches: one in public view, a Church magnified in propaganda, with well advertised bishops, priests, and theologians even with a Pope with ambiguous attitudes; and another Church, a church of silence with a Pope faithful to Jesus Christ in his teaching and with some loyal priests, bishops, and faithful spread about as pusillus grex (little flock) all around the earth. This second church would be the Church of the promises while the other defects or apostatizes. The same Pope could preside both churches that would appear to be one in appearance. The Pope with his ambiguous attitudes would validate the confusion. Because on one hand — being the head of the Church of Promises — he may profess an impeccable doctrine while on the other hand, by sending confusing, even reproachable signals, he would appear to be advancing the subversion and pastoral message of the “public” Church. The possibility we propose here has not been studied enough by ecclesiology. But if we look at it thoroughly we shall see that the promise of assistance [by the Holy Spirit] to the Church is limited to [a] avoiding the introduction of errors in the Roman See and in the very Church and [b] that the Church shall not perish or be completely destroyed by her enemies. None of those promises contained in the Gospel is invalidated by the hypothesis hereby proposed. On the contrary both hypothesis gain feasibility if we consider the scriptural passages that refer to the great apostasy. Such defection will be complete but must coincide with the perseverance of the Church until the end. Our Lord is quoted in the Gospel asking “But when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?” (Luke 18:8.) Saint Paul in 2 Thessalonians 2:3 calls that defection of the faith a universal apostasy that will coincide in time with the manifestation of the “man of wickedness, the son of perdition.” That universal apostasy is the total secularization of public and private life that is proceeding apace in today’s world. The only alternative to the Antichrist shall be Christ, and Christ will dissolve the Antichrist with His Breath thus fulfilling the final act of liberating History. Mankind will not remain alienated under the evil one. It has not been announced that Christ will save the masses though He shall save His Church, the “little flock” (Luke 2:32) for it is the Father’s good pleasure to give them the kingdom.”
[Fr. Julio Meinvielle (1905-1973) quoted from his book (first published in 1970, this quote below is from the Spanish 2nd. edition of 1994, pp. 363-364) From the Kabala to Progressivism. Original title: De la Cabala al Progresismo a PDF edition in Spanish is available on line. Quote translated.]
Thank you for that, Christian West.
On my first read of this, that which you quote above, I have not yet read anything that places into the existential reality that which is occurring through and within the Church of Christ Jesus, as this does. Another way to see this is in the most perspicacious dive into the art of the double entendre’ and in this context the “double life” of the Church— as Church and as church. The Church of course is Divine in Origin and in sustenance. The “church” is the superficial understanding of Church in its temporal praxis, writ large in this time and at once, church is the essence of the “religion of man”, Freemasonic as immanently understood, while it is perfectly in keeping with the dictates of the “Alta Vendita”. This church, which existentially usurps Church in its praxis, as it controls and operates all of the physical facade of Church, has replaced the Holy Sacrifice with what I will call the “pseudo-sacrifice”, or minimally understood as the perception of the Sacrifice, at once recognizing that Almighty God in His infinite Mercy maybe allowing the confection of His Singular Sacrifice in the midst of innumerable sacrilege and blasphemy with the praxis of Novus Ordo Missae in this world.
The Alta Vendita had as its final conclusion, the destruction of the Catholic religion and that is being and perhaps has been done. The Catholic Faith, the gift of His Church, His Mystical Body and Bride, Apostolic in its Divine genesis and sustenance, is that which our Blessed Dominus Deus Sabbaoth and Savior, Jesus the Christ, commanded would prevail until the end of time. While He also questioned whether there be any faith left upon the earth when the Son of Man returns, as noted above. Thus, in the hearts of man will there be any true reception of that most precious and infinitely so, Gift of the One True Faith, that which is both freely given and completely undeserved, without which there is no salvation ?; extra ecclesia nulla salus—deFide, at the time of His Second Coming as Judge.
And so the church has as its faith— the faith in man and his technology, as its religion—the religion of man celebrating freedom as license, as its way of living—all things desired of the flesh and that is proclaimed as “good”. All the while the True Religion of the One True Faith, whose Church is a Supernatural Society, has as its Founder and Master, the Son of God made Man, whose Singular Sacrifice known to Him from all eternity, provides for His miserable human creatures their means of Redemption, while at once their salvation is left to them. In caritas.
That abomination would be a far greater sacrelige if it were valid, but as it stands it’s bad enough.
Mike,
I do not hold that this “Modern, Synthetic Church” is the same as the “indefectible and immutable Catholic Church.” I hold to St. Augustine’s idea that the loyal “City of God” and the sinful “City of Man” do not equate with Church and State. There have been and will continue to be good and evil churchmen and good and evil laymen. Adherence to the Deposit of Faith is the only scorecard you can hope to use to tell the players apart — and even then only God knows the hearts of men. The point of the article is that we all live in polluted waters. There are those who offer us a corrupted view of the church and a corrupted vision of the state. Neither is acceptable, i.e., counterfeits. The only way out is to stick close to Christ and what His Church has perennially taught.
