A MAN STEPS FORWARD

A Bishop confronts the screaming jackals.  He does it calmly and bravely, like a man.

http://wdtprs.com/blog/2013/06/bp-paprocki-in-a-hostile-crowd-tells-it-like-it-is/

I have hopes that a few real men will appear in episcopal robes who will counteract the Lehmanns, the Mahonys, the Mullers and the Danneels'.  Some, thanks be to God, are emerging from the shadows.  One such is Bishop Thomas Paprocki.

It would not be hard to imagine the Bishop feeling the wrath of the Devil during this meeting.  As one who has in a small way confronted shrieking evil I know the feeling of the blood turning to ice in my veins as I watch the deep hatred in their eyes.  No one who has not experienced it can know the feeling.  I suspect the good Bishop knows the feeling now if he hadn't already before.

It has become the good and holy custom to pray for erring Bishops, Cardinals and other religious (while hoping they will go away) so that they may become once again Catholics firm in their faith.  We suggest that in addition to those prayers let us offer a few for men like Bishop Paprocki.  May his courage lead the way for others to follow.

God bless 'im! 

CARDINALS ABBOTT AND COSTELLO

His Eminence Bud Abbott (r) and His Eminence Lou Costello (l) at the recent Conclave

The Catholics of Washington and New York are watched over by, respectively, Cardinals Bud Abbott and Lou Costello, sometimes also known as Cardinals Wuerl and Dolan.  They are a famous team.  Under their careful guidance Holy Communion is given to swine, pimps, sodomites and Buddhists without the benefit of the Sacrament of Penance first or even the nicety of being a Catholic.  That annoyance of receiving absolution prior to receiving the Body and Blood of Christ is reserved only for lowly Catholics in the pew.  The rich, the powerful and the perverted are not troubled by such incidentals.

Cardinal Abbott writes scholarly books about the Eucharist...then refuses to deny It to public sinners, thereby bringing down judgment upon himself and the recipient.  It is more important for him to be seen as tolerant, thinking, reflective and nice...and a good American.  Cardinal Abbott very much likes applause.  On occasion, he will applaud himself:

Cardinal Abbott Wuerl lives in Washington.

Cardinal Costello on the other hand lives in New York City.  He likes to laugh and to joke and to jab his elbow into people's ribs.  He laughs quite a lot.  He is enjoying himself immensely.  He believes he is the greatest thing since sliced bread.  He even sometimes likes to think of himself as Batman:

Cardinal Costello Dolan also likes to think of himself, on rare occasions, as a Cardinal.  But not so often that it might take him away from his favorite role, that of Cardinal-Comedian, or the Clown Prince of the Catholic Church.  He will giggle at the slightest provocation.  If he is seated with the rich and the powerful and a mildly amusing joke is told he will roar with a laughter that will bring the house down.  The Cardinal doesn't really like to be too serious in his role as a Cardinal.

These are two of the most powerful prelates in the US Episcopate, dedicating their lives to spreading the Faith....as long as it doesn't offend anyone.

The only question therefore to be asked is, who's on first?

THE POPE WON'T "JUDGE" HOMOSEXUAL PRIESTS?

A news flash from RT Today:  

"Pope Francis ‘won’t judge gay priests’

Pope Francis said he won’t judge priests for their sexual orientation, speaking Monday during a plane journey back to the Vatican from his first foreign trip in Brazil. “If someone is gay and he searches for the Lord and has goodwill, who am I to judge?” AP quoted Francis as saying. His predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI, authored a document that said men with deep-rooted homosexual tendencies should not be priests."

Could someone well versed in moral theology, and not one prone to mental gymnastics, please explain what that is supposed to mean?  Is this another of those famous off-the-cuff poorly worded blurts of Pope Francis, or is he saying something definite here?   With him it is very hard to know.

The extremely tiresome "don't be judgmental" cliche comes to mind when hearing these words the Pope is supposed to have said.  Did the Pope mention mortal sin?  No.  Did he mention Confession or Penance?  No.  Did he mention what the sin is that cries to Heaven for vengeance?  No.  Read those remarks again very slowly and very carefully and without exasperation.  What is he saying?

First of all, Francis apparently accepts the ludicrous notion that someone can be born with the homosexual perversion, as if God made him that way.  Is that what he thinks if he uses such phrasing as "If someone is gay..."

Secondly the Holy Father seems to be quite comfortable using the perfectly innocent word "gay" to describe the most unspeakable of sexual deviance.  That tells us many, many things.

"Who am I to judge?"  Well, dear Holy Father if you are incapable of determining the difference between right and wrong and are perfectly comfortable with sodomites going on their merry way to eternal damnation then perhaps, with all due respect, you need to find a new line of work to be in.

A NUDIST JOINS THE PAPAL COMMISSION

Really, this is all getting a little ridiculous, isn't it?

Yes, the title of this post is a bit over the top, I know, and I realize that circumspection is not a hallmark of today's movers and shakers, but who on earth is watching the store over at the Vatican?

http://chiesa.espresso.repubblica.it/articolo/1350565?eng=y

Magister's article gives more important information on the Ricca affair (concluding that he hopes the Pope will now at last take action) but then gives us a portrait of a thirty-something babe who has been chosen as a member of the famous Vatican commission everyone is talking about.

