This is what the “world” perceives of the pope’s opinion. His opinion is like the Coronavirus igniting a pandemic of perceptions that disfigures Divine Truth expressed explicitly in the perennial Magisterium of the Church, Scripture and Tradition and implied in Natural Law. The pope is now perceived in his mere opinion as now correcting 2000 years of the teachings of the Holy Spirit discovered in Scripture and Tradition and the Sacramental life of the Church:
Let’s be clear. Schism occurs when a portion of the Church, to include bishops, priests, religious and laity separate from the papacy because of disagreements with the pope and his authority.
Where Peter is, there is the true Church.
But not all Catholics believe that, which is heretical. The Eastern Church at the Great Schism did not believe it, albeit they had some legitimate gripes with the popes of that period.
The Catholics of Germany and elsewhere did not believe it when Martin Luther was able to instigate the Reformation.
The Catholics who formed the Old Catholics did not believe it after Vatican I.
But what are Catholics to do when the pope makes his opinions more important than defined truth or completely changes the course of the Church as it concerns natural law in which we discover Divine Truth?
Let’s be clear, perception of things, true or false can weaken or destroy institutions. The Church will not be destroyed, although she can be weakened. The papacy won’t be destroyed although it is weakened. Think of the times when there was a perception that there was more than one pope. Eventually, the Church clarified who was the true pope and who was the anti-pope. But this weakened the moral authority of the papacy although as time when on that moral authority was recovered.
Pope Francis has crossed the rubicon. Prelates are asking for his repentance and conversion. This is a new phase in the Church and only the pope can heal it or exacerbate it. What will Pope Francis do? The past with him can predict the future. He’ll ignore it.
This is from Fr. Z’s post:
When “going to the periphery” crosses the line is when the exception becomes the rule of law. What about COURAGE ministry, isn’t this a slap in the face of those trying to enact 12 step program to leave homosexual lifestyle?
Yes, it is a slap in the face.
It is a slap in the face of every faithful Catholic priest who has tried to preach about human sexuality with both compassion and truth.
It is a slap in the face of every faithful Catholic struggling with same-sex attraction and striving to live a continent life.
It is a slap in the face of every faithful Catholic politician who has worked to defend or pass laws that uphold the natural law.
It is a slap of every Roman Pontiff who has taught about this difficult topic with charity and clarity.
It is a slap in the face of the human writers of every verse of Sacred Scripture which reveals the mind of the Creator about human sexuality.
It is a slap in the incorporeal faces of the Holy Angels who are horrified when certain acts are committed.
It is a slap in the face of St. Joseph, Pillar of Families.
It is a slap in the face of the Blessed Virgin, Mother Most Chaste.
It is a slap in the face of the Lord who said, “Go and sin no more!”
It is a slap in the face of the Trinity, which models the relationships of God’s created images.
Yes, it is a slap in the face.
What we are witnessing in the consternation and open resistance of many Catholics to the recent world-conforming statements is the sensus fidei fidelium, “the faithful’s sense of the Faith”.
Sensus fidelium is the deeply rooted resonance of the faithful with the Truth as taught by the Church and which reverberates in us as images of God.
Sensus fidelium is not the whim of a majority.
The sine qua non of sensus fidei fidelium is that one has to be faithful to have it.
And “faithful” means faithful to the Tradition as interpreted by the authentic Magisterium.
Yes, it is a slap in the face.
23 comments:
Scraping the bottom of the barrel with Wilton Gregory. Meanwhile, Archbishop Gomez is still not a member of the College of Cardinals. He must be too orthodox
Anonymous @8:27-
Nor is Absp Charles Chaput. The Vatican under Francis must think a conservative Franciscan prelate is an apostate to the Cause of making the Church neo-Modernist or they don't like native Americans.
I am waiting for a list of non sequiturs from our resident Papalotar!
The Venezuelan dictator is thrilled with PF's comments
From "The Moscow Times", October 22:
Catholics Will Convert to Orthodoxy Over Pope's LGBT Support, Russian Church Predicts.
"Roman Silantyev, the head of human rights at the Orthodox Church's World Russian People's Council, called Pope Francis' comments a departure from the Vatican's 2003 document opposing the legal recognition of homosexual unions and a "strong step towards degradation". He also stated more people will run to the Orthodox Church after this and this might cause some kind of split as some Catholics are still quite conservative.
His comments come amid Russia's increasing embrace of conservative values, with persisting intolerance of LGBT activists and persisting criticism of the liberal West. A majority of Russians voted this summer for a number of constitutional changes including added language to the constitution defining marriage as a union between a man and a woman."
I wonder how people in other eastern European nations might be reacting to what is being reported around the world re the Pope's recent words on same sex unions? Take Poland for example, where the majority of its 38 million people seem happy with their socially conservative government and having it's highest court ruling this week a near total ban on abortion even though fewer than 2,000 legal abortions were performed last year in Poland. Or Hungary, whose elected conservative political leaders for some time have driven leftist "progressive" politicians in western Europe mad...