Dear C.T. Rossi,
If I may add, what seems to be in our midst is this abhorrent creature, the anti-Church, whose prelates and priests preach the anti-Gospel, all in preparation for the person of the anti-Christ. While all dressed up and adorned Catholic as this creature controls and operates the “Catholic” structure, it remains as it only can, antithetical in the Hegelian understanding to Her, One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic. Pope Leo XIII warned us of such in his time, 1884, as per “Humanum Genus” for instance. This “Novus Ordo Missae” was and is the sine quo non that had to be implemented to achieve the utter transformation in the praxis of worship, faith, and the life lived, all in perfect accord with lex orandi, lex credendi, lex vivendi. This existentially accomplished by a mercenary of Lucifer, in the human person of the Freemason Annibale Bugnini, all achieved as he wore the robes of the Church, as Pope Leo XIII warned us would happen as a result of the Freemasonic infiltration to the highest levels of the Church prelature. This man concocted an ideological means of prayer, the “new” Liturgy of the Holy Mass, which would ultimately and utterly lead to the destruction of the Catholic religion in the minds of the Catholic faithful, as the ideological manifestation imposed upon the members of the Divine Society of the One, True, Catholic, Faith. This to be understood in perfect contradistinction to that which can never be destroyed, the One True Faith Herself, as per the command of our Blessed Dominus Deus Sabbaoth and Savior, Jesus the Christ, Son of the Living God. Lastly, this Novus Ordo Missae would seem to be the instrument used at the caprice of the Luciferians from their secret societies, as heralded in their “Alta Vendita”, circa mid 18th century or so. In caritas.
““We must strip from our Catholic prayers and from the Catholic liturgy everything which can be the shadow of a stumbling block for our separated brethren; that is for the Protestants.”
– Archbishop Annibale Bugnini, L’Osservatore Romano, March 19, 1965
Good morning, winslow,
What can be said, other than, res ipsa loquitur. Amen.
A very aggressive effort was made to change every visible aspect of the mass and the interior of newly constructed churches. It seems like a very great coincidence indeed that plans described over 100 years earlier in the Alta Vendita came to fruition in the aftermath of Vatican II. Everyone should read the Alta Vendita and consider the plans that were made and results accomplished and where we are at today vs. before Vatican II.
Pewsitter.com has has just announced that The Maltese Catholic Church (http://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2017-01-13/malta-church-goes-beyond-pope-in-remarriage-guidelinesh) is explicitly allowing divorced and civilly remarried Catholics to receive confession and Communion while the diocese of Philadelphia has prohibitted that practice. We are supposed to have One faith. A unity of faith. More and more I see only one sword, the sword of the state, defining what we will believe as Catholics through the agency of the freemasons in the Church. It has been the state that has tried for the last 200+ years to co-opt marriage, through civil marriage. Then the state allowed divorce and remarriage and is currently attempting to impose that on the Catholic Church through Pope Francis, our beloved heretic freemason. Ah, next year will it be the blessing of lesbian and homosexual “marriages” in church? Will that come before or after married priests and female deacons? Again the impetus for this will be the same infiltrators: money people, freemasons, power players, etc., All of them derived from the Deep State not the church. The holders of the Catholic faith have been rendered toothless and clawless before the all powerful satanic state.
And so now the Archbishop of Malta (which I had thought Catholic) tells adulterers they may take Holy Communion. http://www.catholicherald.co.uk/news/2017/01/13/maltas-bishops-tell-the-remarried-take-communion-if-you-feel-at-peace-with-god/
None of these reformers ever changed the policy on financial contributions. If “avoiding sex may be humanly impossible” as that bishop declares, may be parting with my few and hard earned dollar may be indeed a sacrifice beyond my capacity. Have faith, the Lord will provide, reformers.
Well in Germany they even tightened it up. Anyone not paying the Church tax cannot be buried in consecrated ground I understand.
Interesting.
That has been the threat for many years.