Good grief, Your Holiness, couldn't someone else have been found to fill the post rather than her?

DESPAIR AND REMBERT WEAKLAND

A bronze depicting that notable protector of children Rembert Weakland (l), flanked by lesser lights St John the Evangelist and St Anne, mother of Mary.  It now graces the Cathedral in Milwaukee.

What goes through the mind of a man who is struggling to overcome a dark and terrible sin when he learns that his new boss or superior has that same sin and is not only not trying to overcome it but in fact apparently revels in it?  That question came to mind when the news came out in a recent front page article in the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel listing the names and faces of some forty-five priests (one or two of whom I knew personally) who had been secret homosexuals and had molested a number of young men (though some of those named were not sodomites and committed natural, as opposed to unnatural, sins).

Some of these priests were molesters before that most strange of men, Rembert George Weakland, replaced William E Cousins as Archbishop of Milwaukee.  But such men flourished under Weakland's fiefdom and many more were added to the list, a fact oddly missing from most of the news reports of the debacle in Milwaukee.  The pro-sodomy Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel went to extreme lengths to make Weakland look relatively benign in their news coverage, directing most of their venom at his replacement, Timothy Dolan.  One had to look with a microscope at the article to learn that the homosexual Weakland was finally relieved of his post after his own dirty little secret became known by one of his former lovers, wherein the world learned that the Archbishop had used about a half million Church dollars as hush money to keep his sordid double-life out of the newspapers (to no avail as it ultimately turned out). [This article from the much-missed web site Seattle Catholic gives the details.]  The Journal-Sentinel is really quite a funny publication.  On the one hand they will praise the recent Supreme Court decision giving the right of two men to "marry" and adopt boys who will, just as Mary's little lamb followed Mary, be perfect, ready-made victims for these newly-wed pederasts, and on the other they will condemn priestly pederasts for doing the same thing.  One wonders how the editors of that newspaper handle all these difficult mental gyrations.  One wonders how they can sleep at night.

The proclivities of the new Archbishop, one of Cardinal Villot's "boys" given to Milwaukee in 1977, were to be known virtually from the start of his sad reign so these homosexual priests preying on adolescent boys were either happy that one of their own was now in charge or in personal despair knowing that they would get no help from this man in fighting their terrible temptations.  Weakland telegraphed what was going through his mind when he would force priests and seminarians to view pornography, homo and hetero, at a number of their diocesan meetings.  Was it for recruitment purposes, one wonders?  In any event the resolve of those priests who were struggling to overcome these hideous sins must have been sorely tried at such meetings.  It is not hard to see how some of them would fall victim to despair and even, at least in one case, suicide.

Think of a petty thief who quite reluctantly engages in a habit of filching from the cash drawer finding that his new boss shares the same proclivity.  If the boss can do it, he thinks, why should he be so worried over it?  Weakland's promotion of this unspeakable vice is something he will one day have to answer for either on earth or before his Judge.  The number of priests who shared his sin and fell into despair because of his promoting of it are also things Weakland will have to answer for.  For a Bishop to drive not only his flock but his own priests to despair is a serious matter.  How many souls were lost because of this...lost, as in eternal damnation forever?

I hope the higher-ups in Rome reflect upon this when next they choose to send a man to oversee a Diocese.  I say these words even while reflecting on the Ricca scandal for which we all await a Papal response while not being distracted by the hoopla surrounding the latest rock star event in Rio.

THE KANSAS CITY SHUFFLE - VATICAN STYLE

GUEST POST:

The Vatican City Shuffle:

The Conning of Christendom

By Timothy J Cullen

“A Kansas City Shuffle is when everybody looks right, you go left.” (“Mr. Goodkat,” Lucky Number Slevin)

          When the Second Vatican Council ended nearly half a century ago in 1965, the Roman Catholic Church and Christendom were about to initiate a process of change that would prove to be as profound as that brought about by the Protestant Reformation, although perhaps it would be better said “to continue” rather than “to initiate” a process of change begun even earlier and never truly interrupted.

          What makes Vatican II a watershed in Church history is the acceleration and profundity of the process of change: simply put, it is difficult for older Catholics to recognize as the Catholic Church the international organization headquartered in Vatican City and recently presided over by Pope Benedict XVI, formerly Fr. Joseph Ratzinger, one of the principle intellectual architects of the transformation of the venerable religion that was the foundation of Western civilization and culture into… into… into what, exactly?

          Those seeking the answer to this question must look not to the theological antecedents of the transformers, but rather to the philosophical sources of their thought. As for the ongoing process of transformation—the so-called “hermeneutic of continuity”—, one needn’t look far: two of the former pope’s fellow Germans—Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) and G.W.F. Hegel (1770-1831) provided the inspiration for much of the thinking that went into both process and content.

          Space constraints require that the reader make the effort to familiarize himself with at least the general philosophical direction of both Kant and Hegel, but for the purposes of this essay, it should be noted that Hegel is now perhaps best known for what has come to be known as the “Hegelian dialectic,” generally conceived as the “thesis-antithesis-synthesis” model, though Hegel himself never phrased it so, but rather as “abstract-negative-concrete,” by which one may infer that his intention in developing the dialectic was to arrive at the “concrete”—the “synthesis”—though a process of mediation that would end with the retention of what is perceived as useful in the original proposition while employing the dialectical process to move beyond the limitations of the original. In other words, it is a process of continuous change, of immanence, both of these being absolutely antithetical to dogmatic Catholicism, which is to say the Catholic Church as it had existed since its establishment by Christ.