Jesuit Jesse James Martin on CNN:
"Pope Francis may have in a sense, as we say in the Church, developed his own doctrine. We have to reckon with the fact that the head of the church has now said that he feels that civil unions are OK. And we can't dismiss that.....Bishops and others can't dismiss that as easily as they might want to. This is in a sense.....this is a kind of teaching that he is giving us."
By the way, try quoting some scripture like 1 Cor 6:9-10 to Fr Martin in a Tweet and see if you too are blocked.
My 32 year old pastor gave a sermon on the intrinsic evil of homosexual acts this morning. He didn't mention PF at all, he just went about the business of being a Catholic priest.
It is long overdue for Francis to either clarify his comments and teach the Catholic Faith without error or be declared a heretic and anti pope. And only those cardinals who existed before Francis supposedly became Pope can vote.
No priest in Savannah that I know of with that courage except maybe Father May and we had Father Firmin at TLM today.
All a bunch of modernist. Jorge is creating the schism and hopes to drive true Catholics out of his ape of the church.
“ The pope is now perceived in his mere opinion as now correcting 2000 years of the teachings of the Holy Spirit discovered in Scripture and Tradition and the Sacramental life of the Church“
Oh come off it! How can 2000 years of church teaching and tradition be against something (ie civil unions) which has only been in existence for less than 20 years? Pure hyperbole!
Civil unions are NOT civil marriage and are NOT equivalent in any way whatsoever to the sacrament of holy matrimony which can only exist between two persons of the opposite sex.
Civil unions are not predicated on a sexual relationship - this is a legal fact.
They are merely a civil mechanism to formally recognise the legal rights of two persons cohabitating.
The catechism says that homosexual persons should be respected and not subjected to unjust discrimination. Civil unions are the legal mechanism which ensures that the rights of these two cohabitating persons (of whatever sexuality) are respected. As a London priest, I have heard of too many stories where a life long loving partner was refused hospital visiting rights to see their dying partner; refused associated healthcare and pension benefits leaving them in poverty; thrown out from the home they purchased with their partner; and being refused attendance at their partner’s funeral - by a spiteful vindictive family member - among many many other objective injustices.
You should not assume that two persons within a civil union are in a sexual relationship. In many cases that is not, or is no longer, the case. As the saintly Cardinal Hume said “all love, whether among heterosexual or homosexual persons, comes from God”.
London priest aka Kavanaugh,
Naff off
London priest,
I found it very interesting reading your comments.
It is great how this blog has contributions from people holding different opinions and views.
The world really is a very big and diverse place!
Anon@11.22am refers to Eastern Europe, Poland and Hungary. It has interested me lately reading how while the dogmas of intersectional feminism and modern gender studies and so on have increasingly become the prevailing ideology for many in the West, many political leaders and universities in Eastern Europe are taking active measures to drive out any aspects of the ideology of LGBT activists and the ideology of intersectional feminism and modern gender studies etc from their universities and colleges. Perhaps many in Eastern Europe don’t like the idea of such modern dogmas of gender being a social construct and gender fluidity being taught to young people and children and also want to avoid what is now happening in the West with VAST numbers of future teachers, psychologists and social workers being educated/trained/formed by scholars who increasingly believe that displays of traditional masculinity are not only often toxic but can be a form of mental illness......God knows how that is going to play out for millions of young boys and young men in the USA and Western Europe over the next 50 plus years...
London Priest @6:18PM:
You must be a Protestant.
'The Eastern Church at the Great Schism did not believe it."
Well. nor do they today. And that is why it is hard to imagine the two ever formally coming back together. One church is very hierarchal and the other operates more in a synodal manner. As I read back in the 1990s, in a Western Orthodox publication: "Either the Roman Church is correct when it teaches, as it consistently does, that one must be in union with the Pope in order to be in Christ's Church, or the Orthodox view is correct---e.g., that one must hold in the original and Apostolic Faith in order to be a part of the Church. They cannot BOTH be right."
In regard to the Father Zuhlsdorf reference:
The only slap in the face is the slap — many slaps— in the face that Father Zuhlsdorf has delivered over the years to the Vicar of Christ when Pope Francis has been misrepresented by certain forces within and without the Church.
Father Zuhlsdorf has, for years, taken nasty, rotten digs at His Holiness, Pope Francis.
Father Zuhlsdorf has reacted in nasty, over-the-top fashion to Pope Francis' comments in question — comments that were edited in questionable fashion.
His anti-Pope Francis garbage is so over the top that Father Zuhlsdorf even linked the supposed "demon" "Pachamama" to the story at hand.
Father Zuhlsdorf's rants against Pope Francis have encouraged his (Father Zuhlsdorf) followers to post such Satanic comments as:
Gabriel Syme says: 23 October 2020 at 4:07 AM
"It seems quite clear to me that Jorge Bergoglio hates the Catholic faith and those who attempt to adhere to it. It is quite clear from a honest analysis – with years of evidence – that he does not personally hold the Catholic faith."