Speaking as a Maltese Catholic, living in Malta, I consider this as a monumental mistake, for which the Maltese bishops, along with Bergoglio, the German bishops and their ilk will have to answer before God’s tribunal. In the course of 2013 years of its history , the Catholic Church has never, under any circumstances, allowed married and divorced cohabiting couples whose first marriage was still valid to receive Holy Communion. Then Bergoglio appeared and there was light. Anyone who claims that AL is in continuity with what the Church has always and everywhere taught is either misguided or in bad faith, probably as in this case, inspired by pusillanimous instincts. The fact that different dioceses in different countries are adopting different pastoral actions based on different interpretations of AL reveals the ambiguous, divisive nature of this document and its Protestantising implications. This puts in question the nature and operation of the three sacraments of Matrimony, Holy Communion and Confession as the Church has always preached and practiced them in one stroke. One should remind the Maltese Bishops about the words of Sister Lucia to Cardinal Cafarra that the final assault of the devil on the Catholic Church will revolve round the destruction of marriage and the family. The sad thing about the Maltese Church is that this was to be expected from the Gozitan Bishop Mario Grech, somewhat of a weather vane, but thoroughly disappointing from Archbishop Scicluna, who was once directly tutored by both St JPII and Benedict. But no surprise either, for Christ was abandoned by his disciples in Gethsemani – and make no mistake about it, this is the agonising Gethsemani moment for the Catholic Church, initialising it’s approaching Passion. May St John Fisher bless and protect us all.
Can you tell us whether there are any priests in Malta who will resist this? The bishop’s statement is supposed to be read in all the churches there. How about the faithful? Any resistance groups in Malta?
I have not read or heard of a single priest who has publicly declared his resistance, though doubtlessly there are those who may disagree. As elsewhere, most of the signs of resistance have come from lay commenters like me commenting on blogs. Maltese clergy in general are not, to put it mildly, daring or outspoken, except unfortunatly for the occasional self styled progressive ones, and these of course welcome AL with open arms.
Hi Katechon,
Thoughtful discussion. The problem, it would seem, of your Archbishop Scicluna, is that as you say, “…who was once directly tutored by both St. JPII and Benedict”, is that he was tutored by those two Modernists, who were and are intellectual phenomenologists, that philosophy which Pope Pius XI (if I recall it to be him specifically, correctly) alluded, as to be in contradistinction to the Aristotelian-Thomistic method of metaphysics, easily leading anyone who embraces it into profound error. Those two men knowingly or not (deceived or deceiving) played their “roles” near perfectly. Look to those given the ascent into the Bishopric and Cardinalate, at the behest of those two popes. The likes of Bergoglio and his “vice-pope”, Oscar Andres Cardinal Meradiaga, as two of so many for instances that could be listed. Infinitely better had it been that the Church would have gone without so many bishops and cardinals than these deceivers of the faithful. In caritas.
Hi Mark, to be fair, I don’t know whether you are aware that Archbishop Scicluna, who was both a civil and Canon lawyer, was once a student of Cardinal Burke? Moreover, at least on this particular issue, both St JPII and Pope Emeritus Benedict were perfectly orthodox in their teachings and pastoral practice. Apparently Scicluna is not simply the pedagogical product of his teachers, but a kowtowing ecclesiastical careerist who may want to show his gratitude to Bergoglio for having elected him Archbishop. If I am being unfair in this assessment, then his spiritual and doctrinal insight must have become seriously skewed.
Hello Katechon,
Frankly, I had never heard of Archbishop Scicluna prior to reading your words, rather my response was in taking your statement of the Archbishop as statement in fact and then building my conclusions around your statement as fact. Please pursue more due diligence on the part of your consideration of JPII and BXVI as “perfectly orthodox”, as the writings of BXVI over his entire clerical career, when deeply searched and understood and sometimes not so much so needed, and the acts of JPII, speak to the contrary. See here: http://padrepioandchiesaviva.com/uploads/The_New_Tower_of_Babel_final.pdf and here: http://www.waragainstbeing.com/node/40, as well as current thought about Raymond Cardinal Burke: http://www.waragainstbeing.com/ and lastly, development of the thought of Joseph Ratzinger: http://www.waragainstbeing.com/parti-article12. James Larson, an adept purveyor of the deeply epistemological view into reality, is a long time writer at “ChristianOrder”. I pray this helps. In caritas.
By whatever set of words we might wish to describe the actions of Luther, Henry VIII and Pope Francis the situation boils down to wanting to have things their own way, not God’s.
The whole point of Christ coming here in the first place was to teach us that obedience to God’s will was the way to happiness and the way to heaven. Wanting to have things your own way leads to unhappiness and to hell.
Why is it so difficult to understand this and act upon it? The evidence in favor of obeying God’s Will literally screams at us. Are we really that stupid? Lord have Mercy.
But Michael, you forget that the here and now is so close! The far off is, well, far off. Sinful man has great difficulty postponing gratification of anything, especially bodily things. To wait for Heaven seems not only difficult, but foolish.
Now that everything is our modern world is available to us anytime, anywhere with the push of a button we are simply never taught that we can and must WAIT for some better good. As for the cross? Forgetaboutit.