          The Hegelian dialectic was adapted by Marxist philosophers and politicians, most notably the dreaded and murderous Soviet dictators Lenin and Stalin. Communist fellow-travelers have also adopted and adapted the method as a valuable weapon in their intellectual arsenal. The dialectic allows for the slow but steady shifting of the “middle” toward one of the two poles in opposition. In practice, this has meant steadily shifting the “syntheses” to the political left, beginning each new dialectic with an ever-more-leftward-right, so to speak. Slowly but surely, the original “right” has disappeared to be replaced by a “right” that would once have been seen as “left.” It is this writer’s contention that nearly all the post-Vatican II Church hierarchy and clergy have been and continue to be complicit in this deliberate religio-cultural shift to the kind of intellectual subjectivism that characterizes both Protestantism in religion and the kind of oligarchic totalitarianism in politics that typifies both fascism and communism.

          The “Kansas City Shuffle” is a con-game that depends upon misdirection of the victim’s attention for its success. The modernists surrounding the former and present pope—and perhaps the former pope himself—are employing the “Vatican City Shuffle” to move the theological, political, social and cultural position of the Church slowly but surely steadily leftward in sync with what is taking place in secular Christendom, now no longer Christian in anything but name.

          There is an understandable reluctance on the part of the faithful to accept the truth of the above proposition: to do so could be seen as calling into question certain parts of fundamental Catholic doctrine. Then again, one could also posit that the hierarchy, the clergy, the religious and certainly the laity have not only called into question fundamental Catholic doctrine and dogma, but have by their actions demonstrated open defiance. Who, then, is correct? What should one consider Catholic doctrine when what was once quite clear has now become ambiguous to say the least?

          To the best of this writer’s admittedly limited understanding, the answer to the question “who?” is clear: the Holy Father, who is the undisputed head of the Church. Catholic doctrine is very clear on this point and it is an article of faith that the Holy Spirit takes an active part in the election of the successor of Peter. There can be no question that Benedict XVI was chosen pope. If he is in fact a heretic, an agent of the Father of Lies, a deliberate destroyer of the Roman Catholic Church, he is nevertheless the pope and one must believe that the Holy Spirit has made him pope for a reason beyond our present understanding. One could argue that Catholic dogma with respect to the pope has in a sense painted the Church into a corner, but dogma it is and it remains to be seen how the Church will exit the trap laid for her long ago.

          And if Benedict XVI, the modernists and now Pope Francis are in fact being guided by the Holy Spirit, difficult though that may be for a Traditionalist to accept? Should the good Catholic not humbly submit to changes he may find distasteful and threatening? Should one simply accept what the overwhelming majority of Catholics have not only accepted but embraced? Should one be “one with” the Holy Father and “fake it till you make it” with respect to acceptance and embrace of the now-not-so-new liturgy of Paul VI, assuming one accepts that the “new” Mass is valid? Is to do otherwise an act of defiance? Does obedience demand that one follow the Church into what one is in conscience convinced is error; is to do otherwise not the essence of Protestantism? These dilemmas have created great discomfort for Traditional Catholics for nearly fifty years now and show no sign of abating; quite the contrary. What is one to believe?

          Has the Holy Spirit placed upon the papal throne a series of “saboteurs” to test the Faithful? This cannot be dismissed as paranoid nonsense unless one is willing to ignore any and all objective evidence that the Church has been guided in a direction that seems to contravene Her two thousand year history. Or is it God’s will that the Church continue her transformation per the hermeneutic of continuity and that the old forms and faith wither on the vine until nearly no vestige of them remains?

          The “Motu Propio” with respect to what is now known as the “Extraordinary Form” of the Mass has not proven to be a great success in inspiring a restoration of the venerable Mass as it existed until 1969. Many bishops have either openly defied the pope or have quietly refused to offer the old Mass with good will or even polite resignation; indeed, the bishop of Lausanne, Geneva and Freiburg, Switzerland, has published a decree forbidding SSPX priests to celebrate the Mass in churches and chapels in his diocese! The bishop—also a Dominican theologian, Rector of Angelicum, Secretary of the International Theological Commission and member of the delegation representing the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in the Church’s talks with the Society of St. Pius X—cites in his decree a letter written by Benedict XVI to bishops worldwide stating that SSPX clergy “do not exercise legitimate ministries in the Church,” because the society lacks canonical status.[1] This apparently contradictory set of circumstances provides an unfortunately telling example of the “Vatican City Shuffle” in action.

          The “Shuffle” has presented Traditional Catholics with a paradox that will not be easily resolved: if the Roman Catholic Church has demonstrated a strong and apparently irreversible tendency to “Protestantize” herself, then is a Traditional Catholic who believes the aforementioned himself becoming a Protestant if he refuses to accept this tendency in spite of the fact that its characteristics are openly endorsed by recent popes and their hierarchy? Is the institutional Roman Catholic Church recently headed by H.H. Benedict XVI and now by Pope Francis truly what it claims to be, or is it in fact a Protestant simulacrum of what the Roman Catholic Church was until the transformation resulting from Vatican II? Or is the Traditional Catholic simply a stubborn holdout flirting with heresy by way of disobedience? Or is the Traditional Catholic correct in believing that it is Rome and not he who has gone dreadfully astray?