In regard to the issue at hand, one bishop after another has stood with Pope Francis...has declared that Pope Francis' comments in question — even when edited in questionable fashion — are 100 percent orthodox.
Conversely, Father Zuhlsdorf, and one follower of his after another, has attacked the Vicar of Christ, Pope Francis.
Pax.
Mark Thomas
Mark Thomas,
Perhaps you can show us the magisterial document that gives a pope the authority to contradict the Church's teachings on a moral issue?
Tom Marcus:
Mark THomas probably drooled all over the document with his excited defense of the indefensible.....
The poor fellow STILL thinks those pathetic, stinking Pachamama idols are "Our Lady of something or other". As BF noted, to err is human, to forgive is divine, to persist is devilish.
Anonymous at 7:53:
Modern Dogmas?? You are funny.......there is no such thing as "gender fluidity" or gender being a "social construct". God created us male and female. The only toxic thing in your statement is your blatant refusal to accept that reality. THATS what causes mental illness and I will be damned if my kids are going to be taught any of that nonsense. I pity you for the confusion you sow in little ones. Jesus said "If anyone causes one of these little ones to sin it would be better for him if a large millstone were tied around his neck and he were thrown into the sea. Mark 9:42.
I am sorry you find displays of traditional masculinity so threatening. While the only thing I will concede to you is that those traditional roles could in fact be harmful if played out in the extreme, it does not excuse the blatant disregard of Catholic teaching and REAL Dogma.
Anon@4.03am,
Please reread what I wrote at 7.53 again. Was it not fairly clear I was being sarcastic by referring to “gender fluidity” and “gender being a social construct” as modern dogmas? Especially, when I finished with: “God knows how this is going to play out for millions of young boys and young men in the USA and Western Europe over the next 50 plus years.....” !!
Perhaps I could have been more clear?
That is that I actually APPROVE of what some universities in Eastern Europe including Hungary have done and are doing as regards driving out of their institutions as much as possible the ideology of LGBT activists and the ideologies of western gender studies etc.
Last weekend at a rare get together of my extended family, who are mostly lapsed Catholic Leftists, I made myself quite unpopular with my sarcasm regarding modern feminism and various “grievance studies “ and my sarcasm about what I have read the American Psychological Association is now claiming re “toxic masculinity”. It was clear to them at once I was being sarcastic and several people there said they were quite offended by my mocking words and tone about modern feminism and gender theory etc....
Perhaps I should remember writing on blogs is or can be very different to face to face conversations.
And when I wrote that I found what London Priest wrote to be interesting that does NOT have to mean I agree with all or any of what he wrote. His experiences interested me.
The main point I wanted to make there was that I appreciate how Father MacDonald allows here a range of opposing views to be expressed.
To finish here, I have strongly supported 2 priests in our diocese who are doing their best to keep all LGBT activists’ ideology and modern gender theory and so on OUT of all Catholic high schools in this diocese - a losing battle at the moment - to the extent of being labelled a “homophobic bigot”.
I think we need to come to terms with something critical that no one wants to talk about: Patriarchy is under attack. Maybe it deserves some of its criticism because of how badly those in power have abused their power, but make no mistake it is under attack and we are paying a price for it.
The problem is, patriarchy IS part of the natural order, especially in human life. The Church is a patriarchy. The Bible is patriarchy. God the Father is patriarchy. The proper order of the family is patriarchy. Feminism doesn't work--and that doesn't mean that women have no place outside the home either.
Feminism has done more to destroy people, families and the proper order of society than just about any ideology except Communism. Should Biden win the election, feminism will find its apotheosis in Kamala Harris, especially after Biden's inevitable retirement. But it doesn't work. People like Kamala Harris and all the other feminist types reflect a disordered thinking and even the highest people in the Church are afraid to speak up about it. We tolerate it. We observe it. We enable it. But ulitmately, it will come crashing down because it is disordered.
I have learnt so much from this blog and several other Catholic blogs!
For example, a person wrote the following on Fr Z's blog:
"The CDF never should have used the phrase 'homosexual persons'. It's misleading. It's not an ontological category. Language matters."
I spent over an hour yesterday online doing such things as googling 'ontological' etc and reading material
in an attempt to fully understand what I believe to be an important statement and comments by an anonymous commentator on Fr Z's blog.
And often on this blog when John Nolan contributes I learn something new.
As well, until this week I had never heard of Paulo Freire d 1997 and his massive influence - a quasi Marxist influence - after 1970 on American teachers' education, the World Council of Churches AND South American Catholic clergy, especially South America Jesuits.
I just then googled : "American Psychological Association toxic masculinity" and was astounded at what I have read so far! The nonsense of what were the beliefs and claims of a smallish number of women's studies and gender theory "scholars" has gone mainstream!
To Anonymous at 8:36AM
I took it as quite a serious post as is evidenced by my response. If I mis read you I have no problem apologizing for that......but truly the sarcasm was not clear to me.
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