Yes, that’s why patience is a virtue; it’s difficult. And since delayed gratification is not practiced many become addicts of one kind or another, which is to say, sinners of one kind or another. And once this happens unhappiness sets in, and feeding the addiction which only makes it worse. But not to worry. Our modern psychiatric profession has now defined addiction as a disease, so we have an excuse. And even better, someone else will pay for us to get rid of it.. Isn’t it marvelous, our whole privileged world has become something of an insane asylum where the inmates pretend to be happy.
Just as with Amoris Laetitia the statement of the Maltese Bishops is ambiguous: “he or she cannot be precluded from participating in the sacraments of Reconciliation and the Eucharist” Well of course if somebody goes to confession and confesses their adultery and has a firm purpose of amendment then they can partake of the Eucharist. But few will interpret the statement that way; they will think that somehow an imperfect confession will be sufficient or perhaps that they can partake of the Eucharist without going to confession. The traditional teaching of the Church is simply not set out.
It is a type of dishonesty to only accent part of the truth. It can turn the truth into a lie. Why is clarity seen as a problem?
Dear BX,
Yes, the art of the Modernist, aka, one who expertly applies the Hegelian Synthesis; to affirm that which is internally denied and to deny that which is internally affirmed. In praxis this looks like that which it is, “half truths”, utterly misleading in their ambiguity with the most purposeful intention to mislead. In caritas.
May I say that Pope Francis for his errors hopefully will convert. Maybe we have received a complicated Papacy due to the infiltration of satan. Sometimes we have to experience the bad to receive the good, in other words wouldn’t it be a miracle to see someone go from being “everything is merciful” to actually “hang on Jesus was actually very clear in his teachings”. That’s my hope anyway.
By the way Pope Francis has actually mentioned going to confession a great deal, he may have tried to change who can access communion and confession but that fight is being fought by the great Cardinals and eventually the great Cardinals will win that fight.
In all honesty, when one says they are a son of the Church, encourages confession, personally goes to confession frequently, and then encourages confusion, appoints heterodox prelates, and constantly vilifies his opponents what exactly are we to think?
Dear BX, Obviously through God’s grace that can be taken away at any moment, we are to think that he is in error and the error should be corrected, this is ongoing through those great Princes of the faith. However to desire the conversion of those that cannot accept truth as truth, to defend the truth is what we through God’s grace are called to do. Do you remember Saint Therese trying to convert the murderer? The killer that was executed in France but kissed the Cross of Our Lord Jesus Christ on his way to his execution? Her prayers were answered.
Yes, I think about that story often. My point is that I find his words confusing and exhibit a divided mind. It is incomprehensible to me.
Dear BX, you and me both and we are called to deny these deceptions. As Saint Paul Said “Stand Firm” When we had our children baptised we were asked as parents “DO you reject satan and all of his works” the response has to be a resounding “Yes we do!” but how can we defeat satan? Mass, Confession, Prayer and Adoration. It’s not easy to pray for those who seem to want to destroy everything that is true but through prayer, we win in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord!
Saint Therese, pray for the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church! Send an immense rose of enlightenment to rest upon the mind and heart of Pope Francis and upon the minds and hearts of those bishops and cardinals who have not yet supported the dubia. Pray God will have mercy on us sinners who occupy the pews each Sunday in order to be guided by the Supreme Will of God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. Have mercy on us all!
Dear Lady Katherine, Count me in with your beautiful prayer.
For years I have read that the Church is very slow to change. Like turning a huge ship it takes time. But, now we see that is untrue. The Church apparently can change on a dime.
When the change is counterfeit, at least. And administered by one whose beliefs often appear inconsistent with Divine revelation. Sigh.
Fair point
“What Kasper’s theory of Church-State dialogue does is sideline the Church as an intellectual and cultural force.” But it makes him feel he’s important on the international political scene, even as the Davos Crowd and the other oligarchs laugh at him.
Buying into all the priorities and values of the secular world is always fraught. Far better to stay with the reality given us by God Himself and by speaking about God’s reality in ordinary accessible language, encourage and support those with tentative doubts who sense something is amiss in the grand myths being promulgated today – saving the earth by zero population growth for starters!
The longer the labile lutheran of the Holy See reigns, the clearer the truth becomes in stark contrast to his heterodox praxis.
This papacy is what used to be called by the old-timers, a blessing in disguise. He is the face of the New Theology; he is the face of Vatican Two; and while his face may remind some of the Cheshire Cat, his face bears a smile and that face that must become a far different face if his immortal soul is to attain unto salvation; his face must display genuine repentance and weeping and IANS prays for that at Mass.
My mind and heart are singularly enlightened, as never before, by Mr. Rossi’s article and the combox discussion here. It appears to me as a share of the movement of the Holy Spirit, similar to that which filled the Upper Room at that first Pentecost.
Thank you! God bless you!