          The “Shuffle” is in play with respect to politics as well. Once a bastion of the “right,” very politically conservative, Holy Mother Church abandoned this posture by failing to condemn communism at Vatican II and has ever since shuffled slowly to the left, embracing globalism and socialism while paying lip service to conservatism by denouncing such brazenly Marxist manifestations as “Liberation Theology.” And socially? Well, simply look at how modern folk dress to go to Mass. Look at how the clergy dress for Mass! Not all that long ago, “abandonment of the clerical dress and state by clerics who have received major orders” was considered apostasy by the Church[2]; now it is the order of the day.

          Some years ago, this writer wrote a Remnant essay in defense of Benedict XVI entitled “On the Tines of Morton’s Fork,” which treats of someone in an unwinnable situation; that situation now applies to the Traditional Catholic: no matter what one does, one loses with respect to being in “full communion” with the pope and Holy Mother Church, seeming ever more like “Holy Step-Mother Church,” if the irreverence can be pardoned. For its failure to bend the knee before the changes of Vatican II, the SSPX has been rather unceremoniously kicked from the curb directly into the metaphorical gutter, as the institutional Church’s bishop of the home country of the SSPX demonstrates: those who do not keep in step with the shuffle are cast aside.

          This writer has lost his faith in the good intentions of the previous Holy Father and of his subordinates with respect to the Catholic faith; the intentions of the pope and his subordinates with respect to the institutional Church cannot be questioned if logical coherence with Church dogma is to be maintained; the “Vatican City Shuffle” has been superbly executed in that respect. Does this loss of faith damn him to hell? It may well. Can one act in opposition to conscience if conscience fails to conform to Church dogma vis-à-vis obedience, no matter how distorted it may now appear? Apparently not. And so…?

          There is a very poignant nineteenth century Negro spiritual sung by the late Paul Robeson (1898-1976 ) and in a very moving version by the late jazz singer Billie Holiday (née Eleanora Harris; 1915-1959) that is entitled “Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child;” this writer shares the feeling with respect to Holy Mother Church, who seems to have left as foundlings him and no small number of his fellow faithful, clergy and religious included.

          The “Vatican City Shuffle,” like the Hegelian dialectic that gave birth to it, has maneuvered many directly on to the tines of “Morton’s Fork” from which there is no truly acceptable release; every which way you look at it, you lose. One need look no further than at the examples of the various priestly fraternities that have tried to reach an accommodation, a “full canonical status” with the Roman Catholic Church as ruled over by the modernists St. Pius X demanded an oath against: they have either bent the knee or found themselves on the outside looking in.

          Bend the knee or not: that is your choice, a choice with consequences.

          Look right; go left! The “Vatican City Shuffle”!

          Care to dance?

          Damned if I do and damned if I don’t.

---

[1] http://clericalwhispers.blogspot.com.ar/2013/02/lefebvrians-are-suspended-divinis-they_2.html

[2] http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/01624b.htm

POSTSCRIPT:

We here at The Eye Witness are very pleased to present these thoughts from Mr Cullen, who has contributed many articles to such entities as LewRockwell.com and The Remnant.  

In his article above he paints a sad but truthful picture of some of the goings-on in Holy Mother Church that should concern not only Catholics but the whole world.  As goes the Church so goes civilization.

If I offer any criticism of Mr Cullen's thoughts above it would only be in the realm of the actions of the Holy Ghost during a papal Conclave.  I  remain unconvinced that we can say simply that the Holy Ghost personally chooses the Pope.  We heard much of this in the recent papal election.  The action of the Holy Spirit would seem to be more of a form of guidance to the electors, provided they directly and prayerfully ask for such help from the Third Person of the Blessed Trinity.  We have no assurance of that other than a naive hope that the Cardinals so meeting were asking the Holy Ghost for such guidance.  Indeed we have plenty of evidence that certain Cardinals were playing a purely political game and making sure that "their" candidate was getting the right number of votes.  The whole sodomite infiltration also cannot be ruled out of this sorry mix.

Whether or not God, Our Lord and the Holy Ghost are pleased with the current occupant of Peter's Chair I have no way of knowing.  The man is being showered with graces - more graces than those given to any other living person - but it is up to the man himself to cooperate with those graces something, again, I have no way of knowing.

We are grateful that Mr Cullen has offered this piece to us for our little blog and we hope that he will be no stranger to these pages in the future.  

FASCISM ON THE MARCH ONCE AGAIN

I wonder how much longer we American cowards are going to sit still for this:

http://rt.com/usa/obama-ndaa-appeal-suit-229/

Perhaps when a few doors are smashed open in the middle of the night?

IT'S TIME FOR FRANCE TO THROW OUT HOLLANDE

From Le Salon Beige:

 A picture of policemen that says it all

On the world most beautiful's avenue, you can witness the reality of a National Day under Hollandia's Presidency : police violence, several plain-clothed and uniformed riot policemen against one citizen, a few gendarms on the lookout, barriers aimed at facilitating searches and filterings, a citizen hobbled, tourists appalled and all this for one small LMPT flag only.

But as we pointed out five days ago, some of the French police are getting tired of Hollande-style "justice".

From GalliaWatch:

 

RIOTS...ON YOUR DIME

Isn't is just charming to note that our tax dollars are being used by our (In)Justice Department to foment riots should the verdict in the George Zimmerman trial declare him not guilty?  Peruse this incredible revelation:

http://www.judicialwatch.org./press-room/press-releases/documents-obtained-by-judicial-watch-detail-role-of-justice-department-in-organizing-trayvon-martin-protests/

I had thought that I could no longer be shocked by the utter and complete corruption of our government in Washington, D.C., and its paymasters in New York.  I was wrong.

If large groups of ignorant thugs do become unglued over this we have our own government, and the news media (who just love to sell papers) and a plethora of other mindless idiots and the rabble they are rousing to thank for it.  Any blood that is, God forbid, spilled over this will be entirely on their hands.

Not, mind you, that spilling a little blood overly troubles our Assassin-in-Chief.

UPDATE 9:10 PM CENTRAL STANDARD TIME

I had no sooner posted this than the verdict of not guilty has just come in.  Please God that cool heads prevail.

AN INCOMPARABLE READ FROM ANTHONY FRASER

With our greatest thanks our dear friend Anthony Fraser is pressing on with his Editor's blog over at his APROPOS web site.  From time to time he publishes his usual pertinent observations on all things a Catholic should know.  This is crucial, because if the Catholics don't start to understand the problems in Church and State no one else will.

Tony has published his latest interesting blog notes and has included as a bonus an invaluable study of Democracy by Arnaud de Lassus, a man who is greatly admired around here at The Eye-Witness.

This is a must read, an important read.  You can find it by clicking on to the APROPOS link on the side bar or going to this link: http://www.apropos.org.uk/

Our sincerest gratitude to Tony Fraser, as always.

SOME HEARTENING NEWS

One has been wondering of late if all local police departments in America were becoming mere thugs for the emerging despotism forming in Washington.  Over at Gallia Watch, there is some encouraging news that tells us that at least some policemen in France are getting fed up with being government hit men:

http://galliawatch.blogspot.com/2013/07/we-refuse-to-be-political-police.html

God help them, in every way.  They'll need it.

THE WARPING OF HUMANITY

Abortion, the crime of the century, has lost its shock value.

It is awful to have to write that, but it is true.  Many of us no longer express our disgust over the direct, calculated conscienceless murder of unborn infants.  Many of us accept it as an inevitable, non-changeable thing that is now part of life in these times.  A great many people are tired of talking about it either out of a sense of defeatism or despair at their inability to put a stop to it.  It is understandable for some to arrive at that terrible conclusion. What can one say about a people who have arrived at such a state of mind?

It is unnecessary at this point to go over old ground and cover the details about how this criminal, monstrous commercial enterprise began.  What is gruesomely fascinating is how the minds of people have been warped by their indifference and then acceptance of this evil.

"People can get accustomed to anything, even cannibalism," wrote a great Russian author once.  That observation is being played out nearly around the world now.  Take, for example, this episode:

http://rt.com/usa/wendy-davis-texas-abortion-496/

Some people will, thanks be to God, be shocked by this.  One wonders if too many others will.  Too many of us have consciences that are dead or dying, or suffering from spiritual exhaustion.  We look upon such lunacy as depicted in that article with a complacent sigh.  But how much shock will register upon men's minds over what these harridans in Texas are saying and doing?  These people were there in Texas defending these crimes even after the ghoulish doings of Kermit Gosnell were splattered all over the nation's news outlets.   Even after that.

The abortion curse that has come down upon us is the result of many things, not least of which is the triumph of lying propaganda foisted upon the world by a worldwide media owned by essentially six people.  It is the triumph of mendacity on an international scale.  It is the triumph of corrupt governments of every type, be they dictatorships like China, fascist oligarchies like the USA, or even pseudo Monarchies like little Lichtenstein.  It is the triumph of stupidity and cowardice.

But religion is at the bottom of it all.  All wars, as we know, are religious.  The warriors for abortion are fanatical religious zealots.  Their religion is Paganism and it is the duty of pagans to wipe off the face of the earth the loveliness of Christ.  They are are the forces of Evil.  And those forces do not confine themselves only to the slaughter of the innocents.  In "The Everlasting Man" Chesterton wrote that the forces of evil are characterized by their hatred of children and by the very idea of childhood.  That, I think, would describe rather well what is going on in the souls of many.  Every moral corruption being pushed upon us by laws that are patently unjust has as its target children and childhood.  This hatred is palpable.  Only the willfully blind cannot see it.  Children are threatened by abortion, by usury, by international finance which seeks to reduce families to pauperism, by sodomy, by cohabitation, by divorce, by contraception and other forms of "planning" families, by rampant promiscuity.  Fatherless children grow up warped; children stuck in daycare centers while both parents work know no stable home life.  Each generation becomes worse, more detached from reality.  It is visible to all of us.

Can we not, once again, renew our sense of shock over abortion and all its pomps and works?  Many of us inevitably suffer "burnout" over these things.  That burnout is what the relentless purveyors of lying propaganda pray for, if they can be said to actually pray for anything at all.  But burnout can be mended in a number of ways, not the least of which is finding solitude in the quiet of a beautiful church to recharge our batteries and renew our sense of what this battle is, who are Enemy is and how we keep ourselves sane in the midst of such darkness.  We can do this, much like the long-distance runner who calls up that extra bit of strength just before the end.

The abortion monsters are not going to win but they are going to fight to the death trying.  Let's make their task more difficult.  The results of our efforts may never be known in this life.  But Someone watches, and knows.

ODOR IN THE COURT

One of the Nine Oracles, A. Kennedy

The non-surprise of the Supreme, All-Knowing, Divine Court's ruling is over now and all that is left is ruin and smoking rubble.  Everyone knew well in advance what the outcome was to be what with two lesbians on the Court and a few morally malnourished males alongside them, and with busloads of homosexually-disturbed people with banners painted and ready flocking to Washington for the event.  Even the bells of the National Cathedral tolled their approval.  This is what is called an educational moment.  The one glimmer of light that shines through all this is that more and more people are finally waking up to the fact that not only is Democracy a fraud perpetrated on peoples by an oligarchial elite, but a very dangerous fraud at that.

This is the logical outcome of 1776.  When "the people" decide what is law and what isn't law without bothering to discern what is the will of God in such matters it must lead to a moral collapse epitomized by such things as divorce, contraception, abortion and sodomy.  And it will go on from there.  In a very few short years you will be able to legally murder your mother.

Or your father, or your young children.

The US government, long under the sway of a myriad of sinister interests, wants all these aberrations to come to pass.  Therefore the Executive branch will impose its will, the Congress will supinely follow suit and the Supreme Cort will decide in their employer's favor.  Hilaire Belloc once amusingly pointed out that the democracy-crazed Americans are unaware that they are essentially living under a despotic monarchy...and he said that over 80 years ago. 

In a decade or so the black robed oracles of the Court will discover a right to bestiality.  Do not scoff; merely remember where you were forty-odd years ago when some said that they would one day enshrine sodomy into law and you thought such a notion absurd.

This is indeed the inevitable outcome of the American democratic system.  Vox populi, vox Dei: the voice of the "people" is the voice of God.  So under the Vox Populi doctrine (inscribed on every courthouse in this benighted land) God has approved of two sexual deviants having the ability to adopt innocent children and induce them into a life of the most vile forms of perversion, sickness and despair.

The People have spoken!  God wills it!  Some, tragically, believe such nonsense.

Who could have prevented such an outcome in this land?  Only the Church could have had they had strong Bishops and priests willing to convert their fellow citizens to Catholicism, or at the very least maintain a Catholic ethos.  But with rare exceptions most of  our Bishops, from Gibbons and Ireland on down to Dolan and Wuerl, are imbued with what Pope Leo XIII called a heresy.  In his Testem Benevolentiae he named the heresy: Americanism.  Instead of teaching the Faith strongly and forthrightly our Bishops and other clergy preferred to be good Americans first, and Catholic teachers second.  They were (and still are) so starry-eyed over the Masonic principles embedded in our Constitution that for them conforming to the will of the people comes first and above all else.  They didn't convert America; America converted them.

To illustrate, let us examine some of the reactions of several US Bishops to the farcical Supreme Court pronouncement.  Jerome Listecki, Archbishop of Milwaukee, has this to say, among other things:

"[the ruling]...in no way changes Church teaching with regard to the sacrament of marriage."

How does one even begin to comment on a sentence such as that?   Of course it doesn't change the Church's teaching, Your Excellency.  Who suggested that it did, or would, or could change a teaching of Catholic Church?

He continues:

 "The Catholic Church also opposes any and all unjust discrimination against, or mistreatment of, homosexuals. Neither their personhood nor their dignity is being questioned."

The Archbishop opposes "unjust discrimination" against homosexuals.  When said sexual pervert applies to the seminary, or to be a gym coach at a Catholic boy's school, and after being turned away files an unjust discrimination suit against the Chancery what will Archbishop Listecki's defense be now that he has gone on record as opposing such discrimination?

And this writer for one would be pleased if the Archbishop would clarify what it is that he finds dignified in homosexual unions which we know cry to Heaven for vengeance.  What "dignity" can be found in the actions of these tragic souls?  To even contemplate the actions of these people insults dignity, ours as well as theirs.  If His Excellency is only able to confine himself to PC cliches instead of telling these people as charitably as he can that they are on the road to Hell then perhaps he might consider reevaluating his current position in the Church.

Next comes the words of His Eminence Cardinal Dolan.  On the whole his statement is not terrible.  But he concludes with this thought:

"Now that the Supreme Court has issued its decisions, with renewed purpose we call upon all of our leaders and the people of this good nation to stand steadfastly together in promoting and defending the unique meaning of marriage: one man, one woman, for life. We also ask for prayers as the Court’s decisions are reviewed and their implications further clarified."

Here again we smell the sulphur of Americanism come through.  His Eminence expresses confidence in the system, assuring himself that if we really get to work within that system all will be well again.  Behold a man who will not let go of his childhood fancies.  Is His Eminence being naiive here?  Has Obamacare not cured him of the notion that trusting the United States to protect the freedom of Catholics is a non-starter?

Archbishop Timothy Broglio, after lamenting the "unfortunate" decision, has this astounding thing to say:

"As you know well, the Catholic Faith teaches clearly the biblical principle that all persons, regardless of their sexual inclination, are called to chastity regardless of their state of life."

According to Broglio there is a Biblical principle that pertains especially to people with odd "sexual inclinations" [Well, there is.  But not in thes sense that he imagines.].  I do not have the time to thumb through my Bible, either in Greek, Latin or English, to find where it teaches that there is a special kind of individual with different inclinations in these matters that is "called to chastity".  What the Archbishop seems to be saying here is that he accepts the demonstrably false principle that certain people are born sodomites, and that he thinks the Bible backs up such utter nonsense.  There is the "SSA", "sexual orientation", "born that way" lie coming into view again and accepted by a Bishop of the Catholic Church who should be able to distinguish between one who is spiritually disturbed enough to commit the most unspeakable sins and one who has a heart condition.  If this is the best that Broglio can do then his statement on the Court's decision is worthless.

He continues:

"I likewise remain confident that the First Amendment Constitutional guarantee of the “Free Exercise of Religion” will forever ensure that no restrictions or limitations on the teaching of the Catholic Faith will be placed on any Catholic priest or deacon serving in the Armed Forces. Furthermore, the Constitution guarantees that no endorsed minister will ever be compelled to perform a religious ceremony contrary to the dictates of his/her faith nor will today’s decision have any effect on the role and teaching ability of a priest or deacon in the pulpit, the classroom, the barracks or in the office."

Is it possible for a man to be so naive and still hold a high Churchly office?  Like Cardinal Dolan, Archbishop Broglio believes that the Constitution will soon come riding to the rescue of the Church.  I find such a Pollyanna attitude among our hierarchy to be positively weird.

To no one's surprise the Archdiocese of Washington under Donald Wuerl made several fatuous comments about it, emphasizing it with such strong words as "unsettling" and "troubling."  Of course it will not change his practice of giving sacrilegious Communions to the public sinners who are attacking the Church.  Let us leave in sadness the thought of such prelates as him.

After reading more ineffectual statements from what Rome considers Catholic leaders in this country let us turn for refreshment to the words a real man.  It is words like these which should be ringing in the ears of all the charlatans, villains and footpads who rule over us.  Bishop Thomas Paprocki of Springfield:

"As in the case of Roe v. Wade striking down abortion laws forty years ago, the United States Supreme Court has again usurped its legitimate prerogative through a raw exercise of judicial power by giving legal protection to an intrinsic evil, this time by striking down the Defense of Marriage Act in the case of U.S. v. Windsor and in refusing to take up the defense of Proposition 8 in California in the case of Hollingsworth v. Perry.

These hollow decisions are absolutely devoid of moral authority. It is becoming increasingly and abundantly clear that what secular law now calls “marriage” has no semblance to the sacred institution of Holy Matrimony. People of faith are called to reject the redefinition of marriage and bear witness to the truth of Holy Matrimony as a lasting, loving and life-giving union between one man and one woman."

That is the kind of man who will lead us out of this mess.

A genuine Bishop, Thomas Paprocki

[UPDATE 7/10/13:  http://catholicism.org/dont-think-gay-marriage-is-the-limit.html  Why am I not surprised?   With thanks to www.catholicism.org]


 

THIS IS A SERIOUSLY GRAVE MATTER

We offer this quote from The Catholic Encyclopedia, for what it is worth in the present cases of two men, John XXIII and John Paul II, whose pontificates were in different degrees disasters for the Church and whose beatification has just been announced:

[Bold emphasis mine.]

Papal infallibility and canonization

"Is the pope infallible in issuing a decree of canonization? Most theologians answer in the affirmative. It is the opinion of St. Antoninus, Melchior Cano, Suarez, Bellarmine, Bañez, Vasquez, and, among the canonists, of Gonzales Tellez, Fagnanus, Schmalzgrüber, Barbosa, Reiffenstül, Covarruvias (Variar. resol., I, x, no 13), Albitius (De Inconstantiâ in fide, xi, no 205), Petra (Comm. in Const. Apost., I, in notes to Const. I, Alex., III, no 17 sqq.), Joannes a S. Thomâ (on II-II, Q. I, disp. 9, a. 2), Silvester (Summa, s.v. Canonizatio), Del Bene (De Officio Inquisit. II, dub. 253), and many others. In Quodlib. IX, a. 16, St. Thomas says: "Since the honour we pay the saints is in a certain sense a profession of faith, i.e., a belief in the glory of the Saints [quâ sanctorum gloriam credimus] we must piously believe that in this matter also the judgment of the Church is not liable to error." These words of St. Thomas, as is evident from the authorities just cited, all favouring a positive infallibility, have been interpreted by his school in favour of papal infallibility in the matter of canonization, and this interpretation is supported by several other passages in the same Quodlibet.  

This infallibility, however according to the holy doctor, is only a point of pious belief. Theologians generally agree as to the fact of papal infallibility in this matter of canonization, but disagree as to the quality of certitude due to a papal decree in such matter. In the opinion of some it is of faith (Arriaga, De fide, disp. 9, p. 5, no 27);

others hold that to refuse assent to such a judgment of the Holy See would be both impious and rash, as Francisco Suárez (De fide, disp. 5 p. 8, no 8); many more (and this is the general view) hold such a pronouncement to be theologically certain, not being of Divine Faith as its purport has not been immediately revealed, nor of ecclesiastical Faith as having thus far not been defined by the Church.
What is the object of this infallible judgment of the pope? Does he define that the person canonized is in heaven or only that he has practiced Christian virtues in an heroic degree? I have never seen this question discussed; my own opinion is that nothing else is defined than that the person canonized is in heaven. The formula used in the act of canonization has nothing more than this:

"In honour of . . . we decree and define that Blessed N. is a Saint, and we inscribe his name in the catalogue of saints, and order that his memory by devoutly and piously celebrated yearly on the . . . day of . . . his feast."
(Ad honorem . . . beatum N. Sanctum esse decernimus et definimus ac sanctorum catalogo adscribimus statuentes ab ecclesiâ universali illius memoriam quolibet anno, die ejus natali . . . piâ devotione recoli debere.)

There is no question of heroic virtue in this formula; on the other hand, sanctity does not necessarily imply the exercise of heroic virtue, since one who had not hitherto practised heroic virtue would, by the one transient heroic act in which he yielded up his life for Christ, have justly deserved to be considered a saint. This view seems all the more certain if we reflect that all the arguments of theologians for papal infallibility in the canonization of saints are based on the fact that on such occasions the popes believe and assert that the decision which they publish is infallible (Pesch, Prael. Dogm., I, 552).
This general agreement of theologians as to papal infallibility in canonization must not be extended to beatification, not withstanding the contrary teaching of the canonical commentary known as "Glossa" [in cap. un. de reliquiis et venerat. SS. (III, 22) in 6; Innocent., Comm. in quinque Decretalium libros, tit. de reliquiis, etc., no 4; Ostiensis in eumd. tit. no 10; Felini, cap. lii, De testibus, etc., X (II, 20); Caietani, tract. De indulgentiis adversus Lutherum ad Julium Mediceum; Augustini de Ancona, seu Triumphi, De potestate eccl., Q. xiv, a. 4). Canonists and theologians generally deny the infallible character of decrees of beatification, whether formal or equivalent, since it is always a permission, not a command; while it leads to canonization, it is not the last step. Moreover, in most cases, the cultus permitted by beatification, is restricted to a determined province, city, or religious body (Benedict XIV, op. cit., I, xlii). Some, however, have thought otherwise (Arriaga, Theol., V, disp. 7, p. 6; Amicus, Theol., IV"


 I will leave it to calmer and wiser heads (something conspicuous by it absence on ALL of the Catholic blogs so far) who can give a better understanding of this troubling development to comment.  Hopefully someone of the stature of Roberto de Mattei or Arnaud de Lassus or Anthony Fraser or Rod Pead will let their thoughts be known.  As for me, I am too stunned to comment.

"WHY DOES AMERICA WANT ALL CHRISTIANS OUT OF THE MIDDLE EAST?"

The Orthodox Convent or Our Lady of Sednaya in Syria

A good question.

Why does America want all Christians eliminated from the lands where Jesus Christ walked and was the birthplace of Christianity?  As the fangs begin to show in the mouths of the American Oligarchy and as the jackboots are being put on in readiness for an oppression of Catholicism at home the answer to that question should be pretty obvious.  But maybe US citizens might begin to ask their Congressmen and Senators that question, or begin writing letters to the editor asking it.

 The Los Angeles Times has taken note: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-syria-sednaya-20130630%2c0%2c3733445%2cfull.story

The question in the headline above was asked by Hussam Azar, a Syrian Christian of note.  He further adds this:

 "The Christians of Sednaya, Syria are only too aware of what happened to the ancient Christian community of neighboring Iraq, where, after the U.S.-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein in 2003, Islamic militants unleashed a reign of terror against Christians, bombing churches, burning shops and assassinating community leaders. Much of Iraq's Christian population fled, many to Syria..." 

If I were able and had the opportunity I would ask His Holiness Pope Francis if he might stop over in Syria and visit his children being killed, driven out and tortured by fanatics in the pay of the United States government and the leaders of the Israeli government.  I would respectfully ask him to put diplomacy aside just this once and go to that land to give aid and comfort to a besieged people clinging to their Faith in Christ and to their homes and their lives.  It might do more good than visiting wailing walls and publicly lamenting crimes that were ended seventy years ago.  This Pope seems to have some cognizance of what is happening around the world.  He knows that not only Catholics are suffering but the Orthodox as well.

American money wrenched from taxpayers is being used to kill and drive out Christianity from the entire Middle East.  That is reality.  There is no way to disguise this.  The Syrian "rebels" are being used as proxies by the two aforementioned governments to eliminate a relatively benign leader and replace him with one who will do the bidding of Washington and Tel Aviv.  Most US Senators and Congressmen (most of whom accept money from AIPAC) are in favor of eliminating Christianity from these lands and are unafraid of any repercussions for doing so.  The more bloodthirsty types, like John McCain and Lindsay Graham, are calling for all out war right now and can count on the more obtuse members of their Republican Party (such as Wisconsin's hapless Ron Johnson) to go along with them.

Interestingly, Russia seems to want to put a stop to this looming Syrian debacle.  While I do not know all of their motives for resisting the American/Israeli juggernaut I do believe that one of them is a desire to protect Christians.

How odd that the tables have apparently now turned.  Russia used to persecute Christians but is now protecting them.  America (sort of) used to protect Christians and is now persecuting them vigorously at home and abroad.



[H/T: The Hoffman Wire, with thanks.]